Simon

I had a dream that I was hanging out with Simon Cowell.  We were at some sort of conference or something like that.  Although we were in Florida it was cold and snowy.  Simon talked about coming over to my house to hang out and asked if I had a hot tub or sauna.  I told him “no, I only have a pool but I don’t have the heater turned on”  I asked him where he was staying and was surprised when he said he was staying at the Hampton Inn right off the Immokalee Road exit on 75.  I remember feeling surprised he would not be staying in a higher end place.  That’s it.

I think it’s sort of cool what the guy did with the palinaspresident.us site now that the commotion is over. It’s also interesting the little tidbits coming out that all was not rosey in the McCain/Palin camp.  Evidently many McCain staffers were not happy at all with the way Palin handled various situations leading up to the election.  Bummer.

I kept hearing Howard talk about how Celebrity Rehab was the best show on tv.  I finally added it to my Tivo schedule.  I only have seen half an episode so far but I can already tell what he was talking about.  Watching “celebrities” try to crawl out of the depths of drug addiction is good tv.  It took me awhile to recognize Nikki McKibbon from season 1 of American Idol. I’m not quite sure what substance she is addicted to besides food.  She looks nothing like the picture here. It looks like she tried to eat the disappointment of her failed singing career away. You have to watch the show to see what I mean. 

One of my young adult fantasy women, Tawny Kitaen is also on the show.  I saw her a year or two ago on Surreal Life so I already knew that she has aged into a freaky, violent, bitter woman.  It’s an odd thing how so many women that were on Surreal Life have made their way on to the cast of Celebrity Rehab including Briggete Neilsen, Chyna, and now Tawny.  One show took advantage of their addictions to capture outrageous footage of them drunk and wasted.  Now this show is about beating that same addiction.  Seems odd doesn’t it?

Another show I watch is Ultimate Fighter.  This year the fighters have been pranking each other constantly.  The one team had been having fun eating the fruit tray of a fighter on the other team for weeks.  The fruit would be clearly labeled with his name but they did it just to piss him off.  Well this guy decided he would get his revenge in a rather disgusting way. 

He took a fresh fruit tray with his name on it and pissed all over it. Yes.  Not only did he piss on it, three of his teammates did as well. When they were done there was 2 inches of urine in the bottom of the fruit tray.  They sealed it back up, put it back in the fridge with his name clearly on it.  Well the other team snagged the fruit tray immediately later in the day and started digging in.  Evidently the urine had been mostly absorbed into the fruit.  The other team ate the ENTIRE tray of piss soaked fruit.  Once they were told many of them immediately started dry heaving.

Things didn’t end there.  Another fighter had a habit of eating another fighters sushi.  Since the piss prank set the bar high, they had to go higher.  So they had another fighter pleasure himself and then spread the result of his efforts all over the mostly white sushi.  Just like the fruit tray bandits, the sushi stealer struck again.  Yes he ate a piece of sushi with dna all over it.  When he was told he was disgusted and angry (of course)  He vowed that somehow, someway the fighters that were responsible for the semen sushi would wind up with his fecal matter on them.  Unreal.  Great show.

My fantasy football team is a mess.  After an awesome 5-1 start, I now sit at 5-4 after losing three games in a row.  The combination of the Cowboys going in the tank and injuries have just wrecked my team.  I’ve been scrambling week in and week out to try to shuffle things up but have had little success.  Half of my team is injured.  To give you an idea of how bad my team is right now my starting running backs this weekend are Justin Fargas and some guy from the Ravens named McClain.

I signed up for the Midpoint Bridge Veterans Day 5k.  This was the first race Ali and I ever ran some three or four years ago.  I like it because they have it at night and they close off the bridge for the race.  I ran 3 miles on the treadmill last Friday so I should be good to go.  I am going to skip running today and instead do the 300 that I would normally be doing on Monday. The only negative about the race is that this year it is on a Tuesday night.

Ali won’t be running.  She has had ongoing problems with her knee for several months now.  She went to the same orthopedist I did.  I was sure that she had some sort of meniscus thing going on, similar to what I have.  However her MRI did not reveal any meniscus damage.  The only thing it showed was the cartilage on the back of her knee cap was thinning.  Instead of surgery, she has been doing PT for a couple months, taping the knee and most recently got her first injection of that artificial knee fluid gunk I had as well.  I wasn’t real big on her getting the shots based on my experience. The shots had a very limited beneficial effect for me.  The knee was less noisy for a couple months tops.  It wasn’t worth it in my opinion.

Ali is frustrated by the roller coaster she has been on.  She thinks the knee is feeling better and then she tries to do something moderately intense and is once again in pain.  I can totally relate of course since I have had knee issues for the last 10 years.  I know the frustration.  After all that time I learned what worked for me.  Strengthening the supporting muscles around the knee is very important, it helps keep the knee stable.  I think dropping body weight also has helped me a lot from a knee perspective.  I doubt I would still be able to play volleyball or run if I was still tipping the scales at 195-200 pounds.  I also still regularly take flax seed oil as well as glucosamine.  Oh yea, if you have bad knees forget taking creatine.

All that being said, I’m not sure if the course of action the orthopedist has prescribed is going to be successful.  I know when he scoped me, one of the things he did was “smooth out” rough areas behind my knee cap.  I suspect Ali has similar rough areas as well as possibly some loose fragments floating around that cause inflammation if they get lodged in the wrong spot.   Knees suck.

My tendinitis in my right forearm is still the same.  Using the knee strap for my forearm didn’t seem to do much.  I think I want to get an actual forearm support designed for tennis elbow.  At the gym I have to pick and choose what I do carefully.  Many of my regular exercises aggravate the area so I either have to abandon that exercise or do it with much lighter weight.

This weekend I plan on trying to install the replacement rear door latch on the van.  I also may work on trimming up another set of cabbage palms.