King's Dominion 2011

So I tell you, dear reader, a lot about my weekends when I leave the house. Let's talk for a minute about what I do during the week (and some times on the weekend, too) while not leaving the house. There is eating food, which is enjoyable sometimes. There is sleeping, which was a lot more enjoyable before the only outlet in my bedroom broke and I was forced to run an extension cord from the kitchen and plug a surge protector into that, which it turns out was not powerful enough to run my window air conditioning unit on anything other than fan. A fan that blows around hot air is not very productive/conducive for deep stages of sleep. When I studied abroad in South Africa it was summer when we arrived there and there were no air conditioning units whatsoever, including fans. I remember feeling for the first several weeks that I never attained REM sleep and I now realize that is directly related to activity of my sweat glands in a completely relaxed state.

Anyway.

The reason I started the above paragraph is to mention how this summer is becoming the summer of The Wire because I watch it pretty much whenever I am at the house. I figure I could do worse, right? Like go to sleep in my personal sauna/bedroom.

Oh and that new FX show, Wilfred, is hilarious too. But you probably won't think so. Unless you watch it thinking the dog suit guy is actually a dog. Then it is hilarious because animals are funny. If you don't, then you are just watching a guy dressed in a dog suit being ridiculous, which isn't so funny. It takes an imagination and odd sense of humor.

Needless to say, I did not come into this with much to write about this weekend. Let's get to it.

So Friday I did one of those stereotypical social human being things: attended a happy hour. A bunch of roommates (yeah there are a bunch of them. six--seven inlcuding myself--to be exact.) and I bought this beer and hamburger deal for a local bar/restaurant called Lou's. I hadn't used mine yet and one of my roommates had only used his like once so we decided to take advantage of it. And we did. And it was real bar-like with the beer and the burgers and the sports talk. Manliest thing I have ever been a part of actually.

Then we went back to the house, sat on the deck, smoked some and drank more and had a two hour discussion about whether it is possible to will yourself to not get drunk while drinking enough to intoxicate most people. I say nay but, if it is possible, I want back all those days (and there are a lot of them) that I spent in bed hungover because of my propensity to fall to the apparently subjective power of alcohol. Oh the things I would do with those days. Watch The Wire probably.

Best thing about happy hour drinking: passing out early. So by 1130 I was passed out in the living room. Normally this would make me feel old and useless but we were supposed to get up early and go to the, self-proclaimed, best amusement park in the mid-atlantic region, King's Dominion.

I was up by 830am all on my own. Suck on that truth all you haters.

Then we packed our lunches and got on the road to Kings Dominion. I didn't realize it was like 1.5 hours away. I guess that explains the necessity of the early awakening.

2.5 hours later we were there. There was traffic but I slept through it so it's kind of like it wasn't there.

I don't know if you have ever been to an amusement park but if you do not have the ability to delay gratification your time there is not going to be very enjoyable, or at least you will not be riding any of the good rides. In fact, you'll probably be that creepy adult on the kids rides as those are the only ones without long lines. We stuck to only those rides rated a 5: aggressive thrill factor!! I hadn't been to an amusement park in like 7 years (the last was Dorney Park in PA) and this fact escaped me somewhere along the way, or the lines were not that long but what we titled the "thrill-to-wait ratio" at King's Dominion did not start out very high. Much lower than 1, actually. Now don't get me wrong, the rides were quite thrilling (there was the Dominator, the Volcano, the Flight of Fear), but it took us like 4 hours to get through these three rides. With the traffic and long wait times this trip was not looking entirely worth it. I was even pairing up with random people to get on quicker. Screaming like an eight year old girl, asking them to hold my hand was pretty weird. Especially when they said no.

Then came the water park rides. Things sped up there. Or at least the first one where you share a tube with a partner and get flushed down a giant funnel.

Then there was the giant slide. Pretty inexplicably, this ride was the only one that made me nervous the entire day. I think it was because you're pretty much free falling down a 6 story tube at risk of getting any one of your extremities caught on who-knows-what. Then it was my turn and I tucked my sandals to my chest, yelled "oh crap!!" and two seconds later it was over. My muffled panic was apparently pretty comical to those still up top. Thrill-to-wait ratio was definitely lowest for this ride, however.

After that, though, all thrill-to-wait ratios approaching 0 were negated by Amusement Times' (or whatever the rollercoaster magazine is called) Best New Ride of 2010, The Intimidator 305 (the drop is 305 feet high). This was the only ride we got on twice and had we ridden it earlier it might have been the only ride we got on at all. Dropping at an 85 degree angle is a pretty unexplainable feeling. But you know what I mean.

Then on the way back to the house driving through city I felt like a teenager again looking at all the cool older people getting to go out to all the bars and stay out late, thinking "man I can't wait until I am 21 and can go out to bars to drink." Except that I am 26. But maybe one day I will be that cool. Probably not.

And that was me leaving the house this past weekend. Except for Sunday before the travesty that was the US Women's World Cup final loss to Japan (I am not one of those people that is like, "I am happy for Japan given all that they've been through this year." Screw that. A women's world cup is not going to rebuild an economy or clear radiation from the air. Insensitive? Probably. But arguing otherwise pretty much puts sports on a pedestal far higher than it deserves. Really, though, I am just bitter that we didn't win because if there is anything I care about in this world it is women's sports.) when I tried out this new pho place in Adam's Morgan (pho over $10 should be illegal) and then went to workout after the game to boost my mood.