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| Photo courtesy of Clipart Zone |
If you have been watching my personal Facebook page--and I know you all wait on pins and needles to see what titillating thing I post next--then you know there was recently a meme about Bigfoot possibly being a wookie who is lost. I only bring this up because Bigfoot, and my fear thereof, was a recurring topic over the weekend.
So, there was a big dragon boat festival in one of the Chicago suburbs this past weekend. Normally our team competes in Dubuque or Fort Dodge, Iowa, but this year it was Chicago because the people who are going to "fill the boat" at the International Breast Cancer Paddlers Association festival in New Zealand taking place in March of 2023 need to actually meet and paddle together at least once before flying halfway around the world to try and win. Are you with me yet?
See, there needs to be 20 paddlers in each boat in order to compete plus a steersman, plus a drummer, plus a flag catcher. Most dragon boat teams aren't that big, especially the breast cancer survivor/supporter teams, so multiple teams combine to make composite team.
Our composite team consists of ladies from California, Florida, Michigan, Iowa, and Minnesota; possibly a couple of more states that I've neglected to mention. Anyhoodles (I learned that word this weekend from Aunt EM, and I love it!), we all met for the first time Friday evening and did a practice run. For 20 women who had never worked together before, I was impressed!
Then we got the bad news. The four supporters that we had in our boat would not be allowed to be in the boat for the races; they had to substitute in one of the community-based teams at the festival. So now we were four people short in our boat and a brand new "team." But we agreed to persevere. We all got together and drowned our sorrows in wine and burgers before turning in early to get a good night's sleep.
Bigfoot entered the conversation for the first time that evening as Jane, Aunt EM, and I chatted in the room. I'm not even sure how it came into the conversation, but we stayed on that topic for quite a while. Eventually, however, it was lights out and nighty-night because we had to be done with breakfast and at the event site by 7 a.m. Saturday morning.
When we got to the breakfast buffet on Saturday morning, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, we heard other guests talking about being evacuated from their floors due to fire alarms going off. I looked and Jane and Aunt EM to see if they'd heard the alarms...nope, we had all slept through it. That's rather disconcerting! Turns out not only was there fire alarms, fire trucks, police cars, and EMTs involved, there was also blood in the stairwell.
My first thought was "Crap, my true crime obsession followed me to Schaumberg." Then I realized that was ridiculous, and I went to my second thought, "Dammit, Bigfoot got loose and into the hotel." Much more reasonable theory, right?!
Rumors were flying but nobody could pin down the truth. Since Aunt EM wasn't joining us at the event site due to attending a baby shower in nearby Des Plaines, she said she would take the opportunity to interrogate (see...true crime stuff!) the desk staff and housekeeping staff about what was what.
We left her to that and headed to the lake. We were early enough that we got excellent parking just across the sidewalk from our canopy tents. There were six other breast cancer survivor (BCS) teams competing as well as 16 community teams. Some of the community team sponsors were Walgreens, US Bank, and Dekalb. One team that was absolutely inspiring to watch was the Adaptive Adventures teams made up of disabled persons. We'll circle back to this in a little bit.
We had some time to have coffee and rolls--did I mention there is much food involved in these events??--and watch the first couple of races. The races for the day consisted of two 500-meter races and two 200-meter races. The 500-meter races were in the morning, and the 200-meter races were in the afternoon. Good thing because I wouldn't have survived if it had been the other way around.
Our team captain and her husband got everyone lined up in order, we did some stretches. Okay, I'll be honest, everyone else did stretches, I raised my arms up and down a couple of times. A top-fit athlete I am not! Then the captain went over the rules and some etiquette tips. Then she says, "If we capsize, stick with your bench buddy and stay with the boat." Well, I'd never heard that before, and I was a bit discomfited by it to say the least! Mainly because I'd probably be the one to swamp the boat and I would have PTSD flashbacks to the canoe trips of my youth with the Potsdam peeps when tipping someone's canoe over was the pinnacle of accomplishment.
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| Photo courtesy of https://www.record-courier.com |
Anyhoodles, we got lined up and loaded in the boats and paddled out to the start line. It takes some major choreography to get four dragon boats line up so there isn't one with its nose further out than another's. That's up to the race staff, and they aren't afraid to bark at you if you aren't fast enough following their directions.
