Day 31: St. Louis, MO to Meramec, MO, 62 miles, 2400 ft elevation gain
A cursed day. The day we shall not speak of. Except me to the entire internet. Because that is my job as the blogger.
It began with a flat tire. On the cursed wheel. The cursed wheel is on poor Robert's bike. From the start this wheel has been a leaky guy. We've been running all our tires tubeless (no inner tubes, tire hold the pressure!), except Robert's back wheel. We switched it from tubeless to tubed day 1 when it kept going flat. And today it went flat again. We actually managed to patch it while we were lying in the grassy area next to a gas station. But what we did not manage to do was check the inside of the tire for the thing that had punctured it in the first place (a piece of glass).
Cue the second flat tire. Same bike, same guy, same piece of glass. This time we didn't have any more patches so we had to call in the cavalry (Maxwell) to meet us with an extra inner tube. But, Maxwell was an hour away. What was not an hour away was a bike store! It was 3.2 miles away to be exact. So, I proposed a few of us bike to the bike shop, pick up a new inner tube, bike back, and replace the one on Robert's bike. We (me, Sophia, Franklin) did just that. Except actually we just did the first two steps, because by the time we had biked there and picked up the inner tube, Maxwell was 20 minutes away from Robert and Mariela. Who else were 20 minutes away? Franklin, Sophia, and myself.
So, instead of biking 20 minutes back in the direction we had just came from, we decided to let the three others figure out the tire on their own and we would hang around by the bike shop. What we did with our time was somewhat visionary. We invented a game based off of the game "James Bond." It's a game you play with your hands and you have three moves: load, shield, or shoot. Your shot only lands if you shoot while the other person is loading. We played it with shooting water bottles at each other. I am going to allow the video to paint you the picture.
Okay so Robert and Mariela meet back up with us and were on the way. We keep biking and get some some rough scrapes and bruises along the way. Then there were some stupid cars on a road with very little shoulder. But all in all we make it to our lunch spot in one piece.
What I have failed to mention, and is also the title of this blog is: Miranda! My sister (one of them)! She was meeting up with us today! Miranda is road tripping from Telluride, CO (where she worked this year) back to Boston (our home), and she made sure to overlap us in the lovely Meramec, MO! Miranda met up with us for lunch, and I introduced her to the rest of the team.
Things Miranda and I have been told we do similarly are: walk, talk, laugh, joke, gesticulate, look like, etc, etc, etc. Here are some pictures of Miranda and I telling some hilarious story about our childhood, and gesticulating in the same way.
After eating lunch together, Mariela and I piled into Miranda's fully packed car and we drove to pick up ice for the freezer. We also picked up ice in a different form; that form being slushies from Sonic. This was Miranda's and my first time at Sonic. Huge day.
We spent the rest of the night at the campground we were staying at: eating, laughing, sleeping etc. It was very lovely.
Which brings me to Day 32.
Day 32: Spokes Speak aka the Day that Nothing Happened
We woke up to rain. More specifically thunderstorms. This is significant because you may remember our blog post from day 2, when we were caught in this very scary flash thunderstorm. If you do not recall this, never fear, here is the link to blogposts part 1 AND part 2. Ever since then we've been extremely cautious when it comes to thunderstorms. Aka we don't bike at the hint of the thunder storm. So we did not bike!
This day could be summarized into a single sentence. It would be a run on sentence, but still one sentence (English teachers hate me). Here it is: We awoke to it raining, and then we drove to Rolla, MO where we met our lovely hosts who helped us make lunch, and then we chilled until our hosts made us dinner, at which we met a fellow cross country biker (going the opposite direction!) who we then went to the Rolla town fair with! English teachers really do hate me, I have a habit of using commas in places they have no business being,
Here are some pictures to illustrate the happenings of this day.
Since I've summarized our day in a single sentence (and a couple of pictures) I'd like to use the rest of this blogpost to clue you into "Spokes Speak." A term I coined just now to refer to the vocabulary our team has developed over the course of our trip. You can think of this as a dictionary of sorts.
Terms
"The fridge" -- Our insulated cooler bag that we keep all of our cold things in. Example sentence: "Where's the fridge?"
"The pantry" -- A big plastic bin we have with all of our dry goods in. Ex. "Where's the pantry?"
"The lasagna box" -- Another slightly smaller plastic bin that we keep overflow snacks in. Nothing about this box is related to lasagna, except for the fact that it replaced a cardboard box that we picked up from Costco which was labeled "beef lasagna." Ex. "Where's the lasagna box?"
"The bag bag" -- A cloth bag that hold all of our ziplock bags and trash bags. Ex. "Where's the bag bag?"
"The dumb s*** bag" -- This has been censored in case there are any youngins reading our blogs, but you can likely fill in the asterisks. This is a small ziplock bag filled with reusable plastic squeezy bottles, like the type you put your shampoo or conditioner in to take onto airplanes. These have actually been very useful on this trip, but unfortunately it was branded the "dumb s*** bag" early on. Ex. "Why is the dumb s*** bag in the lasagna box? It lives in the pantry."
"The kitchen" -- A big plastic box we keep all of our kitchen supplies in. The bottom is being held together with cardboard and duct tape. Ex. "Where's the kitchen?"
Common Phrases
"We're a casual bunch" -- Said whenever we do something kind of gross. Like all share one utensil for the entirety of lunch.
"Car!!!... Clear!!!... *wave*" -- Shouted when there is a car behind us, then shouted to indicate the coast is clear for the car to pass, then we wave to the car to pass us.
"We contain Franklitudes" -- Inspired by the phrase "we contain multitudes" but also we have all collectively rallied behind being referred to as a group of Franklins. This one's hard to explain. Just trust me on it.
"Is Franklin ready?" -- A questions that refers to not just Franklin, but if the entire group is ready to keep biking. See above, we all have adopted the term Franklin to refer to ourselves.
"Are we ready to keep biking across the country?" -- A new question that has come to replace "Is Franklin ready?" in some contexts. It gives us a little boost of adrenaline, because of the reminder that we simply are biking across the country.
That's all the Spokes Speak you're getting for today, stay tuned as we think of more expressions! As always thanks for reading and always check your tires for little pieces of glass hiding out.
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