Theme parks and other miscellanies
So: theme parks. Six Flags has this deal where if you buy season tickets in advance, you get it for forty-something bucks and half a dozen free guest passes with it. Considering the fact that single-day admission is thirty-something, this is a smokin' deal. However, that deal has expired for this summer, so season passes are like ninety-something bucks now.
So Amy said one day that she wanted to chip in a hundred bucks or so to split the cost of the hotel with me (from the weekend of Dale's wedding). Now, on the one hand, I like money; on the other hand, I was kind of planning on covering all the expenses because it was my thing. But then she offers immediately afterward to put that towards a season pass to Six Flags.
Here's my quandary: I like theme parks, but I don't like them every weekend. Just like cookies are a sometimes food for the pussy-whipped Cookie Monster, theme parks are a sometimes weekend for me. We'd have to go three times just to break even, four to make it worth it, and that's basically scheduling every weekend Amy has off in advance for the next couple months. This does not quite overlap with my idea of fun; rather than go more to get "my money's worth," I'd really rather just wait until next summer to get the better deal.
There's one defeater to this, though, and that's if a bunch of other people got in on this. I like theme parks as big group experiences, and going with a bunch of people would be much more fun because then it's not just what two people want to do, it's what a bunch of people want to do. It would also reduce per-capita gas costs if we car-pooled, too. So if a group is in, I'll go with the group for sure, but otherwise, there just won't be enough fun to justify a hundred-dollar price tag. Of course, next summer, when I can get a cheap-o season pass and free guest passes, it'll be a different story because we can take several different people who wouldn't even need to be the same groups, and we'll have more summer due to earlier planning.
So, how much interest is there in going to Six Flags several times with what's left of the summer? I'd be down for going once in any case, I just thought I'd ask what other people felt like before making up my mind.
In other news, I got a new personal best today: 26 minutes to work (28 minutes was my previous record). I decided to look it up on Google maps to check out the distance so I could get an accurate average speed. I was looking forward to throwing it in Chris' face, because when we all went to see a midnight showing of Spider-Man 3, we had something like the following conversation:Chris: (over the phone) What the hell, dude. You haven't been answering your phone for the last half hour.
Me: I took a nap. I have to be at work in the morning.
Chris: Well, we all left without you about twenty minutes ago. We're almost there.
Me: OK, well then I guess I'll just have to ride my bike. Can someone grab me a ticket so I don't have to wait in line? I'll pay 'em back.
Chris: Are you kidding? It's like twenty miles out here!
Me: I've got like an hour. I can do twenty on my bike.
Chris: What? Eleven is speedy for a bike.
Me: Look, Dale clocked me in high school going twenty-something down a side street, I'm pretty sure I can do that to the theater.
Chris: OK, if you say so. I'll grab you a ticket, but you owe me even if you don't make it.
Me: Yeah, I know. Gotta go, I'm heading out.
I left my house at about 11:15, and made it to the show just about as the trailers were starting, which wasn't bad, considering that I had the wind against me on the open road. Anyway, I rubbed Chris' nose in it because I made it, despite his belligerent nay-saying, but I never actually looked up the distance. Well, first, I checked out the distance to work with Google Maps - 11.4 miles. Oh, wait, that's by highway, but at least it stacks up rather nicely with the 12-mile estimate using Amy's odometer. So by surface streets, it'd be like ten miles or so, right? Wrong. It's 5.8 miles. I had no idea that the highway went that far out of the way. So I thought to myself, "Self, this is ridiculous. Looks like Chris' general statement about 11 mph was correct. But wait... that must mean his distance estimate to the theater was way the fuck off, right?" Right. From the house I was living in at the time, it's only about 7 miles to the theater. Son of a bitch. I guess average speeds are real fuckers, what with all the accelerating, decelerating, and waiting at lights.
So Amy said one day that she wanted to chip in a hundred bucks or so to split the cost of the hotel with me (from the weekend of Dale's wedding). Now, on the one hand, I like money; on the other hand, I was kind of planning on covering all the expenses because it was my thing. But then she offers immediately afterward to put that towards a season pass to Six Flags.
Here's my quandary: I like theme parks, but I don't like them every weekend. Just like cookies are a sometimes food for the pussy-whipped Cookie Monster, theme parks are a sometimes weekend for me. We'd have to go three times just to break even, four to make it worth it, and that's basically scheduling every weekend Amy has off in advance for the next couple months. This does not quite overlap with my idea of fun; rather than go more to get "my money's worth," I'd really rather just wait until next summer to get the better deal.
There's one defeater to this, though, and that's if a bunch of other people got in on this. I like theme parks as big group experiences, and going with a bunch of people would be much more fun because then it's not just what two people want to do, it's what a bunch of people want to do. It would also reduce per-capita gas costs if we car-pooled, too. So if a group is in, I'll go with the group for sure, but otherwise, there just won't be enough fun to justify a hundred-dollar price tag. Of course, next summer, when I can get a cheap-o season pass and free guest passes, it'll be a different story because we can take several different people who wouldn't even need to be the same groups, and we'll have more summer due to earlier planning.
So, how much interest is there in going to Six Flags several times with what's left of the summer? I'd be down for going once in any case, I just thought I'd ask what other people felt like before making up my mind.
In other news, I got a new personal best today: 26 minutes to work (28 minutes was my previous record). I decided to look it up on Google maps to check out the distance so I could get an accurate average speed. I was looking forward to throwing it in Chris' face, because when we all went to see a midnight showing of Spider-Man 3, we had something like the following conversation:Chris: (over the phone) What the hell, dude. You haven't been answering your phone for the last half hour.
Me: I took a nap. I have to be at work in the morning.
Chris: Well, we all left without you about twenty minutes ago. We're almost there.
Me: OK, well then I guess I'll just have to ride my bike. Can someone grab me a ticket so I don't have to wait in line? I'll pay 'em back.
Chris: Are you kidding? It's like twenty miles out here!
Me: I've got like an hour. I can do twenty on my bike.
Chris: What? Eleven is speedy for a bike.
Me: Look, Dale clocked me in high school going twenty-something down a side street, I'm pretty sure I can do that to the theater.
Chris: OK, if you say so. I'll grab you a ticket, but you owe me even if you don't make it.
Me: Yeah, I know. Gotta go, I'm heading out.
I left my house at about 11:15, and made it to the show just about as the trailers were starting, which wasn't bad, considering that I had the wind against me on the open road. Anyway, I rubbed Chris' nose in it because I made it, despite his belligerent nay-saying, but I never actually looked up the distance. Well, first, I checked out the distance to work with Google Maps - 11.4 miles. Oh, wait, that's by highway, but at least it stacks up rather nicely with the 12-mile estimate using Amy's odometer. So by surface streets, it'd be like ten miles or so, right? Wrong. It's 5.8 miles. I had no idea that the highway went that far out of the way. So I thought to myself, "Self, this is ridiculous. Looks like Chris' general statement about 11 mph was correct. But wait... that must mean his distance estimate to the theater was way the fuck off, right?" Right. From the house I was living in at the time, it's only about 7 miles to the theater. Son of a bitch. I guess average speeds are real fuckers, what with all the accelerating, decelerating, and waiting at lights.