Blitzkrieg Tour of Central Florida--Without Even a Single Gator Sighting. Dang.

After a week of shuffle-board tournaments, Jimmy Buffet dance parties, and eating deep-fried snickers for dinner every night, the Florida-inspired Spring Break '08 (Asheville Edition) ended with a caravan of sorts back to the State that is South of the South--Flawda.

Ryan and Ian left at a rediculously early hour (eight or something nuts like that), then Dan and Joe took off an hour later, followed about another hour later by Kylie and Mike, plus a special guest, Lexy Lewis.  The latter made his decision at the very last minute with the words, "hey, you think I still have time to pack?" Kylie and Mike rejoiced with a "Hell yeah, get your stuff...we're going to Florida!"  And so it became three Ashevillians setting out to invade the Swamplands for a weekend of shenaniganning and bike riding.

And this is where it becomes everything that I love about America: the disgusting yet wonderful waste that is the road trip. Who the hell besides our dumb-fuck nation would enjoy--take pride in, even--driving 18 hours round trip in three days for the chance to ride a bike somewhere else, sleep in someone else's house, and shop at a different grocery store chain? In the words of the Great Kevin Arthur Biggs, "'Tevs yo." (That's short for "whatever, yo.")

I think the perfect symbolism for the Road Trip is the amount of coffee and sugar that is generally consumed while driving.  It creates a very surreal and dangerous contentment mixed with a uncontrollable cracked out feeling of invincibility and relentless energy (which isn't exactly needed within the confines of an automobile, but 'tevs yo.)  This creates the paradoxical state of feeling simultaneously amazing and sick to your stomach with disgust of yourself.  That, my fellow Americans, is the road trip.

But on the flip side, its fun to spend hours with your close friends, starring out the window, talking only every once in awhile--whenever a random thought presents itself and interesting enough to share with the others.  And in a single day you can go from late winter in the Blue Ridge Mountains to the dinosaur-era, malaria-infested, 80-degree forests of central Florida. It's magical, to say the least.

Two days and two bike races later (one wasn't really a race--it was more just cruising alongside other goons, peddling through hub-deep puddles, sand, mud pits, and sometmes even amazingly fun singletrack in the fragmented woods of downtown Gainesville--friggen awesome!!) The other race was more serious and expensive, so we don't want to talk about that.

Then we went home, back to 17 Nebraska, which at some point over the past week was re-Christianed by Ian Knabe as "17 Viertel" with an official sign post and everything. So basically, Mikey owns us. 'Tevs yo.