The Raven and the Writing Desk: May 2011

~Ryan was asked to host/create an "Amazing Race" for his cousin Taylor's 19th birthday~

~This year we decided to have a $20 entry fee for each person to make it more interesting.

Half went to covering the cost of the supplies and half went to the winning team~

~There were four teams that participated.

Each team had to come up with names and pay homage to their favorite Amazing Race Team~

~I told my Mother in law that we should dye her hair Pink

and I would go back to black and she could push me around in a cart. She laughed and said it should be the other way around~

This is a stick up!

~We had:

the Hipsters

the Losers

the Late Comers

and the Winners

(which was renamed by the Host as the Cowgirls)~

The starting line

~Phil, formally known as Ryan, gave us our rules and tips for the race~

~Our first challenge was to solve a word puzzle:

each team had a bag of chips, and to get the next clue we had to eat the whole bag and at the same time, be careful not eat the little chips with words written on them~

~Once we knew what the chips said we had to tell Ryan:

It was Professor Plum with the Pipe in the Study~

Jaimie and I figure that your not all in unless your willing to eat a little dirt or Grass.....

~Our Team was the third team to get the clue and everyone was sitting in their cars trying to figure it out. We decided to just drive away like we knew what it was just to psych out the other teams~

~The next clue was:

"Glaze at Nine;" it was an anagram for Annie L Gaetz

(which is an elementary school not far from our starting point)

At the school were our instructions, which were to go to Blockbuster and find the movie that has the quote

"no one puts baby in the corner"

Still not seeing any other teams we hit the Blockbuster.

We had to find the movie Dirty Dancing, take it up to the Counter

and the worker gave us the next clue~

~The Clue was : 7 15 20 15 3 8 1 16 20 5 18 19 6 9 14 4 18 25 1 14~

~Once solved was: Go to Chapters, Find Ryan~

Still no team in sight. Now we are starting to think this will be a cake walk.

~We get to Chapters at 3:30 on a Saturday (So it is Busy).

Find Ryan hiding in the kids section. He hands us a book and tells us to buy it. After we did he handed us a little orange key and tells us to keep the book~

~As we go to leave Chapters we see the Late Comers had finally caught up to us~

Now the Race has begun........

~The Orange Key was a key that the City uses for the public pool lockers.

Problem is, there are 3 pools in town.

We then stop to flip through the book to see if there was a clue as to which pool.

Other then some Highlighted numbers we were on our own~

~After a quick discussion we decided to take our chances on going to the Collicutt Center;

Only because the number on the key was 10,

and they have little lockers just outside of the change rooms~

On our way there we realized we were now following........

Team "Late Comers"

~Our Team decided that we would park in the ten minute drop off parking and Jaimie and I would go in. We are now neck and neck with the Late Comers, which then became a foot race~

(OH! Did I mention: that the Cowgirls team was myself at 30yrs, My sister in law Jaimie at 33yrs and my mother in law Bonnie at 55 and the Late comers was Taylor 19yrs, Mike and Mike who I believe are 18 or 19yrs and Kass who is 15)

So I will mention again this was down to a foot race. We get to the front counter and one of the workers from behind the counter says "your here for the amazing race???"

The 6 of us say yes and get bussed through the gate off to the lockers for our next clue:

"You cross this bridge if you run the Dawe Run."

(By the way I am proud to say I was the first to the lockers! )

~At this time we find out from Ryan that the clue is not at the bridge

due to him running out of time to set it up. (one man operation you know.)

We were then told it was in the parking lot at the end of the Dawe Run.

The whole way down to Bower Ponds we were either following the other team or being followed by them~

The clue was hidden behind a sign and read:

From this water park you can see the "Golden Arches" Ba da da da da

~Off to the Splash park across from the McDonald's we go.

Once there I am out of the car before Jaimie can even stop it. After searching the Park with the other team I spot Ryan over at the Parking lot of the McDonald's~

Unfortunately: the plan at the Splash park (if it would have had water) would have been to fish our next clue (sealed in a bag) out from under the water. The clue was a challenge, and it too was affected by the lack of water. We were supposed to get a bottle cap out of a water jug, without touching the jug or the cap. The answer was to use water~

~Then Ryan thought we could use the bathroom at McDonald's to get water, but it was closed for Renovations~

I look at my Husband lovingly and said .......well stated - ok

Really it was more in a voice of panic....

