Oh my God I hurt.. I hurt if I do nothing more then change the way my weight is sorta dispersed.. Why do I hurt so? Well.. there’s two factors to be considered.

Factor #1

I’ve spent the last week.. mostly in bed, sick. I have ventured out of bed a few times.. and one time even made it to the local chicken bone.. A bar I go just about every Wednesday.. there’s a band that plays mostly covers, where folks get up and sing with the band.. and I drink a few beers.. and this is like.. well more and more it’s turning into the only time I get out of the house.. and after half a week of not leaving the bed.. I figured I’d give it a try at least… and if it was too much, I’d go home.

I got there late.. it took me about an hour to find my car keys.. trying to find those keys.. going up and down several flights of stairs… several time.. whiped me out to the point where I didn’t know if I’d make it.  When I finally got to the bone.. well.. it actually turned out to not be too bad for me.. which seemed surreal, accept for that one rock out part.. that felt a little much…

As a part of.. I don’t know, I guess being sick.. I’ve had trouble sleeping.. and um.. I think that’s played a toll as well.

Today I slept late.. and then went on over to Factor #2

Factor #2: Pig Roast at Greg’s

My friend Greg.. he has a lot of these little parties on weekend days… and this was such a party…  Beer.. really good meat… sitting around talking.. and then… the activities.. as they spontaneously emerged.

The first activity was whiffle ball.. well it was Greg pitching to me. When was the last time I played whiffle ball? Like um.. Idk, 10 or so years ago maybe? I figured just swinging a bat couldn’t hurt too much.. and anyway the first order of business was to see how long it would take me to get some kind of excuse for coordination back.

Oddly, the coordination came back fast.. as did trying to work out my swing.. which I quickly discovered.. involved more physical excursion then I expected… I never really felt like I had it all together.. but it was enough to impress a few of the party goers.. and I think Greg was a little surprised that I had an athletic side.. mind you I haven’t really used that side in 15 or so years but.. sure, it exists..

Anyway.. so my last shot made the ball go behind the Greg family shed.. to ether side of said shed… are nothing but pricker bushes… so, we decided we didn’t need to go for the ball..

But oh man.. was it at this point I was starting to feeling it? My trunk muscles… to the extent that if I stood the wrong way I’d want to fall down? I don’t even know…

Latter.. it was time to play another game.. that Adam Zand and I were going to try and start up.. to which I proclaimed an interest in going on a mission to get the whiffle ball…

Quest for a Whiffle Ball

Just beyond the prickers was a wire fence, followed by more prickers..

Next day sometime:

Shit, much of this post was lost!!!

I had on shorts.. so the whole wade through the briar patch style thing… was not seeming super awesome to me.. however, perhaps I could climb up on the shed and make it to the whiffle ball that way? Adam was in a good enabler sorta mood.. and helped me sorta get some of the wood that was lying around the side of the shed set up so I might use it to scale the thing..

Ok.. so dig this right? When I was a kid.. I was a super duper bad ass tree climber kid.. ask anyone who knew me then, they’d tell you. But.. with age has come both changes in my center of gravity and.. well I couldn’t do a chin up to save my life.. not any more..

A couple days latter, still hurting bad:

So I’m standing on these boards.. at the edge of the shed.. With my arms stretched out above me.. I’m able to get my fingers on the shingles.. if I could just kinda pull myself up I could do it… but I don’t have the arm muscles for that.. I need to get some momentum if I’m going to get myself over.. and I have to be careful about balance cause if I loose it.. I’m going to fall backwards on assorted boards and who knows what damage could befall me..

Eventually I back down and with Adam’s help.. move the board pile more towards the back of the shed, where the roof is much lower.. but also.. I’m not totally sure about the structural integrity of this part of the shed’s roof.. if I make it on, will the roof come crashing down below me? Clearly there’s a thin line between balls and stupidity.. and I’ve already sold my soul to the stupidity.. I’m going for it!

Somehow I manage to pull myself up on the lower roof part.. and.. though it sags, it doesn’t seem like its going to crash beneath me.. though my confidence is still not that high in its dependability.. and so I proceed with a light foot.. though not without first looking back from where I’ve come, to realize I might not be able to get down that way….

