Great thoughts of Fleeting substance

This update begins with BLOOD!



This is Wednesday. A few months ago I decided that it is silly and absurd of me to be scared of needles. I used to be scared of them, and then I wasn’t for a while. And then at one point at the dermatologists, they had to draw some blood and I got really woozy afterwards. (I think you were there too, S, you remember?) So then I got scared of needles again. Well I got over that a few months (perhaps a year) ago by donating blood. Sort of a ‘cold-turkey’ approach to fear reduction.

Well the Red Cross rolled around again a few weeks ago (they do blood drives at work) and myself and J(5) (independently, I might add) both decided to give blood. All went well, though I got some sort of super-cool treatment. See, they were looking for blood type B (they were low, presumably) and O, and since I am B+, they hooked me up to a BLOOD CENTERFUGE. A BLOOD FREAKIN’ CENTERFUGE. Ooooooh. It drains your BLOOD, and then spins your BLOOD around so that all the red BLOOD cells go into one bag and all the PLASMA goes into another. And once they’ve done that, the thing clicks over and gives you all your plasma back. It was an oddly fascinating process to watch, though certainly not for the BLOOD-donating squeamish. Well, everything went well and I’m about 440 mL of red BLOOD cells short, presumably.

Course, perhaps I shouldn’t have done it right before I test for my next belt.

Yep! Next belt test is this week, Tuesday and Thursday. I’m perceiving no problems, except for the board break, which is really hard. It’s a flying side kick, and the most difficult part of it is making sure you kick board, and not fingers. Wish me luck.

Oh, and I’m not actually worried about being short on blood. I ran (something like) 4 miles this weekend (I’m trying to build my stamina up to 6) and felt just fine.

Spent much of Friday (my Friday off) with J(5) this weekend. Activities listed under ‘various’. We went to the public library, walked around downtown El Segundo, went to the park and did some rollerblading (hills suck!). Then I came home and procrastinated to the tune of video games!

Saturday, I went Hiking. I’m not traditionally a big fan of hiking, but that’s because the list of things that I am a fan of is really long, and hiking is just a little far down on the list. But J(5) and a bunch of our friends all went.


From left to right (codenames, all): J(5), Me, The Chef, Pythons, Guns, and Bon-Bon down below. I made up most of those names, but Pythons and Guns are their real nicknames, because they have really nice arms (guns…ha ha). They all went on a trip to Italy together a few months ago, and while they were settling on to the plane (plane, now, keep that image in mind), J(5) leans over the back and calls out to one of them. Yeah, that’s right, she yelled ‘Guns’ on a crowded international plane flight. Heh.

It was a pretty nice hike. A lot of vertical climb (it’s a hike up into the relatively uninhabited mountains that separate ‘Los Angeles’ from ‘The Valley’). Well-maintained and very pretty. There was even a little stream and waterfall. My favorite part, though, was finding the empty riverbed with lots and lots of rocks and practicing my rock stacking. Certain parents may remember this little hobby from the beach back home. I have some other pictures that can be sent around at request.



Saturday evening, J(5), The Chef, and Bon-Bon (and a couple others: ‘Pretty’ and ‘Deep’.) all decided to dress up all nice and go salsa dancing at a club where they give beginning lessons. (No boys allowed…cept for Deep, who is a boy, and is married to Pretty and hadn’t seen her for quite a while). It was a not-half bad time, as reported, but J(5) was pretty tired afterwards, so I was called into relax-inducing service. You’ll like this one, parents. J(5) had a headache, so I did that trick that dad does for mom where you just squeeze the head. It was a temporary fix, but it helped her to relax enough that eventually her headache went away. Thanks, guys!

And today, finally got around to homework, did some goofing off, did some running, just another day.

Oh, and I’m pretty sure you can’t tell in the pictures above, but that’s not just a beard I’m sporting, it’s a beard experiment.



I just wanted to try drawing random lines in my beard. It looks kinda intriguing here, but it doesn’t last. When the lines start to grow back in, it just looks like I have a really spotty beard. So I nixed that one today.

Oh, and as I was driving around today, I saw a taxi with spinning hubcaps. A taxi with spinning hubcaps. They were spinning. Hubcaps. Like in the hip-hop videos. Spinning. But on a taxi. I didn't get it.

I was trying to think of a way to end this blog with BLOOD too, but I couldn’t think of any.

-N