Cici Chases the Guv

Disclaimer – at this date, no restraining order has been issued by the Governor’s office. Cici hopes to remain under the radar of the long arm of the law by being a model citizen in the next few weeks!

NOTE - I voted for the Guv - but editing and review privileges were given to my cousin Paul (GOP) for a full and balanced report about Gov. Ritter. :)

It all started at mile 32 with a short pause, waiting for the girls to catch up to me. One of our guys stops to say ‘Hi’ and asks if I had just seen the Guv go by – he’s wearing a Colorado flag jersey.

A split second decision is made to take off, wait for the girls at lunch, and try to catch the Guv to ride next to him, give him a RawHinie tattoo, and tell him about our team. I pedal as fast and hard as I can for the next 10 miles, slightly uphill and headwinds foiling my effort. Plus he can ride pretty fast for a 50 yr-old.

Not to be dissuaded from my quest, I go to plan B. Rolling into lunch I hope to find him there. A very helpful volunteer says he is just got in and is sitting under some trees nearby. I grab my camera, RawHinie tattoo, and helmet with my horns to pose with him. But I don’t spot him right away.

Instead I come across some of my team members having lunch. I announce excitedly (and loudly) I have been “stalking the Guv” for 10 miles – anyone seen him? Clueless team members say no. I start searching in the immediate area for him.

Meanwhile, the group of riders sitting next to the team are laughing quite a bit, having a great time. They finally tell one of us he is right next to me. Roxy calls out to me to look to my right, 'Hey – there’s the Guv!!' (I never thought of looking for our new governor on the right of anything - that one is for my cousin Paul!). All of the other MS riders in the vicinity are very amused at the show going on as well.

As nice as he can be, he politely lets me put a RawHinie tattoo on his left shin and tell him all about our team, the money we have raised, and that I left my cousin (who has MS) to catch up to him. Only half of the tattoo successfully transfers so I inform he is just a half a Hinie. Catcalls erupt from his posse!

No doubt the more political savvy friends in his group were beginning to get a little nervous to say nothing of the Colorado State Patrol wondering about this crazy lady with horns on her head.

He graciously interrupts his lunch to pose with some of the team members – note that is my helmet with the daisies and horns on his head – so now he is a full-fledged honorary Hinie although it’s unlikely that he’ll use that in a future campaign ad.

After lunch he gets ready to go and we all say goodbye, do a few more shout outs, etc. We tell him to check out our website, rawhinies.com. He jokes back, that may not go over well with any of the watchdogs checking out his internet activity – who knew?? When low and behold, here comes my sister, which means Julie has made it to lunch too. So I boldly ask the Guv if he can wait and I’ll go get Julie so she can meet him. And his posse is really laughing at me now, this tornado of a person asking the Guv to hang out for few more minutes as I dash off without even waiting for his response.

I go running over to find Julie, can’t even talk, just motion for her to move it. She has no clue, but not very happy with me making her run after riding almost 50 miles. The story ends with him meeting Julie and chatting with her and her family for few minutes.

Taking pictures with her family (my uncle, a Republican, even posed “Left” of the Guv).

And then one with us 4 girls riding together for the weekend. (aka "the Committie to Re-elect Bill Ritter)

I was only infamous on my team to begin with, now a legend on the entire MS ride -- interrupting the Guv’s lunch to ‘Tatt’ him up for photo ops while many MS the riders looked on at the crazy sight of Cici and the Guv!!