I'm no Briguy
I'm tired of hearing that John Walton's hobby "claimed his life." If anything didn't the hobby "claim his death?" Is this anything like claiming a coat? When we're born we get a little ticket with a number on it and when the affair is over we walk over to the life-check clerk, hand him the ticket and then die except in those rare cases where the clerk can't find our life and then it's all "You better find my life or I'm calling the manager," and the clerk has that bewildered look that says the life was right here and I don't get paid enough for this. Then somebody else comes up and the clerk grabs her ticket just to avoid the angry guy with the "temporarily misplaced" life but when he comes back with her life the guy screams, "HEY. That's mine!"

And dies.

Actually, I don't understand how an activity can claim anything.

Do you smell that?
It's not a fire because it isn't big enough, but it burns somewhere deep inside of me. It might be indigestion, but I haven't had anything spicy lately. It's tiny lumps of charcoal on a grill that you'd assumed was out, but if I can just keep fanning the coals and maybe find some lighter fluid, I think I can light a fire again. And watch it Burn. BURN. BURN!

This is what happens when my body starts to recover...

Something terrible, something wonderful

The Bad-
I am terrified of the online music store. Or I am terrified of myself when thousands of songs are just a click away. I bought two tonight and I almost had to slap my own hand or I would have ended up with some Spice Girls, a little Jessica Simpson, some Beatles I already have, and who knows what else. It's just button-pushing, money won't change hands for a month, which we all know practically means money doesn't change hands. It's FREE! It's no wonder credit debt is rampant. Online music is a dangerous thing...

The Good-
The digital camera has lead to an interesting new way to express myself (and isn't that what we're all after? No really, I'm asking.) I spent an hour or so Sunday, just wandering around town looking in a whole different way. I shot about 60 photos, with the vast majority either having the local theater, kids playing in a fountain, or bars (the metal kind, I'm not sure what that says.) Then using my expensive desk toy, I made a slideshow. Tonight's addition of the Fleetwood Mac song "Silver Springs" to my iPhoto slideshow of the town by nearly the same name (thanks to Kim for being so Stevie Nicks savvy) means that my slideshow is now nearly nostalgic* enough to kill you, or at least seriously bruise you.

*The Ugly (truth)-
It has come to my attention that the addition of music (most any music) tends to make pictures a whole lot more meaningful. The pictures I took Sunday (that was yesterday) set to music, now take on so much meaning that it almost brings a tear to my eye to remember the town the way it used to be. I long for those days.

I suspect this same effect contributes mightily to my ability to fall in love with most any leading lady thrown onscreen.

Looking to make it- just barely
I set a new PR, that's personal record, today. I figured I needed one more before I close out el 26. Today I ran the slowest timed 5k of my life. The silver lining, other than not repeating yesterday and the very fact that I was able to run at all based on recent injury history, was that it was still a race. I was still chasing a guy in red shorts that I could never catch and I was still being chased by a guy in blue shorts that I desperately wanted to beat. So despite the side stitch, and despite the hilly course, and despite the humidity, and despite the slower pace, I was still in a battle for who knew what place.

My desire to not be passed tends to be greater than my desire to pass. The poor guy behind me must have sensed my demise at least 3 times in the last mile and every time as his footsteps got closer and his breathing started to creep up on me, I managed to dig down and put some distance between us. To his credit, up to the end I wasn't able to really put him away, and I suppose to my credit, he never did get me. Then again, I never got red shorts either.

So if you're scoring at home, I ran a 19:31. We'll be looking for that to drop during this next year.

Next race: A Midsummer night's mile- That'll be the first mile race since oh, '01? Should be interesting. I'll keep you posted.

it rains, it pours
Vomited on myself during a bike ride today, sort of a moderate speed spew. I continued on. Kind of sums up the day. Looking for a chunk-free tomorrow.

