The Planning of Adventure Week

Early in the school year we decided that Spring Break had to happen but we could not decide what to do.

Ryan wanted "SPRING BREAK" spring break, I wanted something we would never have the chance to do again, and Kasey just wanted to eventually be told what we were doing.

Spring Break discussions occurred passively throughout the first semester, but we never finalized anything. As friends booked cruises and updated Facebook statuses with countdowns to Acapulco, Cancun, and Puerto Wherever, we went sledding on baking pans. Fun was inevitable, so planning was meaningless.

In early February, with a rare stroke of genius Ryan decided we should try to go to all 11 Big Ten schools in 11 consecutive days. A cursory Google search seemed to say no one had ever attempted it. Intrigued, we started calling friends at various schools and planning out the 11 days. Then it snowed. Apparently planning a road trip to all the schools in your conference is an undertaking better left for the SEC and Big 12.

A week from the start of Spring Break, last night we decided to sit down and start planning. We were headed towards a redux of housing before Junior Year where Ryan's aspirations were crushed by our laziness and procrastination: two years later, he’s still looking for the other half of his room.

At about 8pm we sat down with computers and started looking; we did not plan to sleep until a trip was booked.

Ryan immediately started with Cancun and the MTV style spring break that has led to so many disowned children. Kasey declared he STILL wanted nothing to do with the process but was willing to cut a check, as long as we figured it out. Deal.

With Men's Aerials and Bob Costas’ banter blasting in the background we pecked away at our computers trying to find a deal or adventure. We explored all the options: domestic and international, all inclusive and totally exclusive, places with multi-star ratings and places without roofs.

Running out of ideas, we compiled a list of everywhere we would be willing to visit but that led nowhere. Nothing new, interesting, or exciting and unfortunately we couldn't find any info about time traveling phone booths or hot tubs.

After hours of yelling and debating, I started making concessions. Cancun was the play. I told Ryan in no uncertain terms that I was angry with the situation but we could do it.

If CNN had covered the event, they would have panned me for being a spineless leader who made too many concessions. My country would have hated me. No one would have understood that I was out of options; it was Cancun or nuclear war. Ryan would have been lauded as a demigod. He fought hard and won.

So we had an agreement in principle and only needed to work out logistics. Two hours later we had checked every combination of flights, hotels, and options and had a trip. Prices were slowly climbing as our incessant checking of flight and hotel prices made it seem like there was a sudden boom in interest. The algorithms were unhappy.

Finally though, we had it all planned, we were on the credit card page of the website, had found a price we were comfortable with and were ready to go. We called Kasey for confirmation.

Kasey's apathy towards the planning process was now replaced with a response of "I have to check if I can go." Thanks for the heads up Kase.

Six hours of work were put on hold until the morning so Kasey could check with his handlers if he could A) have his Passport sent quickly and B) leave the country. He told us he would know by 9 am. We were doubtful.

Either way we figured no one else in the world was booking last second Spring Break trips to Cancun, so the prices and availability couldn't move that much.

This morning, Ryan and I had a meeting at 10:30 for CWIC Technologies. When we first met up, a giddy Ryan proclaimed he had found a newer, better version of the trip to Cancun which now ran from Tuesday to Tuesday--actual schedules be damned.

We went for breakfast after the meeting and still had no word from Kasey, so we decided he was useless and dead to us. When the check came we started discussing an alternate road trip and I sketched the United States on the back of the bill. Ryan started putting inappropriately located dots on it which we hoped would correspond with cities.

Planning everything on a Blackberry and an iPod Touch seemed too daunting so we got Ryan's computer and headed to a North Campus Panera (our own little Camp David meets Bretton Woods).

Up came Google Maps and we started picking cities based solely on their ability to fall into a giant loop and what came up when we googled the attractions in a given place. Some places were left off, some sleepers made the list, but after another 2 hours, we both walked out happy with our 7 city, 9 night journey.

All we've told Kasey is to pack for every kind of weather and be ready this Friday afternoon.

Slowly, we're giving him "Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?" style clues (He knows the first stop is Indianapolis, the last is Cincinnati, we may meet NBA Cheerleaders in one city, and that the whole trip is 2,273 miles) as he sits here yelling out different city names and playing on Google Maps to create a trip he deems acceptable while insulting half the state's in the country.

We're still considering blindfolding and gagging him until we get to the various Welcome Centers.

C