Go, you chicken fat, go away!

Ragnar recovery run.  Saw one of the gates open for the RWCD canal, which is a no no.  I was about to text the boss when a zanjero pulled up.  I went and told him about the gate and told him I would lock it for him.  Turns out it wasn't an RWCD employee that left it open.  At that location they are interlocked with SRP and Flood Control.  Not sure whose lock it was, but I locked it.

I only meant to go 5 miles.  I saw a zanjero at Lateral 3.  Since it's Wednesday that means he would be finishing his 7-day shift in just a few hours.  Then my brother-in-law would be taking over.  I asked him what time my BIL should get there because he typically works the night shift, but this week he is covering for someone on vacation.  Even zanjeros get vacations.  I continued running up to Lateral 1 and then turned and ran back home.  On the way back I saw the crew from the Main Pumping Plant.  Their job is to maintain the pumps at the MPP and the wells that are all through the District.  They were working on the well at 2 - 1/4 and the MC.  I talked to Jason from the other side of the canal since he was the only one I knew.  But he's not a zanjero, so SlowJoe won't have any interest in this part of my entry.

Now that I'm 40 and old, it seems people don't give me a second thought about saying good morning to them.  In fact, they probably expect it from me.
 

This was a fun one.  Our team consisted of me, my daughter, my wife's sister Missy, my wife's sister's friend Daylene, my wife's sister's husband's cousin, and my wife's sister's husband's cousin's son.  We had an 8am to 8:30am start time.  We went in the second wave of that allotted time.  A ton of people did this race.  They needed two days to accommodate everyone.  So there will be more people running it tomorrow.

The first ridiculous obstacle was the World's Largest Moon Bounce.  Next was the Drop, just a big bouncy slide.  Next was the Jump Balls.  You've seen Wipeout?  Similar to that, but not as big.  I fell off the first one and just bounced on the rest.  Missy had a fairly nice wipeout.  Next was the Foam of Fury, basically a foamy slip and slide.  Next, the Sweeper.  This was a balance beam with a sweeper arm that tries to knock you off.  There were two balance beams on each side of the sweeper arm.  One way made you running against the sweeper, the other, running with it.  We chose to go against it.  So, I just crawled underneath it.  I regret not standing there and letting it knock me over.  Next was the Tarzan Swing.  They told us to grab high on the rope.  Good advice, but I was too fat. 

Now we were half way through the obstacles.  My daughter was getting tired, but I urged her on.  The next obstacle was the Gorilla Bars.  Probably 30-feet worth of monkey bars.  My daughter went across by swinging her feet up into the bars in front of her and crawling upside down.  I was able to make it all the way across by going one at a time.  When I got down I noticed I had ripped some skin up from the palm of my hand.  It's like when you have blisters from doing yard work and then you rip the blisters open from doing more yard work a couple of days later.  But my thought was, "You're such a pansy.  You haven't done any physical labor in ages.  How did this happen to you?"  Next was the Tight Rope Traverse.  You have one tight rope to walk across and one about shoulder height to balance yourself.  It was easy at first, but the further I went, the more wobbly it got.  Next was Cool Runnings.  This was my favorite one.  You had to carry an intertube up a giant inflatable water slide.  Since there were six of us, we decided to race each other down.  I raced Missy's cousin-in-law.  I had a slight lead on him until I started bouncing into the wall.  I think we tied.  Next was Get it Up and Over.  This was an 8-foot wall to scale.  There were two boards that stick out about an inch and a half near the bottom to step you up, but the last 5 feet you have to do yourself.  I stepped on one of the braces holding it up to get my fat tummy over.  Next was the Wrecking Ball.  This was right by the finish line, so my wife was there to take pictures and videos.  They hand you a life vest before you go on.  There are rotatating balance beams you have to run across over 4 feet of water while two large red wrecking balls are swinging around in a circle.  I didn't see anyone make it all the way across without falling off the beam and landing in the water.  My wife said she saw a few make it.  I made it about two thirds of the way before the beam got to spinny and I just decidide to let it take me.  The final obstacle/finish line was the World's Largest Inflatable Water Slide.  We decided to race each other again.  This time I raced my daughter.  We were pretty much going down at the same rate, but I slid further than her at the bottom.  Must have something to do with physics.  Anyway, that was it.  We all had a great time.