C is for Cake

Jennifer's wedding has come and past and here is the cake that I made for her.  It was so much work and I would never have been able to complete it without the help of my family.  My parents made the boxes to display the cakes and everyone helped with the frosting and batter making.  Geneen took charge of baking the  top cake and it was absolutely delicious.  I was very pleased with the outcome, but I told my other cousins that I was not going to make their cakes when the get married (but I might change my mind, I mean if I only did the wedding cake it wouldn't be too bad).  My favorite part was when some guests were commenting on the cake and said "I wonder who made all these cupcakes?" and I intruded on the conversation "I did."  At first they thought I was joking, but I assured them that I wasn't.  They then took a picture of me with the cake.

The Rib-Cracker

While the events of this entry happened on a previous date, recent events lead me to relate the tale.  During presidents weekend I went with my roommate and friends to Las Vegas to visit his family.  On the way down, I told my friends about a comfort zone assignment (do something that puts you out of your comfort zone) that I had to do for my choir class and we all decided that we should all do it.  I had the intention of bargaining at a store for my assignment since I hate talking to people while I shop.  

So Saturday comes and we were going to shoot guns that morning with my roommate's papa, when he cancels on us because he didn’t want to get stuck in the mud.  Fortunately we had other friends in town who weren’t scared of the mud and so we go where they are to shoot guns and ride dune buggies.  As we got there, we discover that, 1 there is no mud and, 2 that the dune buggies are not working but they have dirt bikes.  It had been ages since I last rode dirt bikes with my cousin and I had only been on a smaller, 100 engine.  While they did have a small bike, they had two bigger bikes, a 250 and a 500.  While I felt completely comfortable with the 100, looking at the 250 filled my heart with terror.  My friends turned to me and said, “We found a new comfort zone assignment for you.”  I tried to avoid it even though the sinking feeling in my gut knew that this is what I had to do.  I went and shot a hand gun, met new people, watched others riding but avoided the 250 like the plague.  

Eventually I made my way over to it and got someone to help me out.  I put on the helmet, and climbed aboard.  The bike is way too big and I can’t even touch the ground.  Now I am not short, but I am very light for a 24 year old male; this monster weighed at least 3 times my weight.  I killed the bike a few times trying to get the clutch and gas ratio perfect.  The first time I got it to move, the bike flew up underneath me and all the way vertical before we both came down crashing to the ground; too fast on letting the clutch out.  The second time I managed to move forward about 15 feet before I crashed into a dune buggy.  I couldn’t turn, I was moving too fast and I flew off the bike and slammed my left side into the buggy.   I think I cracked a few ribs and my pride in about 2 seconds.  I got up and thought I would move down to the smaller bike once I got my breath back.  I rode the 100 successfully and had a good time, all the while saying that if I wasn’t hurt, I could probably take the 250.  Then the worst happened, a girl in the group I came with got on the 250 and didn’t even fall over.  When she got back I knew I had to try the bike again, but I told myself that there wasn’t enough time.  Besides, I had already tried and almost killed myself, isn’t that enough for the assignment?  Unfortunately for me someone else still hadn’t gotten a ride on the small bike so we had to wait around anyway.  After more encouragement from good friends I got back on the bike.  It was almost too easy this time.  I took off, making sure that there were no buggies right in front of me, and away I flew.  On a bigger bike I could go much faster than before and had a blast zipping across the dried lake bed.

Taming the Rib-Cracker