Ultra-Marathon Man.

My brother, the Amazing AndyMan, just finished his most recent 100 mile race, The Rocky Roads 100 in California, in 22 hours and 21 minutes; good enough for a 9th place finish and a belt buckle prize worthy of Aaron Rodgers and the WWE. This morning's Parade Magazine featured an article about ultra-marathon darling Dean Karnazes. Andy and Dean have run in some of the same races. In 2009, Andy and Dean both ran The Great Western States Endurance Run. Andy said the race was brutal. He was the very last runner to finish, in 30:37 an 243rd place, but he ran every mile of it. Dean dropped after 19 hours, rating a final listing of 275th place. There is no doubt that Dean is a great athlete, and he deserves the accolades he gets. But my money's on my Bro. Congrats, A-Man.

Wreck.

Diane and I got slowed down on U.S. 17 on the way to Charleston on Friday. Traffic came to a stop. We saw a helicopter circling above, and knew it portended bad things.
The chopper landed just a few cars ahead of us.
One of the wounded went by air, at least one other went by land. Must have been a pretty bad wreck.
According to the Post and Courier, It was. We're both thankful it wasn't us.

A Day at the Beach.

When asked how he liked a job he'd recently acquired, my brother, the Amazing AndyMan, once said, "What can I tell you? If they paid me to drink beer and watch sports on t.v., I wouldn't like it because they'd tell me when to do it". Things change. I have it on good authority that he does like his current job... though they still tell him when to do it. The Public Defender's Office isn't a bad gig, all in all. The other day I had a hearing on Edisto Island, which was, quite literally, a day at the beach.

It's Dew or Di.

I was perusing the comics in the Charleston Post and Courier this morning, as I do every morning, and caught this edition of Stephan Pastis' "Pearls Before Swine" (or, if you want to read it in color, you can click on this link). I've previously posted on Pastis' puns. Before you get all "puns are alright, but Stephan Pastis is no Shakespeare", I want to remind you that Shakespeare was a pun guy, too.

The Red Rocker

FYI: I'm not a DIY guy. I've mentioned this before. For some folks, the maxim "If you want something done right, do it yourself" is Gospel. Not so for SD. If I want something done right, I'll recruit somebody.
Still, I am a man, and I'm pretty sure the "Dude Code" requires that I try to do some things myself. I looked at the dull rocking chairs on our front porch, and suggested to Lady Di that we paint them. "White paint would look nice", opined Diane. "Ah, yes, Diane, but is not the theme of Walterboro's Chamber of Commerce "The Front Porch of the Lowcountry"?", I asked. "Why yes, Dear Husband", replied my Distaff Half. "And is not the symbol of this campaign a red rocking chair?", I pressed. Diane sighed heavily, and ultimately agreed that it was our duty to the Boro to paint the rocking chairs red.
.So, we checked our supply of sanding blocks, some white primer, brushes, tarps, cans, and mineral spirits, and supplemented our stock with several cans of Krylon "Banner Red" spraypaint at the local edition of a national discount super-store.

Then we sanded, brushed and sprayed throughout the day. Our work was not perfect, but it wasn't too bad, either, and we got our red rockers.

Dress for Success.

I love the Boro. Really, I do. It has a lot of neat people. It is pretty. And a surprising number of amenities for a small place. You see people you know everywhere you go. 'Course, I forget, sometimes, that it is a small place. And that you see people you know everywhere you go. I specifically forgot this when Lady Di asked me to run a couple of errands. I'd settled in for Thursday night T.V., and was dressed to de-stress, not to impress. A too-small Tom Petty Concert T-shirt over my undershirt. Ragged shorts (made possible by temperatures in the 70's (maybe Punxatawney Phil was right, after all)). White socks. Top-siders. I was only going to be gone for a couple of minutes, right? Well, as I was filling up my gas-tank, maybe three carloads of my clients were likewise fueling their rides. I kept my head low, and I think I'd've been okay, but the pump wasn't having it. No receipt tape in the machine. "See cashier for receipt". Damn! I'm fairly certain I'd call her as a witness in a case. I detected a smirk, as she handed me my receipt. On the way out, I heard a couple of teenagers that I recognized from the office. "Naw, he ain't", says one. "Yeah, it is. That's the Public Defender". Hoo, boy.

I looked a little like one of Monty Python's Gumbies

Food for Thought.

Jumpin' Jimminy! We're growing meat from stem cells in Charleston! That is to say, we WERE growing meat from animal stem cells in Charleston. The paper referred to it as a "meat lab". According to the Charleston Post and Courier newspaper article photographed at left (which you can link: HERE), the Medical University of South Carolina suspended the Director of the project for insubordination and "unacceptable behavior". The article also contained the following: "While the future of the meat lab remains uncertain, the suspension also calls into question the future of a separate project, a $20 million effort that aims to create human organs from a person's own stem cells". Hmmm. The Director in charge of the "meat from animal stem cells" is suspended, and the project for harvesting organs from human stem cells is in jeopardy. Anybody remember the early seventies Charlton Heston Sci-Fi movie Soylent Green?

