03.12.2012 | 7:24 am
Some of you may be familiar with Paul Guyot, who did a really great job guest-posting on my blog while I was in France last year.
As you may or may not know, Paul is, in addition to being a kick-butt guest blogger and short story writer (check out this short story and this short story collection, as well as his story in Ride), is a producer and writer for Leverage.
Well.
Paul just recently sent me this email:
Hey, Buddy!
How goes it these days?
Seeing as how you’re such a fan of LEVERAGE — the show I wrote for that’s on Sunday nights on TNT – I thought it might be fun if you came out to Portland, Oregon where we shoot the show, and did a little cameo. I could create a small walk-on role for you, perhaps as a Portland bike messenger?
You could see the production, meet the actors, dine on some craft service, visit Portland, and generally enjoy yourself for a day or so.
Since you give so much to others, and rarely think about yourself, I thought it might be nice to give you your own little moment in the sun! Or rain, seeing as how we shoot in Portland.
No need to thank me, as this is something I very much want to do.
Your friend,
Paul Guyot
As you might expect, I am intrigued by this opportunity. As you might also expect, however, I have some questions and suggestions, which I am pleased to now present in the form of…what else?…an open letter.
An Open Letter to Paul Guyot (and everyone else at Leverage)
Dear Paul,
Thanks very much for your generous offer to include me in an episode of Leverage. As you no doubt expect, I am more than inclined to accept. That said, I’ve spent a few minutes thinking about this opportunity, and would now like to run a few questions and ideas by you.
Questions and Concerns
This will be the first time I’ve been on television since ninth grade, Paul. And so I’ve got a few general questions and niggling concerns I hope you can clear up.
Hair : I don’t know if you’ve noticed in any of the pictures I’ve put on my blog, but my hair is beginning to thin. Or, more specifically, the hair on the top of my head is starting to thin (the hair on my back seems to be picking up the slack, however). And by “starting to thin,” I of course mean that I have an adorable little peninsula of hair on the top of an otherwise bare forehead zone. The attached photo should demonstrate the state of my hair (or lack thereof) quite well, as well as the somewhat alarming fact that my forehead looks like it belongs to a Sharpei. So my question is, will you provide me with a hairpiece for the show? Or should I buy one myself? Or should I grow a combover just as fast as I can?- Beard : Since you are filming in Portland, I am growing a Portland-ish beard with all possible haste. You will be glad to know, I think, that I grow a thick, lush beard, at approximately twice the rate of most men. Believe me when I say that in the below photo I have been growing this beard less than a week.
I am nevertheless concerned about the state of this beard for two reasons. First, it’s becoming evident that my beard is going grey. Do you have people who can de-grey-ify it? Second, can they take care of trimming it into a less pedestrian shape? I am capable of only the most pedestrian beardscaping techniques.
- Weight : I have heard before that the camera adds ten pounds. Could you do me a favor and have a disclaimer at the beginning of the show, when it airs, saying that due to unforeseen technical issues, in my case it added 35 pounds?
- Diction : I have a slight diction problem, Paul. Specifically, that I am a mushmouth. My “d’s” come out as “j’s.” My “p’s” come out as “b’s.” My “k’s” come out as “g’s.” The only vowel I ever pronouce is the schwa. I recently stopped using fricatives altogether. Will this be a problem? Perhaps you could have me overdubbed, or sub-titled? Or have me hold up cards? Or, right after I say something, have the actor I say it to repeat it back, as if to make sure they remember what I just said (but in actuality to help viewers understand me). Or perhaps you should just have me overdubbed. In which case, I would like to have James Earl Jones be the guy who overdubs me. I think that would be believable.
- Breath : I have terrible breath. I’m sorry. You may just want to give the actors I’m interacting with a heads-up on this fact. You may also want to keep the room well-ventilated, and perhaps have a scented candle burning nearby.
- Face asymmetry : Could you give your FX guys a heads-up that the left side of my face functions only at about 70%, and they may want to do some CGI work on my face afterward?
