Oh, and before I forget to mention it, potato
soup apparently sucks as fuel. By the time I got home at the end of the day, I was creeping slowly along the trail, trying to avoid the big, ugly bonk that was threatening to crash down and temporarily ruin my life.I'm the King of Bonk. I could bonk riding across the street. Come to think of it, I probably have. There should be a town named Bonk, and at its center should be a bronze statue of me hunched over the handlebar of a bike, with a facial expression that looks like I just finished giving birth to something with antlers.
When the bottom drops out, I fall faster than Saddam's half-brother. And we all know what happened when he got to end of his rope: rrrrrrip, splat, thud.
Well, OK, two thuds. Whatever. It wasn't pretty.
I once bonked at the halfway point of a 28-mile, out-and-back trail ride in New Mexico. I was alone, with no food, and the only way back to my car was 14 miles of up-and-down desert terrain. Every inch felt like a death march. I wanted to scream, sob and call out for my mommy, but I was afraid it would tip off the buzzards and they'd commence ta circlin' like they do in old cowboy movies.
My younger brother has the same problem. If he forgets to eat regularly during a long ride and his gas tank drains, it happens quickly and he just enters survival mode. He says the tendency to bonk hard seems to be a family trait. One of our sisters does it, too.
Maybe I should sue Mom. I'm bald, slow and hungry. Where the hell are all the good genes? Oh, wait. I remember: They went to the other sons. The good-looking ones. With hair.
