Well the journey had a mind of its own. A 68 mile ride turned into a 91 mile ordeal. Road construction, bad directions, and misinformation and I just now arrived at the hotel in Athens. I am waiting on my lovely wife!! Some new stats for ya. Flipped off twice, ran off the road into the grass once, yelled stupid things at three times, and rude honking twice. You guessed it, all in Ohio in three days!!! All of the above never happened even once in all the other states. Some very nice people in OH too, but they were everywhere, but no idiotic rude people encountered anywhere else. I wasn't at all surprised. One guy flipped me off as he left from pumping gas. I was sitting on a bench drinking gatoraid! Oh well!! The shoulders of the Ohio roads are littered with gravel, sand, glass, and truck tire rubber. I probably road an extra 10 miles dodging all the debris on the shoulder. Needless to say I am not impressed with buckeye land! HAPPY TO BE ALMOST HOME!

Welcome Randy Home !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We would like to invite everyone to welcome Randy home on Saturday, July 31st. He will be arriving in Parkersburg around 1PM and invite everyone to mom and Randy's house (1703 Park Ave) around noon on saturday to surprise him when he arrives home.  I know he would love to see everyone and has mentioned every time we talked how much the messages everyone has left during his trip has meant to him and his family thanks you also for encouraging him. We hope  to see everyone saturday !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The pics are of a diner in Sidney, OH , famous for serving President Bush and other famous people over the years. The place is over a hundred years old and is like walking into a 1950's soda shop. Food was not very good and the worst burger I had on the whole trip. I did drink a lot of ice tea and water and then almost immediately after leaving town, I had to climb this huge hill to get out of town. Like to killed me! I felt like a big toad climbing out of a well! I am in Urbana tonight and hoteling it. Supposed to get some bad storms. Place is $45 a night and certainly not a Hilton, but then neither was my Kelty tent! Roger, I will be coming in entirely on Rte 50 and getting off downtown. I'm not sure deserve that much attention , but sure could use the company. I hope you all don't think I'll get lost coming from Athens. As for the motivational speaking, I just hope my kids in room 13 will listen to me. If I can master that, then I might consider motivational speaking. Already given up on the family! Nadia might be the only one , but she's only a few weeks old, so not sure about her yet. I am on schedule, so I should be home on time! Not sure what Charlotte has planned, but I hope it's not too embarrassing. It will be so nice to get home and sleep in a good bed and fight with the two furry idiots. Never thought I would ever miss them but I do! Charlotte has them well trained by now! I was looking at pictures last night from the beginning of my trip and they seem to be from last year. Haven't really had much time daily to think about more than how my body feels, what I will eat, where I will sleep, do the daily routine to PJ, blog, and think about tomorrow. Please know that your comments, concerns, and well wishes have kept me going! See you soon!!

OHIO! Celina to be exact. Camping by Grand Lake, a lake that has been plagued by algea and virtually shut down. Normally used by skiers and boaters, it is now just a big pool of water. You can see by one of the pics how the algea has killed a lot of fish, etc. The backroads I used to get here went through Amish country and I got this pic of the horse. Before this horse turned around, I thought it was a U.S. Senator. Unlike the mennonite girls the day before, the Amish do not want their pictures taken. I could have taken a hundred of them as they passed me in their buggies. All of them waved! In answer to what time I will be home Saturday, I will be there between 12:00 and 1:00. I am staying in Athens on Friday night. Tomorrow I will go to Urbana, Circleville, Athens and not sure after that. Might turn around and go back! See you all soon!

Greg we will make a hard copy Of the blog and give it to Ernie the first day of school, as he doesn,t use the school computers either.Jasmine, does this mean you won,t be mean to me when I get home?

Road construction and delays were the order of the day. At least no gravel or rain! I am in Monroeville, IN and will be headed to Ohio tomorrow. Will definately be home on Saturday! Marsha, your rain came down in buckets last night and flooded everything. The pic of the flooded yard was a common scene today. Bill, I bet if the Spanish guy who won the Tour de France had been riding a 35 pound bike with 40 pounds of gear and sleeping in tents, my guess is he would have quit early. :-) Teresa I will be home in time to pick on you the first day of school. It's a hobby. Will be turning over 3000 miles soon. I can tell by the pain in the butt. The 3 major disappointments of my trip have been...... not being in Portland when Nadia was born, missing Justin and Stephanie's wedding, and not being able to see Lauren and Mike on my ride through Ohio! I thought about all of them a lot! I ran into these ladies on bikes at a Hardies. They were super. The young girls surrounded me at lunch and had a hundred questions about me and the trip. Honestly, Six Pack can't touch these girls when it comes to talking! They had me laughing with all the chatter and questions! They were all one family!? Yeah, I know! Their manners and kindness towards me and each other blew me away. It was truly the best lunch I've had for 7 weeks! Not sure I even ate anything! .........FIVE MORE DAYS! YOUR BREAK FROM ME WILL BE OVER!

I can almost smell Charlotte's cooking! I am in Wabash, IN after a rather cool ( thanks Marsha ) morning. Got in 60 miles before noon and 85 total for the day. Nothing exciting about the ride, but I did make friends with 5 turkeys. I think they are members of the Indiana Hoosier cheerleading squad. These ladies were in a little field and when I stopped to look at them, amazingly, they came walking towards me. I'm just an animal magnet! Maybe they thought I was an old Tom! Then I was peddling by this house and heard some real loud noises. When I turned to look I saw all these big birds in a caged in area attached to a house. Let me tell ya this was fun! All of these guys could talk and I had a ball with them! One told me i was cute. He said , "You're a cuty" This lady had 67 exotic birds and 11 dogs. Crazy! Tomorrow I will go to Monroeville , IN and then make an assault on Ohio. It's hard to believe I'm almost home! I am already planning my next adventure! Thought maybe the beach with Charlotte might be a good start! Maybe even go camping!! ;-) Brenda, the guy at the house was not a barber or I would have gotten my hair cut! I hope all of you have enjoyed your summer! It will be good to get home and have a few days before Bill and Jenny put me to work. I can't wait for the opening school meetings. It always gives me a chance to day dream about cycling adventures and stuff! Take care and see ya all soon!