It’s real amusing that you’re trying to escape my chest, but making me cough so much I lose my voice is not fuckin’ cool. And making me whip suddenly between restlessly full of energy and narcoleptically exhausted is not helping, either.

I guarantee you that I will start feeling better approximately the same time friday morning that I have a previously scheduled doctor’s appointment.

Yep, I felt that.

Thanks for waiting until I was in Vegas last night to completely collapse on me. It allowed me to enjoy the vast majority of my vacation without feeling like I was going to cough up a lung.

Made the drive back to L.A. this morning a little miserable, but at least I had a box of tissues I stole from the hotel and a bunch of DayQuil to make it bearable.

Medicinal Chinese food: On its way.

As I go through and update the dates and times that got fucked up in the Blogger-to-Wordpress transition, I’m glancing through my old posts and occasionally coming across things that seem really funny in retrospect.

Particularly given that I’ll be driving to Vegas tomorrow and will consider any gas price below $4 a gallon a gift from God, I was rather amused by this post from 2005 complaining about a $35 tank of gas.

Sigh. Those were the days, weren’t they?

I’ll be stopping in Vegas again tomorrow night, and staying at…The Hooters Casino Hotel.

Hilarity will doubtlessly ensue.

I went fishing with my dad today, and he did really well. He caught five fish: two HUGE cutthroat trout, two good-sized rainbows, and a pretty decent-sized brook trout.

I, on the other hand…I hooked one fish myself. Well, hooked might not be the right word. I had a little rainbow that was maybe five or six inches long bite on my fly, and I yanked the hook to set it.

Except I apparently yanked a little too hard for a fish that small, because this poor fish went FLYING out of the water, at least 10 yards onto the bank, and right next to the surprised and very amused guide.

The guide was nice enough to put what I’m sure was a very confused fish back in the water. His friends will never believe the story he tells: “My god, I saw giants!”

I went horseback riding today with my camera, the pictures that were not completely blurry are now up on Flickr. Western-style riding is ideal for this, since you only need to keep one hand on the reins at all times, instead of both (as you do when you ride English-style).

However, it is not ideal when your horse randomly decides to break into a trot coming down a hill and you have to try and pull hard enough to stop him with just one hand because the other holds your very expensive camera. That was fun.

By the way, remember how I said I was going out with the Old Fart Bike Brigade 2: Electric Jewgaloo? They’re in way better shape than the Atlanta crowd. I got totally dusted by four guys over the age of seventy biking up a looooong but gentle incline.

They even managed to go up one hell of a steep hill at the end. I took one look at the hill and said, “This is No Country For Young Whippersnappers.” My dad and one other guy agreed with me, and all three of us felt really old.

This is a test to see if my signature from my Mobile Posting Unit shows up as part of the post or if WordPress automatically strips it. Let’s find out!

The preceding message was (mis)typed on a Crackberry.

Update: Hm, that’ll make things a bit obvious, won’t it?

Updated Update: Aha! This is why I like Wordpress: When it does something you don’t like, you can Google up a fix for it pretty much instantly. Ironic that I had to switch OFF a Google service to find things that Google can make easy.

Went for a little ride with the Old Fart Bike Brigade: Atlanta Edition today. And when I say “a little ride”, I mean this nice 28 mile loop. I’m a little tired now. 

While I did manage to do better than my dad (in his defense, he’s almost 72 and I’m 27), I was slightly dismayed to find that I was huffing and puffing to keep pace with a barely-breaking-a-sweat 65 year old prostate cancer patient.

I’m in better shape than I was, but I apparently still have a ways to go. We’ll see how I hold up Wednesday with Old Fart Bike Brigade 2: Electric Jewgaloo (aka the Wood River Jewish Community ride).

Vegas was a good news, bad news situation.

The bad news was that I lost $15 playing Roulette, because I never fucking remember that you have to have at least $100 to win squat at Roulette until I drop at least $10 in the frame of three minutes.

The good news was that I turned around and turned $20 into $60 off a blackjack-dealing Elvis impersonator. My mother was so proud when I told her (she, as you may or may not recall, is an insane Elvis fan).

The bad news was that I somehow managed to not notice that the ticket I’d bought to The Dark Knight was to a 35mm show, not an IMAX show, and the bulb on the projector was clearly on its last legs as well.

The good news was that The Dark Knight was still so unbelievably, jaw-droppingly fantastic that now I’m happy I have an excuse to see it again, and in even more brain-meltingly awesome IMAX.

Anyway, I meandered up here to Sun Valley on Friday, and then have been enjoying showing my dad and stepmom my new personality as an insane exercise addict.

I did 2500 meters in the pool and a six mile bike ride. Well, really, a three mile downhill cruise and a three mile lung-punishing climb, to be more accurate. Actually, both bits were pretty lung-punishing, as I’d forgotten how much thinner the air is here than in L.A.

I also have a nice little strip of sunburn right above my left eyebrow to show for my troubles, in the space between the top of the eyebrow and the bottom of my swim cap. Let me tell you, it is an attractive look.

But my level of relaxation is reaching critical mass. Tomorrow’s plan includes a four mile walk, more swimming, and a screening of Mamma Mia. The latter was my stepmom’s idea, as my feelings on that musical/film are well summed up by a quote from the movie The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert:

“NO MORE BLOODY ABBA!”