pretty much sums up the week...

no running.

no rhythm.
no end of work.
no sleep.
no patience.
no joy.

i do have kumquats tho. that somewhat eases the slings & arrows of outrageous fucktardery. so does slayer.

another hard lesson at PetSmart

got a call from nina yesterday afternoon.

- finn, i've got petey tonight and he wants to go to PetSmart. i need reinforcements.

last time nina took her nephew to the pet store, he decided all the animals wanted to be free. that day petey learned that setting a hamster free isn't necessarily irrevocable whereas “freeing” a fish kinda is. he also learned that "oh, bitch" may be an acceptable expression of regret at home but not with strangers. i met petey and neens at her house.

- hey petey - i said as we climbed into nina's mustang – what animals do you want to see today?
- fish! he shouted gleefully. from the driver's seat neens raised an eyebrow at me.

when we got to petsmart, petey made a beeline for the fishtanks at the back of the store but i was right on his tail. i haven't lost much in the way of racing fitness, see: i can still lay the smack on senior citizens and 4-year-olds. when nina arrived petey was knocking off fish by color.

- blue blue yellow blue ORANGE! orange like nemo!

petey's attention shifted to a school of fish in a tank further down the wall. a man elegantly dressed in traditional african garb watched the same darkly shifting shapes with a little boy in a donovan mcnabb jersey. i wondered which was more proud of his sartorial heritage.

- look aunt neeny! - bursting with triumph, petey's voice seemed to carry across the entire store – BLACKS!

i cringed and made myself eminently useful by trying to shrink into a purina display. Doc Kenya turned away from the tank and scowled at us. little donovan looked at petey with frank curiosity.

- yes petey – nina's calm voice smoothed over the charged silence – those are black angelfish. aren't they pretty.
- want to be FREE - petey stated. the man glowered.
- sweetie, they're just fine the way they are.
petey sighed deeply and served up his newest expression d'jour:
- jesus christ.

Doc grabbed the boy's hand and hustled him away. neither of us had the will to remonstrate with petey.

when we left the store 20min later Doc and wee donovan were standing in checkout.

- he was talking about the FISH – nina hissed as we swept by but the man turned away.

NIN is rehearsing

here's NIN rehearsing 1,000,000.
toight. like tiger. i can almost forgive the Lack of Lohner.

Lights in the Sky tour kicks off in a month. huzzah.


UPDATE:
and here's Letting You. josh freese is a madman on the high hat.

UPDATE-2TEH-UPDATE:
saving the best for last: echoplex. how can you NOT like nine inch nails after suchasthis.

that bus with your name on it

this story about 3 local cyclists arrived in my inbox this morning. names have been changed.

it's reason to:
1) hug your friends
2) throw over your fears and strike up a conversation with that person you think you've no business approaching
3) drink that bottle of rioja you've been saving for the "right" time
4) if something's making you unhappy, change it

Melanie, Les and I were heading south when we were hit. Melanie and Les were planning on doing a hundred miles, while I was aiming to be back around 10. Because those guys were doing a lot more than me, I told Les I would pull along at a moderate pace.

I was in the front with Les and Melanie single file behind me (not sure who was directly behind me). As is my wont -- and much to the dismay of many in this group -- I was far to the right. I was approaching the intersection, past the entrance to the picnic park, along the guard rail section of the road, when I noticed a mini van coming from the opposite direction had crossed the double yellow line aiming for us. What happened next and what went though my head probably took less than a second. My first thought was that the driver would correct this, as I had seen this before. Instinctively, I moved even closer to the right, even though I was almost on the white line as it was, and there was precious little room left. I then noticed that the driver was not taking any corrective action. My second thought was that the driver was intentionally aiming for us, that is, playing chicken.

