Pants

Ambient noise.
Background sounds.
Unheard mostly. The soundtrack of life.
Every place has its own flavor of noise, its own potpourri of sound. Stay there long enough and you wont even hear it anymore. Every Gym has its own. They all have things in common. The clank of weights, the whir of machines, the low drone of earphones playing muscle pumping metal directly into the brain stem. All have a common effluvium of distraction.

It can depend on the time of day.
The early morning is the whir and mumble of the before work crowd.
Morning to new afternoon is the high chirping of mommies and wives escaping the children and house for a while.
Lunch to evening is a businesslike clank of men who refuse to give in to the specter of old age, Of obsolescence.
Evening to night is the hormone infested buzz of the mating game. The meat market. The flirting and posturing mind numbing to a casual observer.
Its all there.
A life in a day.
I go in the before any of this time. The before morning crowd. The in between times when humans sleep.
Mostly I am alone.
Sometimes I have the company of a few swing shift humans, sometimes some other oddness.
One gym, a long time ago, had a crowd of centenarians.

4am they would hobble in, sit at their exercise bikes and talk. Wheeze back and forth secrets known only to those that have seen more summers then I have desire to behold. Lives these men had lived. Wars they had fought. They had undoubtedly dreamed dreams and told tales, tried as hard and as fast as they were able. Now they sat, they pedaled. The murmured amongst themselves. Their voices, gradually merged with the whir of the wheels, the maze of sound faded to a sibilant hiss of white noise.
They faded into the background. Such is the fate of us all.
To fade.
I walked around them. Moving in my own patterns among them. Heavy things and sweating things.
Running a long road to everywhere.
Every day for months, perhaps a year or two. These men.
Became ambient.
One time. Night a memory and morning not yet a dream, I was disturbed at the gym. By silence.
The background had stopped. So used to it I had become that its absence startled me into immobility.
I looked.
They were all there. Alive, sitting still, rapt attention focused on the machines in front of them.
Two women.
Young.

On elliptical machines, the hum and chirp of their motions covering the silence of the men.
I looked closer, to see what had drawn these fossils from their reverie.
Then, I saw.
Clearly.
The girl on the right, the prettier of the two. Her pants had fallen down.
Sports bra to the bottom of her bottom.
Bare.
I could see the smiles now.
The seamed faces split in joyous wonder.
I made no sound. Just watched.
As the two noticed, or felt the intensive silence behind them, they turned to look. In turning she must have felt a breeze. She seemed to float then, for a split second, off of the machine and into the air. Gravity released just long enough for her to pull her pants up and tie them. I could see her blush travel to her face from where I was.
The men.
As all men now, no longer old, no longer seamed and cracked by time, but split faces in smiling joy.
Laughed and cheered and lived again.
The girls ran away, as girls do.
The music of the men's laughter faded in my mind.
Much slower then their murmurs.

Fenced

So what do you do when you steal something you don't need?

When you steal food, it could be because you or someone you feel responsible for is hungry.

When you steal a coat it could possibly be because you are cold.

So when you steal something you don't need? Something you cant use?

What do you do?

The hardest thing about stealing odds and ends is turning them into money.

 I would guess.

So what do the maggots who steal things do?

In ye olde days they would go to a "fence"

Someone who specilised in moving stolen goods along. Finding buyers for them. The fence was well known in the community of criminals. He was the go-to guy.

Lets say (for example) that I stole a Gold Chamber pot.

Its worth a LOT of florins, but it has the family crest of the former owners boldly emblazoned on the bottom.

So I would take it to the fence.

He would ascertain its value, and offer me much less.

Say, knowing that he could sell the gold to a reputable goldsmith for 600 florins, he would offer me 60.

We would haggle, and in the end I would walk away happy with the 50 florins clinking in my pocket.

The fence would then approach his friend the goldsmith, the man who asks no questions, and offer the poo-pot to him.

The goldsmith, knowing that he could easily convert this polished toilet into 2000 florins worth of jewelry offers the fence 400 florins.

They haggle, and in the end the fence walks home happy with the 750 florins jingling happily in his money pouch.

Twenty days later, Jewelry done, A man and His wife come into the shop. 

She is depressed because recently her fathers family crested chamber pot was stolen and insurance (not being invented yet) obviously refused to cover it.

