I’m back in the sunny south after running last Sunday in a cold rain with ice underfoot and, no, I didn’t fall, although I came close at least six times. My run this morning of 5 miles followed a 33+ mile bike yesterday and I’m bushed. I don’t know whether I’m mentally bushed or physically bushed (not to be confused with the whole country being “Bushed” into Iraq, but let’s not go there).

My long rides and long runs (if you call a 33 mile bike and a 5 mile run long) are alone. I love the warm weather but I miss running with friends and sitting around afterwards talking and “brunching” together. I guess everything comes with a price, and that’s the cost of nice weather. I’ll have to decide whether it’s worth it.

The flights back to hospital meetings are fine, and it does give me a chance to see friends once a month, but I’m somewhat surprised by the inconsiderate people that fly. I could give hundreds of examples, but this last trip seemed to have more than it’s share.

The flights up were fine, but I’m still amazed at people pushing to be first on the plane. When they board by rows, you have to run the gauntlet to get past the people vying to be first when their row is called. The gate attendant had to ask people who’s row hadn’t been called to step aside so the people who’s row had been called could get by them and onto the plane.

Once on the plane, there is always someone (one of the “world perks” people who get on right after first class), who is standing in the aisle going through their carry ons trying to find something. They could stay seated until everyone else has gotten to their seat, but no. They block the aisle until they find whatever piece of junk they were looking for. And wouldn’t you think if it was that important, they’d know where they put it?

The flight back down was also boarded by rows. The gate attendant called rows 24 through 27 and then rows 18 through 27. I was in row 15, so I sat there watching. One guy got in line and eventually handed his ticket to the attendant who said “Sir, your row hasn’t been called yet” and wouldn’t let him board. The guy said something like “Oh, I guess I didn’t hear you correctly” and sat back down. When rows 14 through 27 were called, he got back in line and just happened to be the guy sitting next to me.

An older couple, yes, older than me, went up when rows 18 through 27 were called and told the gate attendant that their seats weren’t together. He was in row 19, but she was in row 12. The attendant looked at the boarding passes and said, politely, “You’re both in row 19, side by side. Row 12 is your connecting flight and you’re both side by side there too.”

When we got in the air on the flight from Detroit to Tampa, the lead flight attendant came over the loud speaker and said “For the passengers in the main cabin, the rest room is at the rear of the plane. The forward rest room is for first class passengers only”. It wasn’t five minutes later and the three ladies in front of me, all traveling together, got up and went through the first class section and used their rest room. I’m not sure whether they just didn’t understand English, or whether they were thumbing their noses at “the elite”.

When we got to Tampa, three or four people got up before the plane had come to a complete stop, grabbed their carryons from the overhead bins, and moved several rows forward so they could get off the plane 15 seconds earlier than if they had stayed in the row where they sat. I can’t understand how that 15 seconds made any difference at all in the rest of their day and how they could inconvenience the people they forced their way in front of and still sleep at night. Maybe the most important thing in life is looking out for number one. If that’s the way things are headed, count me out.

I’ve been out shopping for some things for the mobe and I’ve come to the conclusion that some people shouldn’t be allowed to wear stretch pants.

Just (Warm But Missing My Friends) Jack

 I plan to fly home tomorrow (Thanksgiving Day) and will be there until Wednesday, November 30th. I planned to skip a week on the e-mails, but I couldn’t let this one pass (npi). This week I got an e-mail from Jon Anderson (as many of you did) with a title of “Try Colon Cleansing At Home!”. The e-mail goes on (npi) to say:

A natural method for gently eliminating harmful wastes and toxins from your body. Did you know that the average person stores between 5 to 25 POUNDS  of waste accumulated over the years in their colon? Did you know that some health experts say that 90% of all sickness and diseases are related to an unclean colon?

Jon comments:

Trilanders, I received this e-mail today and thought that this may be what many of us have been looking for! If I understand this right, we could naturally cleanse ourselves in the comfort of our own home and drop a quick 25 pounds!!!!

I consider Jon a good friend, but I have to admit that some of his ideas may not be the best for all of us. Just to point out my experiences:

Jon (Circa 1999) – “Let’s all do the Iceman. It’s a 25 mile mountain bike race from Kalkaska to Traverse City. It’s easy. You can do it!”

My result – 1999. At mile 6 I went down in a sand pit and lost the lens to my glasses costing me money to replace them and wear sunglasses the rest of the weekend, even at night. At mile 20 I had to stop for a few minutes due to severe muscle cramps in both quads and both hamstrings.