I make it over to the mid portion of the roof.. which is roughly where I assume the ball is… and kinda look over. The drop is short.. not 5 feet.. but the area is covered in brush of the sort that you have to be careful how you fall.. so.. I get myself seated on the roof side, with my legs dangling over, and rock forward.. falling to the ground below.. feet first.. which, is always advisable…

;

My feet hit earth, but a problem emerges.. the earth is slanted in such a way that I start falling back.. as if into a ditch behind me.. head first.. filled with more boards… against which my head crashes.

“OUCH! Matt, are you ok?” I hear from around the corner of the shed.. It’s Adam..  Though my head is full of a dull throbbing pain.. now puffed up.. with a little blood flowing a gash.. I assure Adam that I’m ok. I really am ok.. it hurt.. but it could have hurt much more.. and what the hell, the whiffle ball is right by my feet.. and I throw it back over.

Once I’ve sorta straightened myself out.. standing upright again.. It’s time to work out how the hell I’m going to make it back. The roof overhang is a little above upper chest hight.. so theoretically it shouldn’t be too hard to make it back up.. with a little help from the boards I had cracked my head on.. but there’s one problem..

Greg’s shed is experiencing what we call in the 8th grad science biz “roof to forest succession,” which means the edges of the roof.. are less strong then the rest of it.. will I once again crash into those boards, this time as the roof collapses under the weight of my assent?.. Well risk adversion didn’t get me this far in this adventure so.. precariously I use the boards to try and get back up and….  I make it.. and quickly travel to that part of the roof where I had gotten up in the first place.

Staring towards the ground.. It’s somewhat clear that.. if I were to dangle my legs over the edge, with my stomach facing the shingles..

1. My feet would not reach there foot holds until such time that I was so far over the edge that I would not be able to stop my decent until my feet got there hold.. of my body hit the ground.. perhaps in a disastrous crash.
2. I would not see the feet holds.. they were small after all.. and my head would be facing in the other direction.. only way I’d find them is by touch.. and if I missed.. I would no doubt damage myself on the fall.

So I assess jumping. Where I’m at is a little over head hight.. which I believe… if memory served me right.. was a jumpable distance.. when I was a kid and given to this kind of foolishness.. and when I was in better shape for both withstanding the impact of falls and recovering from the repercussions of miss judgements..

I make the jump..  and.. drum roll please.. no big deal.. I was fine!

;

Now mind you all of this happens at a time when the effort to go up and down a couple flight of stairs a few times might make me feel like I was pushing it a little too much!

Aww, but the adventures were not yet over! Now that we had a whiffle ball.. it was time to play a game of Greg’s invention..

Greg’s Game ( in alpha )

You have this circle.. in this case delineated by a garden hose.. at the center of which stands a PVC pipe.. hammered into the ground, on top of which stands.. fragile-e, a whiffle ball. Players take turns rolling, throwing, or whatever-ing, bocce styles balls, towards the PVC pipe.. from outside the circle.. the object is to get as close as possible the PVC pipe.. as you can, without knocking the whiffle ball off the pipe..

The closest wins some points, the one who knocks the whiffle ball off looses some.. sometimes touching the PVC without knocking the whiffle ball of earns b0nus points..

Well.. the game’s in alpha and we are always trying different rules.. and on this particular game event.. the rules eventually decent into relative anarchy…. as we get around to deciding there will be no turns.. a large group of us will all throw the ball at once.. with the winner of the last throw deciding how me must throw the next round.. which could including spinning around 5 times.. hopping on one leg.. naming a president.. and God knows what else.. while throwing the ball…

Greg has posted a picture (in which you can see the shed to) of the game being played here.

It was a good time.. but perhaps not good for a sick person?

Sometime after this.. the party dispersed.. and eventually a couple of us made our way over to, drum roll please..

The Chicken Bone

I don’t know how late it was by this point.. it was good to have another beer.. as the Blues band played ( see some of Greg’s picks of said blues band here )

Anyway.. I’ll cut this story short here.. we spent a few hours there.. and I eventually made my way home.. to collapse.. now, 3 days latter… My body is still in really bad pain.. and I’m still feeling sick.. though not as bad as before.. and how sick I feel comes and goes.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 12th, 2009 at 9:36 am and is filed under life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.