3 milestones passed this week!!!

Milestone 1 in the photo is the sign telling us we'd basically gone from the Green Zone to the Red Zone. Normally I did this driving just a regular car and with no gun. Tip if you ever have to drive in a war zone or third world country, never drive a clean car. Never ever wash your car as it will instantly peg you as an American. As for milestone 1 in my health I am now able to eat almost all fruits and vegetables!!

Milestone 2 in the photo is the Via Appia Antica. Or more commonly known in the western world as the Appian Way. Where Rome crucified thousands, where Paul entered Rome, where you can still walk or drive on 2,000 year old stones. One of the times I was in Rome I rented a scooter to ride out to the Jewish and Christian catacombs outside of Rome and then back into Rome and around some of the main attractions. It was a super fun thing, like a living Roman Holiday as it were. Milestone 2 in my health comeback is literally dealing with number two. For the first time I went "normally" today!!

Milestone three in the photo could more accurately be called Kilometerstone three. It is a km marker up in the Atlas mountains of Morocco heading back towards Marrakesh. Milestone 3 for my health will be passed on Monday when my wound vac is scheduled to come off. So I will just have a more conventional wound dressing until totally healed, another two weeks or so.

I am getting better! I am getting better!! Passing milestones and I'm putting my foot down to the floor, twisting my wrist all the way.

Freaky Friday

Letting my freak flag fly this Friday, I'll just randomly write out the freaky or not-so-freaky things of this Friday. Judge for yourself, maybe none of them are and I am just totally self deluded...

I had two Humira shots this morning. I have soooooo little body fat that a .5 inch needle was able to reach muscle in one of the injections. They are supposed to be just sub cutaneous, meaning into the fat layer right below my skin. Pun intended, "Fat chance of that!" But at least the drug seems to be working well with me.

Why are my home health nurses old, fat and ugly? Why can't I have a young attractive nurse? If it has to be an unpleasant visit I should at least get some decent scenery. Or even a cool guy nurse like I had last time? Where we could talk cars and motorcycles.

There are three people in the <141 lbs and two people in the <126.5 lbs, purple belt and senior 1 class at the Pans. I really would like to know in the next week if I will be off my wound vac or not by then. Because I am seriously thinking about entering if I am. (I was only 123.5lbs this morning, so I'd probably try and be in the Galo/rooster weight class)

I don't care what the TV or news websites say, I want to go to the beach and check it out, especially sense there has been a tsunami warning. I mean really, what are we having like an 8" surge? Big freaking deal. Heck, if I could get in the water I would go surfing today!

Fingers. The ends of my fingers are toughening up from practicing the guitar. They are still tender, but I can do it and not feel like they hurt. Though I have absolutely no ability to actually play like a song or something yet. Hahaha. It hasn't even been a week and I think I should be playing a song. I also am starting to figure out reading tab, but haven't printed anything out and tried to play it. Yet.

One of my family members, Killer, goes to Japan in less than 3 weeks. He is gonna hit Tokyo right in the middle of their comeback from the huge quake and tsunami. It should be an awesome trip for him. I can't wait to see all of his pictures from this trip!

I love Nalley's Chili. Especially the "Thick" version. Yum! Well they don't sell it anywhere in in So Cal. I even emailed the company and asked them the closest place I could buy it. They replied with basically that there is no place in San Diego to buy it, duh I knew that, and that I could order it directly from them off the web. For twice the price it is sold in the store! They want $58 for 24 cans and that is before the price of shipping a 25 pound package. Whatever! Though....... I do love this chili so much I might just give in and do it. Don't judge.

What I want..... I get.

For so long now, 7 months, I haven't been able to do what I want, in the way I want. On the surface that seems very childish and self centered. I don't know how to reconcile that, or even write it in a more appropriate way.

What I have been doing 95% of the past seven months is doing what I needed to do, all things involving staying alive and dealing with the nightmare medical journey I've been on.

Previously the challenges I wanted in my life were all physical. To run faster, be stronger, get better at riding my mountain bike and of course everything tied into brazilian jiu jitsu. The challenges from my surgeries and health issues have been 66% physical and 34% mental, so even than a lot of what I had to put out most of my effort into was doing something physical.