My result – 2000. At mile 20 I did an endo (mountain bike-speak for an end over end flip) resulting in a separated right shoulder earning me a trip to the ER.

Jon (Circa 2000) – “We’ve all done short triathlons. Let’s do a half ironman (1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 mile run). It’s easy. You can do it!”

My result 2000. At mile 45 on the bike I had severe muscle cramps in both quads. On the run (it was a walk for me) I limped from mailbox to mailbox, stretching my quads so I could finish in under 8 hours.

Jon (Circa 2001) – “We’ve done a half ironman. Now let’s do a full ironman. It’s easy. You can do it!”

My result 2001 – 7 weeks before the race, on a 100 mile training ride to Saugatuck, I fell on the bike resulting in a flake fracture to my hip and a 3 day stint in the hospital to remove a large hematoma.

My result 2002 – At Ironman Florida I had muscle cramps in both quads at mile 56 on the bike. On the run (again, it was a walk) I ran 200 yards and walked 400 yards for the first 13.1 miles, and walked most of the second 13.1 miles ending in a time of 16 hours, 18 minutes and 1 second.

My result 2003 – IRONMAN WISCONSIN You know the gory details so I’ll spare you.

Admittedly the bad results are my own fault, but…I didn’t think of doing them on my own!

You may have forgotten about my bout this last summer with Ulcerative Colitis. First of all, I don’t believe there’s a “gentle way” of eliminating wastes and toxins from your body. The preparation for a colonoscopy is anything but (npi) gentle and has to rank in the top 5 bad experiences of my life. And second of all, just look at me. After all of that (and I must admit…my colon was squeaky clean) I didn’t “drop a quick 25 pounds”. And thirdly, if the procedure eliminates “…waste accumulated over the years in their colon”, I don’t want to be anywhere nearby when some of that “old stuff” sees the light of day.

I’m choosing to stay away from this one. Like the time Jon suggested taking a COLD shower after a hard workout to help the muscles recover, I’ll pretend that I’m doing it and, if asked, I’ll lie. I’d suggest many of you do the same.

Just (Not Falling For This One) Jack

 HAPPY BIRTHDAY BECKY!!!

I won’t say how old she is, but she’s 5 years younger than I am, so figure it out (for you non-family members I’ll be 59 on December 1st).

I’m getting settled in here at the mobe, but it’s taking some getting used to. The first night I was here, I was so tired I didn’t unload the car but did take the bikes off the rack, put them on the porch (to Florida people it’s a lanai), and put the rack between the mobe and the storage shed. After going out to dinner with Mom and Brother Bob (you may know him as Bobbie Butane), I turned on the TV to let my brain unwind before I went to bed.

As I was sitting there I heard something fall and it sounded like it came from the kitchen. Because I was so tired (I’ll blame it on being tired…not my normal paranoia), I immediately thought it was a mouse since the mobe had been unoccupied for 6 months. But the noise was quite loud, so I figured it must have been a rat. I looked through all the cupboards, but couldn’t see anything that had fallen. I laid in bed for an hour, unable to go to sleep, listening for “the critter”. When I got up in the morning, I opened the vertical shades that cover the slider to the porch and noticed that all 3 bikes had fallen down. So much for the rat.

(Don’t tell Jean this one…she says she’ll be coming down in December before Christmas and this may keep her away).Yesterday I decided to clean some windows and do the laundry. The people that we bought the mobe from left their washer and dryer. Jean and I talked about running a wash cycle before I put any clothes in just in case there was rust or sediment in the lines. I did that, cleaned off the outside of the washer and dryer, and cleaned an area to fold clothes. After the cycle finished I opened the washer lid and it was perfectly clean except, there in the bottom, was a lizard. I reached in to grab him and he went under the agitator and hid.

I couldn’t get him to come out so I thought I’d run another cycle. I know they can swim and I figured it would force him out. Most family members know that I love animals (except cats). When I was in one of my early grades, I went to a one room school (kindergarten through eighth grade) near Three Rivers. Mom was called to the school by my teacher and I was crying uncontrollably. Apparently I had picked up a bird while walking to school (a mile uphill each way) that had been hit by a car. I felt sorry for it, took it to school, and put it in my desk. After a few days, the odor was noticed by everyone. The teacher checked the desks at recess, found the bird, and threw it away, hence the crying jag.

