HOT / Picnic

Whew. It's hot here today. My sweet little weather station recorded a high of 100.0. That's pretty high in itself, but it's also pretty humid. What amazes me is that I saw dudes jogging on base today right at noon. What are they, masochists? I was sweating profusely while standing at the gas pump on my way home. I plan to run my 4 miles on the treadmill today- I finally had to turn on the air conditioning when it hit 89 in the bedroom. I probably could've slept at that temperature, but it sucks to sweat when you're just sitting there.

The main highlight of the day was the company picnic. It starts at noon and there's food, ice cream, a dunk tank (that all the bosses take turns in), and it ends with a raffle. This is all well and good, but what you're really buying is a $5 afternoon off. The way they regulate attendance is by waiting until 4:00 or so to start the raffle. So, I convinced 3 co-workers to join me in a rousing game of badminton. On a side note, I have very little natural athletic ability, but I will take you down in a game of badminton given the chance. During the badminton unit of 9th grade PE I actually ran out of people willing to play me. I like to think it was because I was so dominant, but there were actually some grumblings about trash-talk and excessive celebration. C'mon, I had years of basketball humiliation to make up for. Anyway, we made an honest effort at badminton even though there was a pretty strong breeze that meant you had to hit the birdie at like a 45 degree angle to where you wanted it to go. I think our record volley was like 5 hits, but we eventually gave up, because as I stated earlier, it was hot as crap. We really could have chosen from any activity that was set up because most of the attendees wouldn't leave the shade of the pavilion. Actually, the dunk tank was starting to look pretty good.

But the highlight of it all was the raffle. It takes a while, because most people just eat and take off, so there's a lot of dead space while they determine if the person they called is still there. I was actually called up for a $25 Best Buy gift card, which is good for three reasons:
1. Staying for the raffle finally paid off.
2. I got a 500% return on my investment, not counting the hamburger, hotdog, 3 popsicles and 2 brownies I ate (which is why I really need to get that run in today).
3. My over the top fist-pump celebration as I walked up prompted the Captain to say I also won the "most excited winner" award, which means they'll probably remember that I didn't punk out early.

So put that with my Outback gift card win at the Human Society 5K and perhaps we can dub 2006 "The year of the raffle."