Nineteen weeks ago, I woke up in my hospital bed following two days of heart surgery. The running streak was over, and I was trying to sort out the names of people around me. It was beginning of a recovery that has been difficult, frustrating, and tougher than expected. The initial ride home from Tampa was painfully jarring, as was coughing, sneezing, and sometimes even moving. Sleeping was uncomfortable since I couldn’t adjust from being on my side. Everything was fuzzy from the pain medication, so focusing on reading, writing, or watching TV was impossible. Thankfully, times have changed.
I’ve since been through occupational & physical therapy, follow-up visits, medication adjustments, relying on a walker, a trans-Atlantic cruise, cardio rehab, dizziness, nausea, leg cramps, and have finally made it to the gym. Tomorrow, I go in for an ultrasound to find out why I’m having difficulty walking. There seems to be no problem with the stationary bike, rowing machine, swimming, or weightlifting, but the Charlie Horses in my left leg are debilitating after about 10-minutes on a treadmill. Walking was my first course of action, a little further each day, up to 3-miles, but that has become a set-back. Workouts in the pool have helped bolster my endurance. I even returned to chair yoga yesterday and followed up with an hour in the gym.
A simple adjustment of Lisinopril to half-a-tab-twice-a-day seems to have quelled the dizziness and light-headed feelings. My normal routine has returned, but to be able to walk without pain is the final “step” in this healing process. Losing a few more pounds would be helpful, however, my appetite has returned. I’m no longer restricted from lifting heavy options or doing some projects around the house. This is actually the bad news – no more excuses.
Another Memorial Weekend is in the books – my 73rd and counting. While remembering those we’ve lost – we mourn yet another in Bill Walton, basketball star, personality, and Grateful Dead fan. He was a young 71. My first indirect contact with him was on March 24, 1973, when he scored 17-points in a 70-59 UCLA win over my Indiana Hoosiers. I watched from home after injuring my hand changing a flat tire. It was not a good day.
Before the announcement of Walton’s passing from cancer, we had already attended the annual Venice Symphony Memorial Day tribute at Cool Today Park. As has been the tradition these past two years, our Indianapolis friend who now lives in Vero Beach has come to visit. It was a beautiful night, capped with fireworks over the stadium. My wife and I have now seen 3-and-a-half of these shows since having moved to Florida. The first year we only count as half since we watched from the parking lot in our convertible without buying a ticket.
We returned to the house Saturday night after the fireworks to watch the Pacers “choke” in Playoff game one against the Celtics. The Cubs also lost to the Cardinals, the Sox got beat by the Orioles, the Dodgers lost to the Reds, and the Hoosiers eliminated in the BIG tourney. Our friend’s father once played for the Dodgers, so it was not a good sports day for either of us. My wife, who could care less, took the dogs for a walk while the two of us ranted.
Sunday was race day and we had invited a house full of people to watch. Unfortunately, there was a rain delay, but no one seemed to care with plenty of food and drink to ease the pain. The weather was ideally hot here in Florida, so we had plenty of space to entertain 40-people with tables on the lanai. It was reminiscent of the many times that we had visitors back in Indiana, stuck in our home waiting for the rain to stop and the race to start. The only problem there was that these were overnight guests, and it was sometimes days before the green flag dropped.
Our party guests on Sunday were mostly all neighborhood acquaintances that retreated to their nearby homes once the afternoon had ended. The race did eventually run in the evening, so there were only the three of us left to watch. It was an exciting finish and our favorite driver, and son of a friend, finished a respectable 10th. The Cubs lost again to the Cardinals, as did the Sox to the Orioles, and the Dodgers to the Reds.
Holiday Monday finally arrived with more baseball losses and the Walton shocker. Although I never met Bill in person, I’ve certainly followed his career. My Portland friends knew him from the time of his Trailblazers championship, so they were lamenting his passing in our text messages. We enjoyed the day by the resort pool, eating leftovers from the party. I left early to tend to the pups. A Zoom call with Indianapolis friends filled the evening before a final Pacers loss on top of more Cubs and Sox shortcomings. At least, the Dodgers mercifully were rained out against the Mets. They will all try again today, but the Pacers are done for the season.
