65 miles into a century. I've got the hills and headwinds behind me and am looking forward to almost 35 miles of relatively flat riding with a tailwind to burn on home. It's been raining for most of the ride, but it's warm so I don't care.

POW....SSSSSssssssssss. Rear blowout. It's raining so I'm not going to mess with a patch. I can't find anything in the tire, so I put in my spare tube and pump it up. I put the wheel on the bike and POW.....SSSSSSssssssssss. There goes my spare tube.

Oh, look! The side wall on my brand new Panaracer T-serv 700x25 tire has a hole in it. That's bad.

I try to patch the original tube, no friggin way, the hole is too big. Plus it's raining and I can't get a patch to stick anyways. Well golly, I'm stuck. Didn't bring my cell, doesn't matter since I'm new to area and hardly know anyone. The other half is working a 12 hour shift at an understaffed hospital, no way I'm calling her. Hmmm.

So I try to stuff my tire full of leaves and grass just so maybe it'll roll slow. No friggin way, I don't know where I read that, but don't try it, it doesn't work. Maybe for mile or so, but dam sure not for no 35 miles.

Finally a guy stops with a pickup. We drive down the road to his house, try to patch the tire several more times in his garage, no go.

Happy ending, the guy actually drove me home for a twenty since he didn't have much going on today. First time in 20 years and many thousands of miles I've actually had to accept a ride.

So here I sit, having showered and eaten and just ordered a new Gatorskin.

And of course, the rain has now stopped.