We are registered and I can't ride a bike, who knew?

Got HRH registered this weekend. It was not as easy as we would like it to be. We had to get the contact person changed to HRH in order to drop me, but we got it all done. Why are we dropping me? It isn't like I actually rode. And we don't need a team since we don't need a car permit. So we are a one person team. HRH Rocks.

I mentioned I forgot how to ride a bike, right? Well, I did. We tried out a lot of, well they call them comfort bikes. But they are little old lady bikes. They have a wide seat, not as wide as mine, but still it will do. They also have a step through, what we used to call a girl's bike. But the last time I rode a bike it only had one speed and you stopped by dropping your Keds in the dirt.

I finally found what I was looking for at Bike World here in Des Moines. It is called a Townie and is brilliant purple. I spent $600 for the bike, a rear view mirror, and a helmet. HRH said I needed the helmet. Keep in mind she wasn't wearing one when she tried to ride that luggage cart into the Toyota. But she is the expert so I got one. It is not easy to get something stylish  in my size.   I'm talking about the helmet now not the bicycle seat. Everyone asks me if I got a bell or a horn. I assured them the blood-curdling scream should be sufficient.

HRH is pretty certain I just need confidence. That and to learn to stop without falling down. We are certain my bike will fit on the rack with hers. All that being said, it will be the last full week of July soon enough and I want to get good enough at riding this thing so I can help her train...well maybe next year.

Registration Due by June 1, 2015

Well, HRH and I were at the planning summit for the 2015 Ragbrai ride. The summit, as protocol dictated, was held in the Apple Valley Nail Trust. She went with the traditional Lady of the Evening Red, while I chose Who The Hell Thinks of These Names Pink.

We agreed we should get the registration paperwork (well it is done by computer but you know what I mean) done this week. CaDiva is checking the hotel. We also started to accumulate squart bottles.

These are squat quart plastic milk cartons. CaDiva makes iced tea and freezes it in these bottles. Then we pack them into the cooler with all the carbs and Simply Raspberry Lemonade. I won't go into how something can be simply raspberry and lemonade because HRH likes it and she is the one who is pedaling her backside across Iowa.

I'm worried because Costco quit carrying the Greek Pasta Salad, which is a Ragbrai cooler staple. But I'm certain CaDiva will find a suitable replacement. I think we get a fridge in this hotel. That is good given this is a four day ride. I'll give you more information after CaDiva conducts her recon session this week.

HRH said she is going to take me riding as soon as these spring rain storms slow down. I asked her to concentrate on some place I can relearn how to turn. I know I used to be able to turn both right and left. I know this because it was a right out of the driveway, left on Granada, and another right at the crossing guard before we turned left to the bike racks at Stonewall Jackson Elementary School. Not to mention, at that time I had HRH on the saddlebag rack and a violin across the handle bars. So, I know it is doable.

Anyway, the important thing is, this is going to happen. RAGBRAI 2015  is looming. And we need to get registered.

Ragbrai isn't for two months - let's play

HRH, CaDiva and I took time off our diligent training for Ragbrai 2015 to visit a pottery fair at a local winery. I loved the cranberry and brought a bottle home for Thanksgiving. It seemed appropriate. HRH found some adorable pottery pieces, a few bottles of something fermented and some ill-gotten lilacs.

And so it begins again...

I know I was promising you more about the honeymoon. But, it turned out, we had pneumonia. It landed me in the hospital with A-typical bilateral some such and nonsense. CaDiva was flat out in bed with the same strain but in only one lung. It went through the family like wild fire. And then it was the holidays. Anyway, I have lots more excuses. You have heard them before. I'm a bad, bad blogger.

However, I'm back with RAGBRAI news. They announced the route for this year. HRH was over here with little hrh and we tried to live stream the video. Not as easy as it sounds, I ended up signing up for twitter just to see if I could get the information faster. It actually worked.