- Appearance Trademark : You may want to have your legal guys check and make sure that Stanley Tucci hasn’t already trademarked the way I look. So you don’t get sued and stuff.
Plot Suggestions
This is, of course, your show and I would never want to presume to tell you how to write a story. That said, I have a few ideas for how you might want to work me into the plot. I think your viewers would enjoy any or all of these.
Idea 1 — Have the episode be about a midpack endurance cyclist : I think people would really be interested in endurance mountain bike racing, if only they knew more about it. How about if the whole episode centers around me training for the Breck Epic, culminating in lots of action sequences – with dramatic and exciting music in the background – of me racing and finishing midpack in the race.
At some point in the training montage (because, obviously, there would need to be a training montage), I could take a fall, in slow motion (you’ll need to get a 5′7″ stocky stuntman for this part). As you go to commercial, there would be concern about whether I will be able to even participate in the race at all. (Don’t worry, though, in the next scene it becomes apparent that I want to continue on, in spite of the obvious pain, because that’s what midpack endurance cyclists do.)
I could have a dramatic, powerful monologue about how, for me, it’s not about finishing first. It’s about confronting my limitations and then busting through them. I would make my eyes look fierce and my voice steely, dramatically quiet, and less-mushy than usual for this speech.
Maybe the regular actors could be my support crew during the race or something, so they don’t feel left out.
Idea 2. Have the episode be about a beloved cycling celebrity blogger : Did you know that there are 20 million blogs in the US, alone? Obviously, blogging is white-hot, and yet there are no TV shows I am aware of tapping into this massive demographic.
I can imagine an episode where all the regular characters discover a blog written by a really interesting middle-aged guy who likes bikes. Before long, they’re all totally addicted to the blog (it’s my blog by the way), and are ignoring the job they’re supposed to be doing right then.
The blog helps them keep their sanity, because the job they need to do (stealing a maguffin back from someone who shouldn’t have the maguffin in the first place) is impossibly difficult.
And then, in an awesome plot twist, by reading the blog they figure out the missing piece to the job that’s had them stumped. High fives ensue! They execute the job flawlessly, and leave a comment on the person’s blog thanking him for saving the day.
Then, in a surprise twist, the blogger rings their doorbell just as they post the comment. “How did you get here so fast?” they ask.
“Oh, I have my ways,” I reply, with a sly wink. The regular actors look at each other, shrug, and the show ends with a giant group hug.
Idea 3. Have the episode be about a guy who really likes Mexican food: What if there were a guy (played by me) who really really liked Mexican food, but – because he loves Mexican food and therefore notices these kinds of things – discovers that all the good Mexican food restaurants in the area are starting to put more and more refried beans in their burritos, cheapening the product without reducing their prices.
The Leverage gang discovers this is true, and finds out that it’s because the Mafia has bought all the Mexican restaurants in the area, using blackmail or threats or something. And now they’re money laundering and making exorbitant profits on their burritos, both at the same time.
Doubly criminal!
So they start their own taco stand, making really great burritos, probably with fantastic guacomole (I can help with that). The client (me) spreads the word and soon it’s the most popular taco stand in the area.
When the Mafia tries to buy the taco stand using threats and blackmail and stuff, the Leverage gang demands a bunch of money because they’re the last decent taco stand in Portland. Then they disappear, give all the money to the original Mexican restaurants, and I teach them all how to make really good guacamole so they can regain their clientele.
And the Mafia can’t do anything about it because they spent all their money on that super-expensive taco stand or something.
I’ll let you figure out the plot niceties.
I think you’ll agree these are all really good ideas, and I won’t blame you if you want to use all of them (I’ll of course expect to get fair compensation).
I look forward to finding which of these you like best, and am excited to be a part of the show!
Kind Regards,
The Fat Cyclist
PS: You know what would be cool? If I became a recurring character in the show.
