On our way home from a late lunch on Peachtree, Michelle and I noticed two women helping an old man across the street. They were moving very slowly and when the light opposite went green, they were still partly in the street.
Fast forward about an hour; it's 7:20pm. Michelle's cooking a July 4th meal and I'm reading a magazine at my desk. I've been glancing out the window occasionally, and a few minutes ago I just happened to glance down to see the same two women and the man emerging from behind the parking deck by Juniper. It suddenly became clear that they were completing the race, long after the others.
Michelle grabbed a couple Vitamin Waters from the fridge and suggested I take them down.
I rode the elevator down and approached them on Juniper, two cold bottles in hand. At this point I could see that they all had their race numbers on, but still I asked if they were doing the course. I think the women may have been a little tired (they must have been doing this all day), but the man seemed quite energetic. They were also thirsty and looking for a place to get some drinks, so this was pretty awesome position to be in.
I came back upstairs and, from the balcony, could see them at the corner, sitting down and having a drink.
update I guess there was some coverage of this.
Something must be said about the lack of updates. We've been spending much time lately walking. I have decided, it seems, that walking to work during the summer is better than walking when the weather is nice, such as in the spring. This doesn't make complete sense to me, profuse sweating suggests it shouldn't be done this way, and I can't say gas prices are a prime factor. I will be healthy, maybe.
After work I do some more walking, this time with Michelle and Fitzwheeeeliam. We cut through the leafy neighborhood and head to Piedmont Park. Fitz really enjoys seeing other dogs, and though this town is quite large we know many people there by now.
If we're in the mood for something different we walk to Georgia Tech and let him off his leash. The place, especially during the summer semester, is pretty quiet. Students, sequestered off in the brick dorms, seldom come out. We sometimes lay down on the sidewalk and try to see the stars. Fitz plays with cockroaches and crickets. He gently swipes a paw at them if they're uncooperative. I fear one day he'll accidentally kill it, like Johnny 5 in Short Circuit, and spend minutes swiping still, not understanding.
After this walking, we relax some, watch TV or read. Fitz stretches out and recharges just enough so that he can start "playing" at midnight as we're getting ready for bed.
A few years ago Michelle and I came up with a concept for a book we would call That Must Have Been Exciting that would contain pictures of skid marks in very interesting places on the road. The inspiration came from a set of marks we saw on the I-85 exit on I-75 South in Midtown. At that exit, I-75 turns around 180 degrees and becomes I-85. And right as you enter the turn there's a burm that curves along with the road to your left. We noticed while slowing down to make the turn that someone had completely not slowed down and ramped right off the road over the burm, apparently with their brakes applied (a little too late). Michelle casually remarked "that must have been exciting" and I found it really funny.
Well tonight we took Fitz on a walk to Tech and on the way back while we were waiting to cross the street at Spring and 5th. Some strange set of factors combined to produce one result: Fitz's leash somehow slipped from my hand and he began to move across the street, into oncoming traffic.
Michelle lunged after him and tried to get him to stop, but he got scared of us yelling and pressed on as a car sped past. Pretty soon Michelle was following full speed behind him, yelling. I was following her waving my hands at the oncoming cars to make sure they could see us.
We made it to the other side but Fitz was a little scared and started making his way back toward the road. Some girls that were heading out to party helped us get him and then asked us where 14th St was. We quickly settled into giving directions, as if what had just happened was a perfectly normal occurrence.
Thank you for helping us catch him, and for pretending that we are normal.
We just want to party. Tell us where we need to go
That must have been exciting.
Back in 2002 (and again over the years) I've registered domains through Assurance Hosting. One of my domains was up for renewal so I went to their site only to see a landing page. It appears they've gone out of business and any attempts to contact them have failed.
If you're going through this and think you're about to lose your domain, here's what you can do: Assurance Hosting was an eNom reseller, so you can contact eNom and they'll work to unlock your domain so that you can transfer it elsewhere (during the process, which has been going very quickly for me, you'll need to verify your identity and proof of domain ownership).
Michelle was reading a book called Complications that mentions an experiment to test your pain threshold. It involves filling a bowl with room temperature water and another with ice water. You put your hand into the room temperature water for 20 seconds and then shift it to the ice water. With a stopwatch (preferably someone else is timing it) you report when you first feel some pain. This is your threshold. Then you keep your hand in as long as you can stand, up to two minutes. Across people, the pain threshold is pretty similar, but the time it takes before you simply can't stand it anymore varies widely.
The experiment (and some others) is mentioned in this Outside article. There's also a lot of information at Stanford's Pain Lab.
In our trial tonight I lasted the full 2 minutes but felt pain at around 6-9 seconds. The amount of discomfort was surprising actually. My wrist felt like it was kinking up. Michelle went to 24 seconds, but after her bridge work she still has some residual pain that probably affected her "score". The average, according to the Outside article, is about 20 seconds.