Contemporaneously with my second thought, or perhaps, milliseconds later, he hit me. At this point I was abreast of the rear of the van. I suspect that my left arm, which is fairly swollen but not cut, hit the very back of the van. I did not go down. The next thing I heard was the driver slamming into Melanie and Les. Ultimately, his vehicle continued along the guard rail, across the entrance to the picnic park and came to rest - disabled - on the other side of the picnic park entrance. I stopped and while still on the bike turned my head back. Both Melanie and Les had been launched over the guard rail and were lying motionless down the embankment perhaps 20 to 30 feet from the road and 10 or more feet below the surface of the road. I dismounted, turned and began to run backwards as fast as I could. The severity of this accident hit me like thunder and lightning: Seeing them at the bottom of the embankment that far away from where they had been, I knew was severe; registering the severity and calling 911 took a few seconds. I stopped got my phone out of the seat bag and called 911 while coming to a good point to jump over the guard rail and down the embankment.

At some point, I believe perhaps before I jumped the guard rail I became cognizant of Melanie's painful cries. I assumed Les, still motionless, was dead. There were some people either already with Melanie or running toward her. I knew I had to get to Les and give him CPR as I saw no one headed in his direction, and as I went toward him I yelled at the people with Melanie to give her CPR if she needed it. When I got to Les, I discovered he was breathing and amazingly did not appear to be in shock. His eyes were fluttering and I truly did not believe he was going to make it. At about this same time, while talking to him and attempting to keep eye contact and keep him alert, I noticed gaping holes in his head and thigh that were bleeding profusely. My next thought was that he would bleed to death. The head wound looked to me like it went through the skull. At this point, people began popping out of no where and I was handed some t-shirts to put pressure on his wounds. One of these persons was an EMT and Nurse who is a full time employee at the picnic park. He was on the scene quickly. He and the other EMTs that attended to Melanie and Les were absolutely professional. Doing their job without hesitation; calm, cool and collected. I wanted to go over to Melanie, so I asked someone near by to take over the keeping-pressure-on-the-wound duty and without blinking an eye whoever it was did so. I went over to Melanie who was clearly in shock and a great deal of pain. Her only visual external injury was a gaping leg wound; surprisingly it was not bleeding like Les's, but someone had pressure on it. At first, she did not recognize me, but then muttered my name, which gave me some comfort. The EMTs were arriving by this time and shortly thereafter two separate helicopters. I don't know how long it took before both Melanie and Les were airborne, but it seemed like a long time.

There are few accidents that one can look back on and come to the conclusion that absolutely nothing could have been done differently to avoid it or mitigate its consequences. This is one of those few. Les and Melanie were sitting ducks. They were riding on the right side of the road with a guard rail to their right. They weren't in the middle of the road; they weren't on the wrong side of the road; they didn't run a stop sign or red light. They were obeying all traffic laws. They simply had no escape route for a driver so blatantly negligent. Even if their last thought before being run down was to pull to the left, I doubt that would have helped. Once the mini van hit the guard rail, it was guided by the rail to its resting point and, in the process, taking anything in its path, i.e., the south bound lane, with it.

I, like some of you, have been riding these roads on and off for 30-35 years. I have never had a car come this close to me before or been involved in an accident like this. Although I don't believe that this is less likely or more likely to happen in the future, one thing is for sure: The roads we ride are far more crowded every day and drivers have far more distractions such as cell phones, hand held devices, etc., which do in-fact, in both cases, increase the probability of these types of accidents. That was the case here as the young, inexperienced 19 year-old driver told me as I yelled at him "What the f__K were you doing?" He said he was not paying attention as he was attempting to pickup a dropped bottle in his car. It is clear that he did not have his eyes on the road as he took no evasive maneuvers. The arc of the path his van took never altered.

this is my bone stimulator...

this is my bone stimulator,
this is my gun,
this is for healing,
this is for fun.

this is my bone stimulator. it uses ultrasound pulses to heal fresh and established breaks, and purportedly it decreases by 38% the time it takes to heal a stress fracture. 20 minutes a day will do it – the rep told me then held up a hand to stop the question she knew was on deck – and you can do it twice a day, but there's no evidence to show increased benefit.

when it's working, you feel only the faintest vibratory tremor. it's not like galvanic stim where you crank the dial up to a pain threshold you think you can justbarely endure and spend the next 20min trying to not pee yourself.