Comments (47)
03.8.2012 | 11:51 am
A Note from Fatty: My friend Dustin Brady is at it again, raising money for the YSC Tour de Pink with a contest to win a Pink Intense 951. Click here for details on this one-of-a-kind bike.
For every $5 you donate by April 1, you get a chance at this bike, along with other prizes.
And, more importantly, you’ll be fighting cancer alongside one of the greatest champions you could ever meet.
To enter this contest or for more details, just click here.
Recently, I asserted — using both convincing rhetoric and unassailable fact — that I am the best cyclist in the world. I stand by that claim.
And yet. And yet.
I — yes, even I! — have a chink in my cycling armor. And it is this: the final five miles of a ride.
Five Miles May or May Not Be Five Miles
By “the final five miles of a ride,” I don’t actually necessarily mean the exact final five miles of a ride. It could be the last two miles of a mountain bike ride. Or it could be the last ten miles of a 100-mile road ride.
The final five miles is really just my way of giving a number to the last part of a ride, where I’ve stopped thinking about — and enjoying — the ride itself and have begun thinking about getting off my bike and being done with it for the day.
Oh sure, every ride invariably starts out great. I begin with enthusiasm, thinking of getting away from the real world for a few minutes (hours, whatever). I then settle into the ride, happy as a clam (and make no mistake: clams are very happy indeed).
But then, around five miles before the end of the ride, something changes.
I no longer am thinking of the ride. I no longer am looking at the rocks and bugs and trees and the top tube and The Hammer’s butt and pavement and / or dirt and stuff.
No.
Now I am thinking of getting off my bike.
What I am Thinking Of
So, if I’m not thinking of the ride, what am I now thinking of? Well, a variety of things:
- Food: Really, this is the most obvious one. Generally, I will start with an inkling: “I would like some food.” I’ll then probe around that inkling, trying to figure out what kind of food sounds good. “Salty. Cheesy. Some kind of tomato sauce. Big.” I will then go through my mental database of foods that satisfy the criteria I have set: “Enchilada — no. Ravioli — no. Omelette — no. Spaghetti — no. Carne asada burrito — yes.
- Getting out of bike clothes: For some reason, I seem to expand during bike rides. Seriously, I do. It’s measurable. I inflate by up to 10%. So by the time I near the finish of a ride, the jersey that barely fit me at the beginning of the ride is starting to cut off the circulation to my spare tire. Or, it’s also possible that I’ve reached the maximum amount of time I can hold my stomach in. Regardless, as I get into that final five miles, I’m starting to get really excited about getting out of my jersey and shorts. Not excited enough to start early, though. Fortunately for everyone.
- A shower: By and large, I am a leave-it-as-is kind of person, plumbing and faucet-wise. However, I have installed a particular showerhead that magically gives my shower enough force to cut through aluminum and other soft metals. It is wonderful beyond belief. So while I definitely think about showering when I near the end of a ride, I should probably also confess that I think about showering during a lot of the rest of my life, too.
The Tragedy of The Final Five Miles
But you know, to be honest, it’s not so much that I’m thinking about something that I’ll do after the ride itself. I’m just thinking about the end of the ride.
Yes, I am, somehow, looking forward to the end of the thing that I have been looking forward to the beginning of for the whole rest of the day.
Yes, I astonish myself with my own foolishness.
Especially since, within a couple hours, I’ll be back to thinking about the next ride.
Comments (38)
03.6.2012 | 11:29 am
I have been thinking about myself lately and have come to the conclusion that I am, in many (perhaps most, and possibly all) ways the epitome of what a cyclist should be. Which is to say, I pedal smooth circles. I wear my glasses on the outside of my helmet straps. I shave my head to increase my aerodynamic properties.
I carefully match my shorts to my jersey, which are both matched to my socks. I have both a black helmet and a white helmet, and my selection of which I shall wear on a given day depend on a carefully-considered algorithm that takes weather, duration of ride, and what I am wearing into account.
I shave my legs thrice weekly. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, since I am sure you are wondering.