Spring, Spring, Already!

I'm tired of winter. Punxatawney Phil apparently told us February 2nd- on Groundhog Day- that we'd have an early Spring. I found that using Wikipedia, of course, but in checking, I was dismayed to discover that there are lots of different_groundhogs, that play this shadow game, and a lot of 'em thought we'd have six more weeks of Winter. Great. It appears this Groundhog Day stuff might be kind of arbitrary. Next thing you know, they'll be telling me professional Wrestling's fixed!

The Name Game, Redux.

Though I'm a Florida State graduate, I first went to college in Tennessee, at "The University of the South: Sewanee" (or, as it is now called, "Sewanee: The University of the South"). Names are funny things. Shakespeare pointed out that a rose would still smell nice if you called it an old shoe, but names still have power. Diane and I went to the Charleston chapter gathering of the Sewanee Alumni association last night, and they gave me a name-tag that indicated I was "Sparky", though I'd never used the moniker at Sewanee. Whence the mix-up? Well, "Chip" Manning, one of my old classmates, was dunning me for a contribution, and I sent my generous contribution of, maybe, twenty five bucks an returned the gift card with the name Sparky. Chip apparently amended the records to reflect my new name. A couple of people at the gathering looked at me quizzically. "You look familiar", they noted, "but I don't know any Sparkys". The host of the event, Mark "Moose" Phillips, with whom I'd played football (and quaffed a few brews way, way, back then) gave me a funny look, too. Once I'd assured him of my actual identity, he loosened up, a bit (though he did watch his liquor cabinet closer!).

Happy Birthday, Baby.

Today was Diane's Birthday (well, actually, it was the anniversary of her birthday. You only get one actual birthday). I took her to the Indigo Girls concert in North Charleston last night. It was a lot of fun. Today I made us a right respectable meal of: meatloaf (94% lean ground beef, a couple of eggs, some bread crumbs, ketchup, onions, Worcheshire sauce, and a glaze of ketchup, brown sugar and honey (and a dash more W-sauce); some red-potato mashed potatoes with five cloves of garlic and a bit of butter and milk; a steamed vegetable medley of broccoli, carrots and red onions with pepper; and a decent bottle of Cianti. It was pretty good, I think. Not in Lady Di's league, of course, but not bad. A middling from-the-box yellow cake (Duncan Hines, I think), with some raspberry compote in between the layers, and topped with home-made butter chocolate frosting (butter, cocoa, vanilla, milk and confectioner's sugar) that tasted better than it looked completed the meal. A pretty paltry gift for my wonderful wife, but I think she liked it anyhow. Happy Birthday, Baby.

You Don't Mess Around with Tiramisu.

Among the treats Lady Di has recently prepared was a pan of tiramisu. Espresso, cream cheese, sugar (regular and confectioners) coffee liquor, lady fingers (I had to hunt at five different stores to find the ladyfingers, but it was worth it), and, what? Oh, what do you do with this batch of egg whites?


Or, as Michael Jackson had it:



Right, beat it! Mix the sugar, cocoa and cream cheese, fold in the beaten egg whites to make the filling. Drizzle the espresso/coffee liquor/confectioner's sugar concoction over the lady fingers, spread the filling and sprinkle some cocoa over the top, and refrigerate. I'd've taken a picture of the finished tiramisu, but I ate it too fast!

Ghost Whispering.

I was messing around with FaceBook the other day, and took a gander at list of friend suggestions FaceBook recommended. I guess their suggestions are based interconnections that my FB friends have with their friends. I guess FB figures that if I'm friends with Mitch and Cathy, and Mitch and Cathy are friends with Betty and Bob, maybe I oughta check out Betty and Bob. So I did. As I scrolled through the list, I noted at least two people who have died: a local police officer and one of Lady Di's former associates (none of the folks in the pic at left are dead, as far as I know. I just picked the page randomly... Okay, it was because of the dude that looks like Elvis). It was kind of creepy. I declined to send friend requests to them, since it's pretty unlikely they'd accept (even Mark Zuckerburg doesn't have an app for that). Maybe I'll try the original social network connection: maybe I'll say a prayer for them.

My Old School, 3.

One of my friends from the good old days recently posted this picture in FaceBook (Thanks, Julie).
See if you can pick me out of the crowd. Or Dave O. Or Mitch.

Ambiguous Headline Alert.

I really, really hope they mean shooting BY co-eds.