Central American Madness; Stage I: The Trio

I just went on a 10-day trip to Costa Rica and Nicaragua.

It was incredibly fun, I loved being there, and awesome activities abounded.

It was also just plain crazy, did not go as planned, and was an adventure I will never forget.

***

My friend (and roommate for the past year) Brit Hatch had the idea and did just about all the advance planning for the trip; our friend and schoolmate Fred Fombrun joined us for the first half-or-so of the trip.  It was our last break from school before starting clinical rotations, so we wanted to do something fun and memorable.  Though we were in school and taking finals till the day we left, Brit somehow found time to meticulously research our itinerary and make several reservations.  (Thanks again Brit for all the time and effort you put in to prepare for this!)

Below I will describe the events of the trip, day by day, for your reading pleasure. 

But first, a quick note about third-world countries:  If you've never been to one, it may be difficult to properly contextualize the following events.  For that reason, I demand that you immediately plan and execute a similar trip before you continue reading. :)  Just kidding.  But try to use your imagination--it was not at all like being in the US.
 

Stage I:  The Trio 

We began as three. 

Fri, 19 Oct:  Departure day.  (Not to mention our last day ever of class for PA school!!)

Once school got out around noon, we had the rest of the day to shop, pack, and generally check off all those tasks you gotta do before leaving the country for 10 days.  Our red-eye flights were scheduled to leave around 10pm.  

And things were going smoothly until a couple hours before our flights, when Brit informed me that there were no open seats on his and Fred's stand-by flight. 

You see, Brit and Fred had used "buddy passes" to buy stand-by tickets  on US Airways, while I had purchased a flight on Spirit Airlines (perhaps because I have more than a little history with stand-by flights).  And now both of them were in jeopardy of not making it to Costa Rica, or being significantly delayed in doing do.  Their other option was to purchase a last-minute ticket on Spirit, but the price for those had shot up to $500 (one-way), since it was so last-minute.

So with Brit and Fred mulling it over and making calls to all their favorite customer service representatives, we headed to the airport.  Upon arrival, they both tried to buy outrageously-priced tickets for the Spirit flight, but now there was only one of those left.  Fred bought it, and Brit was forced to take his chances standing by on the (full) US Airways flight as originally planned.  When we parted ways in the airport, Fred and I didn't know if or when Brit would make it to Costa Rica.  And we didn't find out until our layover in Ft Lauderdale five hours later, when Brit called us from Charlotte to let us know he had made it on the flight, barely, with the last seat.  Thank goodness. 

(A quick note on Spirit Airlines:  They have decided to antagonize all passengers by making seats that don't recline.  I do not approve of this, especially for red-eye flights, and I will do my best to avoid them in the future.) 

Sat, 20 Oct:

Fred and I arrived in San Jose, Costa Rica around 11:30am; Brit's flight wasn't far behind, and we met up just beyond Customs. 

After skipping past some money-exchanging stations (a good choice in retrospect--turned out their rates were the worst we'd see) and tourist info, we made it to the car rental area, where representatives from several different agencies were crammed into one small room with  little desks.  Kind of a funny setup, but it made it easy to compare options.  After due diligence, we opted for a four-door Toyota Yaris from National, mainly because they said we could drop it off right at the Nicaraguan border, rather than a city that was 80 kilometers away from the border.  (Yes, everything is in metric in Costa Rica.  Get used to it.  We did.)  We'd been told it would be smart to get an SUV for the rough terrain in some parts, but we decided to take our chances with a car since it was cheaper, got better gas milage....and hopefully wouldn't get stuck even if it took a beating along the way.  And that's exactly how it went.  (And in case you were wondering, it was a stick shift, because automatic transmissions practically don't exist in Latin America.)

The guy at the rental office gave us our very first set of bad directions--the first of many to come.  You see, directions in Latin America are just...different.  They don't really have addresses, and more often than not there are no road signs.  On top of that, the landmarks they choose to mention are not always the easiest to find.  It's pretty mind-boggling...but it's all part of the adventure, I suppose. 

While trying to apply our shoddy directions and get to the main highway, we just happened to drive right by the San Jose (Mormon) Temple.  So we stopped and took a picture.  Somebody should tell the guy at the rental office that the Temple would make a pretty good landmark. :)  It was pretty random that we found it, as it didn't even seem to be on a major street. 

Back on the road, we were treated to an extremely-green countryside and some afternoon showers (a daily occurrence as it turned out, since it was rainy season) on our way to a town near Manuel Antonio national park, which is right by the Pacific Ocean in the Southwest part of Costa Rica.  Along the way we stopped at a roadside diner for our first Costa Rican meal--some "casados"--and made our first transactions with the local currency, called "Colones" (which means "Columbuses").  Colones were pretty easy to figure out because one dollar is worth about 500.  But things in Costa Rica were a bit pricier than I expected (based on experience in Guatemala, Mexico, and El Salvador), presumably because Costa Rica is the wealthiest and most developed country in Central America. 