With a memorable, long weekend behind me, I return to Chair Yoga this morning, followed by another trip to the gym. With my surgery, I have not been to class since January, while the gym these past few weeks has given me some stamina. I could tell how sadly out of shape I am, struggling breathlessly to negotiate all the stadium steps the other night. I obviously have a long way yet to go in recovery. The girls are headed to Boca Grande beach this afternoon after Aqua-Fit class. I’ll be in charge of the dogs. We’ll dine in tonight but tomorrow night will be our friend’s 69th birthday celebration. We’ll then probably do it all again next year for her 70th – just another of many a “Memorable Memorial!”
We’ve done so much traveling this past year that we decided to take a break and rent our Marriott Vacation Club timeshare. We selected the Barony Beach facility at Hilton Head in prime season and reserved a two-bedroom, beachfront unit. We then posted its availability on several credible VRBO sites. Several weeks ago, we got a bite from a guy named Thomas Britt claiming to be out of Washington, DC. His company was awarding he and his family a trip incentive, and the corporate vacation planner would make the arrangements. It sounded legit, so I drew up a contract from a legal site with his name, address, and phone number, as provided. The check arrived yesterday.
He had apologized in advance that the check was for more than the agreed rental because the fees for this planner had been accidentally included by the company. We were to cash the check and forward the balance. The check turned out to be nearly double the rent, so I grew suspicious and went to the fbi.com website:
“Rental scams occur when the victim has rental property advertised and is contacted by an interested party. Once the rental price is agreed-upon, the scammer forwards a check for the deposit on the rental property to the victim. The check is to cover housing expenses and is, either written in excess of the amount required, with the scammer asking for the remainder to be remitted back, or the check is written for the correct amount, but the scammer backs out of the rental agreement and asks for a refund. Since the banks do not usually place a hold on the funds, the victim has immediate access to them and believes the check has cleared. In the end, the check is found to be counterfeit and the victim is held responsible by the bank for all losses.”
I immediately did a Facebook and Linked In search for the renter’s name and the travel agent. Nothing. I then put the name on the check and the Downers Grove, Illinois address into a second search and found a phone number. Luckily, the person answered even though she didn’t recognize the number and could have dismissed my call. I could tell she was very suspicious and when I told her about the check, she was very disturbed. “This has happened before,” she claimed, so she had to go to the trouble of closing her account, including automatic payments and already written checks. What a hassle! I felt sorry for her, but at least we apparently stopped the scan.
I still have the check that will never be cashed but noticed that the return address on its overnight package was from Gold Coast Mall in San Francisco (it doesn’t exist). The scammer’s texts are from a Nashville area code. Unfortunately, there is probably no way to track this guy down. All I could do was cancel our Marriott Vacation Club reservation, moving the points to something else. I probably should have been more proactive earlier in this process but had no reason to be suspicious until the request for a check on the balance.
Obviously, our first attempt to be a landlord was a bust, but we didn’t get burned. At least, not yet! There are a lot of bad people out there like this criminal. I certainly don’t want to make any threats directly to him because he knows our name, address, and phone number from the rental contract. He (or she, since we’ve had nothing but electronic exchanges), would also probably claim that they knew nothing about this, and that the company they work for was also a victim. I also thought it was interesting that they chose a bank holiday to send the check to us. Be careful!
It’s hard to believe that I can sit in the air-conditioned comfort of my living room and watch the entire Carb Day event from Indianapolis. Carburetors, of course, don’t exist anymore on IndyCars and haven’t since 1963, but the last day of practice before the Indy 500 is still called by that obsolete name. The race itself is still blocked in the Indianapolis area, so I can remember going out of town to even see the race on TV. However, I still enjoy listening to the radio broadcast, that became a habit years ago as I was working on home improvement projects over the long weekend.
I used to sell sponsorships in the race broadcast every year, working for WIBC in Indianapolis. However, we didn’t cover Carb Day back then, so it wasn’t part of the packages I sold. This is why I’m so intrigued with the fact that it’s now streamed on Peacock TV. It is technically pay-per-view but included as part of my subscription that I bought to follow IU basketball this past season.
The race and qualifying have been broadcast in their entirety for many years now, so it only makes sense to extend the coverage to Carb Day. After all, the cameras are in place, and announcers/crews already in town. Everybody gets a day off tomorrow, but it used to be two days prior to 2005 when the event was held on Thursday rather than Friday. I’m just not sure how long they’ve been doing this live broadcast? Even the Pit Stop competition will be included from 2-4p. I’ve watched Carb Day from the infield, the stands, the pits, and from luxury suites. This is first time I’ve watched it live on TV, other than on the closed-circuit monitors at the Speedway or in the TV studios at WISH-TV, where we picked up that feed for later sports coverage.
