Kirby: October 2008

Where do I start? Since my last post we have done a lot. I guess I can start with Last weekend. My mom came into town for 6 days. We had a great time. Thanks for coming Mom; you really help us out while I was out of town. While she was here we took the girls to an apple farm that had a corn maze, chickens, apples, pumpkins, pigs, turkeys, and a bunch of other things. We also headed to Banner Elk to participate in the Woolly Worm Festive. What a hoot that was! You buy a worm for $1 and for $5 more dollars you can race it against everyone else. Talk about racking in the money! The Woolly Worm Festive was packed and we had a ton of fun.

Monday came around and I had to fly out to Providence, RI to meet up with me King Family for Interbike East. Had a great time seeing my other family out of Portland. Good people, good food, and lots of bikes. I flew home late Thursday night and had an early meeting in JC on Friday.

Spent Friday in JC and back home to pack the car and leave for Knoxville, TN for the night and part of Saturday. Lyn had a bunch of old college friends meeting in K-Town for the UT vs. Alabama game on Saturday. We meet everyone for dinner Friday night. By this time I was running on fumes and wondering how the heck I’m going to keep going. But….in Joey fashion I found the energy and continued on for the night. Dinner, some persuasion, and we were off to a local favorite for a few drinks. That lasted a few minutes and everyone was ready to call it a night, but Paul and I had some energy left in the tank. We decided to mix it up on the strip with the college kids and show them who’s still the King. After a few games of pool, my losing a bet to buying beers in Dear Valley, UT Paul and I decided it was time to hang it up. 2:30am and a hotel floor later I was sleeping. Thanks for the hospitality Beth and Paul. I owe you one.

Saturday came and Lyn and I were off on a morning ride at Norris (our old riding area). He had a really nice ride and headed back to town to prepare for the game. Cleaned up, some food in the belly, and people to see, we were off once again. Found a tailgate, watched the UT walk, and meet up with friends. Things were rocking. Now….my plans were to leave K-Town right before the game and drive to Newland, NC so I could race in the Boone cross race today. So I’m getting ready to leave and Rick says if I want to come into the game he had an extra ticket. How can you pass that up? So I head into the game and stayed through the first half.

I get to my car at about 9:30pm and hit the road with a destination of Newland. I get to Newland around 12:00pm and hit the sack. 7:00am comes around and I’m back up and going again. Breakfast, cold weather, frost on the car, and wind….what a day for a cross race. I got to the race and meet up with the team and start the morning. The race was great; me on the other hand was a hurting boy. I guess the lack of riding for almost two weeks, all the airplane time, car time, late nights, and sleeping on floors finally caught up to me. I got killed in the race. The best part was the heckling we did to the other races. That was worth the trip. Jason piled in with me and we drove back to Asheville. I was home by 6:00pm and ready to sleep for about a week.

Declaimer: The photos are not in exact order. I tried but failed in a few areas. I'm too tired to fix, spell or grammar check.