Since math isn't my strong suit--which also came up in conversation over the weekend--I Google the conversion of meters to yards, and 500 meters is 546 yards and change. For all of you Packers, I mean Vikings, fans out there...that's 5-1/2 football fields.
Yes, we came in last. However, I want everyone to keep a couple of things in mind. (1) We were paddling together for the very first time, and the fact that we made it 500 yards only 3 seconds behind the other boats wasn't too shabby. (2) We were four people short in our boat versus the other three boats that had all 20 people paddling. (3) We are mostly middle aged women who aren't toned athletes.
As we were paddling back to the loading dock and I was gasping for air like a landed guppy, I saw the Adaptive Adventures team loading their boat, and I told myself to quit whining. Those paddlers were being carried from wheelchairs to the boat, or walking on crutches with help to the boat. There were prostheses and canes, and they were game to go out there and give it their all. If they could do it, by God so could I.
We had a little bit of a rest before the second 500-meter race, and that consisted of drinking a lot of water and hitting the porta-potties frequently. The phrase I heard tossed around was "drink and pee, and no IV." There must be some retired nurses on our team.
We went out and finished the second 500-meter race, still came in last, but we improved our time by 2 seconds. I know that doesn't sound like a lot, but many of these races are decided by hundredths of a second, so it was a BFD.
Before there was a lunch break, the did the survivor's ceremony. All seven boats were loaded up, each survivor was given a pink carnation (can we say, ear worm?), and we maneuvered out just off shore as a group, holding all the boats together. The emcee read a poem written by a survivor and then they played a song called Paddles Up (I think) and we all tossed our flowers in the water to create a little pink carnation blanket. Many tears of gratitude for being alive and able to participate in such an event.
Then it was lunch time! We trooped back to the tent and filled up paper plates with sandwiches, fruit, crackers, cookies, bars, chips, etc. There was another paddler who had brought her crochet project along, so we sat down and bonded over corner-to-corner patterns and the virus pattern. More hydration, more potty breaks, and some good laughs in the tent. Then it was back to finish up with the 200-meter races.
We came in last in the first heat but still with a better time again, and we came in second of three in the last heat! Okay, in the spirit of transparency, that's because the third boat veered off course into the weeds. Still, we had an improved time. And we had fun, so we were winners even if we didn't get any medals.
While we were back taking the canopy tents down and loading up chairs and coolers, someone made reservations at a local pizza place just down the road. Since Aunt EM was done with her baby shower and also needed to eat, we circled back to the hotel and picked her up before heading to Lou Malnati's. While we drove to Lou's, she filled us in on all the poop and scoop about the blood and fire alarms.
Turns out there had been a wedding at the hotel Friday night, and two of the guests overindulged in adult beverages and then got into some fisticuffs involving a broken bottle and a gash in someone's arm. Said gashed person freaked out (on the 14th floor, for some reason) and went tearing down the stairwell splattering blood all over the place for three flights before deciding that he really needed medical attention and figured that pulling the fire alarm would bring help immediately. Why calling 9-1-1 wouldn't work or wasn't thought of, I'm not sure, but there you go.
All 25 of us trooped into Lou's and were thankful to plunk our butts on something other than a boat bench. I passed on ordering pizza--I can't be disloyal to Mr. Pizza North--and ordered chicken fettucine alfredo instead. I must say, it was the best CFA I've had! Some folks enjoyed an adult beverage or two but since I was driving in an unfamiliar town, I stuck to the ever dependable Diet Pepsi.
We were back in the hotel room while it was still light out with Jane working on embroidered note cards, Aunt EM telling us about the baby shower, and I worked on an afghan. Aunt EM brought back the games that they had played at the shower. There was the usual word scramble and such, but then there was an emoji game that was supposed to indicate the title of a nursery rhyme.
Jane was looking them over and clicking them off like no one's business. Then she paused, clucked her tongue, and said "I'm not sure what burger, barn, chicken, cow is supposed to be." Aunt EM burst out laughing and said it wasn't a burger, but she wasn't going to say WHAT it was because it was so obvious. Jane decided it was a good time for a potty break, so I asked if I could see the emoji list. I found the one that had stumped her...and also burst out laughing.