Years ago, the only option to see Carb Day was to drive to the Speedway, fighting the traffic to find a spot in the infield. It was then a long, hot walk through a mass of spectators to get to an air-conditioned suite, if you were lucky enough to be a guest. On some occasions, I might have had a suite parking pass, access to a golf cart, or a rare race day police escort. Otherwise, it was a hassle unless you got there really early. It was always hot and crowded, and without the right credentials hard to find a good seat near the pits. Unlike race day, it was never sold out, but seating was restricted to the main straightaway.
So, here I am, marveled by technology, watching an event that was once only enjoyed by paying for admission or flashing a badge. It’s usually not particularly exciting, but more so than qualifying, in my opinion. Actual race day conditions are in effect and multiple cars are on the track with full tanks of fuel. Colton Herta flipped his car on Carb Day 2022, but there have been no fatalities, even on race day since 2010. “Gentlemen (and Katherine Legge) start your engines.”
Geoffrey Chaucer is credited with saying, “all good things must come to an end.” In other words, nothing lasts forever, including all of us. Chaucer, of course, is best known for writing The Canterbury Tales. I do not recognize any of his other works, but just like his words, he died in 1400 and is buried in Westminster Abbey. I do not recall seeing his monument there when we visited exactly a year ago today, in fact. I was still running at that time, although I knew that the end of my streak was not far away.
Sure enough, January 15, 2024 was the last day, with open-heart surgery later that morning. I sent a notification to the United States Streak Runners Association to that effect, and today I saw the official word in the Summer newsletter. I had been moved from the active list to the retired list, slotted as #164 in all-time lengths of streaks, after 15.05 years of running every day. Realistically, others will soon pass me by, and this ranking will continue to fall. I will salute each one, as well as the 163 others that maintained longer streaks through the years.
Even though I indicated that I had already started walking a couple miles every day in recovery, I have since had a setback. Charlie Horses and cramps in my left thigh and calf have led me to the gym. I can do the stationary bike and rowing machine, but after about 15-minutes on the treadmill the pain is too great. I do finally get an ultrasound next week in trying and get some answers. Also, for the first time in several weeks, I started to feel a bit light-headed during the course of writing this post. This had been an issue, along with balance, for some time. The treadmill at least allows me to hold onto the side rails for support. I did notice that my blood pressure dropped from 111/87 to 83/77 after this morning’s workout.
Running for me was more than just exercise. It was a daily goal in my life that helped me transition from the working world into retirement. Now, I at least have the gym to keep me busy for an hour every morning. Writing is a secondary motivation that keeps me going every day. I’ve been so consumed in writing a neighbor’s life story that I’ve somewhat ignored my own personal need to get in touch with myself through these rants. I’ve often noted that putting things in writing is like having my own personal therapist – you, the reader. Thanks for tolerating my all-too-often-boring life stories. They, too, will inevitably come to an end someday. Right, Mister Chaucer?
Eighteen weeks have passed since my open-heart surgery. I spent two weeks going to Cardio rehab to get a program set up. The past two weeks I’ve been on my own with a daily gym routine that includes about 30-minutes on the stationary bike, 20-minutes of the rowing machine, 15-minutes on the treadmill, and some light weightlifting to conclude the workout. The good news is that I no longer double-up in pain from a simple sneeze, although still a bit uncomfortable. I would like to walk more but my left leg is still reacting with painful cramps and Charlie Horses. Oddly, the other exercises don’t seem to affect it. Next week, I get an Ultrasound that should indicate the problem.
I try to follow-up this workout with a late afternoon session in our swimming pool. I wear a cut-off tee-shirt to prevent any darkening of the scar tissue on my chest. This will probably have to continue through this summer. For about a half-hour, I will run in place, do some laps using both my arms and legs, step-ups, push-ups off the side of the pool, and stretching. Last night, after the gym, my legs were just too tired for the pool. My wife is concerned that I’m over-doing it, so I’ll make some compromises going forward.
I’m beginning to feel a lot stronger but still frustrated with my progress. I continue to struggle with some balance issues, dating back to long before surgery, and will return to chair yoga next week to work on this. Some medication adjustments have helped, and I still carefully monitor my blood pressure as advised by the cardiologist. There’s a little more tone to the muscles that were dormant for many weeks. It’s tough for a former active runner to get back in shape and lose weight. As a former boss liked to say, “onward and upward.”