Let's go out to the movies
Tonight's pace was leisurely and leisurely was good. Blah-Filet, not so good. On the other hand, Batman Begins was quite good. Bale is Batman. It makes me want to forget all those previous Bat flicks. Also, I must say, you can call Tom Cruise a lot of things, but after seeing Katie on the big screen, I can't call him crazy. No sir.

As for the previews, there was all kinds of excitement. I almost let out a "Yee-Haw" when the General Lee was jumping on the big screen. Let it be known- I'm going to see The Dukes of Hazzard. I felt like a 6 year old kid every time that old orange Charger made an appearance. My ears and brain will hurt from the dialouge, but it's worth 9 dollars to see 01* jumping again (and .25 to see Jessica Simpson in a bikini.) Right from old infatuations to new ones, the preview for the upcoming Serenity** movie was also shown. It looks like all the crew got a haircut and style, but I have high hopes despite the cleancut look the movie will be even better than the failed Firefly TV show. Go see it, and maybe they'll bring back the show.

*(whoops I had said 00, but I was wrong. Some fan I turned out to be.)
**rather than Serendipity which starred John Cusack and that cute Brit, but wasn't very good after all.

Better than warm milk
I love perspective before bed.

My A-D-D existence
As I'm working on this blog post, I am also working on
1. burning a CD.
2. improving my pretentious digital slide show.
3. organizing iTunes
4. picking CDs to let my coworker borrow.

Interestingly enough, not one of these things is going particularly well, but these days that doesn't seem to stop me. I talk on the phone, surf the Internet, and listen to music at the same time. I listen to NPR and read the City Paper at the same time, sometimes while trying to make dinner. My universe is so splintered that it's hard to remember what I am doing, let alone what I want to do.

F9 may be the answer. I'm on a Mac and F9 gives me a global view of all my applications in miniature at once. If I press it, I'm forced to take a step back. I can look at all the applications I have open and decide which one to focus on. I picked the blog for the moment. I'll finish up here and it's back to CD burning.

Don't bother trying to keep up. I can't.

SPARE US: Dress it up and slap a full bar in the back
It's still a bowling alley. The pins may be neon. The blacklights may make white-shirts that trippy purplish-blue. The bar may stock more than beer. The kitchen may serve appetizers that include nachos rather than serving strictly nachos, but the alley- still for bowling. And the ugly shoes? Still ugly! Maybe the ugly shoes are the essence of bowling? The thought of rolling a ball and knocking over wooden pins with nice-looking shoes; crippling.

On the one hand, this should have been my perfect bar. One of the things I've never mastered is bar behavior.* The mixture of cocktails and conversation is a baffling one to me. Add in noise and women and basically I'm useless. Most of my trips to bars end up in a grumpy-that-was-pointless exit. A bar with a scorecard, a bar with a purpose, that should be right up my alley! I was too focused on getting my money's worth to really figure out if the place was my perfect bar. No easy task with the prices they charged.

The smelly orange and blue vinyl and plastic combinations that usually arch around an alley scorers table were replaced with very classy and comfortable chic couches. Pre-lane, not including the electronic scorecard, this place was a martini glass. Not in that clear vermouth with an enormous olive on a toothpick way, but in the sleek-lines, Frank-Sinatra-is-hiding-around-the-corner kind of way. The music, however, failed the Rat Pack. The alley opted instead for slow remixes of the classics. I refer of course to the classics like "Come on Eileen." There wasn't any smoke, which is a beautiful thing, but almost feels like cheating when I'm comparing bars.

As much as I want to disparage this trendy bowling alley in my county, I think I enjoyed myself. Even in defeat. There was one small detail that troubles me more than the money and more than the idea of bowling being the "it" scene. It's having to tell my children that I met their mother at a trendy bowling alley bar. NO. Not really. I can think of worse fates.

It's those little lane arrows. I have this same problem with my Extreme bowling and with proper support I'm thinking of starting a letter writing campaign. When my dad taught me how to bowl, he taught me to focus on the arrows instead of the pins. If the alleys turn out the lights, I CAN'T SEE THE ARROWS! They can make the pins glow. They can shoot spotlights all across the room. The lanes can have emergency plane lights directing me to the nearest strike and/or exit, but the little arrows are always neglected.