Anyway, I’m sorry to tell you all that the lizard didn’t stand up well to two washings. After the cycle was over, I opened the lid, and there he was resting in peace with his feet up in the air. Even though he was very, very clean, I picked him up with a couple of sticks (just in case he came around and was vindictive) and took him out to sun himself in the yard. He must have liked it because an hour later, he was still in the same spot, still sunning the bottoms of his feet.

The dryer is a relic but either it or I can’t tell time. I set the first load on 30 minutes and went out after 25 to check on things. It still showed 10 minutes to go on the timer. I checked the clothes and they were dry, so I put the next load in for 25 minutes. I was watching the Ohio State football game and went out during a time out which was right at 25 minutes. The timer said It had 10 minutes to go, so I decided to set my own timer from now on.

I joined the YMCA and go there Monday, Wednesday and Friday to lift weights and swim. I waited until around 11AM on Friday and went out to US 19 and turned right. I noticed there wasn’t a car on the road at all, which is unusual. I looked in my rear view mirror and saw police lights behind me at Hudson Road and 19. I assumed it was an accident at that corner and traffic couldn’t get through. I went a mile North to New York Avenue and there were two police cars pointed at me with their lights on. That was where the accident was and they were rerouting traffic there too. I u-turned at a turnaround and went back. I couldn’t get through Hudson Avenue so I did another turnaround and went back into the mobe park (does this sound like a repeat of the Saturday I came into town?).

I went through the park and took the exit that goes out on Hudson Avenue. I hit the lights just right and was able to head East, but half a mile down the road the traffic was backed up a mile because of the traffic signal at Hudson Avenue and Little Road. Brother Bob tells me that he heard a cement truck was going around the corner, it’s load shifted, and it tipped over onto a car. When I came back at 1:15, they were still cleaning up and pieces of the car were on the flatbed of a wrecker.

After an hour, I finally made it to the Y. I lifted weights and decided to do the EFX (elliptical trainer). The televisions were directly above my head, so I looked out at the weight machines. Staring at me or, hopefully, someone directly behind me, was a guy in his mid-forties. I was quite uneasy, thinking back to the “nice pecker ” incident from a couple of years ago. I thought I may have to stay on the EFX all day until I was sure he wasn’t in the locker room. After a while he left and I noticed a woman wearing a t-shirt and Levi’s working out on the machines right in front of me.

She could have been anywhere from 40 to 60. Se had a set of keys fastened to one of her belt loops and looked, using my buddy Ron’s description, “…like she’d been rode hard and put away wet”. Get your minds out of the gutter…the expression refers to horses. The t-shirt had a picture of a cartoon kid that could have been one of the “South Park” kids. It said “Good News. I’ve decided not to kill you”. Maybe I’m being a prude,  but I can’t imagine a situation where a t-shirt that says “I’ve decided not to kill you” would be appropriate.

The times, they are a-changin’.

Just (Borrowed A Line From Dylan) Jack

 Well, as many of you already know, I’ve made it to the sunny South for another winter. My plan was to stop by Panama City Beach on the way and watch John Hopkins do Ironman Florida. Congratulations, John, on your race!! Unfortunately, things didn’t work out for me to get there.

I had a meeting at 7AM last Friday and planned to have the car loaded and in the hospital parking lot ready to go. At the last minute (Wednesday) I noticed a transmission fluid leak (those things happen when a car has 144,000 miles on it) and took it in for service on Thursday. They couldn’t finish it until Friday at 9AM. The meeting didn’t get over until 9:20 and, taking a page from Jean’s “Book of Chatting” on how to exit a meeting, I didn’t actually leave to get the car until 9:40. Of course, with no car, I had to walk to the Jeep dealership to pick it up, drive back to Green Street to pick up things Jean wanted me to take, and head for the lake.

By the time I got to the lake and got the car packed, it was 11:22 when I pulled out of the driveway and got on the road. I made it 6 miles before I called Ron Lewis, a friend, and asked him to do a couple of things at the lake that I had forgotten. I made it all the way to Battle Creek (25 miles) before I remembered that I forgot to bring the spare garbage disposal (the one down here doesn’t work) and my Rodney Yi yoga CD. The strange thing was that I remembered the garbage disposal the night before and wrote myself a reminder note so I wouldn’t forget. I took the note with me to the lake and tossed it in the trash while I was packing because I thought I didn’t need it any more. I can blame the memory problems on the bike wreck of 2003, but it’s just geezerdom I think. 