So the husband, being a wise man, takes his wife to the local goldsmith. An upstanding member of the community, well known to all. Once there he buys her three beautiful pieces of gold jewelry purchased at the "friend" price of 2200 florins.

Little does she know, that 20 days previously she was pooping in the pot she now wears happily around her neck.

Its a win win.

Right?

In a word, no.

There is one really really unhappy party. Party being a word I am using to describe an entity, or group of people rather then where you go to hit pinatas.

This unhappy Party is, of course, the government.

Especially when the goldsmith is elected Mayor.

Knowing full well where the poo-pots were originating from he invites his friend the fence over to dinner.

Over the clams he mentions offhand that he wants a piece of the action.

After choking on his clam, the fence asks the Mayor if he has gone soft in the head.

The Mayor smiles and twirls his Grotesque mustache. Which is really gross cause its covered in clam juice.

This is actually a sign for the local watch to come in.

6 burly chaps with clubs that work for the Mayor. 

They stand behind the fence and make growly sounds and hit their clubs against their meaty palms.

All is clear.

So the fence and The Mayor haggle. In the end it is decided that the fence only has to pay the Mayor a small percentage of everything he sells. 6.5 percent to be precise.

As the fence leaves, nervously stepping wide of the brute squad the mayor, slurping down a few more clams calls out "HEY! we will just call it a sales tax" his grotesque mustache bobs obscenely as he laughs.

So everyone is happy.

The thief gets to steal, the fence gets to fence and the Government gets to make a little on the side.

The Mayor laughs. 

He collects taxes from the people who pay the Mayor to protect them from the thieves who steal from the people, the theives sell it to the fence who sells the stuff to other normal people and some criminal types at a higher markup to cover the sales tax which he pays to the mayor to protect the fence from the brute squad who protect the Mayor from the criminal types and other normal people who could perhaps threaten his position, The Mayor pays the brute squad with the money he gets from the fence to protect the people.

Make perfect sense.

Good thing it is all a fantasy.
Do I need to spell it out?
Plain English?
Okey Dokey.
Pawn Shops are fences. They can buy "loan" on anything of value. The person selling the object does not have to prove that they own it. Possession is enough for the LAW and the Pawnshop.
They pay "loan" very little compared to the real value.
The Police force is funded primarily on taxes, in my town, the Majority of which is sales Tax. The Police are essentially paid by the pawn shops. (greatly simplified, I realize)
Now lets say you are an enterprising active property owner, a payer of taxes and a (fairly) good citizen. All your stuff gets stolen.
You go to the Police, they tell you that their hands are tied.
So, you venture forth and find your stuff, some of it, at a local pawn shop.
You know its yours cause it has your name written on it.
So in triumph you call the police, who arrive at the Pawnshop.
JUSTICE!
Well, no.
You see. According to the law, since the pawnshop has now paid for your stuff, they own it. You now have to "prove" that it is yours.
Receipts and serial numbers are good. Pictures of you holding said objects will work in a pinch.
Your name being on it? Not good enough. Pictures of you and your family on the film in the camera and on the tapes? Not good enough.
So then you go to a city council meeting and yell at the Mayor.
Who then sends the brute squad round about your house to remind you that if you do ANYTHING wrong at all. They will arrest you.
Fantasy.

Or is it?

Our furry friends

 *NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS BLOG*

Except me.
As you may, or may not know, I have a cat. His name is Fat Jack and for the most part.
 He is a bad ass.
He was the first Feline to be Issued a man card.
He likes his women and his food ready and waiting for him.
He sounds like Barry White. (But I am the only one that can hear him)
He had a staring contest with Chuck Norris and not only did He win, he went to Chuck's house after and peed on all of his sunglasses.
Yeah.
Fat Jack is a pretty cool dude.
He got his name because, well, he is fat. 25 pounds of lean mean sleeping machine.
A few weeks ago he Jumped a full size Raccoon.
From the sounds of things it was apparent that Jack had been leisurely eating his midnight snack out on the front porch and Vladimir the coon came sauntering over.

Thats when Jack jumped him.

Thats when the coon got a hold of Fat Jack and bit a coon sized mouthful right out of his ass.

Thats when Tom shot Vladimir.

You get the Picture?
Good.


