Saturday February 24, 2007 was an outstanding day weather wise.  Pete was recovering nicely from his hernia operation and he wanted to get out and do a short hike.  I can’t remember why but it just ended up being me and Pete this day.  Our plan was to drop off Pete’s Dodge Magnum at the Goodyear auto repair place in downtown Rochester while we hiked around the city waiting for it to be finished. 

I’m not sure why Pete keeps going to this place, they are always slow and they always seem to mess up somehow.  Apparently this visit wasn’t going to be any different.  I think Pete just wanted some basic maintenance done to the vehicle.  Stuff like an oil change, tire rotation and maybe another one or two simple things.  When Pete asked the guy how long it was going to take the guy told him 3.5 to 4 hours.  Well, we didn’t plan to walk around the city that long, so we quickly changed our plan and decided to walk back to Pete’s house.  From there Pete could give me a ride home with one of his other cars and go pick up the Magnum later in the day.   

Pete did bring some business he wanted to take care of at the post office, so we at least stopped by the post office before heading to Pete’s.  Pete and Steve were going to a friend’s house for a yearly chili cook off.  Now that I mention the chili cook off that reminds me why Steve didn’t join us, he was busy slaving over the stove making his entry for the contest.  On our way hiking back to Pete’s we stopped by Steve’s house and rang the door bell.  Cheryl let us in and we went to the kitchen to check out Steve’s pot of chili on the stove.  Pete looked into the pot on the stove and started accusing Steve of making stew not chili.  Apparently by Pete’s rules if you use certain ingredients, like corn and other items it is stew and should not be considered a chili.  I think Steve and Pete have had this argument before based on the way they were discussing the definition of stew and chili.  We only visited for a couple minutes, I could tell Steve wanted to devote all his intention to his chili.   

During the short distance from Steve’s to Pete’s I asked Pete what he was planning to make for the chili contest.  Pete told me he was going to buy some frozen Skyline chili from Meijers and cook it up with some pasta and cheese to make a Skyline famous “Three Way”.  Seems to me using a store bought chili is cheating, but Pete seemed to think it was perfectly acceptable.  He also told me he should have won last year if it wasn’t for someone who entered a cheese dip.  Pete tried to get the cheese dip disqualified without success and he ended up coming in second. 

Once we got to Pete’s I decided to tag along with Pete to Meijers while he shopped for his chili supplies.  While we were at Meijers the Goodyear place called Pete’s cell phone and told him his car was done.  It certainly didn’t take 3 or 4 hours as they estimated.  It was only two hours at the most.   

We stopped at Penn Station at some point this day for lunch.  I think it might have been on the way to Meijers.  We each had one of Penn Stations delicious subs which always hit the spot of me.  I drank a lemon aid with my lunch.  Bob gave up drinking pop a few weeks ago and Pete has recently cut way back on his pop consumption, almost to the point of quitting.  With these two guys no longer drinking pop I figured I might at well join them as well.  As of this day it has been almost a month since I drank a pop.  The hardest pop to give up I is the one 12 once can of diet coke I traditionally dink with my lunch at work.  I am now drinking a lot more water which I figure is better for me anyhow. 

On the way home we stopped by and Pete picked up the car and I drove the other one to Pete’s house.  After we dropped off one car Pete gave me a ride to my house ending this adventure. 

Following are the statistics from this hike, I estimate we went hike right around 4.0 miles at a nice leisurely pace of approximately 3.3 mph.
David Lindquist