On the way down I noticed a couple of interesting signs. No, not the Club Erotica signs that I talked about in some prior e-mails. The first one, somewhere in Tennessee was a medium sized sign that had only four words on it. It said:

EAT HERE        GET GAS

I had seen that sign in jokes before but couldn’t imagine anyone would pay money for a sign like that.

The other sign was near Lake City, Florida and was on a huge billboard. Saturday was the day of the Georgia-Florida game to be played in Gainesville. It said something like:

Florida boy seeks Georgia girl

I helped you get a ticket to last year’s game at gate 21  Call me at XXX-XXX-XXXX

When I read the first line my first thought was that it was the Club Erotica again. When I read the rest of it I wondered whether this guy didn’t ask for her name and number at the time and thought he had made the biggest mistake of his life or, if he was a real loser and this was his only chance for a date…maybe there were a hundred girls at gate 21 buying tickets (and every other gate for that matter) and he was taking a shot that one of them would call. So is it romance or perversion? You be the judge. By the way, I used Xs for the number so none of you would actually call him. You aren’t Georgia girls are you?

I went through Atlanta at around 10AM on Saturday only to come to a screeching halt. One of the overhead highway information signs that tells you how long it will take to get from where you are to some point ahead said “I-75 South closed 2 miles ahead..All lanes blocked”. So there I sat for 45 minutes. When traffic started moving and we got up to the spot where the highway had been closed, there was nothing there. Not a stalled car. Not an accident scene. Nothing!!

The rest of the trip went fairly well until I got 7 miles from the trailer park…Oops!!! I mean mobile home community. Traffic was stopped on US 19 and there I sat for another 30 minutes. I was able to make a left onto a “turnaround” and go back about a mile to Spring Hill Drive. I thought the streets were like Michigan where you could take some side streets past the accident, get back on US 19 and be on your way. Not so!!

I went as far as the first traffic signal and turned South. It took me into a neighborhood with curving streets and speed bumps every block. I have an OK sense of direction (unlike Pat and Diane) and finally made it to County Line Road (the next major East-West road) which I thought was past the accident that had 19 blocked. Again, not so!! The accident was another couple of miles South of there. When I got to the corner of County Line Road and 19, the police directed all the traffic North back to Spring Hill Drive.

As I was driving down Spring Hill Drive for the second time, Jean called to let me know how John had done in the race (she was giving me race reports all day) and she could sense my frustration. I called Mom to let her know I was going to be later than I thought and she got brother Bob on the line who talked me down some of the back roads and I came out past the accident. The accident had happened around 3:30 (it was 6:30 by then) and they were still in the clean up stages. I finally made it to the mobe (I spent my first 5 years as a CPA in South Bend, and mobe was the shortened term for travel trailers and mobile homes that were made by the thousands in and around the area) by 7:15 or so. That made it 14 hours on the road that day and I was whipped.

So that’s it for now. I’m here for the winter. I’ll be making a few trips back to Hastings for hospital board meetings.

Just (Finally Warm and Loving It) Jack

 A little while age Ernie and Barb Strong, friends of mine, sent me a copy of the classic story where Cliff, a know-it-all barfly in the TV show Cheers, is telling Norm, an overweight accountant (sound familiar) barfly, about his theory of survival of the fittest.

“Well ya see, Norm, it’s like this. A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the herd is hunted, it is the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first. This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members. In much the same way, the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells. Excessive intake of alcohol, as we know, kills brain cells. But, naturally, it attacks the slowest and weakest brain cells first. In this way, regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells, making the brain a faster and more efficient machine. That’s why you always feel smarter after a few beers.”

Well, apparently I haven’t had enough beer in my life, although some would disagree with that statement, and at 10:02AM Monday, local time, I signed up for Ironman Wisconsin 2006. In my defense, so did Jean, Larry Etter, Libby Jennings, Ruth Bareman and George Pravda (Libby, Ruth and George are friends from GR and Holland that we met at triathlons) along with 1,994 other people. Yeah, yeah. I Know. The old saying, “If your friends jumped off a bridge, would you jump too?” makes that not a good excuse.

I’m not a long distance triathlete, and I’m only a mediocre short distance triathlete, but I’m looking at it as a way to force me to lose the 15 pounds I put on after Ironman Wisconsin 2004 and my health problems this summer. I can’t do the race on that hilly course without getting lighter. That’s not the real reason for trimming down. With a family history of diabetes, and my blood pressure rising as my weight rises, I have to do it for health sake. Many of you know me as “thrifty” and the $452 I have invested will be a good incentive.