After a quick stop at Jacó Beach--where some friendly natives decided to climb the trees and fetch us coconuts--the remaining portion of our drive to the Manuel Antonio area was done in the rain and dark; but that didn't stop a ton of bikers and pedestrians from strolling along the edges of this single-lane "highway", with little a care for the cars whizzing by.  When we arrived in the town of Quepos (near the park),  we just needed to find the hostel called "Villas Jacquelina", which Brit had read about online.  But we didn't have an address, and  nobody we asked seemed to know where it was.  Those who had heard of it struggled to give clear directions.  But that was understandable in this instance, as the hostel turned out to be about a kilometer outside the town on an incredibly rough dirt road.  A strange location to be sure, but we were extremely happy to have found it.  We got our own room for only $15/person/night, and we were big fans of the establishment, despite the crappy access road.    

Sun, 21 Oct:

The complimentary breakfast at VillasJacquelina consisted of gallo pinto (rice and black beans cooked together) and eggs, with some toast and fruit on the side.  I quickly grew to love that combo of gallo pinto and eggs, and tried to eat it whenever possible the rest of the trip, usually requesting fried plantains on the side.  In fact, I would like to continue eating that for breakfast every day, if I could just get someone to make it for me.  Any takers??  I will pay you.  

After breakfast, we drove the short distance to Manuel Antonio national park, known for its plentiful and exotic wildlife.  We took a walk through the forest, where with the help of the guide we hired we were able to see several sloths (both two-toed and three-toed varieties), monkeys, bats, iguanas, crazy-looking spiders, and some other stuff I'm forgetting.  One of the sloths put on it's own trapeze show on snapping and crackling branches directly above the walkway, as a veritable hoard of geriatric tourists ooed and awed below.  Luckily it didn't fall, though apparently they often do.  But hey, if you're a sloth, how else do you get thrills?  Once through the forest, we swam briefly at a beautiful, secluded beach.  Then Brit found us an alternate route out of the park by climbing over a large rocky embankment.  I was only scared for my life for a few seconds while following him.  

For lunch we enjoyed fish tacos at a restaurant near the main beach of Manuel Antonio.  After a short chat, the guitar player hired for entertainment invited me to play something for the patrons.  I shared a few songs while he added fancy accompaniments on his guitar; some Americans watching football at the bar cheered loudly for a John Denver special, and one of them even gave me a tip afterward. 

We spent the remaining daylight (it got dark each day around 5:30) at the main beach of Manuel Antonio, attempting to boogie on a board.  The scene was remarkable:  as storm clouds swirled above, gentle showers fell and waves rolled in from the ocean, all framed by rocky embankments and a lush, green forest.  Brit said it reminded him of certain parts of Hawaii.  

On the way home we hit up "El Avion", a restaurant that is literally built of and around an old airplane (allegedly from the Iran-Contra affair), with a bar inside the plane itself, for dinner.  The food was good; the view was great. 

That night Brit taught us how to play Pinoy, a card game he plays with his family which is a cross between Scum and Poker.  It became our nightly tradition.  

Mon, 22 Oct:

With more gallo pinto, eggs, and fruit in our bellies, we left Villas Jacquelina and Manuel Antonio behind.  

What was supposed to be roughly a 4.5 hour drive (estimates varied wildly) turned into about seven hours as poor directions, funky roads, fog, rain, and typically a complete lack of road signs repeatedly led to wrong turns and delays.  We each took a turn at driving.  Passing slow trucks on a windy single-lane highway in the rain led to some tense moments, but we survived.  Finally, around dusk, we arrived in La Fortuna (a quaint, touristy town near volcano Arenal), and had a surprisingly easy time finding Hotel Dorothy, where we were lodged for just $32 (total) per night. 

As it was too late for any of the myriad daytime activities in the Fortuna area, we decided to hit up Baldi Hot Springs.  At Baldi, in addition to a hotel and restaurant, they've built a series of swimming pools, hot tubs, and water slides that take advantage of naturally hot water from springs.  It's allegedly the largest hot springs in the world.  True or not, it was an awesome place to hang out.  Fred and I also sampled the buffet, and then we all went on the water slides (one of which was the fastest I'd ever been on, not to mention in total darkness), before lounging on underwater bar stools in the middle of it of a large pool, watching Monday Night Football.   

Tue, 23 Oct:

For breakfast in La Fortuna, we went to "Soda el Rio"--in Costa Rica, "soda" is another term for restaurant, much like bistro in English.  That was pretty confusing at first-we just thought a bunch of places were advertising soda for sale.  I got the usual (pico, eggs, plantains), and so did Fred...but he also got a steak on the side for good measure.  Fred doesn't mess around when it comes to Costa Rican breakfasts.  