"Honey, ......... everything is falling apart on you just give us the next clue........."

at this point we still have not seen the Hipsters or the Losers.

~Finally: Ryan tells us the next clue and we are off to 176 Lamont Close (Bonnie's house)~

On the way there we are cracking up cause of what I said to Ryan

and that we were trying to be sneaky to throw off the other team by

turning at the last min and taking some side roads.

Whom by the way passed us when we were sitting at a Red Light

and were visibly ahead of us. The plan really didn't work.

At this point there was a lot of

Laughter, as we yelled out "we have the worst taxi driver" - "muy rápido - we are in a race for $25"~

At Bonnie's I told Jaimie just to slow down enough and i would just "tuck and roll" out of the car to the mailbox~

Clue 7:

"Mickey is not only the name of a very popular Mouse.

Mickey is also Red Deer's Official mascot. There is a Ghost statue commemorating Mickey in Red Deer. The story on the plaque has your next clue."

Off to Coronation Park; The story is about a little girl and a beaver and the plaque referred to 2 locations: one was waskasoo creek, which is where we were at; and two was Kerry Wood, so off to the Nature Center we go~

Still Neck and Neck:

At Kerry Wood the clue was inside, hanging above the caves, and it read :

"When I was a kid my favorite piece of equipment was the witches hat."

This truly was the best type of merry Go Round EVER. but like everything out there it was

'Too Dangerous' and was removed~

~As I go to leave the building i was brutally tackled to the floor by the other team~

My war wound.......if you can see it.

Okay..... I am sure it was an accident and I really wasn't brutally attacked per se, but I have my doubts.........~

Ryan was waiting for us at Rotary Park with our next challenge:

~Only one team could do it at a time~

There was two buckets.

One was 5g the other was 3g

we had to get exactly 4g into the 5g bucket.

What we figured out, was that you had to do this by filling up the 5g pail with water, then pour it in to the 3g till it is full.

So you would have 2g of water left in the 5g bucket

Empty the 3g bucket and pour the 2g of water from the 5g bucket into the 3g bucket - this leaves 2g of water in the 3g bucket, and 1g of empty space

Fill the 5g bucket again

then, fill the 1g of empty space in the 3g bucket, leaving exactly 4g in the 5g bucket.

I think I am still confused on that one......~

~I was very thankful that Jaimie decided to run after parking the car and pass

"Team Late Comers"

so we could go first. It gave us a bit of a head start on the other teams~

Clue 8:

"This park is at the end of the only road that leads to it, and you have already been on that road before."

~This caused a bit of a debate.... cause there were 2 parks in two different locations.

And going to the wrong place would mean that there would be no way to catch up to the other teams.

We took our chances and headed to McKenzie Trails~

AND WE WERE RIGHT!~

The Clue was another Anagram:

"Listen can be rearranged to form what word?

Text Ryan the solution."

The solution was "Silent" - which we sent via text - and the reply was:

"Douglas Cardinal"

Douglas was the famous architect that created St.Mary's church~

This was the first time I was actually aware of how I looked and what I was doing.

As I was searching for the next clue a wedding was coming out of the Church.

Located at the back of the church grounds was the words BMX written in chalk~

this either meant the Freestyle bike park or the BMX race track

Since the Freestyle park was on the way to the BMX track and there were no other teams in sight we decided to hit both just to be safe~

Over these last few Clues there was again, Lots of Laughter, Slamming of the breaks,

Jokes about the post interview comments........

"Well if Jaimie had listened to me and went straight......."

"If Shauna hadn't convinced us to go to McKenzie Trails when it was great chief..."

"You could have made that light. But that would be when an accident would happen and you know how much time a hospital trip would take, and We would lose our Lead."

Freestyle park was not where we were to go so off to the BMX track~

That was where we found Ryan's Car but - no Ryan!

We also found some blocks of wood with locks on them and they were labeled with Team Names.

This was where we found out our name had been changed to Cowgirls~