boulder, co fourmile canyon fire

the fourmile fire erupted on monday, september 6, 2010 outside of boulder, colorado.  after 4 days, the flames have spread to over 7,000 acres and engulfed 170 homes, displacing thousands of individuals.  below is a current burn areas.

boulder county has up to date information available here. let's hope that this is contained very soon. many thanks to all those fighting the fire, your efforts are valiant.

attack of the zombie daikon

somewhat suddenly,
the simpleminded carrot top found its beta-carotinian self in a precarious situation...

...the vegan halloween horror ensued.

acupuncture

i have suffered from chronic lower back and hip alignment issues for well over a decade now. not fun.

there was never an event of injury which set things off, unless you count the sneeze on an early october morning in '94 that rendered be incapacitated and begun this series of lame pronunciations of mortality.

i've tried the chiropractor and yoga and core work and rubber balls and inversion boots and all have helped or hindered further to one degree or another. well this time, i've tried acupuncture. the session was relaxing and interesting. there were definitely some key points of 'ohhhn that really hit something.'

ther hour was over and i mindfully erected my weight back over the top of my frame, expecting magic to heal me, i was pleasantly greeted with even more discomfort than i had originally walking in the door of the therapist's office. however, time is more fickle than the changing trends of a high school in-crowd and as the day progressed, i noticed a subtle release in my lower lumbar which even awoke me in the night with a 'clearing' sensation.

now i am an eternal skeptical optimistic pragmatist, yet pushed to extremes of human condition i will try alternative practice that people i trust speak highly of. i must tell you, in the days which have followed the acupuncture, i have suffered from what i believe people call recovery.

now i am still experiencing a bit of tightness in my hips, but i can once again lace up my own shoes without looking like an 80-year old man. again, my cynical side says, 'ah, that could have happened as the days passed in any event,' yet i am confident that my current status of recovery was expedited by a series of tiny little needles injected at numerous points along my trunk and legs. at this juncture, i am a believer in the healing stimulation of this centuries old asian medicine. it is worth a shot, in my book.

free will vs. prescribed fate

i guess i am becoming an old man. this morning i was swilling coffee and munching on granola over the morning's news and all of a sudden a big chunk of tooth dislodged from the back of my mouth.
fantastic.
very classy. ironically I went to the dentist yesterday and had decided to set up an appointment to extract the set of wisdom teeth that one of which must have heard me and decided to taste freedom on its own this morning.
let me say this to the other three deep molars and 3/4 stump... go ahead, jump! if you want to vacate my mouth, i invite you to as it will save from my out of pocket expense and y'all ain't been nuthin' but trouble.

vile illness

ugh. the past 36 hours have rendered me incapacitated. the demon began to surface in the midst of a meeting, feeling like a sour stomach from too much coffee. within an hour, i was incapable of focusing on anything but discomfort and pain. i evacuated the workplace and unlocked the front door of our home only moments before the horrible bug inside of me forced most of everything i had in my stomach back out from wince it came.

i floated between an unconscious state of "sleep" and a hyper-conscious run to the vomitorium. i seem to be well on the mend late today, however. the pain has resided and i felt hunger, which was satiated by soup and it stayed where it is supposed to, in the belly. i haven't been this ill since i was a kid.

explosion down the street in hampden

amongst "the urban pirate" (who removes his t-shirt once the temp hits 52degrees) and "toby, the goth wind-whipper" (who wears a long black trench coat and paints his face in scary devilish designs), a tragic explosion back in the olde hood. it appears there were only injuries and no fatalities. the thick skin of the hampdenites keeps us going and going.

wtf?

in the past year, i have replaced the following:

-chain

-front chain rings

-crank

-bottom bracket

-rear cogs

-rear wheel

-front derailleur

-rear derailleur

-gone through 4 tires

and tonight on the ride home, as i was leaning into a right hand turn, the handlebars
just gave way about mid turn. my brain jumped to preparation for a crash, but something kept
me upright through the turn. in the end, there i was with two sections of aluminium pipe in my hand.
guess this part needs to be replaced now, too. at this point, it is basically a new bike.

bike accident

so, on the bike commute into work on friday, a gentleman in a large green suv coming in the opposite direction crossed the center line of the two-lane road i was on and headed straight for me.

a moment before he was driving normally, and then the last thing that flashed through my mind was "he's trying to kill me."

voluntary instincts took over quickly and i swirved toward the curb, but not before i was clipped by the truck and thrown in the air landing in a patch of rocky soil alongside the road.

the real kicker was the driver of the car kept going for awhile. the woman who was in the car behind him stopped to see if i was alright. my right bicep was throbbing as it smashed the driver's side mirror and sent schrapnel flying along the road. i suspected that my arm might be broken, and then decided to test it. no, it didn't feel broken. i said that i might be o.k. to the woman, and we looked up to see the perpetrator continuing to drive away, however slowly. the woman said that she was going to chase him down to get his license number. when the suv saw her speeding after, he decided to stop and return to the scene. i assessed my secondary damages, my left hip was definately cut, as my bike pants and undershorts were both ripped. the damage was more of an abrasion caused by clipping the front quarterpanel of the truck.

the ambulance came within 5 minutes, several passers by stopped to see if they could help. the emt assessed that i was lucky and if i felt symptoms of a concussion to go to the hospital. a cop came and took a report of the incident. never did the suv driver take responsibility of his actions. he said that bikes should be on the sidewalk. i tend to disagree. nevertheless, i feel grateful that i was able to walk away from the accident. it could have been a lot uglier.

here is a shot of my left arm. it is a much deeper black and blue now, but is thankfully just a deep bruise. (i'll spare you the shot of my arse)