And then it was time to go white water rafting!  The company we booked it with shuttled us about 1.5 hours away to the Sarapiquí river, where we spent a couple hours moseying down the river on some grade 3 rapids.  Though we would've preferred a higher grade, it was still awesome.  The other people in our group were there complements of the Ellen DeGeneres Show.  And since some of them were a bit frail, that might explain why the rafting company picked innocuous grade 3 rapids that day.  We stopped a few times along the river for rope swinging, swimming, and cliff jumping.  At the end they served us some potentially-fresh tilapia for lunch.    

When we got back to La Fortuna, Fred and I challenged some natives to a soccer game at a local park.  We played 3 on 3 (Brit watched, Fred and I played on a team with one of the locals) on a small cement court...and boy did we take it to 'em.  Except not really. :)  But we kept it reasonably competetive, and Fred got to cross that off his bucket list (he's a long-time player of soccer).  After the game I asked if they were gonna play any more, and one of the kids basically replied that their lungs couldn't take any more because they smoke too much marijuana. 

As it was Fred's last night, we stopped by a souvenir shop near the town center.  While we were looking around, all the stuff on the shelves started to shake.  I just thought somebody had just turned on a fan or something, but it turned out to be an earthquake (magnitude of 6.5)!   The epicenter was about 100 kilometers to our West.  I'd only experienced one other temblor, but this one was quite a bit bigger.  

Later we strolled around the town to see if there were any dance clubs where Fred could get his groove on.  Unfortunately they only do that on the weekends.  But we all decided Fortuna was a great place to hang out, and I'll definitely go back.  We rounded out the night with another game of Pinoy.  Fred is the reigning champion because he won the last round by playing progressively higher pairs over and over again.  

Wed, 24 Oct:

Fred needed to catch a bus around 4:30am to make sure he could get to the airport (about 3 hours away) on time.  He would also need to catch a connecting bus in the next city.  Since Fred speaks little Spanish, we taught him a few key phrases that he could use, and told him to keep repeating them if he got in trouble.  I would have enjoyed seeing that in action. :)

We all slept through the alarms and snoozed a couple times, until finally Brit noticed it was 4:20am and told Fred he better go.  Fred was up, ready, packed, and out the door about ten minutes later.  

Fred was gone.  He later informed me that he made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare, but was sleeping on the bus and woke up in the nick of time before the bus continued on to San Jose.  Good thing, otherwise he'd probably still be in Costa Rica. 

About 9am, Brit and I took a shuttle to a zip line course near volcano Arenal, called "Ecoglide".  The course boasted 13 zip lines, each some hundreds of meters in length, high above a thick forest next to the volcano.  They also had a special swing they called "The Tarzan", where you got to jump off a metal platform way up high and swing back and forth...you know, like Tarzan.  About half of our group chickened out after they saw the first girl jump off, but not us.  It was a rush.  Overall, the zip line course was great, and the views were fantastic.  Highly recommended.

After Brit and I checked out of Hotel Dorothy, we hoped to rent some ATV's and go swimming at the Fortuna waterfall before beginning the five-or-so-hour drive to our next destination (Tamarindo Beach).  We were pleasantly surprised to find out a guy near the square rented out dirt bikes for just $20/hour, and we could take them wherever we wanted.  Brit got one of those, while I opted for a four-wheeler since I had no experience with dirt bikes.  A short distance up the highway we found a dirt road that we followed for about half the hour before tracking back, crossing a river and discovering some cool scenery along the way.   

It was nearly time to return our rentals when we made it back to the main road; on Brit's suggestion we decided to spend our last five minutes zipping up the highway to Baldi Hot Springs (about a kilometer outside town) before returning the rentals.   

"Let's just go up to Baldi..." 

I led the way on my quad, but didn't look behind me for about 30 seconds.  When I didn't see Brit, I assumed he was just going slow and would shortly catch up.  I looked back a few more times as I worked my way up to Baldi, but never saw him.  I never really worried because I knew Brit was a fairly experienced rider of motorcyles and dirt bikes, but it seemed a little odd.

I got to Baldi, flipped around, and after a few seconds headed back to find out what Brit was up to.  As I rode I felt a mild sense of foreboding; enough time had passed that it was a bit strange for me not to have seen him by now.  

The story continues in part 2.  

All Things Ben

lying dead near the Grassy Knoll

Or at least several.

So I live in Las Vegas now.  Technically it's Henderson, but you know how that goes.  I started PA (Physician Assistant) school just over two weeks ago.  So far I like it--good classmates, good teachers for the most part, so you know, good times.  If you want more information, here are some questions I could imagine someone asking me if I were to, you know, speak with that person.  I also provide the answers to said questions. 

What is a PA?
Perhaps Wikipedia said it best:  "A Physician Assistant is a healthcare provider licensed and trained to practice medicine with limited supervision of a physician."    Chew on that.  Literally. 

Where do you live?
In a house.  I rent a bedroom in a three-bedroom mini-house about eight miles SW of the school.  The commute takes about 15 minutes.  The owner is finishing up his graduate degree in Marriage and Family Therapy.  The other roommate is a pilot and gone every other week for work...or so he says.

Do you have any pets?
No. 