It wasn't a burger at all. It was an old guy with glasses and a fringe of hair. Memo to me: when traveling with Jane and Aunt EM, bring t he thicker Poise pads so when I laugh hard enough to pee my pants, I don't actually pee my pants. So the emoji thing was Old McDonald (burger-looking old guy) had a farm (barn) with a cluck and a moo.
There was another one that I thought was the emoji for "hang ten" and then "spank" (an open hand), and then a baby. I didn't think that was very nice at all...hang, spank baby. Maybe this wasn't a baby shower; maybe this was a bridal shower with an S&M theme.
Nope, what I thought was the hang ten emoji was the rock emoji; you know a raised hand with the thumb, index, and pinky fingers extended. What I thought was a spank was just a bye-bye wave. So Rock, Bye, Baby....Rockabye Baby. Well, that devolved quickly, didn't it?
There was more hilarity and laughter for a couple of hours before we all finally fell asleep.
Breakfast on Sunday morning was a much more laid back affair with no overnight evacuations or bloodshed. Always a good thing! Since we really had no timetable for our return to Minnesota, we lingered over coffee and pancakes for awhile. I mentioned that it might be fun to stop at this unique little gift shop in Onalaska on the way home, and my peeps were game for that. When I checked their website, however, I discovered that they were not open on Sundays. Bummer! I'd have to come up with a Plan B later.
Once we got checked out and loaded up the van, we hit a nearby gas station for 5 gallons of $5 gas to get us out of Illinois and into Wisconsin where it was a couple of bucks cheaper per gallon to fill up.
Once we got onto I-90, I tasked Aunt EM with researching someplace fun to stop on our way home. I didn't care if it was an indoor thing like a museum, gift shop, antique store or whatever or if it was an outdoor thing like a botanical garden, a zoo, or an interesting park. Just something fun.
What she came up with was the National Mustard Museum in Madison. Perfect! It sounded just kitschy enough to suit my taste.
Photo courtesy of the National Mustard Museum
I'll stop here and say that what I enjoyed about travelling with Jane and Aunt EM was that we were all comfortable being silent for extended periods of time. I have been on other road trips where at least one person in the party feels the need to fill every second with conversation...natural or forced...and it gets tiring. So the quiet times were welcome in my van! Thanks, gals!
Anyhoo, we found the National Mustard Museum in a lovely little neighborhood section of Madison on Hubbard Avenue. It was just a tiny storefront in the corner of an old building, but it was LOADED with all things mustard. Of course there was the novelty merchandising stuff right inside the door...coffee mugs, T-shirts, shot glasses, etc.
Then it was on to the main event. I'm going to say there must have been five THOUSAND choices of mustard from all points on the globe. I picked up some horseradish and honey mustard for Captain and some cherry BBQ sauce for myself. We haven't tried the mustard yet, but we had the BBQ sauce last night on the grilled chicken and it was amaze balls! Chunks of real cherries in it....yummy!
From the Mustard Museum we sauntered 100 feet down the block to the local diner, known for pies. In fact, their catering slogan is "If you don't eat your pie, you can't have green beans." Catchy and clever, I was impressed. My go-to pie place is Betty's Pies in Two Harbors, and I can't tell you if the Hubbard Avenue Diner pies were better or not because the chicken Caesar salad I had was huge and I was too full for pie!
Between Madison and our last pit stop at the Visitor Center on the west side of LaCrosse, I saw a sign for Circus World and mentioned that it sounded like a fun place. Thus, the next road trip plans were hatched!!
After leaving the LaCrosse Visitor Center, wouldn't you know it, the minute I merged onto I-90 in crazy rushing traffic...my phone range. Aunt EM saw that it was Captain and kindly answered it for me. From what I could hear of the conversation, this threw Captain for a loop-di-loop! He just wanted to know how soon I would be home.
Awww...he missed me!
I dropped Jane and Aunt EM off at Jane's house, hugged all around, and hit the road for home.
I spent the 30-minute drive home contemplating how much difference good travel buddies make on a road trip, and I have to say, Jane and Aunt EM are welcome on my travels any time!