Alleys, that's a gutterball in my book. Light my arrows and put out the fire that burns in my soul.


*(It's fine with me if you decide NOT to list some of the other things I've never mastered.)

Paul, don't bother
Some things I want:
a fire escape balcony that sits quietly above the city, an ocean view, a lake view, mountains all around, 72 degree evenings, snow, to make new friends, to keep growing with the friends I have, adventure, peace and quiet, a good book, the top-secret back-of-the-package recipe for Anne's all-meal dessert bars, the stars, love, independence, to remember, to forget, to reach people when I need them, to listen to the voices, to have nights like this, a kid to play with, a nice slow kiss, independence, freedom, someone to tell me what to do just so I can rebel, the courage to just say, "Hi. My name is Dave." satisfaction, a shower, deodorant that doesn't fail, the end of the feeling that something is coming out of my nose when I'm talking, more courage, patience, this list to end.

A response from the body
Dear David,

You bastard. Do you think that's how things work? You give the orders and I follow them? Give me a little respect here. There are things I do that you don't even begin to conceive. Yea. So. Thanks. Think about that.

Maybe if you had started conceiving a while ago, you wouldn't be whining now. That's all you do is whine, isn't it? Do you have a clue of what I'm really capable of? No. You don't. You're so caught up in what you think. It's incredibly frustrating. Maybe if you actually put some decent food in me, maybe if you drank enough water, maybe if you would let me f***ing rest instead of staying up at all hours of the night with your incessant whining to the world. Oooh. I'm David. Feel sorry for me, because I'm not what I thought I'd be. OOH. I'm David. I don't have a girlfriend, but I'm soooo sensitive. la la la. Give it a rest. Nobody wants to hear it you pathetic whiner.

Seriously, where would you be without me? Would you have any self-confidence at all? What if I shut down your legs? What if I stopped letting you catch and throw a disc? You wouldn't know what to do with yourself. You'd be a little lost blob. So threaten me if you want. We're a team here and if you haven't figured that out by now, maybe you will the next time I holler about pain.

Don't you ever give me T-shirt slogans again. Disrespectful little ---.

Ugh.

-Body

A letter to my body
Dear body,

I understand that you are getting on in years and I appreciate that you still look so gosh durn good. BUT FOR PETE'S SAKE CAN YOU STOP WITH THE INJURIES!

I was swimming today. We're talking low-impact. We're talking water. We're talking swimming. And granted, I've been in a bit of mood lately what with another year 'bout to pass, pushing a little harder than I had been when it comes to sports, but SWIMMING. I injured myself swimming. Body, we've never had so many problems before. Are you trying to tell me something? If it's 'slow down' I wish you'd stop telling me that. I don't like hearing it. In fact, if you don't shape up soon, I'm going to have to resort to drastic measures. You thought that marathon was painful, let me tell you something body, that was just the beginning. Remember that old shirt with the saying, "What the mind can conceive, the body will achieve?"

Oh, you remember it.

Let's just say that if you don't get your act together, the mind is going to be conceiving of some pretty serious endurance tests.

I don't mean to come off threatening, here, but I'm threatening. I can google a triathlon faster than you can take breath.

Don't think I won't.

Get your act together so we can play some Ultimate or go take a nice brisk run, or get ready for some real pain.

Sincerely,
David

stuff not entirely related to sandwiches
The problem with having a friend named after a sandwich is that if the friend is a respectable kind of person, then I start to think the sandwich is a respectable kind of sandwich. It doesn't take long at all and I'm confusing my feelings for the sandwich with my feelings for the friend. So, if I've got a friend named "Crap Hoagie" and I really like him (despite his terribly unfortunate name), then when I'm out for a meal and I see "Crap Hoagie" on the menu, I think fondly, "I like Crap Hoagie, I think I'll order me some of that."

