Ready, steady.

You know what? I think I have a grip on this.  I hate to say it, in case I remember something huge I’ve forgotten to do, but after a few days of dashing around, I think I’m almost ready – or at least packed, if that’s the same thing. I don’t know if I’ll ever really be ready for Sunday.  I get this huge nervous tummy thing going on every time I think about pushing off on my bike. You’d think that I’d be less nervous, what with having done it before and lived to tell the tale, but the experience almost makes it worse.  I know how hard it’s going to be.  Still, that experience pays off in other ways. This year (even though the forecast doesn’t call for rain) all my clothes are in ziplock bags, and they’re all labelled. If it does rain, this lady will have dry clothes to put on.  (I also will not be finding an earwig in my bathing suit, an experience I have yet to fully recover from.) I have my tent, and a tarp (even though it is not going to rain) and extra batteries for the flashlight, and camping dishes, and a sleeping bag, and biodegradable soap because I’ll be washing in the lake –  I think I’ve got this.

stuff 2015-07-24

Tonight I’ll have a bit of a knit, and then a really good sleep, and then tomorrow, bright and early, it’s “Packing Day”.  On packing day, we take all of our stuff to the staging spot, and make it all fit into two rubbermaid bins that will house all our worldly goods for the six days of the Rally.  They put the bins on the trucks, and there it all sits, until Sunday morning, when we’ll ride 105km to Port Hope, and the trucks will drive ahead with all our stuff. &^%#@#$ – Almost forgot my water shoes. Hold on….

shoes 2015-07-24

There. The shore is rocky at Port Hope – I’ll need those. (See, that’s experience paying off again – also, technically those are my sister’s water shoes, but I stole them years ago and she’s never asked for them back.)  The thing is that everything I put into my bins tomorrow morning, I won’t see again until Sunday night.  Many is the rider who’s put their housekeys in a bin, only to get home with a problem. Many is the rider who’s worn their shoes home, not putting them in a bin, only to have to ride 105km with sandals in their pockets.  It takes a fair bit of thought, and for me – part of the problem is the knitting.  I want to keep knitting what I’m knitting, and I don’t want to put it on the truck tomorrow, but I also don’t want to cycle to Port Hope with my knitting in my jersey pocket. Luckily, I have solved this problem.  Pato’s boyfriend Keanu is on road crew  again this year (another young man with his head on straight) and will be driving the route in a van keeping all of us safe, and I have pretty much decided he’ll be my mule.  I’ll only have to cycle to the departure point with my knitting, and then I can give it to Keanu, and he’ll give it back to me whenever I need it. (This, again, is the voice of experience. In years past I’ve kept my knitting in a little bag mounted to my top bar, but after stabbing myself in the stomach a few times when stopping suddenly, I’ve realized I need another system. The mule it is.)

sockstogo 2015-07-24

Now, I’m at the end of my day, and I’ve got a few things left to do, and I have a choice. I can do Karmic Balancing gifts – which will take a few hours, or I can make dinner, walk it down the street, and snuggle a new baby for a few hours before I go to bed.

I hope you all understand. The choice was a little easy.