Cause now a couple of weeks have gone by and Fat Jack is all but healed. He lives outside so I haven't worried too much about the blood clots and dried yuck and coon spittle all over his fur.
At least.
Not till yesterday.
That was when Child #2 informed me that Friday is the "GREATEST DAY EBER!!!!!"
Pet Day.
and she was going to be taking Fat Jack cause he is the coolest most famous cat eber.

So.

He needs a bath.
I had never bathed a cat before.
I have seen movies of lions swimming rivers with little lionets in their mouths, and I have seen the sister in laws Russian Van Kitty happily playing under a running faucet, so I figured it would be simple. Easier than the dog anyway.
I mean, geez, he may be THE FAT JACK, but he is still just a little kitty.
I should have a theme song. Something like "Tom is dumb, he is just dumb, he is really really dumb" and just insert it into the soundtrack during these moments.

I filled the tub up with about four inches of warm water and had #2 standing by with the Johnsons baby soap, perfect for babys and kitties.
Then I grabbed Fat Jack and
pay attention here it goes pretty fast
I tried to set him in the water but those ten, inch long razor tipped weapons of death started spinning at mach 8 or so and his 25 pound body proved to have not an ounce of fat on him as he turned and yowled and spit and snarled and twisted and turned and somehow jammed his paws, all four of them, onto the side of the tub as I pushed him towards the water.
At this point he began to scream for help and his Buddy, my yellow-bellied neurotic IBS afflicted Mr. Dog ran in and bit me on the leg.
Then Jack gave me a little love bite on the wrist.
So he earned a moments grace while I slammed the door of the bathroom with the dog in the hall and me and Jack and #2 in the bathroom. She is still standing ready, holding the soap, giant tears running down the sides of her face.
Because.
I was hurting her Kitty.
Here I thought that the damn cat was kicking my ass, silly me.
So I manned up, looked at the spot where Jacks used to be, and dunked him.
then I held him while #2 dumped the entire bottle of soap on him. I figured, why stint?
I was holding him still with one hand and soaping the gross of off him, all was well.
Then he started crying.
Not soft manly sobs either.
he was wailing, sobbing, heart broken and letting the entire world know it.
#2 joined in, then Mr. Dog, never one to pass the chance, chorused in with Howling from the hall.
This went on. Through the soaping and the rinsing of the cat.
He even continued as I lifted him up out of the water and wrapped him in a dry towel.
At which point he did three things.
Bit me, farted and then started purring.
He lost his man card.
The women are gonna make him do some chasing for a while.
and worst of all.
Late late last night.
Chuck Norris called.
He wants a rematch.

                                                                                love taps

And the wall, wins.

Whats the worst pain you have ever felt?
Mommies, no fair bringing up the whole birth thing. That's a hands down winner.
Give the rest of us non-mommies a chance and think of the NEXT worst pain you have ever felt?

Whats the silly little law? The one that states something to the effect of  "an object in motion will stay in motion unless it pisses a bigger object off who then stops its motion with a well placed forearm?" Anyone? Bueller?
I forget the law, in fact, the immutable laws of physics have always seem to stretch a little bit for me.
But not always.
I was once running away from this really big scary person with white blonde curly hair. I am pretty sure it was female, either that or a guy with very high estrogen level wearing a sheepskin hat, and I know that whatever it was chasing me for was more than likely well deserved.
Actually. It was going rather well.
I was 10 or so and fleet of foot, especially when terrified. The sheep-thing was screaming at me and looked really scary so I was making  good time towards home. I had just about hit 88 miles an hour and turned around to see if my feet were kicking up flames when a giant brick wall jumped out of nowhere and smacked me in the head.
It was extraordinary. One second I was moving at light-speed through the sir, my feet barely touching the ground and the next.
Splat.

The sky looks really pretty when it spins.
The sheep was nice enough to let bygones be bygones and carried me home.
Sheep must have known about my parents aversion to livestock because it left me on the front porch in a pile of Tom and doorbell ditched.
That wall kicked my ass.
Fast forward. I am a grown-up man. Married, with children and a dog.
My dad calls and says "Hey! Your Uncle Bill's water heater went out. Go and stick a new one in for him."
He was The Boss at this point, so I hopped to it and bustled over to Uncle Bill's.
I know just enough about a lot of things to get really hurt.
Keep that in mind.
I had cut the old heater out, schlepped it outside, grunted the new one in and was just in the process of soldering all the joints together.
Quick plumbing tutorial. Back in Ye Olde days before PEX we used to have to use flux and solder and propane or mapp gas torches to stick the copper plumbing pipes together. New construction was fairly quick and painless but remove and replace was always an adventure.
Now, the Solder is a mixture of two metals (Antimony and Tin) that both have a fairly low melting point, the heat combined with the flux you spread on the joints creates a vacuum and pulls the molten solder inside the joint.
Did you catch the word MOLTEN, as in HOT!