Don't you know it, the quality of the friend has nothing to do with the quality of the sandwich, but now I'm stuck with a bum lunch and it's all Crap Hoagie's fault. The next time I see Crap Hoagie I might glare at him most distastefully and he'll only be able to wonder why.

stuff not entirely related to American arrogance
My Morrocan coworker was telling me that she had never been to a hotel in the United States. I was trying to tell her that the hotels were probably not that different. She told me that it didn't matter. She wanted to be able to compare 4-star hotels so that when she was talking with her friends about why Americans are so arrogant she could say, "the conceriege works so much faster in an American hotel." I tried to tell her that I didn't think that was why Americans were arrogant. Then she went on to say that she had read about the phones in the airports. I didn't know what phones she was talking about. Finally after some back and forth she explained to me that she was talking about the phones in the airport at the kiosk for hotels. The ones where you didn't have to dial, you could just pick up and they would connect to the hotel. "See. We don't have phones like that. That's why Americans are arrogant."

I could only laugh. My arrogant laugh.

Don't get pithy with me, Mr.
The problem with getting all excited about life is that it makes going to bed at a reasonable hour so much more difficult.

Reminders from the weekend. It's ok to:
*drink 2 glasses of expensive mango juice.
*be afraid at the movies.
*give a retail bike store a second chance.
*wear sandals and pants.
*talk to strangers.
*sing duets with strangers or friends.
*let everyone laugh at you.
*drink a margarita.
*change tires.
*ride slowly.
*take the scenic route.
*finish the brownies.
*relax.
*go to bed late.
*sleep late.
*not play Ultimate.
*get your hands dirty.

It's not ok
for the weekend to be over.

Jolted awake by "There he is!"
I was reading my morning paper on my morning commute when I flipped open to the feature and had a seizure. It wasn't a real seizure, it was a Why-is-there-a-picture-of-Adrian-H.-peeking-out-over-a-computer-in-my-morning-paper? seizure. I knew the answer, chicagocrime.org, but I was still stunned to see him. Maybe because his hair looks lighter.

OR MAYBE BECAUSE HE WAS IN MY PAPER!

Fast foward some hours and I was asking Autumn if she had read a story I had enjoyed in yet another paper. I was stumbling over the headline, "Its headline was like 'white women in the news' or something."

"I wrote that headline," she replied.

"Oh. Then I guess you've read it."

What a day.

The need. The need for something to write about
I need to write a short 500 word story. It's got to have some imagery or something. If I do it real good, I'll get paid $2 per word. More than likely I won't, but it'll be good to write something. The thing is, as usual, I've got nothing. Give me a suggestion and I'll give you a dollar*.

*If I win.

OR

If you're feeling sorta feisty and writerly, you can go ahead and try and steal my G right out from under this blog by entering yo'self. Get the details. 'Course it wouldn't hurt anybody if you left me something to write about first. I just need something to get started, like three little words for example: Bongo, prairie, dance. You can use those if you want. 497 words to go.

You didn't lose it if they can't take it away
They say that records are made to be broken and I guess they must be right because this past weekend my record fell. "David 4:17.9" will no longer hang above the gymnasium doors. Very soon they will be replaced by Mike 4:17.2" It might seem like my 8 years of glory have come to a close. It might seem like I would shed a tear at such a loss, but it turns out that I'm prouder of that record now than I have been in years. That record motivated countless (or probably more like 8, but 8 of the countless variety) runners. Even though my name comes down, 4:17.9 will always be mine. I don't need a placard in a gym to know that was a special achievement. I'll always know that I've never run faster for 1600 meters.

All of this would have been a lot harder to say 6 years ago. And don't think I didn't take a look at my old track spikes to see if they might have another record run in them. I can't go back to high school, but I'm still theoritically in my prime. But then, you knew that by looking at me, didn't you?

Perspective is for sissies
You know what's tough?

Trying to figure out music genres for iTunes organization.

That's tough.

June 1, 2005
The beginning of something.
Or was it the end?
It was definitely somewhere in the middle.