I’ve found the only way I can lose weight effectively is counting calories. I’m trying to balance what I eat so it isn’t all carbs, but I just can’t stick with the no carb diets. I don’t have much will power and find it easy to fall off the wagon. But if I can lose a couple of pounds a week, by September 10, 2006 I’ll weigh 110. Too drastic?

Until next time…

Just (I Feel Marvelous, Simply Marvelous) Jack

 I was trying to think of an appropriate title to this e-mail update, and “body trade-in” came to mind, but God doesn’t work that way, so I’ll have to settle for a rebuild. You all probably sense by now that I write these not so much to show off my writing talent or lack thereof, or share my bodily function setbacks with my family and friends, but to put into words what is coursing through my brain so I can sleep at night.

I had my follow-up visit with the gastroenterologist yesterday. He sees patients in Hastings two half days a week and leases space from Diane (Dr. Ebaugh to you non-townies). His schedule is typically behind (npi) and yesterday was no exception. My appointment was at 12:30 and there were two people ahead of me. I got in to see Dr. Papp at 2:10.

One of the people ahead of me was a young man in his early to mid thirties with two active boys I would guess were around 4 and 6. They completely rearranged Diane’s waiting room and turned the six chairs in the center of the room around to make a fort. They took every magazine in the room over to Dad to read, stayed attentive for about five seconds and went and got another one.

After me, a family came in…three adults and three children…two girls ages 6 and 8 and a boy about 10 with a Mohawk haircut. Only one of them, the mother or grandmother, had an appointment with Dr. Papp. I can’t imagine taking all those people in to listen to the Dr. tell you about your digestive problems.

The guy with the two boys was beside himself because the Dr. was running late. He talked on the phone to his wife/girlfriend three or four times. The last time he told her “I’ve told you ten times. If I walk out now the Dr. will probably walk in right after I leave and I will have wasted all this time.” After a short listening period he followed by saying “I don’t want to hear it. I’ll talk to you later,” followed by a quick hang-up. Four seconds later when his cell phone rang he turned the ringer off and buried the phone in his pocket.

About ten minutes later Dr. Papp showed up and called his first patient, Martha, which infuriated the young guy. He gathered up his kids and stormed out the door. About ten minutes later he walked back in and sat down with the kids. About five minutes after that, Dr. Papp poked his head in the room and called my name. I looked over at the young guy and didn’t move a muscle. Dr. Papp said “Oh, Jim, you’re back. Come on in. I’ll take you first.” The guy got up and started walking in. The kids had gotten under his skin, probably due to the Dr. being late, and he had to take it out on someone. One of the kids was dawdling and Dad gave him a gentle nudge towards the open door. Of course the boy played it for all it was worth and did a face plant on the floor right in front of me. Has father, I’m sure, felt like a jerk and probably thought everyone had him pegged as a child abuser.

So my appointment was one of those good news bad news talks, or at least that’s the way I took it. He told me what I already knew and had read about but in much more detail and we talked in detail about the options for treatment. I have a lot of admiration and respect for Dr Papp…being a “butthole doctor” can’t be the most fun job. The good news is that I’m feeling better and it looks like this “flare-up” will soon be under control. The bad news is that I’ll have to continue taking the medication (three capsules three times a day) maybe indefinitely.

No, they don’t know what causes it and, no, it’s not curable. What happens is that your immune system is always looking throughout your body for things to protect you from (my apologies to the English majors out there for a poorly constructed sentence). When it gets to the lining of your large intestine, it mistakenly thinks it’s foreign, and sends “the Sheriff” (white blood cells) to run the rascals out of town. The lining gets inflamed from the “friendly fire” attack, often bleeds, secretes mucus, and causes the muscles to cramp. When food and fluids get there, they encounter the inflamed colon and get “the bum’s rush” out the door.

People tell me to watch what I eat and I’ll be fine, but what you eat has nothing to do with flare-ups. They just happen. Once you have a flare-up, there are certain foods, which are different for everyone, that cause discomfort as they pass through quicker than normal. For me it’s jalapeno peppers or pepper jack cheese which have caused me discomfort on my best days. Through trial and error I’ll find out what things cause me discomfort and I’ll stay away from them or pay the price a couple of hours later.

