Pueblo West, CO – Rest Day
Yesterday I slept in. As long as I could at least. I was awake by 8 or so and out of bed by 9. Taking my time I drank some coffee, did laundry, took a shower, and caught up on some things on the laptop. Shanna had the day off because this weekend she is volunteering at a youth camp up north near Denver I think. At around 1030 we went to grab breakfast at the Hen House, a local restaurant nearby.
I had the Huevos Rancheros, it was delicious!
After breakfast Shanna dropped me off at Ron and Cathy’s (Shanna is Cathy’s daughter). We chatted for awhile and then Ron, Cathy, and I went to explore Pueblo a bit. Our first stop was the Center for American Values which was downtown Pueblo. Pueblo is known as the Home of Heros because a few years ago they had four living Congressional Medal of Honor recipients from their town. Only one is still living today, Drew Dix, and he helped start The Center. The downtown area was pretty cool. It had a canal running through it and the place where we were going was right on the river walk.
Cathy set it up so that Joe Aldaz, Executive Director of the Center for American Values and Tanya Quintana, the Gallery Coordinator, would present a book of quotes from every medal of honor winner to me. I was surprised and very humbled that she thought I was worthy of such a gift! She said she thought I deserved it because I was a hero to her. I think it’s the other way around! Cathy is extremely selfless and is constantly thinking of everyone else all while dealing with a terrible illness. I think the world would be much better off if we all thought and acted just a little bit more like Cathy! In fact, not that long ago, The Center recognized her as a hometown hero! A truly incredible woman.
Next we went to the Sunset Inn to get Sloppers, a Pueblo original creation. It’s basically a burger smothered in green chili.
Sunset Inn was featured in the Food Network show Food Wars where they battled it out with another local establishment, Coors Tavern, for the best Slopper. Sunset Inn took the trophy. The owners, Mr & Mrs Chuck Chaves were kind enough to dig up the trophy and plaque and pose for a picture with me.
After the Sloppers we headed back to Rod and Cathy’s, so Rod and I could get to work on their garage. They had recently moved from south of Pueblo to Pueblo West to be closer to Shanna and to move from a multi story home to a single level home, so that Cathy could move around the house easier. Since they had moved, there was still quite a bit of stuff cluttering the garage such that they couldn’t pull a car into it. We moved a good amount of things to the basement and cleared up some space so that Rod can organize the things left in the garage and Cathy will be able to pull the car in, shortening her walk from the house to the car.
Once we finished with the garage Rod cooked a pizza and we sat around and discussed my fundraising goal dilemma. With Cathy’s encouragement I decided to set our new fundraising goal high at $10,000! It’s a big goal, but MS is a terrible disease that we know so little about. It has stolen and threatens to steal mobility, independence, and aspirations from some of the most thoughtful and nicest people I have met.
I’m so grateful for all the donations so far. Each one and each note of encouragement has served as reminder to me that if we all pitch in we can achieve great things. Some of the toughest hills I’ve climbed and most intense rain storms I’ve pedaled through could not have been conquered without knowing that there were so many people out there cheering me on. Even though I’ve been doing the pedaling there is no way I would be where I am without all of you! Same goes for the progress we have made raising money for the cause. If we all continue to share the goal we can achieve things we never even imagined at the onset of this adventure!
