This is the first entry and I'll try to keep up with more as time permits. I have always been attracted to the sea and sailing but have not been able to pursue such pleasures because I get motion sickness easily and even watching rides at a fair are enough to make my stomach quezy. So I'm a landlubber, but not by choice.
This is just a place to keep friends and family up to date on what is happening with Joan and I.
We took the day off on Tuesday to attend the Oregon State Fair. After all it's "Too Big To Miss" and living here in the state capital makes it easy to get there. Actually twice in four days. We went with the old foggy crew on Saturday (08/29) so we could see all displays and exhibits, plus do a little junk shopping without the grand kids begging for another elephant ear or other yummy glob of junk food. So was rather peaceful. Just Mom, Jo, Carol (our friend) and me.
We went back to the fair again on Tuesday for wristband day (all the rides you can stomach for $25 a head) and set the grand kids (Aiyana and Skylee) loose on the FunTastic rides for 7 hours. Boy did they have fun! I don't ride the "vomit comet" or the "slush and barf" rides and can't hardly look at them, but Mom decided I should have some fun anyway and roped me into riding the Slingshot with my son-in-law Craig.
Now this machine is designed to launch two riders from the platform straight up over a hundred feet in a two person plastic butt hugging-shoulder crunching seat made for someone that weighs 100 lbs or less. Of course the first problem was just getting parked in it. Seeing that I weigh a trifle over 270, this was an accomplishment worthy of epic song. Still just latching the foam padded metal shoulder harness into place was giving the technician a workout. I tried to suck in my gut, but it wasn't cooperating as there wasn't any room left in my ribs from being squished into the tiny seat. Somehow he got it latched and then the ride was on.
The seat is tilted back just before launch so that your looking up between the two masts with the four cables that will propel you on your short but terrifying ride into the sky. I was thinking "this ain't so bad" when the technician counted down from 3 to zero and hit the release button.
What a rush! I could see the fair dropping away on each side as the chair rocketed up to the top of the masts (eat your heart out space shuttle) and then put us in weightless limbo as the chair passed the tops of the masts and continued for another 4o or so feet up, and the same going back down. At the apex of the journey (first time to the top) the chair flipped over and then stayed with us facing down so we could more appreciate the view of the ground coming up at us at ever increasing speed. It's amazing how fast the ground was approaching. I thought at the time that this must be what it feels to bungee jump. Just about the time I thought it was going to give us the immersion experience of going through the aluminum plates of the launch platform, we flipped over again and were headed back up, accelerating, past the mast tops again. I could see Eugene from up there, I'm sure of it. Then down for the second trip and the seat of course flipped again so I could once more enjoy the view of my imminent death approaching. I think it did this 3 or 4 times, before the operator took mercy on us and finally lowered the chair of terror back to the deck. Wow. $50 for the ride $20 for the video (I won't need it to remember that trip!) not soiling my undies, priceless. So a couple of hours of vertigo and mild nausea later I was fully recovered.
Hey Mom, you want to buy another ticket?
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