I am feeling better physically than I have in the past half year and so my mind then has time to wander and my body starts to feel like everything is A-OK and I should be just out there doing my rowdy thing, in rowdy style. But I physically can't. I have doctor imposed limitations that I really have to follow.

Which is good that thanks to some natural desire and the help of my dad I was able to find a new challenge. Something I can do at home and is a total challenge to me in soooooo many ways.

Learning to play the guitar!! Monday I got a brand new Fender Stratocaster and all the stuff I needed to get started.

This is a challenge and I love it! (even though I whine about how sore the ends of the fingers on my left hand are) I'm sure the 30 minutes a day I practice could easily morph into something more.

I wanted a challenge........... well now I have one!!

truth

MCs get a little bit of love and think they hot
Talkin' 'bout how much money they got; all y'all records sound the same
I'm sick of that fake thug, R&B-rap scenario, all day on the radio
Same scenes in the video, monotonous material
Y'all don't here me though
These record labels slang our tapes like dope
You can be next in line and signed; and still be writing rhymes and broke
You would rather have a Lexus? or justice? a dream? or some substance?
A Beamer? a necklace? or freedom?

This is from the Dead Prez song Hip Hop and it speaks to two truths the average person seems to be missing.

One, the state of modern, popular rap and hip hop is crap. If you have any sort of artistic sense you could realize that. See lines 2,3,4 above.

Secondly that people would rather have material things that in the long run mean nothing than something physically intangible but of much greater worth. Reference the last three lines from above.

Once again, soo much out there is aimed at and made for the lowest common denominator in the population's taste and intelligence.

And it disgusts me.

firsties!

all today, a monday.... some good, some bad. buy through it all smile and have fun!

bought my first electric guitar ever. a fender stratocaster. i'm also going to be playing my first song ever on the guitar by the end of the week!

ate at a tgi friday for the first time ever today, and it was 100% free through a family connection.

noticed for the first time that someone has keyed my porsche, vandalizing it in two places and requiring it to be painted. they keyed it down to the metal. f-ers.

for the first time in weeks i weighed over 125lbs.

risky business

if my wound vac is off by march 15th, i am going to register for the pan ams and fight with zero training. risky business.


this saturday is a huge bjj tournament in san diego. the world pro gi qualifier. this is what i went up to santa cruz for last year and got all the way to the finals through all of my side of the bracket no-showing, being over weight or being DQ-ed. 3 "wins" i don't count.

so tomorrow i will be spending all day at a jj tourny i'm not fighting in, but supporting my new team mates, Atos jiu jitsu. which means it will also be the first time in public my old team will really see me. some of them have no idea i switched teams since i did it while out for surgery.

jj schools and teams can be like a gang. i switched gangs silently without telling any one, in a less than manly way. could i be called a creonte? maybe. but tomorrow i am sure i will have to face the music in a very public place and i doubt it will be pretty. risky business.

It's a small world after all.... And a cool one!!

Last year for the heck of it I fought in the Mundials, or world championships for brazilian jiu jitsu. You know, cause I do things like that on a whim.

The brackets are online a week before the fights so I googled my first opponent's name and found him on youtube and facebook. I like to scout the people I am going to fight ahead of time.

Well after he beat me and went on to be 2nd in the world in his class (I can't say "our class" as I really am in the old guy class and he is in the true adult class) we became friends on facebook. I even left my old jiu jitsu team when the team he trains with opened a branch in San Diego.

So because there are a bunch of big tournaments in the next 6 weeks in San Diego and Los Angeles area all of the big names from our team, Atos, are here in San Diego training. I am getting to hang out with world famous black belts, spend more time with a guy who I've fought one and then been FB friends with for a year.

Like he is having dinner at my house with my parents and such on Sunday. Just 10 years ago I could have never made this type of friendship and had it grow. It really is an awesome world and I love being in it. I can't wait to visit him in Rio Claro sometime.

It just makes me smile to have friends from different places and cultures. I love it.

Ronaldo and me. Big smiles, big hugs and big friendship!