Does your landlord have Netflix streaming?
Yes.  This is convenient because I started watching LOST in late May, and I now have eight episodes left in the final season.  Recently I've watched one episode per day while eating dinner.  I may even tell you what I think about the series sometime in the future.  Recommendations for other tv shows to watch when I'm done will not be rejected outright.  

So you spend most of your time watching tv?
Pretty much.  Actually I go to school for about eight hours a day.  We have about four hours of class most days, and then there's a bunch of studying to do.  I treat it about like a full-time job so far, but I'm pretty sure some of my classmates study substantially more than I do.   

cookies

So what are they teaching you over at that silly school of yours?  And what's it called again?  UNLV?
Actually it's called Touro University-Nevada.  Not surprisingly, no one has ever heard of it unless they're into the whole "health professional school" scene.  So far this semester we're taking Anatomy, Physiology, Biochemistry, Radiology, and a couple of fluff classes (that are actually important, just don't require studying like the others).  A few other classes start later in the semester.  It seems like this first semester is basically the first year of med school, whittled and compressed into 3.5 months.  Which makes sense.   

How long is the program?
28 months:  16 didactic (i.e. classroom), and 12 on clinical rotations.   

So wait, I'm confused, whatever happened to podiatry school? 
I took a leave of absence in December 2009, partway through my fourth year, and eventually decided to attend PA school.  

Weren't you almost done?  Why didn't you just finish?  
I was pretty close to graduating, but overall it's a seven-year process if you include a typical residency.  So I was about half-way through the full process of becoming an independently practicing podiatrist.  If I was gonna jump ship and switch careers, that was actually a pretty good time to do it...at least compared to later.  

Is it really that simple?
No.  

What's one thing that attracted you to becoming a PA?
PA's can work in just about any specialty, and even switch midstream.  Docs can't do that.  

Do you currently own a guitar?
Technically, yes, but it's in Missouri (and pretty crappy).  Luckily I have a much nicer one with me that I don't own, compliments of a generous friend.

Do you consider blogger user-friendly?
No, it's ridiculous, especially arranging photos. 

What have you been doing since December 2009?

Elena and Abigail, probably May 2010

First I moved to Missouri and honed my skills at being as unproductive as possible, for about three months.  Then I moved to Dallas (April 2010) (taking a circuitous route through Colorado, Utah, Idaho, and Montana to visit friends) just in time for the birth of my cute twin nieces Elena and Abigail.  Actually I got there the day after they were born.  Shortly thereafter I spent two weeks digging ditches in "Texas clay" (the dirt in Texas is like clay) to help Mark and Sarah (my brother and SIL who were living in Dallas at the time, and the parents of the aforementioned twin baby girls) install sprinklers in their front yard.  About a month after that I performed surgery on my own big toe.  Another month or so later (July 2010) I finalized my decision to apply to PA school, and started the process.  Six months after that (early Feb 2011), I got accepted to Touro.  In the meantime I traveled to Phoenix for about six weeks (Sep-Oct) to finalize my affairs at Podiatry school once and for all.  In November (2010) I started working as a tutor (for all subjects...I'm only partially kidding) and music teacher.  In December I started substitute teaching as well, which I did until June 1st of this year.  In May I went to Utah for a family reunion and started watching LOST.  In June I left Dallas after a bit more than a year of living there, spent two weeks in Phoenix (on the way), and came to Las Vegas. 

Do you really think I got all the way to the end of this post?
This isn't the end.  

Have you seen any good movies lately?
No. 

Have you seen any movies lately, period?
No. Did I mention I've watched 112 episodes of LOST in the past two months?

What about Harry Potty and Deathly Hallows part five???!?
Plenty of time for that later...that's my usual approach to movie theaters...don't go. 

Did you really see a car burn up in your parking lot last month?
Yes.  

I know this is changing the subject, but doesn't the title "Physician Assistant" make you sound menial? People probably get you confused with Medical Assistants, right?
Yes, it's misleading.  From what I've heard, some early PA's wanted to call it "Physician Associate", which is a better title, but they had to grovel before influential organizations to gain acceptance.  Now it would be expensive and impractical to change the name. 

Don't you feel like this post is bit lengthy?  
Yeah, so what.  Actually, it's probably shorter in total word count than several others I've written.  

Are you schizophrenic?  Why are you conversing with yourself?
I heard in lecture yesterday that 1/100 people become schizophrenic at some point.  Which is probably not true.  But if them, why not me? 

Me at the Alamo in June.  Remember it. 

What do you now consider your favorite band?
That's easy, The Beatles.  But Led Zeppelin is extremely awesome, in case you weren't aware.  Here's proof. 

Have you made any friends in Nevada?
About five.  Actually, I have some pretty cool classmates who've been fun to "hang out" with (mostly meaning studying and attending lectures), and the people in my singles ward have been friendly and welcoming, though I haven't been around them that much yet.  Plus a friend from college lives down here, and she invited me over for bbq pulled pork last Sunday.  Afterwards we jammed on the ukulele.