So, I was working on the last joint, it was above my head but being a safety conscious young fellow I had safety glasses on. Well, safety conscious and still paying for the surgery to remove metal splinters from my eye...... Another story.
The glasses were kinda fogged up so I did not see the large drop of MOLTEN solder that dripped off of the pipe and landed on my lip. My upper lip. Just to the right of the little divot thingy I have.
I screamed.
 Like ten little girls all at once. High and piercing, shattering glass for miles, Dolphins around the world heard me and wondered who had just gone to the big glass bowl in the sky, Millions of bats were blinded forever and I have  unconfirmed report of two submarines colliding with a giant underwater spaceship sent by future us back in time.
It hurt.
Living the life I have led developed two things, a fear of water and a high pain tolerance.
This hurt.
 I can honestly say that it was the most concentrated single spot of pain I have ever experienced. This from a man who as a wee boy zipped his wee-wee into his corduroys.
Solder melts fairly fast, it also cools fairly fast. But not fast enough. I was screaming and laughing and the glasses were fogged and I could not really think. It was more of instinct. Running really fast upstairs to the sink, hoping for an ice cube, hoping for a fairy freaking godmother, anything. I was blazing up the stairs as fast as I could, screaming in gasps now but still at a very high pitch.
I reached for the door handle just as my Uncle Bill opened it from the other side.
I didn't even slow down.
That wall jumped out and hit me right on the head.
Even after the ice cube melted and Uncle Bill kindly picked the now solid solder out of my lip with a needle, I  really had only one thought.
That wall kicked my ass.

Cookery

I cant cook.
I failed Home economics remember?
The last time I made breakfast for the #s I used powdered something instead of powdered the other.
Then I made them eat it.
After I had screamed and yelled and forced them to eat three bites each, I sat down and took a bite.
It made me gag, which made #2 throw up, which made #1 spew, which made a mess for me to clean up.
In lieu of an actual apology, I took them to Marie Calendars.
I suck.
So when I decided to cook dinner I tried to keep it a secret.
I figured I could always tell them a neighbor brought it over and feed it to the dog if it was too bad.
But what to make?
Something simple obviously.
Toast?
With Jam?
I could always garnish (food channel word) it with canned corn.
It was a conundrum. So I Googled it.
I was directed to millions of  blogs, all about cooking. Most of them displaying food porn in abundance.
All of the recipes sounded intricate and complex.
What in the Hell is plating? Braise? Glaze?
Not in my vocabulary these words.
At least not for food.
So I looked on my phone. And found this thing called "BIG OVEN" simple recipes for families.
Done,
Under "Easy" I found a recipe for Chicken Enchiladas.
Win win.
Of to the store to buy the ingredients. (thats the food stuff)
I found it all, but I was starting to think that whomever wrote the recipe was an idiot.
oh, wait.
Whoever wrote the recipe was WRITING it for idiots! That actually just occurred to me.
Damn.
So I got all the stuff and headed home.
Then I destroyed the kitchen.

It started when I had to boil the chicken boobs.
Boiling chicken boobs is boring as Hell.
So I decided to skip to the next step whilst the mammary's were marinading.
Open the can of Cream of Mushroom and plop it into a pot, a small pot.
Open up the can Of Cream of Chicken and plop it into a pot. a big pot.
Then cover the bottom of a pan, a really big pan, with olive oil and turn it on high to cook the raw tortilla things.
Are you keeping track?
My stove thing has four burner things on top, each  of these was now occupied with a kitchen vessel full of water,fowl tits, mush,mush and oil.
Did you know that when the steam from the water and mush evaporates and drops into the boiling oil it splatters?
And it HURTS!
So, i quickly chucked  a tortilla on the oil, and started stirring the mush.
Then the boobs started boiling.
It was at this point I forgot the instructions and just started making stuff up.
Hot salsa, quickly stirred into grey mush.
Mild salsa quickly stirred into brown mush.
Flip Tortilla.
Half a can of boiling breast water into each can of mush.
Flip tortilla.
Swear break to run burned fingers under cold water.
Flip tortilla.
Colby jack cheese,  two small handfuls stirred into mushes.
Flip tortilla
Grab hot boobies, scream, drop them back into boiling cauldron of death and then grab tong things.
flip tortillas
use tongs to grab mams, shred them up
mix them into mush. 1 1/2 boobs per pot.
Throw burnt tortilla to the ground for dog.
Flip tortilla.
Find glass dish. Discard for size. Find bigger glass dish.
Turn on oven to 200.
Flip Tortilla.
Put done tortillas into dish.
Find spoon
Flip tortilla