It’s been a very exciting year for basketball in Indiana, even without the success of Indiana Basketball. IU did not make the tournament, fans lost faith in the coach, recruits reneged on their commitments, and the future looked grim. However, things quickly turned around after locking down the #1 class in the portal. As a result, the Hoosiers are finally getting some pre-season respect and Coach Mike Woodson has suddenly become a recruiting genius.
The real excitement, however, came from the rival Boilermakers, who made their way to the Championship game of the NCAA tournament, regaining the respect they lost last year in falling early in an embarrassing manner. They too have reloaded for the upcoming year and now the “way too early” projections show them #2 and #3 respectively, behind conference newcomer UCLA.
Let’s add the Indiana State Sycamores into this mix of statewide excitement. They barely missed selection into the NCAA Tournament, many say unjustly, and went on to compete in the Championship game of the NIT. Although Indiana State and Purdue both finished second, they rekindled March Madness locally. Let’s hope IU can join them next year!
But that’s not all! The Indiana Fever drafted Caitlin Clark #1 and sparked excitement on the professional basketball level. Although the Fever are off to a disappointing 0-5 start, the long-range potential is extremely promising. At the same time, the #6 seed Indiana Pacers caught fire and ousted both the favored Milwaukee Bucks and the evil New York Knicks. Game #7 at Madison Square Garden was as much excitement as we’ve seen since the Reggie Miller days. The Pacer’s then went on to “choke” themselves in Game #1 at the fabled Boston Garden.
There’s more Pacers basketball excitement to come in a month typically dominated by racing. Indiana sports fans are looking forward to a Memorial weekend that will include the Indianapolis 500, Pacers vs. Celtics Playoff basketball, and maybe a Fever first victory. The excitement is mounting!
It’s the middle of May and the start of the WNBA regular season, while the NBA playoffs begin to wind down. The Indiana Fever and Caitlin Clark had a tough debut against the Connecticut Sun, while the Indiana Pacers failed to maintain their winning momentum and fell badly to the Knicks. Shohei Ohtani had another big night at the plate for the Dodgers, while the Cubs lost to the Braves and the Sox split with the Nats. The Phillies and Kyle Schwarber were the first team to 30-wins, while the White Sox joined the Marlins in the 30-loss club. I.U. baseball plays the final series of the regular season against Michigan. Alex Palou won the Indy Grand Prix, in preparation for the upcoming Indy 500. That’s about it for me in the world of sports.
I just added my 250th item to the Sherm Lollar collection, a couple of more magazine clippings from 1947 and 1962. His #10 White Sox uniform hangs in my office, along with a photo/plague, catcher’s mitt, signed ball, and tribute cups. The rest of the items are organized from 1945-1970 in three big binders, the span of his career as a player, coach, and manager. It may very well be the largest collection of his memorabilia in the world – if anyone cares. I still contend that he should be in Cooperstown, but that includes a long list of worthy candidates. He’s been in my heart since childhood but died of cancer at age 53.
My other collection is baseball cards, also mainly in binders. I did get a bit carried away with my Topps Now purchases of Shohei Ohtani cards. I’ve captured his U.S. career starting with his rookie debut with the Angels and leading up to the more recent Dodgers. He’s wowed us with his pitching and hitting, often compared to Babe Ruth. This year he’s on a quest for .400 and the triple crown, taking a break from pitching after surgery. I’ve amassed about 125 of his cards, captured at various stages of his young career. They are for sale and on display at a local Venice card shop, Blue Breaks, and have even been to Japan in search for a buyer.
I maintain binders full of Cubs and White Sox cards, that follow the careers of Kyle Schwarber, Javy Baez, Chris Sale, Joan Moncada, Luis Roberts, Elroy Jiminez, Ernie Banks, Ron Santo, and the 1959 American League Champion White Sox that began my interest in card collecting. I’m at the point in life now where I’m more in the mood to get rid of things rather than accumulate.
My wife has been under the weather and slept through most of yesterday. What a sad way to spend a Mother’s Day! She made a batch of vegetable soup a few days ago, so I won’t starve, nor will some of our neighbors. A lot of sharing goes on – tools, food, advice, and rumors. The dogs did not get to go to the park yesterday or this morning, so they wonder what’s going on. “Why won’t Mom get up and play with us?” I’m planning on a typical Monday afternoon with a trip to the chiropractor, a call to my sister, the gym, pick up my grandson, and exercise in the pool. She’s still in bed.
