It’s quiet except for the din of tires sluicing through rain puddles, the sound of the city going home to their husbands, their wives, to kitchens smelling of chicken pot pie and home spice, of muted TVs and Friday night anticipation. It wasn't very long ago. It could easily be me, walking past green windowed skyscrapers to meet my wife for dinner. We have a cat who kneads our laps constantly moving paws, we have an apartment with a view, promising jobs with edgy companies. We cook dinner and she watches her shows, I work furiously and hard and I know I'm cut out for something even more. We're still young and we talk about what's n... [More]

I was mumbling something crotchety in the Safeway parking lot on our way to the gym on Tuesday and Corey fired back at me.  He usually tolerates my groaning: how I am doomed to 15 pound weights forever, how it sometimes kind of totally sucks to lift weights with someone so spectacularly ripped and strong, god, don't you understand my oversensitive kind of assholish woe?  I feel like a seventy-six year old Ethel with my limp little arms and I actually experience something akin to...anger when I watch him lift 70 pound weights with his pinkie as I labour through the 2 pounders with the force of a dysfunctional cooked noodle. "You'r... [More]

Corey stands in the kitchen, scooping cookies-and-cream flavored whey protein into a plastic shaker cup.  The protein powder tastes neither like cookies nor cream, but when you add it to vanilla soy milk and banana, it's passable. Like Splenda and apples-as-snacks (rather than peanut butter cookies) -- I'm getting used to it. But I still don't love it. We've just finished an hour long workout at the gym, abs and shoulders and my body hurts everywhere.  This is fairly normal. "So are you starting to like it a bit?" he asks, shaking the cup with water. "No," I reply stubbornly. "It doesn't feel even a little bit good?" he asks aga... [More]

My phone would ring every morning at 6:15.  My hand fumbled in half-awake panic, searching in the dark for the source of the shrill.  It was always Shannon on the other end, my colleage and sporadic workout partner. "You wanna go this morning?" her voice was breathy and barely awake and I'd roll toward the edge of my tangled sheets and look out the black window at the sleet and ponder my warm toes and I would say too quickly,"No.  Totally not.  Let's go back to sleep and we'll go tomorrow.  For sure we'll go tomorrow." She'd sigh with relief and hang up.  Sometimes we would indeed go "tomorrow", but often we wo... [More]

This was the brainchild of Black Hockey Jesus, who I firmly believe is one of the funniest and most talented writers in the blogosphere.  He also doesn't mind a little controversy and this challenge, encompassing some of my fave bloggers of all time, is one I'm super stoked to watch and contribute to.  Check it out.