thanks to PPO insurance coverage and a pro-athlete podiatrist who knows how to play the script game, the bone stimulator is mine for keepsies, and i see no reason why i shouldn't share my largesse with those who also might benefit. it is for that reason that i am proposing Bone Stimulator Parties @Chez Finn. so come all ye morsels sufferers: ye lafs with yer plantar fasciitis, ye jacks with yer fockered knees, ye Fs with your femoral stress fractures.

for such fit people, we're a pathetic bunch. who thought running and cycling could be so hazardous?? but the bone stimulator might just turn things around.

now *this* is some handstanding

you know, the more i look at iPimp's xray below, the better my foot feels. i think it is like the picture of dorian gray. i hope it's making you feel better too.

nice crack, asshat

well guess who went and ran when they shouldn't have and turned a 3rd metatarsal stress fracture into a full-bore break:

NOT ME!!! that's my teammate iPimp's crack. it's doubly ironic, like rain on your wedding day AND your first communion, that we should suffer the same injury in the same foot, verily on the same bone. only iPimp REALLY fucked his ship up and now he's Booted 24-7 and and can't ride, not even the rollers, and can't do the EFX or elliptical (read: no excuse to check out jack on the rowing machine or doing pushups orSTOP the train,kay). he can, however, pool-run, so i may soon have company for my misery.

- what did you DO? - i emailed iPimp.
- Well, I had a stress fracture for a while, and thought it was better... so ran in a local du... got 3rd and after that... went to Vegas... by the time the plane landed my foot was so huge I couldn't get my shoe on... did you know they sell crutches at 11pm on a Saturday night on the Vegas strip? LOL. I was 4mm away from surgery... I asked the Foot Dr (Tell me, why are they always so small? Like hardly 5'5') I asked when can I start even the smallest bit of training, he said anything with the legs would be at least 4-5 weeks....

lesson lock stock & barrel-delivered. there will be NO runninks on the tready for me for at least another week.

but, all is not gloom & doom according to iPimp:
Das Boot can fit a flask, and an amazingly huge boot-knife.

reason # 1010101 why i love mac

it's for this simple line of code:
rsync -Cavz --delete ./Volumes/backup/music

enter that in Terminal from a directory you wish to back up (that folder with your 250G of toonz perhaps), and the hamsters behind the scene will sync (not just brute overwrite) the second directory with the first, spitting out a verbose output so you know exactly what's going on.

next step is figuring out a chron job to run that sync whenever both drives are connected.

- you're such a loser - laf said when i confessed i'd spent my friday night with a double-shot of jameson and 2 unix manuals - it's no wonder you're alone. but there was fondness in his voice.

reason # 939393 why i love mac

yesterday morning i get on the bike early, before the heat index reaches triple digits, and end up in Big Sky Country. out there amongst the horse farms it occurs to me i might be near dr. fellows' house. i could stop by and say hello and it isn't inconceivable that i could be invited in for breakfast... or at least a bloody mary.

only, i've never actually been to dr. fellows' house and at that mo' i'm a little dim as to exactly where i am on the planet. i THINK i am in PA but amn't sure.

so i:

1. stop. pull iScrotum from ziplock bag in soggy jersey pocket.
2. scroll to 'Bruce Fellows' in Contacts
3. click on address. GoogleMaps situates location on map.
   
4. click on pin; GM prompts include “directions to here” with default “start” set to “current location.”
5. click “route”; iPhone triangulates my location and passes it to GM, which informs me i'm 23.6mi away, and offers directions should i be interested in riding for another 3 hours (am not).
   

this learning took about 20sec. fast, intuitive, and the way *i* think. oh steve, does it get any better? DOES it?

iWant

subtle, eh?

today's earlingmorny progressed much like yesterday's only with -1 mile and +2 smiles. foot still quiescent; hooray!! dunno tho; is a motley crue sticker on your red pickup a deal-breaker?

happy friday. and here's a reason to celebrate (FMC look away):
New Hints that Red Wine May Slow Aging (free NYT reg. required)

Lights in the Sky

while we're (okay i'm) on dudes with buzzcuts, you can download more free stuff at nin.com: samples from bands opening for the upcoming tour plus graphics & wallpapers for those of you who're total tools (okay me).

reason #3430313 why i love mac:

** we have fixed the download to accommodate those of you living in the 80s running Windows! XOXO

thursday earling morny at the YMCA

went down like this
eats
1 doubleshot latte
handful of jelly beans
NO advil!!!
20 min on EFX
Canterbury Tales on ipod
jackshep rowing.
eep
4 miles on treadmill
Tool on ipod
1 mi ez
2 miles @7:19
lovely to open up (a little).
window reflecting
jack's 4 sets of pullups.
nearly fall off tready.
finished w/6x30sec @6:20ish
repercussions
so far just
happiness.