So, there’s no special diet…I can eat fruit like I always have…I can get back into my training as long as the “runs” (npi) don’t interfere…I can do a long race (half or full ironman) if I want knowing that if I have a flare-up the week before the race I MUST NOT DO THE RACE. If I keep taking the medicine I’m on I may have an average of 2.5 flare-ups a year. If I go on a different medication (IV at the doctor’s office every two months) I can expect an average of .5 flare-ups a year. (There were tons of things to remember so I may not have these occurrences exactly right). Everyone is different and I may have more or fewer problems than the average.

So I’m bummed that this can’t be fixed and I won’t be back to normal again before I know it. But I’m relieved (npi) that we know what it is, how to recognize the symptoms before they get too bad, how to differentiate between a flare-up and a “stomach virus”, and when to call the doctor’s office for reinforcements.

I talked to Dr. Papp and told him this would be a good time for me to lose the extra pounds I’ve put on with limited exercise and the extra foods and sports drinks necessary to get the electrolytes back in line. He thought it would be a good idea and suggested I not try the fad diets (Atkins, etc.) or diet pills. I told him it would be a reduced calorie diet with moderate exercise (a normal triathlon training schedule with no speed work for a while and lower mileage) and he thought that would be fine.

So if you see me and I’ve lost weight, it’s not because I’ve been sick. If I haven’t lost weight, that’s the story of my life.

Just (Insert Your Own Butt Joke Here) Jack

 npi = no pun intended

It’s time to set the record straight. Many of you who see me often probably have noticed that I’ve been somewhat subdued lately (which, for me, is one step above a coma). I know there are rumors flying around about why, so here it is, from the horse’s mouth.

If you have a weak stomach or don’t want to read anything gross and disgusting, STOP READING NOW, DELETE THIS MESSAGE, and you will sleep better tonight.

Without going into too much detail, I’ve been having some digestive problems. Not the ordinary “Boy, I wish I hadn’t eaten that burrito”, but something more intense and persistent with bleeding that started at 2 AM the day of the Bayshore Marathon (Saturday of Memorial Day weekend). I didn’t tell anyone I was having problems because I thought they would pass (npi), but they got worse.

I finally went to the doctor on June 22nd. O.K. I told everyone I was going (npi) because of my ankle problem, but that wasn’t really true, although I did tell him it was sore (the ankle, not my ….Oh, never mind). I knew I was in for a not so pleasant exam and I was right. The digital exam was a piece of cake compared to the contraption he used to look farther than any human should ever see.

I was given two specimen containers to take stool samples to the lab. Luckily I had a meeting in Lansing the next day so I dropped them off while most everyone was sleeping. But that’s not the end (npi) of it. He asked me to keep track of, and write down, all of my bowel movements for the next week including date, time, consistency, and other things too gross to mention. Of course, being the anal (npi) person that I am, I did it on an excel spreadsheet. I titled it “The Tales of the Turds” or, subtitled, “What a Bunch of Crap”.

I had some trouble with the consistency descriptions, but settled on terms like Au Jus, Mashed Potatoes Without Lumps, Mashed Potatoes With Lumps, Hot Chocolate With One Brown Marshmallow…. O.K. You get the picture. Dr. Weatherhead knew I was in a lot of discomfort, but could tell my sense of humor hadn’t been affected.

By the next appointment, things had gotten worse. Dr. Weatherhead scheduled me for a CT scan and gave me another container for a stool sample. This time I borrowed the Baptist Church Bus, wore a fedora hat, put on a trenchcoat, donned a fake beard and sunglasses and dropped off the sample. Even at that people know who you are and, since you are carrying a sample wrapped in a grocery sack, know it’s either a stool sample or a semen sample. And, odds are, there aren’t many 58 year old men carrying semen samples to the lab.

I had to keep track of BMs for a second week and did it the same way. This one was titled “The Fecal Matrix Revisited” or, subtitled, “Some Turds Roll Downhill Faster Than Others” (a takeoff on the saying *%#@ Flows Downhill).

At the next doctors appointment I knew what was coming. The stool samples and CT scan eliminated a lot of really bad things, but didn’t identify what was causing the problems, so he ordered a Colonoscopy. The preparation the day before, as many of you know, is no fun at all. The procedure itself is relatively straight-forward but I have a complaint about the sedation. They use Versed (sp) which keeps you conscious but you forget everything. WRONG!! I was in so much pain with intestinal cramping that inflating me with air was excruciating and I do remember it.