We originally had Mother’s Day plans to go to Cracker Barrel, but that didn’t happen. We did, however, enjoy the band, Dukes of Brinkley, with friends on Saturday night at the ballpark. Unfortunately, we southerners were left out of all the Northern Lights hoopla. Like everyone else, we’ve been chasing them for years but have not been in the right place at the right time, even on our cruise to Alaska. I would guess that it’s not as big of a deal to see them from your backyard as opposed to spending thousands to go to Iceland.
The Pacers trounced the Knicks yesterday to even the playoff series. I watched the end of the game from the pool, between dog outings. The little one, Fosse, needs to go out every two hours, so this often means disruption from other activities – like running home and back in the middle of the band set the other night. With regard to small humans, we’re expecting a call from Indy mid-week announcing the birth of our newest relative – making me a GUM (Great Uncle Mike) once again.
My wife teaches school tomorrow, if she’s feeling better. There is also Book Club, and it’s my youngest granddaughter’s 6th birthday with a party on Saturday. We helped fund the bounce house. Twice this week I’ll have cardio rehab, in addition to the gym and pool workouts. There’s a Garden Party on Wednesday eve near our tiny plot in the neighborhood “farm.” Little Fosse goes to the vet for the first time on Thursday, accompanied by her big sister Tally, while I pay a visit to the optometrist. We might then go to the Dueling Pianos performance at nearby Wellen Park. Friday Night will be “Date Night,” last week we went to La Rocca for Italian. So ends another week of retirement without me being rich or famous.
My neighbor down the street owns a black, 2011 Mazda Miata Grand Touring MX-5, 6-on-the-floor, that he bought used in 2015 with only 6,000 miles on it and jokingly “drives only on Sundays.” It does require a lot of shuffling to get it out of his garage. He’s taken me along on some what he calls, “Miata runs,” where we drive the back roads to a dining destination. He’s done some quick accelerating along the way to satisfy any racing fantasies, since it will probably be the closest that he will ever get to a Ferrari and his F1 dream!
He joined the Miata auto club, attends the monthly meetings, and often takes part in some of their road rallies like Sebring in January 2023 and Revs Institute just yesterday. Since his wife is not necessarily a fan of riding in the car, he usually invites a neighbor like me to be his navigator. My wife thinks it’s hilarious when he selects me, since she’s convinced that I have absolutely no sense of direction. At 6a we were on the road to Revs, billed as “more than just a car museum.” It’s the permanent home of the Miles Collier Collections of over one hundred significant automobiles built between 1896 and 1995, as well as a library, teaching, and restoration facility located in Naples, Florida.
The club met at Cracker Barrel in Fort Myers, where we formed a “parade” line, drove the 45 miles to Revs as a group, toured the museum, and had lunch at nearby Spanky’s Speakeasy. During the course of the day, his odometer passed 26,000 miles, so he gave the dashboard of his Miata a loving pat. It’s a fondness for cars that I’ve never found.
He told me that one of these days, he will organize one of these club drives, as we all enjoyed the day and the common interest in the Mazda Miata. There were about 16 cars of various years, options, and colors all lined up in the Revs parking lot while we took the tour. One of my favorites was a purplish-blue, Dupont 1929 Du Pont Model G Four Passenger Speedster, with a 140 hp, eight-cylinder Continental engine. It sported a glass, eagle’s beak, hood-ornament, known as a mascot. There’s also an impressive collection of these on display.
His interest is primarily horsepower but was also intrigued with one of the least appealing autos on display, a 1989 Trabant Type P601L with a twin-cylinder, two-stroke,594 cc, 26 bhp engine. “The ‘Trabi’ might have been crude, ugly, slow, and smoky but to the car-starved East Germans, it represented motoring heaven.” The body was constructed with “Duraplast,” a plastic composite rather than hard-to-get steel and eventually became an environmental nightmare. Despite the very long waiting list, the car was also very popular in Hungary, his native country.
I would join the club, but that would require buying a Miata. It probably doesn’t count that I ordered my 14-year-old granddaughter a 1/32 scale version of a pink model of the car for her upcoming birthday. She joined us at Cracker Barrel, wanted to see all the cars, and showed me a picture of this particular Mary- Kay-like design with retractable headlights. For once, I’ve found a common interest with her.
