Happy Birthday America

Today, I helped out the Junior Scholars at Kings Island. I know, it's tough getting paid time and a half by working and riding rides at an amusement park, but I managed. Thanks to the great staff for their wonderful company today, you are all good people and I had fun with you all today.

When you go to amusement parks, there are always those people who you don't want to be. You have the usual people who wear simply their bathing suits all day when they should be covered up. And you have your people who make out constantly in public, it being worse when the people have barely reached puberty. But today, I got to witness an individual who found a way to drive all of Kings Island crazy. While waiting for Faceoff, there was a girl who would scream everytime the ride went over us. At first, we thought she was just excited. But when this started happening repeatedly, she became scary. When we got a look at her, her eyes were as red as beets. Yup, this girl was stoned out of her mind. Saying she was high would be an understatement. This girl continued to scream her lungs out while waiting for the ride, adding some jumping and other erratic movements to her act. When it was her time to ride, all you heard was her. She was even louder than the ride at times. And when the ride was done, yup, still screaming. The joy of amusement parks.

Also at the park, I did not vomit, ending my streak of doing so. In terms of great significance, it really doesn't matter, but for me, it does. Doing well in the heat and being able to handle the rides validates the physical and mental condition I'm in right now and all of the working out I've done. I was a young 24 today, and I'm glad I still have the stomach for amusement parks.

Stage 3 of the Tour de France took the riders from La Chataigneraie to Tours. Despite a valiant effort from Erik Dekker to hold off the main field and win the day, Tom Boonen won his 2nd straight sprint, showing he is the best sprinter in this year's Tour. Dave Zabriskie is still your overall leader, and Lance Armstrong is still 2nd, 2 seconds behind. Tomorrow is the team time trial, a very key day for the title contenders. Somehow, Armstrong's rivals must lead their teams to victory in order to pick up time on Lance. This will be hard to do since Armstrong's team has won this stage 2 years in a row.

Tomorrow, it's back to work on the paper and finishing things up. All that remains is editing and prep for the defense itself.