Fill up done tortillas with mush, roll them up and put them in dish
five with hot salsa mush
five with mild salsa mush
(brown and grey)
Dump steaming water down sink.
Through the cloud of steam see lonely forgotten can of enchilada sauce.
Full Stop.
Now what?
The instructions were no help at all.
I had left them behind long ago.
So.
Improvise.
Dump can of enchilada Sauce into what is left of brown mush, bring it to a boil.
Dump it over the top of enchilada things and then cover them with shredded mexican four cheese blend bag you find in the fridge.
Turn to discover #1 and #2 staring with wide eyes at the destruction of a clean kitchen.
Sigh.
Forget about blaming neighbors.
Pop whole damn thing in the oven.
After 15 minutes turn oven to broil to melt stubborn cheese on top.
Take out of oven.
Take a deep breath.
Serve it to the three pickiest eaters on the planet.
They Loved it.
Had seconds.
And nobody got sick.
I rock.

School

I have a really hard time making my kids go to school.
School is dumb.
Bad Dad.
I know.
Its just that I am not impressed with teachers.
Never have been.
I had some good ones, even a couple of great ones.
but mostly, some really weird people end up as teachers.
Its a thankless, monotonous, painful job.
And its 99 percent bullshit.
I flunked out of middle school
A lot of people wondered why I went to Jordan instead of Hillcrest, Its no mystery.
It was either that or detention.
Hillcrest would not take me.
Perhaps blowing up the chemistry lab had something to do with that.....
It really was an accident. Sort of.
Or maybe it was when Roger and I launched a model Rocket engine equipped Derby car down the hall.
No one was in any danger, the school was evacuated at the time for a gas leak. A real gas leak, but I had NOTHING to do with that.
Geez, that Frau Doctor Schmidt (may she burn in Nazi Hell) had NO sense of humor.
I admit freely that I was a terrible student. I never paid attention in class, I refused to do homework and if it got too bad, I would just leave.
Stand up in class and walk out.
Walk down the halls and out the door.
Then walkabout for a bit.
Walk down the road to the elementary school and visit my Brother, Hang out inside the giant tire and read a few library books.
Adults are so oblivious.
I would disappear in the middle of the day and show up, you know, whenever.
After a while I didn't even bother to hide it. Just walk out. Do my own thing.
Caught a snake one day.
Walking along the side of the canal.
Just glanced down and saw its head and thought about leaving it in my Brothers lunch-box.
  SUPRISE!
Oh the cleverness of me!
 I was already chuckling at the look on his face.
To think is to act, So, quick as thought I reached down and grabbed it. Right behind its neck.
It wrapped around my arm so fast I almost did not notice the rattles at the end.
God loves morons.

By pure blind luck I had grabbed so close behind its head that it couldn't bite me.
five rattles.
Fangs.
Then it peed on me, and pooped. And it smelled and felt awful.
But even at the young age of 13 I was pretty sure dying would be worse.
So I hung on, arm as straight as I could make it, getting those fangs and creepy wicked looking tongue as far away from me as possible.
Sat down on the banks of the canal and had a good PMC.
(poor me cry)
Then I smashed its head with a rock and threw its body as far as I could.
Walked home.
Did I learn my lesson? See the underlying moral fable in my encounter with the serpent while I was supposed to be in school gaining invaluable knowledge and perhaps unlocking the mysteries of math?
Knowledge that may have been valuable later in life? Important life altering things. Like the difference between a TSP and a TBSP?
nope.
Bad teachers.
What do we expect? We don't pay enough for good ones.

MATH it does a body good

The very first word of anything is always the hardest for me. It will either catch an audience or turn them away. Whether it is writing, speaking or singing it’s all the same. It’s that very first word that matters.