You play the ukulele?
Yes, of course I play the ukulele.  And by that I mean I've learned about six chords on two separate occasions in the past month.

Have you done any dating recently?
Yes.

Care to elaborate?
No. 

What else have you accomplished in the past few months?
Learned some Beatles songs on the guitar.  Also started recording some music in Dallas before moving.  I studied Italian for a month or so and became very mildly conversant.  Ate a lot of cookies in June.  In addition, I slept on a random guy's couch in Albuquerque. 

What's your BMI (Body Mass Index)?
26.2

Does that make you part of the growing obesity epidemic?
No, I'm just in the "overweight" range, so take it easy.

the Jake Erickson tribute album (one song so far)

Below I play a version of "Winter", a song written by Jake Erickson in 2004, which also appears as the 12th track on the album Jake and I released in 2006.  For various reasons*, the album version didn't turn out quite as we wanted, but I've always liked the song.  Consider this** a tribute to an under-appreciated modern artist.  Perhaps other artists will join in the effort so we can make it a full album. :)


     

*All our recording was done with very limited time and money, and no prior experience.  We barely knew what we were doing in there, did most songs in a single take (for each part), and yet certain things turned out really well.  Others left something to be desired.  Before we recorded Winter, I gave Jake some suggestions about how to sing the song that I think backfired and made it sound worse, and I've always felt a little bad about that. Having just re-listened to it, I can say it is not without merit.  But I also think most of the live performances of the song Jake did were more satisfying than the studio version.

**Please excuse the poor framing of the video.  Recording songs with a camera placed on a stack of books in a cramped bedroom is not an exact science.

PS:  Stay tuned for the sharing of additional music, maybe even recorded with something other than my camera.  I recently procured a decent-quality digital recorder, and I've begun to dabble.  Now I just need a guitar that I don't hate...though I still use the hated one out of necessity.   

Update:  I recently started a new website about guitars, which I talk about in this post.  

Overdue Op Report

Last June I did surgery on my own toe, at home.  Sound ridiculous?  Well it was.  There's no getting around that fact.  But it seemed justified at the time, and even sounded kind of fun.      

Background  

a few days post-injury

Six days earlier I smashed my left big toe with a door.  It bled a little, and a few days later it was still painful and oozy.  Further investigation (trimming the nail back) revealed the flesh underneath was red and raw, and a pretty classic example of what's called a "subungual hematoma” (That just means excess blood causing pressure under the nail).  I'd experienced this once before, in 2004, when a basketball player landed on my toe—the same toe—with most of his weight.  A few days later I visited a podiatrist who removed the nail, releasing the pressure and allowing proper healing.

With that experience under my belt, not to mention my podiatry training, I figured I pretty well knew how to handle the situation.  So after observing the nail for a few more days, I decided it would be best to remove it completely.  The nail was already somewhat loose, and the flesh underneath would heal better with it gone.   

supply table

Now, removing a toenail is easy....if you have the proper supplies.  That includes certain surgical instruments (which I had, since I'd purchased some during school) as well as local anesthesia (which I did NOT have, and couldn't think of any way to get), and appropriately-sized needles and syringes (didn't have any of those, either, but figured I could scrounge some up).  

Obviously I could have gone to a podiatrist's office and let them do it for me.  But suffice it to say that I was cheap (and my insurance wouldn't have covered anything), and feeling kind of adventurous.  After all, it was right up my alley.  And all I needed was a a little lidocaine (that's the local anesthetic), and I'd be good to go!  

But where could I get lidocaine, other than the black market?  And where exactly is the black market?  I would have been perfectly willing to buy some there, had someone provided the location.

A breakthrough 

the O.R.

The problem of my absent anesthetic was solved when I read online that in the case of a drug allergy to lidocaine, an injection of diphenhydramine (aka benadryl) can be used in its place to provide anesthesia.  Um....really??

By the way, this is really bizarre because, as you probably know, benadryl is an antihistamine that's typically used by people with seasonal allergies, or as a sleep aide.  I'd certainly never heard of its being injected to produce anesthesia, and neither had my podiatry classmates (now in residency) that I subsequently mentioned it to.

Preparation 

Supplies!

Even with this breakthrough, getting supplies was trickier than I expected.  Benadryl abounds, but not in an injectable form.  I hypothesized that I could buy it in pill form, crush the pills in my handy mortar and pestle (which didn't exist), dissolve the powder in some water, and then inject that solution.  (This was a stupid idea for various reasons, but we'll get into that later). 

So I bought some benadryl tablets.  The only needles and syringes I could find were single-use, 1ml (small!) insulin syringes with 29 gauge (tiny!) needles attached, sold in a box of 100.  These were not at all ideal, but better than nothing....actually even that's debatable.  I also picked up some distilled water and alcohol swabs to further furnish my operating room.  

