Thursday, February 9, 2012

Hee Haw

I'm looking for seconds any and everywhere. Last night it was at Newman Hall in Congregation Sherith Israel where Baleen and I listened to Nurse McMoyler heeeeee and hawwww as coping mechanisms for those coming contractions. When she lined me up with Baleen, face to face, and made me squeeze a handful of ice into my fist while Baleen heeeeed and hawwwed just like she'd like me to on or about March 8th, all I could think of was, I'm going to McMoyler Hawk Hill tomorrow. I kept that part to myself.

When the hill pointed up this morning, I forgot about McMoyler and even Baleen for a bit. It hurt early. I tried to hide it when I saw Merlin's Beard, the third hummingest of the hummingbirds, ride on by for the first time in months and I jumped on John Wooden's wheel on the Flats. That's normally a good place to be, but not when Dr Wooden's spent the hour before that doing repeats. My distance to Dr Wooden stayed the same while Dr Wooden's to Merlin's Beard kept increasing. So I left him, but not before MB was long gone, leaving me working harder than I wanted to to the Circle. 7.35, which a few weeks ago would have had me pacing the room looking for another two seconds, now it's just 7.35.

That left the Sprint as my only real chance for a jersey. Ruthlessness comes in handy on the Sprint. You can win without it, but when somebody else is close and is willing to take the risks that you aren't, then you're not going to win. After tailing Packy Bonner for the first half, I did the work in the second half to lose everybody except Walter Iooss. When I pushed that little bit harder and the big metal U-Lock in the back of my jersey flew out (I was going straight to work), I stood up, trying to let Walt know that I wasn't throwing objects in his way like it was Mario Kart, and he sprinted on by. I'm not sure I could have beat him in the end and while I'm glad he got the jersey, I'm especially glad my flying U-Lock didn't hit him.


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