Catching Up: Highlights from the last two weeks

- I had scheduled my last two posts to post on Friday, May 27, and Monday, May 30 - both really early in the morning. They didn't actually post (or at least they didn't show up in RSS feed readers) until sometime in the afternoon on Tuesday, May 31. I don't know what's up with that, but I apologize for two untimely posts this week. I'll try to get to the bottom of that.

- From May 19 until May 28 we were extremely fortunate to be visited by my brother, Jaron. It was absolutely fantastic having him around for more than a week. He's a hassle-free houseguest, and I love his idea of "fun." We spent a lot of time at the park playing with his super-long-distance frisbee. After I threw it into the tree once (and he had to climb up and pull it down), we managed to have a really fun time with it. What we learned is that to play with that kind of frisbee, you need a field about the size of 10 football fields that has NO ONE else playing on it.

- Tuesday we checked out Red Rocks Park and amphitheater, which is one of the coolest sights to see around here (I think Jaron would agree). After that we headed up to Evergreen and did a mild hike that Elizabeth and I have enjoyed numerous times. When we got back to the city Tuesday night we went to a Rockies game. The Rocks lost the game, but we all had a fabulous time (it was $1 hotdog night... and the dogs were Hebrew National, which totally made it worth it).

- Jaron took me golfing. First time I had swung a club in over four years. I had a really good time. I birdied a hole for the very first time in my life. Jaron was a bit disappointed, because the 9-hole course had just two par-4s and the rest were par-3s. We both felt a little silly for having rented a cart. It felt like the equivalent of riding the escalator up 3 stairs.

- Last Friday Jase and Rachel arrived from Des Moines. They were here to pick Jaron up and bring him back to the Motherland, but they drove through the night Thursday so they could be here for all of Friday and spend some time with us. It was a fantastic 24+ hours. We went out to Red Rocks Park to run around a little bit. Later, we pulled out the Saint Louis Cardinals-themed cornhole set that Joel built for us last year. It was the first time we'd ever used them. They are AWESOME and we had a great time playing. Jase, Rachel and Jaron took off on Saturday morning. Spending time with my family always makes me want to move back to Iowa as soon as we possibly can!

- Monday (Memorial Day) Elizabeth had the day off work, and was signed up to run one of the biggest and most famous 10k races in the country - the Bolder Boulder. So we headed up to Boulder early in the morning for her to run. It was a really fun race. A lot of people put on goofy and funny outfits to run it, and there are bands playing all along the race course. Elizabeth finished well below her goal time, even without ideal training conditions the week before with family here and everything. I'm really proud of her.

- Today I had two wisdom teeth pulled. It was an interesting experience. They gave me an IV and I was "consciously sedated" during the procedure. I was told that after the surgery I probably wouldn't remember much of it because the sedative gives you a mild form of amnesia when it wears off. I remember it pretty well, though (I think). It didn't hurt at all at the time, but since the numbing stuff has worn off, it's gotten pretty painful. Fortunately, I've got a bottle of vicodin to keep me company. I can't really eat solid food, though.

That's the last couple of weeks in a nutshell. Now it's June.

The Dentist

My whole life I've hated going to the dentist. I don't have particularly bad teeth, but every time I've ever been to the dentist it's absolute torture. The sounds of drills and metal rubbing against metal, of metal rubbing against teeth, the nasty smells of fluoride and sterility, and the dentists and their assistants who ask questions the whole time they're digging around in your mouth as if they truly want to make conversation, but who never take their hands out of your mouth so that you can actually answer them have always made me hypothesize that if hell were personalized for each person who ended up there, mine would surely be an eternal dentist's chair (good thing I'm not going to hell).

Then, when I was in high school I visited a new dentist, Dr. Mareno (I think that was her name). She was extremely pleasant. Her dentist's chair had a television on the ceiling that faced straight down so you could watch while they worked. They'd give you headphones, and place the tv's remote control in your hand so that you could choose your own distraction. I watched Seinfeld. The people who worked on you were also all very pleasant. They understood that it's impossible for me to answer questions verbally while my mouth is pried open wide, so after each question they asked, they'd pull their hands out and let you answer. They'd tell their own stories too (which makes much more sense than asking questions the whole time... it is possible to listen to stories with your mouth open).

But the best part about Dr. Mareno's office was the laughing gas. No kidding. They'd rest a little hose-like thing on my nose and pump nitrous oxide through it, and before long I was in a world of my own. I don't remember much about being under its influence. I remember that it felt like I watched 5 or 6 episodes of Seinfeld, but it was probably only one. I remember being completely oblivious to the pain that the dentist was inflicting on my mouth. And I remember feeling great. In fact, I remember the dentist asking me once, "Does this hurt too much?" and while I'm sure my actual answer was, "No," in my head I remember thinking, "I honestly don't care. I feel great." [I still can't say that this experience made me enjoy the dentist, but if you've got to go, Dr. Mareno was the closest thing to a good idea I've ever been part of.]

That story came to my mind when I watched this hilarious video of a little kid who is apparently "under the influence" of some very entertaining narcotic. Enjoy.