I have a bike for every occasion I can think of, as well as a couple of bikes for which I have not yet thought of occasions, but anticipate some appropriate occasion arising, at some point in the future, and thus want to be prepared for this hypothetical cycling opportunity (E.g., I have a track bike, just in case a velodrome appears nearby; I also have a second track bike, in case a friend wants to come along to the suddenly-existing velodrome).
I also have a cyclocross bike, although I defy the current cyclocross fad by not using it. Once all the cycling magpies have turned their attention elsewhere, I shall commence to race cyclocross, and am confident I shall dominate my racing category, just as I do in any
Further, I revel in all aspects of cycling. Which is to say, I relish a good climb and celebrate the agony of really good climb. I ride with unparalleled power when on the flats, my quads a bottomless pit of smooth strength.
I take my turn pulling, and keep the group together with an almost preternatural sense of how the paceline behind me is doing. I pull just hard enough that nobody gets a free ride, but not so hard that I drop others. When people finish riding with me, they often describe the experience as “transcendental,” even if they are not familiar with what the word “transcendental” even means.
I hold my line.
I offer advice, but only helpful advice. I avoid indulging in passing along speculative opinions offered by others, preferring instead to offer practical, time-tested guidance based on an unimpeachable source: myself.
I am well-versed in the goings-on in the world of pro cycling. I do this primarily because pro cyclists are always contacting me, asking me for advice on nutritional strategies and race tactics. At some point, I am going to have to call Levi Leipheimer and tell him to stop giving out my number, because it’s starting to get tiresome. If they offered to pay for this advice, that would be different, but you’d be astonished at what cheapskates most pro cyclists are.
I know exactly what to wear for any cycling occasion. Is it sunny now, but the weather prediction is for sleet in one hour, followed by rain, followed by wind and then sun again? I will layer properly for the ride and never be uncomfortable during said ride. My weather / clothing sense is uncanny. It cannot be canned. Don’t even try to can it.
I am willing to hear other opinions. When I render a verdict, however, you can be confident that it is correct, and you will be well-served to adopt my point of view as your own.
I pick the right line. Follow it without question, and your riding experience will be vastly superior to the one you would have had in the event you had followed any other line.
When I race, I race to win. And yet, I am able to separate the experience from the objective, so that even as I am turning myself out with an intensity you can’t even imagine (go ahead and try. There. You failed.), I am likely to notice the beauty of both the site and sound of a leaf as it rustles on a branch as I go by. After the race is over, I will congratulate those both those I defeated, and those whom I allowed to go on ahead of me, as a courtesy, because I know that some people are not self-actualized and therefore need external validation to feel good about themselves.
I use nothing but the very finest lubricants for my bicycle chains.
I can ride for hours — or, should I choose to prove a point, for days — without food or drink. However, when I do eat something while riding, I easily and fluidly reach behind me and grab whatever it is I am going to eat, remove the wrapper, eat the food, and then put the wrapper back in my jersey pocket — all without any difficulty whatsoever. During this process, I do not deviate even half an inch off my line.
Finally, I can ride no-handed.
I assure you that as efforless as I make this look, It is not easy — indeed, it takes a great deal of work — to be the finest cyclist in the world. I do it for you (and others like you), however, because I want you to have something to aspire to.
You’re welcome.
Comments (88)
03.1.2012 | 2:03 pm
A Note from Fatty: This is the latest post in my effort to tell the story of Susan’s fight with cancer. Eventually, this will be part of my next book, Fight Like Susan.
Neither of us could sleep the night before Susan’s first chemo treatment. We had too many questions about what it would be like.
How sick would it make her feel?
How soon would it make her hair fall out?
Would she always be sick from now on, or just right after the chemo?
And the biggest question of all: How would we know if it was working?
The problem was, the only question we had any kind of answer for was the trivial one: Her hair probably wouldn’t fall out in any serious way until sometime after the second treatment. For everything else, our answer was the terrifying unknown: “Wait and see.”