The other complaint is that, when the doctor comes out and tells you what he found, you do forget that part, so I’m passing (npi) the results on by way of Jean, a not so detail oriented person. She said that he said I had “a full blown case of ulcerative colitis”. I’m not going into what that really is. If you wonder, ask Diane or look it up on http://www.webmd.com/ . Dr. Papp Jr. (next time it’s my turn to bring the candles, flowers and a bottle of wine) prescribed two new medications, much stronger than the ones I had been taking.

With one I take three capsules three times a day (9 pills total) with 12 refills printed on the prescription bottle. With the other, I’m still trying to figure out the best way to take it. The directions say, before retiring (too late for me…I retired three years ago), start out with your knees, head and forearms on the floor, reach around, insert the applicator tip and squeeze out the contents. Hold that position for 30 minutes to allow the solution to disperse and try to retain it all night. (If picturing that in your mind doesn’t cause nightmares, I don’t know what will). I have 28 of those with 4 refills.

So with all those refills, it sounds like this won’t be a quick recovery. The worst part of the whole thing is that, on the discharge instruction sheet, someone wrote, as a joke I’m sure, “No Swimming San Fran Bay At This Point”. Jean says Dr. Papp said that several times, but I don’t believe it. He’s really a nice guy and wouldn’t do that to me. He must have coerced that information from me while I was under sedation with my butt pointed toward him and him holding a 10 foot flexible tube.  Jean says that Dr. Papp is afraid of cramping and dehydration due to the inability to absorb fluids until this thing is under control.

On the one hand I argue that I’ve been swimming a mile and a half three days a week for quite a while and this should be no different. But then I recall the story of Chris Legh, a multiple Ironman Triathlon winner, who lost part of his colon due to dehydration during a race. Then I think maybe doctors do know better than we do and it isn’t worth the risk. We’ll see.

So there you have it. The End (npi).

Let’s get all the jokes out of the way now like:

Your problems are all behind you now.

Everything comes out in the end.

All bad things will pass.

After all those tests, the doctors finally got to the bottom of the problem.

No, I don’t want to talk about it so don’t ask. And please don’t look at me with that Cheshire Cat smile. Something tells me my history of including many of you in my e-mails against your will is coming back to bite me in the butt (pun intended).

Just (I’m Getting Tired of This Crap) Jack

 I’m still not out of town, so the e-mail is out of character, but I’m a little laid up and going stir crazy already.

For those of you that didn’t go to the Bayshore Marathon, or haven’t heard any of the details, it was a mixed event. Some had a good race and met their expectations (whatever they were), some didn’t have a good race and didn’t meet their expectations, and some weren’t able to do the race due to injuries. But I believe everyone had fun.

It’s hard to understand how someone can have a bad race and still have fun but, as I’ve often said, the fun is in the training and planning. When you consider how many hours were spent meeting with training partners or the Sunday run group and doing the training mileage, the race is just a small part. Congratulations to all who took that first step over the starting line. For those of us that didn’t, next time!!!

I promised not to pass on any of the stories that were told in Traverse City like Patti Bellgraph telling us about the time she helped a teacher with a class outing, tried to move a garbage can out of the way, tripped, and fell INTO the garbage can…or the discussion we had at the brew pub the afternoon of the race about how to avoid nipple rub (yes…it’s painful) with Vaseline, Nip Guards or Band Aids, so I won’t. It’s like Las Vegas…what happens there, stays there.

So, back to the title of the e-mail. Some of you know I’ve been having lots of trouble since last year’s Ironman Wisconsin race with minor injuries. I don’t know whether it’s physical or mental. This is the first time in four years I haven’t been on an Ironman training program.

The first year I had that bike accident over in Saugatuck seven weeks before the ironman race. The flake fracture and the hematoma on my left hip took me out of The Great Floridian in 2001. The second year I trained for Ironman Florida 2002 and, during the race, had my quads cramp turning that race into a survival walk. Then there’s the big bike wreck at Ironman Wisconsin in 2003 and the quad cramps and nausea at Ironman 2004.

Couple those seasons with a dislocated shoulder in the last year of the Superstars (ask Bill Bradley…he also participated) and an AC joint separation in the 2000 Iceman, and you may wonder, as I do, why I ever got involved in athletic competition. Maybe I’m a “herd animal” and the security of the herd outweighs the danger of the hungry Lion. Wait a minute…that’s a bad analogy. In that case, I’m the old and weak Gnu that gets separated from the herd and becomes the pride’s picnic lunch.