The Operation

The day had come, and it was kind of invigorating.  I was less invigorated when I realized that my crushed pills didn’t stay dissolved in the distilled water, instead settling to the bottom of whatever container they occupied.  As a result, it was nearly impossible to draw the mixture up into those insulin syringes before the diphen resettled to the bottom. (Not to mention it's nearly impossible to draw anything up into such small-gauge needles!  A 25 gauge needle is typical for such activities.)  It was equally challenging to actually inject the solution into my toe, due to both the settling and the smallness of the needles, which kept getting clogged by tiny pill particles.   Even when I did successfully inject fluid, some of it wasn’t as concentrated as it needed to be, due to the settling problems I mentioned.  So in case you hadn't gotten the message, that part was difficult.  But after a couple hours of finagling, most of my toe was numb, and I was ready for the fun part.

And it would have been pretty fun.  Except that despite my best efforts, one edge of the nail bed still had sensation.  I loosed the nail and separated it from the bed for the most part...but it was too painful to separate it on the edge that wasn't numb.  So I eventually yanked it off without having separated it 100%, and ripped off a chunk of flesh with it for good measure.  Yes, it was quite painful.  If you're having trouble relating to the experience, imagine sticking a butter knife under a small toenail to pry it up, only not being able to do so completely because it's too painful, and then ripping it off with pliers.

post-op

{Technical details:  Injected ~10cc's of impure solution, variable and unknown concentration.  Achieved numbness over 90% of surface area.  Loosened majority of nail with an elevator (all except medial edge), extracted whole nail and some adhered tissue from nail bed with a hemostat, observing proximal "feathery" edge.  Scraped proximal nail bed with currette to smooth and flatten, in hopes that the nail would grow back more smoothly and uniformly than it had since its prior avulsion in 2004.  Applied generous triple antibiotic ointment, followed by somewhat-sterile dressing.  Including application of anesthetic, op time ~3.5 hours.} 

Aftermath 

My toe was in a lot of pain that evening at the ward party, but I was very glad to be done with the surgery.  My biggest concern on day one was infection--my technique had been anything but sterile.  And for a couple days I thought I had one, due to a pattern of redness on and around the injection sites.

To make a long story (everything that happened after the surgery) fairly short, over the next few days I carefully assessed the spread and movement of the redness and ascertained that there was no infection, but only a local reaction of some sort to the various impurities I had injected along with the benadryl—read the ingredients in sleep aid pills sometime and imagine the possibilities.  Redness, swelling, and pain remained for several days, which was worriesome.  I nearly went to see a doctor.  But after a couple weeks it improved enough that I was comfortable and functional once again.  Gradual change continued and still does.  Even now, over 10 months later, there lingers a mild degree of redness and puffiness around the nail, but it’s rarely painful.  The main difference is that I have to trim the nail much more aggressively to avoid over-encroachment by the puffy skin around it, which otherwise results in pain, ingrown-toenail-like symptoms, and eventual ulceration (all of which are awesome). 

tracking possible infection

Do I have any regrets in life?  Yes.  Do I regret surgerizing my toe?  Maybe.  The goods and ills are nearly a wash.  One of the most important things I learned:  If you're thinking about crushing up oral benadryl pills that contain a million ancillary ingredients using a non-existent mortar and pestle in order to inject the produced solution into your own toe using tiny insulin syringes...it may not be the best idea you've ever come up with (though it could possibly be in the top ten). 

Can I get a larger slice of pie, please?

I'm tired of college football.  I've often been perturbed by it.  But after an ugly series of events⁽¹⁾ during Thanksgiving weekend, which led my brother Nathaniel to suggest that he would now boycott college football, I couldn't help but agree with his rationale.  It's just a mess.  And we watch it for the wrong reasons.

The college football model is one of "haves" and "have-nots".  Its motto is "Keep the little man down."   Their idea, lately, is that an unfair system will lead to controversy, which will generate interest, which will boost ratings, which will lead to lucrative TV contracts and big advertising money. And it works.

There are some people who like the system because it gives their team an advantage.  It's kind of like if you were born into the upper level of a rigid caste system and you thought, "Man, this caste system is awesome!  I'll always be at the top!"  Most people, on the other hand, realize the system is unfair, and wish for a change.  But both groups have something in common:  they watch the games.  They may whine and complain about the injustices, but they still watch.  And as a result, they feed the beast.  They become part of those controversy-boosted ratings which generate huge profits.

Now, even though the college football model "works" (makes quite a bit of money), I believe they would make a lot more money if they switched to a playoff system⁽²⁾.  So why don't they?  I think there are two main reasons.

1. It's new.  It would be a departure from their tried-and-tested model of controversy = ratings.  So if you're already making billions of dollars with minimal effort, why change your approach?  That's pretty understandable.  The other reason is less so. 
2. The people in charge want to maintain their larger slice of pie.  Teams from the six BCS conferences get a lot more money than teams from the other five conferences, and a huge recruiting advantage, and they don't want that to change.  They have "Bigger Slice of Pie Syndrome".  It's a serious condition.  

