Pain in the Rear

My crotch region hates me right now. Everything down there hurts from having the bike seat bounce underneath me for hours at a time. I think I would be in more comfort if someone had just swung a medieval mace into my butt. I think I'm getting more calloused though as we go on, so by the end of the trip someone probably will be able to hit me in the butt with a mace and I won't flinch.

Also, I used something called "Butt Butter" today to help lubricate everything so I don't hurt as much. It's not working, but it makes me feel like I'm sweating a lot.

Realization: with the umlauts over letters in German words, there is a whole new level of emoticons available. Check out the difference.

American emoticon - :o
German emoticon - ö

And this one is German with a big nose
ü

Biking Begins

Yesterday I met everyone in my biking group that is going to ride from Vienna, Austria to Piran, Slovenia. There is a friendly guy from San Francisco who reminds me of the boss from Office Space if he did a lot of drugs. Also there is computer-oriented guy who checks his watch every minute or so and says things that he thinks are hilarious such as, "That depends on if the UK is considered part of Europe." I have not laughed at that joke yet even though he has said it three times.

We started off the trip with a night 30 mile day to get used to everything. Then today they decided to shred our hineys by giving us a 49 mile ride through hilly terrain and cold rain. My quads feel pulverized and it's nice to be sitting down on something that isn't wedged between my blistering cheeks.

I'm nervous about the rest of the trip because everyone is in much better condition than I am and doesn't seem to be intimidated after this day of gladitorial efforts. I'm going to limp to bed...

Eating Lots of Wiener (Schnitzel)

When we first got into Vienna I thought the place seemed very hostile because everywhere I looked, signs said "Die" on them. After asking a native, she said that it meant "the" and I could stop worrying. Needless to say, I blushed.

So far my German vocabulary includes the following words: die, nazi, wiener shnitzel, and joop, although I don't actually know what the last one means. And instead of "hello" they say "hallo." So I picked up on that.

I ate a ton of weiner in Vienna. Every chance I could I ate weiner. The only place they didn't serve it was at this Asian restaurant we went to one night. Other than that, I was stuffed full of weiner.

To Frankfurt and Beyond

So on my flight to Frankfurt, Germany I fell asleep pretty quickly. And what did I wake up to? Some guy screaming "Help!" as someone literally passed out in the aisle beside me. The guy was okay. The last thing I remember before falling back asleep was some lady giving her prescription sleep medication to her neighbor (a stranger) who asked if she could try it.

As we arrived in Germany, I couldn't help but thinking one thing: This place smells like Pet Smart. It truly did. And since I had just buzzed my head, I walked cautiously through the airport aware of my neo-nazi haircut.

The soldiers in the airport have an interesting fashion sense. It appears they are still stuck in the trend of camouflage from 5 years ago... but not the normal one. I'm talking about the camouflage that is shades of blue so the only thing you could hide in is a cloudy sky.

New favorite word: Joop.
New goal: Figure out how to turn colons sideways and put them over the letter "u."
Next stop: Vienna, Austria

High Adventure

Here's the lowdown: last week I went scuba diving in Key Largo and today I'm leaving to go biking for two weeks from Vienna to Venice. Awesome.

There's more to come soon, but here's the gist of the scuba trip: Everyone was an idiot and kicked me in the face a million times with their fins while we were diving. And it was really beautiful and fun. And I had an allergic reaction to my dinner and broke out in rash one night.

Here is basically what will happen over the next two weeks: My dad is in shape and will dominate me every day on the bike. The only athletic thing I've done in the last month was to play a pick up game of kickball. And I also jumped up and down a lot after the season finale of The Office. And I will eat strange sausage-like things.

Cheers!

Sports Announcer Brilliance #1

As a new section of this blog, I will periodically post the ridiculous things that sports announcers say. Announcers mainly have to fill up air time with their voice, so a great deal of their comments are pure garbage... like this gem:

The rain in San Francisco is wet. You can get soaked just walking to your car.

Dense Dog with Panties

My family recently got a puggle (a cross between a pug and a beagle) at my home, and he turned out to be a very dense animal. For example, earlier today he ran full speed into a wall while chasing a ping pong ball. Perhaps even more concerning is the fact that the 8 pound monster ate a pair of my sister's panties. He choked a little and ultimately swallowed the whole thing. So now he might die, but we're hoping he will somehow digest the panties. Let's hope the panties aren't as dense as he is.

It's a Cheese Joke

I'm lactose intolerant and I don't like to get my picture taken. Once we were taking a family picture and everyone said, "Cheeeeese." I vomited all over the deck.