That’s why I grunt so much.

I finish triathlons, I would love to say that I “Race” or that I “Compete” but compared to the wee little elves that actually do these things, I am a scary oversized puffing and slobbering Troll.

They actually have a special class for guys like me.

Just like in school.

They call it Clydesdale.

For Hell's sake!

I would prefer Hercules or Goliath or even Ogre.

Nope, Clydesdale.

It used to be anything over 200 lbs., so I dieted until I thought I was going to blow away in the wind and the powers that be changed it to 195 lbs.

And

They had a weigh in.

198 pounds.

Then they write it on your leg.

So all the little gazelles that pass me know, Fat Ass.

I can hear them smirking at me as they bounce by with their effortless strides, gravity hardly pulling at them at all. I used to throw rocks at them. But I had a really difficult time hiding the body of the last one.

So now I just yell “OH YEAH!!!!!!” in a really mean voice.

It’s all I got.

My nephew (a gazelle) started finishing them with me. I could beat him by a few minutes but only because he couldn’t swim.

Bobbing along in the current dog-paddling does not make for an excellent swim time.

But man, the kid can run. Averaging a 5 ½ minute mile. That’s after the swim and the bike.

Then he beat me. By 8 minutes.

Desperate times etc etc.

I read an article that ascertained that for every pound you dropped you could shave one minute off your finishing times. He had beaten me by 8 minutes, so I did the math and discovered that I needed to lose 12 pounds. (Really bad at math)

Then I read another article, in another  magazine. It’s far too disgusting to ever repeat in any sort of English speaking company.

If you have a weak stomach stop HERE.

Colon Cleansing.

Apparently all of us carry all sorts of vile and unspeakable things about in our colons. Old food, Plaque, Bugs and yucky stuff of all description.

Then I got really excited because it says that the “average person” has about ten pounds of vile in their colon at any given time.

SHAZAM!

Problem solved. I am not average. So I figured 12 pounds was as good as gone.

 The Cleanse

It sounds really ominous. Say it out loud in a raspy breathy Darth Vader voice and it sounds exactly like I felt going into it.

THE CLEEAANNSSSE

It wasn’t that bad.

It was just a seven day deal. I didn’t eat anything at all for seven days. I had to drink this magic potion to help speed things along, but it really was not that bad.

Juice of two lemons

One tbsp. of grade B maple syrup

Cheyenne pepper to taste.

In a Nalgene bottle of Distilled water.

For seven days.

Day 8 was the Kicker. And day nine was the race.

God made the world in 6 days, I made a lot of ahem poo.

It’s amazing actually. I wasn’t eating anything and I was still producing poundage.

It’s the magic poo potion that does it.

Day Seven.

The cleanse instructions said to mix 2.5 TSPs of non-iodized salt with one gallon of warm water and drink the whole thing.

No problem.

Wait!

I failed Home Economics. Stitched my finger to my sachet and caught the oven thingy on fire somehow, Failed with an F. And Math? Who needs Math? That’s why God invented calculators. (Really, I am horrible at Math)

FYI: 1 tablespoon (tbsp) equals 3 teaspoons (tsp)

A TSP is apparently 

different from a TBSP!

Who knew?

So, two giant heaping TBSPs of salt, then a level One cause I couldn’t just fill it half way. Mixed in a gallon of warm water and guzzled. Gagging, coughing, groaning and retching. But I swallered it all. And I kept it down.

God created the world in 6 days then took a day off to sleep.

I created poo for seven days. Then I exploded.

The instructions read something like “After completing the seven day pre-cleanse you will be ready for a gentle salt laxative. This will clean the walls of your colon and finish your cleanse”

Slap me with a giant roasted buffalo.

Gentle?

I thought I was pretty much empty by this point. I had lost ten pounds of vile and was sitting at 196, fighting weight. I figured with the “gentle cleanse” I would expel those last two pounds and slaughter the nephew come day nine.

Shit. And more shit.

Then things that I don’t even like to think about. Then my appendix and I am pretty sure my other tonsil. Bugs critters and stuff that was supposed to stay in came out.

For 14 very long hours.

I lost the weight.

183 lbs. morning of race.

I finished the triathlon. Not dead last. Just dead.

The nephew dog paddled and sprinted his way to beating me by 16 minutes.

Boy,  was I clean.