For those curious about my latest Boulder Weekly piece, you can read it here. I'm happy with how it came out and I think it's a fairly interesting piece. I hope you like it!In other news: yesterday I had a therapeutic massage which is not to be confused with one of those relaxing messages administered by pretty middle-aged women in sarongs. This was more in the style of the burly, meat-padded hands of a cigar smoking Bronx native in a 1940's baseball clubhouse. Actually my masseuse was a kind woman (and I feel like I should have given her a huge bonus for having to look at, let alone touch my hiking-worn feet) but she warned me it could hurt a bit. Most of the work I was having done was on my ankles. The idea with this massage was that it was going to force stiff and tight muscles to relax but at the same time release tension-based toxins from deep within the muscle fibers. I don't know what kind of toxins reside in my body or how they get there, but I strongly suspect Count Chocula.
Anyhow, the pre-massage ritual consisted of the doctor doing that neck twisting thing where they violently jerk your head and snap your spine in half (or at least that is what it sounds like). Then, once they've disable your reflex system so you can't fight back, the actual masseuse takes over. My ankles are as stiff and nearly as wooden as Al Gore himself, so she took the appropriate measures to bend, contort and soften up long neglected ligaments. What hurt the most was the manipulation of the shin muscles and connectors; both legs now sport some fancy black n' blues. Overall though the pain wasn't too bad, akin to getting bashed in each leg by NFL kicker Morton Andersen.
Since my body has been generally neglected for the better part of 30 years, the doctor warned me the release of toxins could trigger some funky reactions. Some people get really weepy and emotional, some get tired, some feel sick while others do all of the above. Most of the day, all I felt was sore in the shins. When I got home however, the toxins kicked in. No moodiness or sorrow, but I got really tired so much so that I drifted in and out of sleep for the better part of two hours. In the background, like a bizarre hazy dream the History channel showed back to back shows on the Mexican Gangs of Los Vegas and Alaskan railway maintenance. Bits and pieces of these soundbites would drift into my semi-conscious mind, along with the morbid chanting of Tom's "Don't you believvvve it" from yesterday's post. It was all quite surreal and when I woke up it was 8:30 and still light out, which I oddly hadn't expected.
Today, I'm feeling mostly detoxified though my legs still hurt--nothing a little mineral ice and 16 Ibuprofen can't fix.
