It is done, Iron Girl, Wheel of Sweat, 6 Year Rain check

I don’t know if I could jam much more into a single weekend.  It was go, go, go pretty much the entire time.  I left work early on Friday so we could get a head start on our trip up to Clearwater.  Ali was running an all girl 5k called the Iron Girl.  The Iron Girl race series criss crosses the country.  It’s mission statement is to promote healthy lifestyles in women, something that is sorely lacking nowadays.

The drive up went smoothly.  We went directly to the race site so Ali could get her race packet.  It was quite an impressive set up.  This was no small, local race, everything was done BIG.  They also were quite organized.  The process was incredibly easy and smooth.  Since I am doing the timing for our local races I was interested in seeing what they were using for timing.  They had an Ipico set up, something we looked at but it was quite a bit more money than what we went with.  Like our DAG chips, the Ipico timing device is attached to the top of your sneaker.  The race was in a pretty , scenic park right by the water.  After getting her packet we were off to find our hotel.

Due to our trip west over the summer we accumulated enough hotel spiffs to stay at the local La Quinta for free.  It was about 5 miles from the race site.  The hotel was right across from the spring training site for the Phillies, ironic.  The place was on the old side but clean enough.  Thanks to my Slingbox, we were able to somewhat duplicate our normal Tivo and pizza Friday night routine.  We ordered a pizza from Dominoes and then I set up the lap top and used La Quinta’s free in room high speed internet to connect to my Slingbox at home which is connected to our living room Tivo.  Through the magic of tech we were able to watch The Biggest Loser and a Dancing with the Stars episode as we laid in the hotel bed.  It worked remarkably well.  The quality wasn’t bad at all.  The only negative was not having a remote to control the Tivo.  Each commercial break I had to get on the laptop and virtually hit the FF button.  Regardless, the Slingbox is definitely sweet.

The time at the hotel was very stressful for Nicki.  She was a nervous wreck the entire time.  She wouldn’t eat her supper and when I took her out to go to the bathroom she was constantly freaked out and kept her tail firmly planted between her legs.  She wouldn’t even take a leak before bed.  As a result I got a 5 am wake up from her to take her out.

The race started bright and early at 7:30.  We were out the door of the hotel a little after 6:30 to give us time to find a parking spot.  Even with leaving that early, parking was tough to find.  We wound up parking in a Checkers parking lot even though it had an “Unauthorized Vehicles WILL BE TOWED” sign at the entrance.  As we headed down the hill to the race the mass of mostly female humanity was impressive.  They had around 1400 women signed up for the event.  Since Ali had already picked up her race packet we didn’t have a lot to do before the race besides walk around and take it all in.  There was a lot of energy.  As the race time neared Ali ran and stretched a bit and then headed over to the huge pack of women waiting to start.  The race was a 10k and 5k at the same time so it added to the size of the field.  They started together, the 10k’rs just keep going at a point where the 5k’rs turn around.  Instead of a gun, the race started with the sound of the Aflac duck.  Aflac is the major sponsor of the event.  The horde of women headed up the hill that was right at the start.  I was scrambling to find Ali to get a picture.  It was tough having Nicki with because she was constantly trying to pull me all over the place.  I spotted Ali coming towards me and got a picture, unfortunately it was a blurry one.    

So I had about a half hour to kill before Ali would be crossing the finish line.  I spent it just walking the grounds.  Nicki was driving me a bit crazy.  She would be frantically sniffing everything she could.  Then she would spot someone in the crowd that she thought was someone she knew and would pull mightily to get to them.  Then once she realized it wasn’t who she thought it was she would back away in fear, crazy dog.  I walked towards the water with her and looked up at the bridge where I could see the women running across it.  I knew Ali would be struggling with the bridge, it looked like a tough run.

As the half hour approached I tried to get in good position to get a finish line pic of Ali.  I saw her coming down the hill and I hurriedly got the camera ready.  As she approached I was about to take a picture when I noticed the screen was black.  I quickly realized I had the lens cap on, doh.  I quickly threw it open and was able to snap this picture just as she crossed the line. I quickly headed to the end of the finish chute to congratulate her.  She was breathing hard but seemed to be ok otherwise.  She said it was a very hard course, probably the hardest she ever ran.  After she cooled down a bit she got into the food line and scored some first class food.  The food was catered, something I have never seen at an event.  Even though I didn’t run, she grabbed me some food.  Nicki was very happy to see Ali.  After eating we stood in a line for Ali to get her official results which were very basic, just her time and her pace.  It had no other info like how she placed overall or in her age group which I thought was a bit weird.  Ali got a very nice medal for finishing.  She said she really enjoyed herself and would do it again.  You can see all of the pics I took at the event here.