The Treatment
The people at my new job were unfailingly supportive of my need for some work flexibility. Maybe part of it had to do with my manager already being a good friend of mine, and my manager’s manager being one of the almost absurdly-nice Osmond family (yep, I had lived in Utah for most of my adult life, but never met an Osmond ’til I moved to Washington).
Or maybe it’s just that most everyone has had contact with someone with cancer, and so want to help.
In any case, there was no question about whether I’d take the afternoon off to take Susan to the hospital for her first treatment. Eventually, we figured, a friend or family member would take her and I could do my job. But for this first one, it definitely needed to be me.
The thing is, though, there just isn’t much to tell about a chemo session.
Susan sat in one of the big comfy chairs they had set up for chemo. A nurse plugged the IV bag full of the chemo stuff – being very careful not to get any on anyone’s skin, because it burns — into Susan’s portacath.
Geeky sidenote: A portacath is a permanent little plug doctors install in people who are either going to be giving a lot of blood or getting a lot of IV’s, or both. Imagine a little drumlike thingy right under your skin, somewhere on your chest. The needle, instead of going into your vein, goes through your skin and into the drum, which then leads to a vein. Having one makes it a lot easier for the nurse to hook you up to the IV. They’re a great invention; Susan had gotten one implanted at the time of her mastectomy.
Once hooked up to the IV, we sat there, waiting for something to happen.
Nothing happened.
We tried to talk for a while, but we were both too anxious to talk. Eventually, Susan got out the little portable DVD player we had brought along, and watched a TV show — Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I’m pretty sure.
In a little while, we were done.
Quiznos
The thing is, Susan felt fine after the chemo. Seriously, just totally fine. The doctor had said that — rarely — patients are able to go about their daily lives without being seriously affected. Maybe we had gotten lucky and Susan was one of those people!
I felt great. And, to be honest, hungry.
So I suggested we stop by the Quiznos (for those of you who don’t know what Quiznos is, it’s a toasted sandwich chain in the US) and split a sandwich. I don’t remember what kind of sandwich we got, but I remember it was really good.
By the time we got home ten minutes later, Susan felt sick.
Ten minutes after that, she had thrown up.
Ten minutes after that, she felt worse than she ever had in her entire life. Curled up in a ball and crying, laying on the bed, Susan was throwing up over and over, and then she was dry heaving.
And when she wasn’t retching, she was saying that she hated Quiznos worse than anything in the world.
Help
Of course, it wasn’t really Quiznos that was at fault. Susan and I had split a sandwich and I was fine. It was the chemo, pure and simple.
The anti-nausea medication wasn’t working. Obviously.
I called the number for the oncologist. A nurse specially assigned to be the cancer patients advocate and answer-person got to the phone, and I told her what was going on.
“Some people do really well with some anti-nausea medications, some do beter with others,” she told me. But we weren’t out of options. Not even close. She called in a different medication to the pharmacy. I went and picked it up.
No luck.
So she called in a third anti-nausea medication. This one was new, she told me. And expensive.
Not-so-geeky sidenote: You may have noticed that I’m not mentioning specifics about medication here, nor disclosing doctors’ names. In large part, that’s because I’ve learned a pretty important lesson about talking about medication and doctors on the web. Specifically, no matter what you’ve done, there’s someone who will tell you (with great conviction and often considerable condescension) that you did it wrong; you should have used this doctor and that medication. Frankly, I’m not interested in having those conversations. They weren’t helpful when Susan was alive, and they certainly wouldn’t be helpful now. Everyone’s case is different. Knowing who and what Susan worked with won’t help anyone, any more than my hearing that I should have done something I didn’t do will help me.
I went and got it. If I’d had to pay, it would have cost $50 per pill. Somehow I would have come up with the money for it, but I was glad I didn’t have to.
This one worked.
By the end of the evening, Susan was feeling better. Not great, but tolerable.
It was the best $100 / day expense I have ever had.