[note: pic is Not My Fault. must have happened when i was cuing up the Knight's Tale on the iScrotum. oopsie.]

bad news & good, from dr foot

dr foot proactively quashed all my protests and denials by kicking off yesterday's appointment with a display of my MRI results. kinda hard to deny in black & white. that's the 3rd metatarsal, the bone that runs from the middle toe to the ankle.



flanked by his technician and a doctor-in-training, dr foot put me up on the table to assess the damage. his fingers poked into soft tissue crevices, tested my peroneal strength and then pressed along the bone where the MRI indicated the fracture. tech and junior leaned in. there was a collective holding of breaths. dr foot looked at me questioningly.
- hurt?
- it's a little sore. but it's sore there on my other foot too.
- it's a deep fracture - dr foot noted. i might not be able to reach it with my fingers.
he hummed softly to himself while rummaging in his pocket. i winced when the tuning fork emerged. he struck it on the side of the table and i started doing kegel exercises. 3 pairs of eyes stared at my face while the fork touched down. i didn't have to say a word.
- no pain on the fourth metatarsal - he observed.
my upper lip twitched when he moved the fork. oh jesusfuck.
- and third...
nothing. no jolt, no jism of pain. the tech looked dumbfounded. dr foot completed some desultory poking and then cleared me for "training as tolerable": pref 2 more weeks of rest, and then slow return to mileage with a bone stimulator unit thrown in.
- so i can run on a stress fracture?? and it'll still heal?
- yep, as long as you don't do anything stupid. the bone stimulator will help, of course.
- what causes a stress fracture in that area?
- tight calves, tight shoes and broken-down orthotics. we'll make some minor tweaks to your orthotics today, but nothing major until your season's done in october... he sailed out the exam room with junior and his cheerful voice faded down the hallway - or earlier if you wrack yourself!

the tech gathered my files, frowning as she pulled the MRI printout off the viewer.
- i can't believe you don't feel more pain when it's that broke.

laf wasn't surprised.
- you have a high pain threshold. kel ran on her stress fracture 'til her bone was mush. so are you doing the half-ironman sunday?
- hell no!!
- good girl.

so look out grandpa-on-his-way-to-the-library. i'll be gunning for you this weekend.

Sightings

I kept seeing him on my ride this evening, maybe because it was getting late and the dropping sun played tricks on me. I'd see his long shadow on the road as he pulled up on me, but it was just a car. I'd see shifting movement over my left shoulder but the road was clear. The days are getting warmer and longer and I know the Snakeman is playing somewhere tonight. Like Betsy's mom said.

Betsy and I were sitting high up in the pine tree next to her building. From there you could see into Mrs. Dwyer's living room. That was how we figured out who was taking Betsy's mom's Glamour magazines. When the mailman left magazines on the table in the hall, Mrs. Dwyer would take the ones she wanted upstairs and read them while she ate DingDongs at the dining room table. After a couple days she would put them back on the table but the pages wouldn't be stiff anymore and in the spine would be DingDong crumbs.

That day we were watching Mrs. Dwyer and carving. Carving was when you took a piece of the broken sidewalk and sliced through the thick bark of the pine tree. If you cut deeper and deeper you could smell something sharp living inside of the tree. This was Betsy's idea. I felt bad about cutting into something alive, but she said the trees would last longer than us and this was our way of making something "enduring." We were carving and talking and watching Mrs. Dwyer eat DingDongs when suddenly she got out of her chair and came toward the window. I went down the tree as fast as I could. When I got to the bottom my hands were sticky and raw. Betsy was waiting for me. She yanked me under a bush.