The drive back from Clearwater went smoothly.  We pulled into our driveway a little after noon.  Even though our day had started very early and we both were tired, Ali more than me of course, we had a fence project to complete.  All that was left to do was string fence along two sections.  As the fence project progressed I found myself getting better at various parts of the fence building process.  Well it took me until the last two sections of fence until I perfected the fence stretching process.  With the other sections of fence I stretched I kept having issues with the fence stretching unevenly with the top or bottom section creeping slightly ahead of the other.  I finally figured out it was because I was applying the initial tension by simply driving the truck forward until the fence stretcher got tight.  By doing this I had no control over how the tension on the wire attached to the pole was distributed.  For the last two sections of fence I created the tension by manually cranking the come along and as I did I would stop and adjust the cable to try to keep the length equal on the top and bottom.  I did that and I cranked the fence TIGHT, really tight.  On the last section of fence I had so much tension that as I cranked the come along the truck started to slide towards me.  I nailed the last few staples in and viola, the month long project was complete! Well it was enclosed at least.  Even before I had the last section completely attached, Ali had Nicki out roaming freely.  She didn’t seem as excited as the other day when we left her off leash.  She made up for it later though with several high speed sprinting sessions around the back yard.

I gave myself no time to bask in the glory of the fence being completely enclosed.  There was still a lot of related work to do like cleaning up and finishing ripping down Nicki’s old fencing.  While I was knocking down the old fence the neighbor across the street that helped me get the project started, came over and was surprised to see it was done.  He said it looked great and that I did a real nice job on it.  I didn’t let on the pride that made me feel. 

I got all of Nicki’s old fence down except for one post, one massive, long, extremely heavy post.  It was the post that the 12 foot gate was hung on.  It was bigger, fatter and heavier than anything I put in the ground for the new fence project.  I knew it would be a bitch to get out.  I think when we pulled it from my neighbors old front fence line we had to use his truck to extract it.  I manned the shovel and dug out a big hole around it probably four or five feet across and three feet deep.  I rocked the post back and forth, beat it with my post bar but every attempt to lift it of the hole was fruitless.  I could move it a little bit but after a 6th or 7th attempt I felt an uncomfortable pull in my back so I bagged it for the night.  I knew I would be ripping right back into it the next morning (if I didn’t rip my back) so I left most of the tools, the truck and the tractor out in the yard. Of course we got unexpected hard rain overnight.

When I got up Sunday morning I was relieved that I didn’t feel like a cripple.  I was really worried that I seriously hurt my back.  When I headed back outside I had a new plan of action.  There was no reason for me to extract the entire pole.  I decided to bring out the chain saw and just cut the damn thing below ground level.  Doing so was much easier.  The section of pole that was left was still heavy but manageable.  The rest of Sunday morning was spent cleaning up the rest of the junk left over from the project as well as Ali mowing the grass while I weed whacked.  I got back inside a little after noon.  We had to hurry up and get ready for the Wheel of Fortune auditions!

I originally had hoped to get there shortly before 1 to get the process started.  Ali was much less enthusiastic and wasn’t in much of a rush since she knew the auditions went from 1pm to 5pm.   By the time we actually got there it was closer to 1:30.  I had no idea how Wheel of Fortune auditions went but I imagined it went something like you talk to a screener, they give you a test or maybe simulate a game and then they get back to you.  Well I wasn’t very close.

As we walked up to the college we saw the sign pointing to the auditions.  After turning the corner we saw the line of people waiting.  It was a long line.  As we approached we were given a small application form along with a Wheel of Fortune pen to fill it out with.  The line and the entire event was outside which I didn’t expect.  It was hot as hell yesterday in the upper 80’s.  People were BAKING in the sun and tried to huddle in whatever shade they could find.  On the back of the form it gave a brief description of the process.  It said something about simulated games every 15 minutes.  So ok I figured every 15 minutes or so the line would move as groups of people get to play a simulated game.  As Ali and I were talking about it a girl in front of us clued us in on how the process really goes.  She said that you aren’t guaranteed to get to play the game, in fact your odds of getting to even try out are not good.  What they did was split the 4 hour window into three contestant groups based on the color of your application.  All of the applications in your group get thrown into a bin and then they randomly draw names for people to come up on stage.  There seemed to be at least 500 in people in our group. 

