77 Day 6 Waverly to Independence: Sacrifices Must Be Made

And it hit me like a bolt from the sky. There was only one way to appease the Gods of Ragby and make the rain stop. Someone had to get almost too drunk to ride her bike. Here. Now. In this VFW hall. The drinking would have to continue until the sun came out. 

And, that someone would be me. 

Yes, me. I would make that sacrifice for my beaver friends, for all of ragbrai, indeed for this good state of Iowa. 

The day before I had made a dangerous discovery. Vodka. On ragbrai. 

Now, I've dabbled with booze on ragby before. I'll have a bloody mary in the morning, if they look tasty. But, for the most part, I stick with beer. It's cheap. It's refreshing. There's lots of water in it. It's plentiful and it doesn't take a long time to get one at a bar. 

But vodka. This was new. I did have to admit that the one or two(?) vodka lemonades I'd had the day before at the Dirty Lemonade Stand Regroup was pretty darn tasty. 

If my goal was going to be accomplished, and I was going to get sacrificially-wasted, I knew beer wasn't going to do the job. I'd have to drink like 65 Coors Lights to get that drunk. I'm not actually sure it is possible to get drunk on Coors Light (though, the Mayor might be an example to the contrary). Much like the Milk Challenge, your body might not be able to accommodate enough CL to achieve a reasonable blood alcohol level. 

So, I ordered another bloody mary. And, another. And, then a vodka lemonade. Then I got a beer two. God didn't give me two hands for nothing! Ha! Then, I "found" an abandoned bloody mary on a table near our beaver huddle. I drank that. I drank it all. 

My view as I got drunk

Which was pretty easy to do. Beavers were buying drinks, and there wasn't actually any room in the bar to like walk around or get distracted. I was just bundled up between FOB, my party periscope, and Masinga, who was tap, tap, miserably tapping away on her iPhone. 

Now, before I get into what happened, I want to remind you all that I was doing a service and I was pretty well on my way to accomplishing my goal.

And, here's the thing. No one can remember exactly what happened. Half the beavers didn't even see what happened. And, the other half can't remember what predicated it. But, happened it didn't.

Masinga said something. My guess, based on my reaction, that it was something nasty about ragbrai. I asked her the other night if she can remember what she said. She doesn't. 

And. 

Before: Check out the crazed look in my eye! 

I slapped her. 

Not hard! Not hard at all! But without my really realizing what happened, I reached up and popped her on the cheek. 

Though, in my heart, I felt it was right--someone had to defend the honor of ragby, I felt bad. She'd suffered a great deal, already. Masinga was not having a good time on ragby. She and ragby were not getting along. It was unclear whether she even likes ragby, to this day! But the slapping was yet another straw on the back of already beleaguered beaver. 

Tears welled up on her face. She turned back to her iPhone. I tried to give her a few pat-pats on her shoulder to try to make it up to her a bit. Please remember, I was drunk. 

And then, on the side of my face, I felt it. Something strange and long forgotten. A rider had opened the back door and was stepping out. In the crack of the open door, there it was: 

The Sun.