Why did the chicken cross the road?

Shortly after the previous incident involving go-karts I get dispatched to a better run. Here is how I got dispatched (mind you it's in cop talk over our radios).

Dispatcher: Springdale Unit available to respond to the area of Tri-county Parkway and 747 I.D.

Me: I I.D.'d myself as available to respond.

Dispatcher: Attempt to locate a chicken crossing the road.

Are you serious? Do you know how bad I wanted to ask "Why" or "Does the complainant know why it is crossing the road?" Of course I am not afforded that opportunity. My supervisor apparently had already checked on the chicken and attempted to catch it to no avail. I thought it had to be a prank call until the supervisor called up on the radio to advise. Never did see the chicken, but how classic a run is that?

Bumper Car Fight

Well, my job gets better and better. What is the deal with people. I've decided that people are willing to fight anybody for anything as long as they think they or someone else has been wronged in some way. I get a call for 7-8 people fighting at a local amusement area inside a large enclosed shopping area in our town. Show up and find two different groups of people. Apparently they were all riding the go-kart/bumper cars at the same time. While driving the bumper cars, one guy bumped into a girl from the other group (bumped......bumper cars.....right?). Guy riding around in the girls group goes up to the guy that bumped her and says..."you bumped into my daughter kind of hard, didn't you?" He then hits the guy in the face. Anybody sees something wrong here. Bumper cars!!!!!!!!!. Ever hear the term "Rubbin is racing", or thought about the term "Bumper Cars". Is it just me that understands what that entails? People are ridiculous.

Law Enforcement Torch Run

Well, today was the Law Enforcement Torch Run for Special Olympics (the Cincinnati stretch). Myself and 6 co-workers bikes from the PD to downtown where we met up with the runners at their starting point...in front of Cincinnati Police District 1 headquarters. It was around 16 miles on the way down. Apparently....thanks to many of your donations....law enforcement officers and family raised enough money for the 2008 Special Olympics by themselves. Thanks again to all who donated. The ride back was very slow paced as we were going the same speed as the runners were running. They had police escorts shutting down all the intersections allowing us to continue on without stopping. We had support crew that traveled in vans and would go ahead of us to set up a checkpoint with water, Gatorade, and bananas that you grab on the way by. Harder to eat a banana on a bike than I thought. You kind of need two hands to open the thing. The whole way back was very slow. Very, very slow. I'm pretty sore because it took so long. It was pretty far too. I'm thinking it was somewhere in the neighborhood of 32-34 miles total which is my furthest ride to date. One step closer to the Police Unity Tour next year. We ended at Springdale Recreation Center for a cookout that was waiting on us. All the support staff were very good and it was well organized. All for a good cause. Good stuff. Now we'll see how long it takes to recoup.

picture courtesy of channel 5 news

Cuyahoga Valley National Park

Kate and I went to Cuyahoga Valley National Park to do a little hiking the day after the concert. There are so many trails to choose from there. We hiked to see Brandywine Falls (one of the more major attractions). It was a very short hike, but pretty falls. Kate then also found on backpacker.com that they mentioned a trail called the ledges. It was a pretty hike, only a couple of miles (about what I wanted). The whole hike is along rock ledges with lots of spaces in between rocks and fun things to explore.

Justin's New Bike

Well, I did it. I bought a new bike. I dropped a whole bunch of cash on lots of equipment for the bike. I've been thinking about it for a while, and finally went for it. I have lots of work friends that ride a lot, so I plan to do some riding with them. I bought an intermediate level bike from the brand "Giant" which is a very good, very large manufacturer. I bought the bike at a place called Montgomery Cyclery . I bought from the West Chester store (because its close). Myself and the store manager spent a lot of time making the bike do exactly what I wanted (i.e. adjusting the brakes to the tension I wanted, adding a couple accessories). We spent a lot of time going over equipment and how parts of the bike worked (much more complicated than I thought before this trip). My bike has clip pedals, which for those that don't know, work kind of like skies, clipping you into the pedals with special shoes. It is hard to get used to clipping in and out. So after doing all of that, I had to take it for a ride. I suited up and went out to the Little Miami Bike Trail . I rode about 8 miles one way ending near the city of Morrow. On my way back, I slowed to check my phone which was ringing. I unclipped the right pedal, and then the bike leaned left. It was too late. I had a minor crash. No damage except a scraped, bloody knee. Luckily nobody was around to see it. I remembered at that moment that the store manager had warned me that I would crash a couple of times before getting used to the clip pedals. Only once so far. I rode the 8 miles back at a much faster pace. It took about an hour 10 min to do the whole thing, which I think put me at about a 17mph pace (with stops). Not bad for my first ride. It was the best work out I've had in years, but also the most fun. It is a very nice bike path that winds along a river and old towns, so it seems rather scenic.

Concert

Well, as a big surprise, Kate had a two day trip planned for the two of us. I had no idea what we were doing or where we were going till the day of the event. I was simply told not to have anything planned. The day of...she announced that we were going to an Eric Clapton concert (pavilion seats) in Cuyahoga Valley National Park. So we go...set up camp when we first got there, and then explored some of the park (which is very large). We didn't do any hiking, but stopped by a vineyard called "Sarah's Vineyard" across from the concert grounds and did some wine tasting as well as grab a bite to eat before the concert (sarahsvineyardwinery.com). After we finished we went across the way to the concert grounds (the Blossom Music Center). The whole concert pavilion area was really cool looking, but we got no pics (as cameras were not allowed). We found out that the opener was a group called Robert Randolph and the family band. I didn't realize until he starting playing, but I knew exactly who he was. For those of you that don't, he was a major part in the Crossroads Concert of Eric Clapton's. He plays a sit down steel guitar and is absolutely awesome. Most people there appeared not to know him, as most of the seats were empty. He was fun to listen to (robertrandolph.net). Then Clapton came on and started getting the seats filled. At the beginning-middle, he played very little that I knew, but didn't make me care much. Every song was like a blues jam out session with long solos in the middle of them where he would just rock out on his guitars. He played several of his classics toward the end (i.e. Hoochie Coochie Man, Layla, Cocaine, Wonderful Tonight). We got the best of all of it. Then for his encore, both Clapton and Robert Randolph came out and played together, absolutely rocking out. It looked like they were trying to show each other up, both of them smiling like crazy while doing it. They both looked like they had a blast playing with each other. The audience,I thin, got the best of it though. It was a mini Crossroads Concert. We stayed for a long time after the concert waiting on the thousands to meander out and let traffic die down. Too many drunk people driving away for my likes. The concert was absolutely awesome.