So maybe my body is telling me to get out while I still can. Since my racing weight at Ironman Wisconsin, I’ve gained 13 pounds (I’m trying to take it back off, but it’s not that easy), I’ve had a sore right ankle (inside…more like a high ankle sprain), I’ve had a sore left ankle (outside…more like bone pain), a sore left hip (arthritis…maybe made worse by the bike wreck of 2001…uh oh…that may be the key…I have bike wrecks resulting in injury in 2000, 2001 and 2003), and now I’m back to the sore right ankle…same spot.

This morning, according to the triathlon schedule I’m trying to follow, is a recovery swim day. Since I’m not training for anything special I got to Diane’s at around 6 and only swam 3 laps (around 1,800 yards). I’ve been having trouble with my normal spring allergies, as many of you know (sorry for the gross-out but I’ve become a snot machine), got into a sneezing jag while changing into my clothes, and sneezed myself into a back spasm. Now I have trouble getting out of a chair and even walking hurts.

So maybe I should quit. But I don’t want to miss the comeraderie.  Maybe if I tried not to get hurt, I wouldn’t!! I wish I had thought of that earlier. I could have avoided the pain. But, then again, what would I have written about??

Just (I May Need Help Getting Off The Toilet) Jack

 Do you ever have those times when you have a lot of pressure built up and you have to let things vent? No, I don’t mean after a Double Stuft Burrito at Taco Bell! I mean like when you go to bed with too many things swimming around in your head. So I’m venting!

I attended my fourth in a series of seven continuing education seminars today. I need 40 hours per year to keep my CPA license active and need to report my hours every two years. Last year I didn’t attend any classes since I couldn’t remember anything longer than 5 minutes, so I’m doubling up this year.

I got there (Grand Rapids) at 7AM for a 7:30 start. There were 7 different sessions and, coincidentally, the first four were all in the same room. At the end of the third session, my butt was so tired of sitting, I started to stand up just to stretch my legs. Before I could move, the guy in front of me spilled his coffee, which he had placed under his seat. I knew it before I could see it because it all went into my left shoe. How could that happen? Has that ever happened to any of you?

It reminded me of the first day of school when we moved from St. Joe in town to St. Joe in the country. That was back in the days that we actually rode the bus and our parents didn’t take us to school every day. Anyway, we went to the bus stop and one of the kids (one of the dorks trying to impress the girls) found a chocolate milk carton. He stomped on it trying to make a popping sound like a firecracker, but it still had milk in it and it went all over my new school pants. The milk had soured and all day I smelled like puke with brown stains all over me.

O.K. So that kept my mind rolling for a while and passed the time in a somewhat boring seminar. The fourth session was presented by two people (they acted like robots, but I think they were alive) from the Securities and Exchange Commission talking about what’s new there. In unison, let’s all say WHO CARES!!!

In the fifth session one of the presenters talked about Sarbanes-Oxley, which is slightly more boring than watching paint dry. About half way through he made a reference to Mountain View, California in the heart of Silicone Valley. When he said that, I almost laughed out loud. Silicone Valley refers to strippers in Las Vegas. Silicon Valley refers to the tech centers near San Francisco. I know it doesn’t seem funny to you, but at that point, I would have laughed at anything including Roseanne Barr (she isn’t one of my favorite people).

This last Sunday, I had a good run in my Yo-Yo run series. I call it that because every time I have a good run, It’s followed by a bad one. Anyway, I caught up with a couple of runners and drifted into a conversation that Patti and Nancy were having. They run all the time together, so I assume it’s a soap opera conversation that has no beginning and no end. It just continues. I talked about wearing a heart rate monitor or Garmin GPS when Patti quipped that she was running naked. I’ll have to confess that I looked at her right away (even though it was Sunday), and it appeared she had clothes on to me. I guess she meant she was running without a heart rate monitor. A couple of minutes later she said she would be stripping all afternoon. I was going to offer to help, but Tom is a friend of mine and he probably should have first chance to help if he could. I later found out she would be stripping off old wallpaper.

The real reason to write this is to wish all the Trilanders who are doing the Bayshore Marathon this weekend, good race. I would say good luck, but at this point it isn’t luck. You’ve all spent countless hours and endured much pain to train for the race. So have fun. No matter what your time is, HAVE FUN!!! We’re all proud of you and will be there cheering for you.

Just (Bummed I Had A Sore Ankle) Jack