Like ten miles of rough road

It has been a bit of a rough patch, lately - not so much any huge crisis like a car crash, but a bunch of niggling problems that have just been wearing - as a friend used to say, "like riding bareback for ten miles o' rough road." I'm grateful to say, I'm still sunny-side-up, suckin' air and sober, though a bit out of touch with my sisters and brothers in the digital domain...

First, for those of you who are dying to know, I managed to have a great time at the AMA Supercross races in Detroit. It was an expensive day - I'd already bought the tickets, but between lunch at a local eatery and then snacks and dinner at Ford Field we'd been pretty well raped... But the races brought some dramatic changes in the standings, and yes, I found it exciting. The crowds were pretty well behaved, and at one point on the way home, I even caught myself using the words "lap times" in a sentence. It's something Chris loves, and I find interesting and enjoyable, so it was a "win-win" day.

The trip was kind of marred at the end by hitting a monstrous pothole on the north side of Toledo on I-75. The tire held together for about 5 miles until (fortunately) we got through downtown and on the southeast side where there were some shoulders. But when it failed, it blew out big time, and we just barely got the car off on the shoulder to change it in the rain. The rim was dented beyond repair, the tire was totaled, and both right hub caps went on to Glory. The next morning we found that the right rear wheel also had a good-sized dent in the rim. So I found two used wheels ($50 total); hopefully we'll be able to save the rear tire and only replace the front ($82). So in short, I guess I should have shut up about the food at Ford Field, and concentrated bitching about the roads in the Toledo hinterlands...

Sunday and Monday, I had nosebleeds so bad I had to go to the doctor's Monday morning to get them cauterized. I haven't had nosebleeds like that since I had sinus surgery in 2001, and it was pretty scary. Immediately after that, I came down with some kind of respiratory gunk that just lodged itself in my sinuses and chest, and still hasn't let go. You know it's bad when they get out the albuterol nebulizer to help your breathing get better. Fortunately, Chris is a sound sleeper, and my barking-like-a-basset-hound didn't impair his sleep too much.

And we have had two continuous weeks of the most unGodly fubars at work - days when you get to the end, and think, "Could I just hose my brain out, and start fresh?" I don't know, but I'm getting less resilient to these weekly bobsled rides from Hell. It's not nearly as challenging, or rewarding, as it once was. But it's a sucky time to be job-hunting, especially in northwest Ohio. Thank you, Mr. President - and your oil/banking/military-industrial-complex bastard friends, of course...

The invitations to church remain unaddressed. We were still assessing the damages last week, and this last weekend, I was still feeling too puny to go much of anywhere. Perhaps this weekend, perhaps...

But spring is officially here...there is green and "buddage," as my sister calls it. The first trumpet of spring in Ohio is forsythia, whose yellow explosions give us hope that winter is gone.