Those are the two major reasons why college football doesn't change.  They don't want to try something new when their unfair system beautifully generates billions of dollars already.  And the people in charge want to keep their larger pie slices.

To illustrate further, imagine yourself in a room.  In front of you is a table, and one it are two iterations of your favorite kind of pie.  Only, one of the pies is very large, and the other is small.  In this room there also happen to be ten of your friends.  Now you are given with two choices: 

• Option A: You can select the large pie, divide it into eleven equal slices (hard to do, by the way) and share it with all your friends.  You are told, however, that if you do this, there's a 0.1% chance the pie will spontaneously combust, and you will be left with no pie.  Also, you are warned that if you share the pie equally with your friends, they may become very powerful from the pie-nutrition (or "pietrition").  And who knows but that next time your friends will be the ones dividing the pie?  Perhaps with their newfound pie-strength they will no longer fear you, and will give you a smaller slice.  These seem like valid concerns to you.  

• Option B: You can select the small pie, cut a piece comprising 90% of it for yourself, and then leave the rest to be divided among your friends.  You strongly consider doing this because, even though you'll actually be getting less pie, there's not that 0.1% chance of the pie spontaneously combusting.  Gotta go with a sure thing, right?  Plus, you can't have your friends getting pie-strength.  Who knows what they can do with pie-strength?  Pie-strength is a thing of legends. 

So which do you choose?  If you choose the first option, you're a reasonable person.  If you choose the second, you're college football (and a hero to supporters of caste systems everywhere!).

And that's great and dandy that they're going to keep doing this, keep hogging pie and fearing new frontiers.  I can't do very much about it.  But starting today, no longer will I be part of the controversy-generated-ratings-boosting crowd of mindless followers.  Starting today, I renounce college football^(3),(4).  And you should too.

Join the movement. 

**********

Footnotes:
1.  Auburn somehow came back from a 21-0 deficit against Alabama, and Boise St. lost because their kicker choked twice.  (Plus BYU lost to Utah, which is always a downer for humanity.)  But more important than what these games meant for the race to the BCS title game, was how they begged the question:  Why should we care?  They were part of the fabricated drama, and part of our being drawn in, hopeful for the little guy to get a fair shot.  Only, those hopes are dashed 99 times out of 100, because the cards are stacked against them.

2.  A college football playoff system is easy to design, and there's no reason to believe it wouldn't generate a ridiculous amount of money.  Though there are other reasonable methods, I think the best system would be a 16-team playoff including the conference champions from all eleven conferences, plus five other teams chosen by a committee.  The first two rounds would be home games for the higher-seeded team, and the last two rounds (three games) would be played in high-profile bowl games.  I assert that all arguments made against such a system are disingenuous attempts to preserve the current, unfair system.

3. The one exception to this will be watching my own team.  I'm a fan of BYU, and I will continue to watch their games.  But I won't be drawn in by the fabricated drama of the "national championship" chase.  There's no such thing as a national championship in the BCS, so why should I care?  And BYU's approach, starting next year, largely aligns with my perspective.  When they decided to leave the Mountain West Conference and become independent, they knew this would actually decrease their chances of playing in a BCS game.  But they didn't care.  What they cared about was exposure, or in other words getting out of the crappy TV contracts of the MWC so their fans can watch games.  And starting next year that will be a lot easier, with games on ESPN and BYUTV (instead of "mtn.").  As a bonus, they will also make more money.  Screw the BCS. 

4.  Admittedly, there are good reasons to "renounce" many other sports or leagues as well. NBA players make way too much money.  Professional baseball is boring, and both the season and individual games are way too long.  The NFL causes a lot of head injuries which lead to premature dementia.  Plus it's played on Sunday, when it's better to be doing other things. And hockey isn't very fun to watch.  So by all means, stop watching those other sports, too.  I've hardly watched any baseball or hockey during the past ten years.  But at least all of those sports can say undefeated teams get to compete for a championship.  College football is not only unfair, but enjoys using that unfairness to lure us in.  And I won't be lured any longer.

A Field So White

So there's a white field.

How white, you ask?

Soooo white.  Sooooooooooo white!

It's A Field So White!

And now it's on YouTube!  Hooray!

Yeah, I know, this is pretty much the moment you've all been waiting for, the day when A Field So White would be available to the masses.  It reminds me a little bit of when the printing press was invented. 

Just in case you have no idea what I'm talking about-

A Field So White is a musical film produced in 1984, essentially a collection of inspirational music videos.  The songs are about helping other people and doing good stuff.  The music is by Lex de Azevedo (a fairly renowned LDS composer), and the music, clothing, and hair in the videos are straight out of the eighties!  Some people find this latter element humorous. 

I think this quote from the back of the video cover pretty much sums up how I feel about it:

"A Field So White promotes sharing, caring and loving activities.  It is a pioneering event in Christian entertainment and will become your favorite video to be played and re-played over and over again."