So anyway I expected the line to move every 15 minutes.  But what I found out was the line only truly moves once every hour to hour and a half once the group in front of you finishes.  Standing in line all that time and as we were waiting for the simulated contest to start gave us lots of time to people watch.  There were a lot of old people there, a lot of women and a lot of cellulite.  In front of the Wheel Bus they had a small stage set up with miniature versions of the puzzle board along with a wheel that was spun to select what cheesy prizes the contestants won instead of being used for dollar figures for letters. 

Finally about 1:30 the game starts.  Ali and I were a bit disappointed with how the process was going to go.  At most they would be calling 30 to 40 names out of the hundreds there.  The host for this traveling game show was frantically high energy.  He was as cheesy as you could imagine, talking in his made up game show host voice,  smiling at all times and throwing in rapid fire bad jokes while hopping around on the stage.  He said that more than puzzle solving skill, they are looking for people with personality, people that showed great enthusiasm as they make for entertaining contestants on the show.  He said that getting up on the stage was no guarantee of making the show or even a second audition.  It’s only a small step in the process.  After this audition they were coming back in a month or so for second auditions, that would be much more personal, much more one on one (like I thought this audition would be). Only after passing that test would you be forwarded on to the real show.  He said that even people that aren’t called up still have a shot as their names will be drawn at random to get a shot at the second audition.  I didn’t believe him.

Well the hosts instructions were taken to heart by most there.  There were copious amounts of yelling and screaming.  Ali and I played along with both of us joking about the silliness of the entire scene.  As contestants got called up to play the crowd played along although  we were instructed to keep quiet.  Ali showed off her puzzle solving skills, coming up with the answer almost every time before the people on the stage did.  It came down to the last group and we still had not been called.  A bunch of the people they called had either left or gotten back in line for the next show. (yes some stuck around for all three)  When the last person was called and Ali wasn’t among them I was disappointed. I know she would do real well on the show.  Most of the crowd that was left bolted and didn’t stick around to cheer on the lucky few that were left to play the game.  Ali and I decided to be good sports and stick around to the end. 

It was interesting watching the people that were called up on the stage try to impress the Wheel staff.  Some of them bombed miserably showing the personality of a doorknob.  Others went too far the other way putting on such fake exuberance that it was obviously not genuine.  A few got it right.  The most entertaining was an old guy that sung a bit of a song after revealing he was into karaoke. 

So we headed home with no interest in sitting through the last group of shows.  We figured we gave it a shot.  We talked about how the show misses out on tons of potential contestants using the random screening process.  I guess with the huge numbers they have little choice.  To talk to and test every one of those people individually would take far longer than the four hour window allowed.  Who knows, maybe we will get lucky and have our name drawn in that random drawing that I doubt exists.

When we got back to the house our weekend of non-stop activity continued in earnest.  One of Ali’s best friends growing up was supposed to be coming down for a few days during the week.  We had a lot of tidying up to do to prepare for her arrival.  Ali has been encouraging her to come down and visit pretty much since we moved to Florida.  For whatever reason it never happened but now plans were in place.  Ali was very excited to have her good friend come down and spend a few days with us.  You can imagine how disappointed Ali was when she got a call from her friend in the middle of cleaning Sunday afternoon saying she wasn’t coming down.  She gave various excuses for the change of plans.  Ali tried to talk her out of cancelling the trip but was unsuccessful in doing so.  It’s a shame.  I know Ali is bummed out about the entire situation.  Even though we now didn’t now have to prepare for a visitor, we finished up our prep and cleaning.  Randall is supposed to be stopping over in a couple weeks anyway.  It felt good to get the house somewhat back in order after the chaos of a month of nothing but fence building.

The work continued late into the evening.  A little after 9pm I finished up hanging two shelves in our hobby room to further facilitate getting stuff organized so it can double as an exercise room.  It was a weekend of non-stop stuff.  It felt good to get a lot accomplished.  You can see the final pictures of the fence project here.  Enjoy the fruits of dozens of hours of labor.