- Do you think she saw us? Do you? Huh? - I was so scared I had to go to the bathroom. If my mom found out I was spying on Mrs. Dwyer she would kill me.
- Dingy old Mrs. Dwyer couldn't see us.
- Are you sure? She looked mad. Hey, what did you do to your leg?
There was a long scratch on the inside of Betsy's leg. From under her cut-offs there was blood coming out. She wiped at it a little.
- Hit something on the way down, I guess. Dingy Dwyer. Let's go to storage and see if there's anything new. But first – she stopped – we have to go get Captain Kirk.
- Will your mom let us?
- She better. He's MY guinea pig.

When we walked into the living room Betsy's mom was watching General Hospital. I could see the top of her head over the rocking chair. She went back and forth.
- Mom – Betsy said from the doorway – I need Captain Kirk.
The chair kept moving and there wasn't any answer. Betsy walked into the room. I stayed at the door. Betsy's mom gave me the heebiejeebies. Sometimes she would give you cookies and ask whether Mrs. Stahl was still giving you too much homework, and sometimes she didn't say a word and rocked away like a creepy puppet. You never knew which Mrs. Billings you would find when you walked in. How could Bets have such a cool dad and a weirdo mom?
- Mom – she got between the chair and the TV - I need Captain Kirk. Finn wants to see him. She bent down and picked up the guinea pig. Thanks. He'll be back in a little while.
The rocking chair shook a little and then it stopped. I couldn't see the top of Betsy's mom's head anymore. I could hear her voice though. It sounded like the Tin Man, squeaky and dry.
- What's that? - a hand lashed out at Betsy's leg and one finger stabbed at the smear of blood under her shorts. Did HE do that? Did he? We had a deal and he promised. He PROMISED.
The hand grabbed Betsy's arm. She had to hold on tight to Captain Kirk with the other.
- Did he? Do that?

Betsy pulled away.
- I was playing dodgeball. I got scratched.
- Are you telling the truth?
I saw the top of her head again and it was turning around. I wanted to run away but I wanted to help Betsy and Captain Kirk too.
- You. Is she telling the truth?
I wished Betsy hadn't lied. What was so bad about being in a tree? I couldn't answer, I was so nervous. Betsy's mom made a noise that sounded like a growl and then her voice got softer.
- It was him wasn't it. You can tell me.
I was confused and scared. I didn't want to lie. I was confused.
- It was who?
Betsy's head dropped. Her mom hissed.
- It was the Snakeman. We made a deal but he was always weak when it gets warmer. And you – she pulled hard on Betsy's arm. Captain Kirk squealed. Oh I know what you are.
Betsy stared at her mom and then pulled free.
- We'll be back by 6:30 .

Bets closed the front door behind us.

- Maybe the 10-speeds will be unlocked again today - she said, cradling Captain Kirk in one hand and rubbing her leg with the other. We walked down the steps to the basement.

Pyramid in Your Pants

friday's Happiness lasted approx 8 hours, or until dr foot called to say my x-ray and MRI reveal a stress fracture. before confining me to Das Boot for 4-6weeks he wants to see me tomorrow so he can confirm. know how you confirm a stress fracture? (you learn a lot when you are injured.) you ring a standard-issue tuning fork and apply it to the bone-in-question.
- if there's a fracture, you'll light up like a christmas tree! - dr foot tittered - and when i press down on it with my finger you might pass out.
- you sound like a great date - i said sullenly.

it's JUNE motherfucker. i've raced TWICE this season, NO victories, when this time last year i had about 8 races under my belt and i think i was winning things. i am frustrated and chafing and so full of testosterone i keep checking to see if i've grown a penis but nothing yet. yesterday it was so bad that even though i should have been riding easy, i chased down a skinny old man riding his cruiser bike down valley road. i'm sure grandpa was really impressed and after he got to the library and unpacked his panniers i bet he told the people behind the Returns desk how he got passed on his way there by a girl (i think it was a girl). yes i'm sure that's how it went down.

oh penisshitfuckcunt. i need to not have a stress fracture.