Roadside: Music

[As promised, I'll try to update during the day sometimes, as well as daily recaps. It will be much more feasible when my hands aren't wet and shaking when we stop! I thought this post out yesterday, and cheated a bit by typing some of it out last night.]

What do you listen to for 400 biking hours? The short answer is: your entire iPod, several times. But there is more to it than that.

There is a yet untold story of heroism going on within the B4B. Anyone who knows Tyler is probably familiar with his music misadventures while traveling. The stolen iPod in Austria, the Greece iPod story (you've probably heard this story 15 times), and the forgotten iPod on the plane in Venezuela. You know where this is going...

The epic charging station we use at fast food restaurants.

Tyler's iPod died slowly on this trip. On the first day of the rain, his battery quit. Not too bad, but not great. But then when we did an emergency charge in a McDonald's, it didn't take. Ok?? So the next day, we hooked it up to one of our battery backups, and it worked just fine, for a few hours. Then the whole iPod just died. One voided warranty later, and Tyler has been musicless for pretty much the last four days. If you have read any of our other blogs or our Twitter, you know how tough these few days have been. Tyler is doing it without music. But it's not even listening to music that's the the issue - we go long stretches unplugged - it's the option to have music. And the absence of that choice must be brutal. I like to think that his iPod heard him singing, and took it upon itself to end everyone's misery.

I have a another problem: randomness. My iPod (probably the headphones, actually) has this crazy pause-pause-max volume-min volume routine, with a healthy dose of the "voice-over lady" (Kyle gets her, too). She reads you the song title, then the song title and artist, and then the song title, artist, and then the name of every playlist on your iPod. This happens sometimes every minute or every ten minutes. Always in the middle of a big hill. But at least I have the possibility of music.

But back to the music - songs that we've really been feeling: Semi-Charmed Life (TJ), Desire (J), Amazing (T - on the first day, he went long because he was so locked into this song), Levels (K), and Baggage Claim (J). My number-one song right now, the one I would put on for a run, is Springsteen by Eric Church, and I haven't heard it once. I've listened to the entire device several times, but I'm too stubborn to choose it, so we will see how long this lasts.

Kyle's got Rush, Queen, Alanis Morissette, The Beatles, two country songs, and some two-weeks old Jays podcasts. Country and Top 40 are my go-to genres for cardio, but my iPod is spitting out healthy doses of rock and oldies, which is cool, too. Tyler is hoping someone reads this and magically ships a new mP3 player. Hey @Apple.... kidding!

Don't worry mom, I usually do one earphone at a time. And I'm NOT typing this as we ride. :)

Sent wirelessly from my BlackBerry device on the Bell network.
Envoyé sans fil par mon terminal mobile BlackBerry sur le réseau de Bell.