We are going to drive up to Fort Dodge for the first leg, a killer 71.8 mile launch but with only 1,490 feet elevation. We'll be staying in Marshalltown (if CaDiva can straighten out the reservations I tried to make on-line and ended up booking for tonight and non-refundable because it was after 6PM) at a Best Western. Anyway, her second day will be easier in length only 56 miles but over 1,800 feet elevation. Cedar Falls to Hiawatha is day three and that is almost 70 miles with over 2,660 feet elevation. That last morning we'll check out of the hotel and she'll cruise into Coralville on just shy of 60 mile up hill climb of 2,600 feet. We'll drive home from Coralville.

Possibly we will stop off at the Colony Village Inn for a little strawberry rhubarb preserves, wine and horseradish. Then we could also slip into Williamsburg for a little shopping at the outlet mall. Who knows, on Ragbrai all things are possible.

So it wasn't a cold

CaDiva got me to the Doctor on Wednesday, who got me into the ER, which got me admitted with a bi-lateral pneumonia.

I'm trying to figure how to use this system at the hospital. It is pretty cool really. Right from my TV I can see Gmail, FB, and even my Blog. Well see is a rough term for knowing it is on the screen and trying to make out the individual elements from the bed. But today I'm sitting up in a chair and I'm hoping I'll be able to caption the other pictures while I'm up and learning to breath deeply again.

We tried walking this AM. The nurse put the supplemental O2 down to 1% and I got down two doors before she made me stop and hold onto something while she upped the oxygen. You see, your blood oxygen saturation point should be like at 100%. They aren't so testy about it at 95%. Although they would prefer that via "room air" rather than a rolling silver tank. But if you are breathing the stuff from the rolling silver tank and it still is at 87%, they do not agree you can leave the hospital.

The doctor said I could keep taking walks and doing other things that would help me expand my breathing. But I have to have hand holding and rolling silver tanks or finger probes (I know, right. I didn't think that was a good name for it either but that is what the nurse called it.)

I will do anything I can do to work the "gunk" out of my left lung (they no longer seem so worried about the right side.) So, up and out of bed to do as much as I can with limited sleep at night.

Truly, do you need to know my potassium level at 4 AM? I can promise you if you give me my banana or plums and let me sleep until 7, it will be improved.

Anyway, this is just my way of saying, go back and look at some of the earlier posts and see if I have updated the pictures. Maybe I have. And maybe I haven't. But you won't know until you look.

You are not going to believe this one

My cold was getting worse by the mile so CaDiva just drove and drove and drove. We reached Kickapoo and I had a pork Manhattan, CaDiva, ever so reasonably, had the small turkey Manhattan. I'm certain everything tasted wonderful. But frankly, I was feeling worse and worse as the day went on. I did my only driving from that point to Iowa. By which time I told CaDiva we needed to find a place to stay because I wasn't good for three more hours.

And guess what?

There were no rooms - well at least none from the quad-cities to the University of Iowa area.  Truth be told we never checked for anything on the Illinois side of the river and there was no reason to keep looking after Coralville because we were almost home. I checked Hilton, Best Westerns, Marriott, and Super 8.  No one had any rooms or recommendations.

Ok, lesson learned, we will not live on the fly again.

Well, you know we will.

But, I would appreciate it if any of you hear of us planning to do it again in the near, or even distant future, you would remind us it doesn't work as well as we thought it would.  Maybe I need to add it to the girl trip rules.

I don't think I have much more in me today, so I'll have to catch you up on the rest later this weekend.

Just so you know, those little coughing capsules with no codeine don't work worth spit.

Ok, here's the thing

We are going to pass on St. Louis. This changes our route to allow a stop off at the Jubilee Cafe in Kickapoo, Ill. It is also about 400 miles shorter and will have a us home a day earlier. It seems I have caught the creeping crud. CaDiva is on an errand to find me soup or pancakes or some other food that doesn't require me to make the choice between breathing and eating.

On the home front, the message from HRH is we have had a power outage, although the kitten girls are not fessing up to what happened. HRH also reported the three of them are out of cookies and she can see the bottom of the m&m dish. So, I guess we better get home with necessary supplies.

I'm going to set the camera up to download pictures while I wait for this cold tablet to kick-in. I may have more to say as I recover. See you soon...or not, depending on whether you can die in Columbus Ohio of a chest cold...I'll have to check the local ordinances on that issue.