*****

A few years ago I did a google search to see if A Field So White had come out on DVD.  Not only was it not on DVD, it wasn't for sale anywhere!  And you still can't buy it new, though there are some used copies with exorbitant prices on Amazon.com.  It's not easy to get ahold of.  And the other day, after watching it for the first time in a few months, I thought to myself, "If somebody out there has a sudden urge to watch "Mrs. Mahoney" and does an online search, that person should not be disappointed."

And from now on, they won't be.  And neither will you. 

Now, a lot of people get a good chuckle out of the choreography and styles in A Field So White.  They think it's "funny".  I don't begrudge them that, but I actually quite enjoy the music and find the themes touching.  It's well-done!  It pulls at my heart-strings!  For some reason there are strings in my heart!

But whatever your purpose--to laugh at the eighties, to scoff at choreography you deem silly, or to be inspired to good acts while enjoying quality music--if you follow the links below, all of your wildest dreams will come true. At least it's possible. 

By the way, my favorites are "Maria Alvarez" and "Mrs. Mahoney", with a slight nod to "The Mighty Winds of Change."  "Share It" seems to enjoy a sort of cult status.  But they're all good.  

Note:  YouTube has a "playlist" feature which lets you put videos in a queue and save them as a playlist.  I made one with all the videos from "A Field So White" for easy viewing, you can do likewise if you want to watch them in order. 

The songs from A Field So White:

• Leaders of Tomorrow (opening song / intro)
• A Field So White
• Maria Alvarez
• Hold On
• Mrs. Mahoney 
• A Letter Home
• Share It
• The Mighty Winds of Change
• Child of Forever
• Leaders of Tomorrow (reprise with credits)
• Love the People (with closing credits) 

Texts are like Cows

I kind of hate text messages.  Do you kind of hate text messages?

Let me tell you why I feel so. 

But before I do that, I may as well say what they're good for.  Text messages are great for relaying one small bit of info, such as, "The dog has been fed", or, "Your house just burned down."  Or asking a simple question, like, "Can I eat your last doughnut?"  That's probably easier than making a phone call, right?  And obviously texts are better when no noise is allowed, such as during a dance recital.

Text messages are also less time-sensitive than phone calls, which can be nice if you're busy baking a pie.  (And even if you're not busy, you can always pretend you're busy....like when a girl you don't like texts to ask about your weekend plans.  This has not happened even once, though.)  And perhaps what texts are best suited for, something that really makes them worthwhile, is mass communication, such as inviting a 100 people to a fondue party on short notice, or changing the details of a rendezvous involving 600 people. 

And that's all nice.  Pretty nice.  But I still kind of hate text messages. And that's because far too often we lose our way as a society, and use text messages for what they are very poorly suited:

Extended conversations.


I hate it when text messages are used to have an extended conversation.  In fact, I loathe it.  But I don't abhor it, that's going too far. 



Here's the point.  When used for long conversations, texts usually become:

1. Distracting.  They're like an interrupting cow, and especially so if your ringer sounds like a "MOOO!!" (Kudos to you if this is the case.)  I generally have a pretty one-track mind (1.5 on a good day), so when I settle down to a task only to be interrupted over and over by a cow, it really slows me down.  If it were a mule it might not be as bad. 
2. Extremely inefficient.  An unofficial experiment just now showed that it takes about six times as long to enter a text message as to just speak it.  That's not so bad if it's a one-word message, as it doesn't take long to say a word like "Freakazoid!"  But imagine if you had to enter this entire blog post into your phone.  Or better yet, imagine if you were part of the hypothetical experiment where you place infinity monkeys in front of infinity typewriters until one of them types all the works of Shakespeare; only in this version, you are one of the monkeys, and you're using a cell phone instead of a typewriter.  Imagine how much faster you could inadvertently produce the entire works of Shakespeare by randomly talking instead of randomly enterting text on your phone?!  
3. Expensive for people with crappy cell phone plans.  
4. Inducers of tendonitis in the thumbs.   
5. Characteristic of teenage girls:  I would ask, who is most known for their dexterous and voluminous production of messages comprised of text?  That's right, girls aged 13-17.  So do you want to be more, or less similar to a teenage girl?  Or perhaps you literally are one, in which case you get a temporary pass on this point.  You also get a prize, because I doubt anyone of your demographic will read this.
6. Social Impropriety:  If you've ever read a Jane Austen novel, you know she's all about propriety.  And one sure way to violate her rules, and to lessen your chances of a happy marriage with Mr. Darcy or Elizabeth or whomever, is to send a lot of texts while in social settings.  I'm confident she would not approve. 

The bottom line for me is this:  You can be an interrupting cow, or you can not be an interrupting cow.  And don't forget there are pros and cons.  While "moos" can be annoying, even a cow of the interrupting variety can likely produce milk, and by association cheese and ice cream, which are always good, unless you're lactose intolerant, or trying to lose weight, or a vegan, or otherwise at odds with the dairy industry.

Or to put it another way, is the following your destiny?

"Knock, knock."
"Who's there?"
"Interrupting Cow."
"Interrupting C....."
"MMMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!"