Regardless, though, Susan never ate at Quiznos again.
Comments (39)
02.29.2012 | 1:21 pm
A Note from Fatty: This is the latest post in my effort to tell the story of Susan’s fight with cancer. Eventually, this will be part of my next book, Fight Like Susan.
If you were to visit my house, you’d notice one artist’s work dominates the whole place: Lori Nelson. Exactly twenty of her paintings can be found on our walls (I just counted).
The biggest part of that has to do with the fact that I genuinely love her work.
Part of it is that she’s my sister.
And part of it is that she’s helped my family get through some times I wouldn’t have thought we could get through.
When the twins were born, Lori’s gift was a painting she made for the occasion: Entwined.
This painting now hangs in the twins’ bedroom, and is one of the things I would grab for if the house were on fire. The other identifying feature in the twins’ room is a wall mural (about eight feet wide) Lori painted for them:
Those of you who have kids that love My Neighbor Totoro as much as my twins do will have a pretty good idea of how awesome this mural is.
But I’m drifting away from the story I need to tell.
First House of Three
While Kenny and I drove to Washington — saving us the money it would have cost to transport the cars, which meant Microsoft gave us that badly-needed money, instead of the car transporting company — Susan and Lori flew the family to our new home state. I met them at the gate (this was back when you could meet people at their gate), and was astonished that everyone seemed to be in a good mood.
I then drove us to the apartment we’d be living in for the next two weeks, while we waited for the larger rental home we’d been promised to open up.
And we set about doing our new jobs. I went to my first day of work at Microsoft. Susan met with her new oncologist — Tena (my friend and manager’s wife) — had done all the research to find us a fantastic oncologist, so all we had to do was transfer Susan’s records and show up.
And Lori took care of us for a week. She bought and made food, entertained the kids, and in general helped us feel a lot better about the temporary apartment we’d be living in while we waited for the temporary house we’d be living in while we looked for a house to buy.
And when Lori wasn’t taking care of us, she painted. But she didn’t show us what she was working on.
Odds
The night after Susan’s first visit with the oncologist, Lori told Susan and me to take the night off. Go out on the town. Explore Issaquah. So Susan and I went to see a community theatre production of To Kill a Mockingbird.
While we waited for the play to start, Susan told me about the visit, and about the plan. Susan would start chemo very soon — as soon as she had recovered enough from the mastectomy to handle it. Just a couple of weeks. She’d feel sick sometimes, but mostly just tired. They had good drugs for combatting nausea now, and since we had superpremium health insurance (I felt a surge of pride), we could get whatever we needed, whenever we needed it. The cost of meds was no object.
Even so, Susan told me, cancer treatment was a game of odds.
If she had done nothing — no surgery, no chemo — the odds of surviving breast cancer were very low. Negligible.
With surgery by itself, the survival rate went up, but not to a very good number. I think about my grandmother — my dad’s mom, who I never met.
With surgery and chemo, the survival rate went up well into the 80-percent range. With surgery and chemo and radiation, the number budged a tiny bit more.
I don’t remember the exact numbers, but I remember being struck by both how good and simultaneously bad eighty-something percent sounded.
That would be a “B” if it were a grade, I thought. Not an “A.”
“Everything will be fine,” I told her. And me.
Video Night
The next night, Lori got out a DVD she had brought with her — something she had gotten on NetFlix (yes, NetFlix was around back then): American Splendor, a semi-autobiographical movie about Harvey Pekar.
What none of us knew going into the film was that Pekar had gone through cancer, and this film went into a gritty, darkly-realistic depiction of his treatment.
With Susan’s chemo about to start in a couple weeks, the timing for this kind of thing couldn’t have been worse. Susan cried and went into the bedroom, where she sobbed for the rest of the night. I followed and comforted her as best as I could, wishing I knew enough to be able to say, “It won’t be that bad.”
And then, even though I was still thinking about the percentages Susan had told me about, I told her, “We’ll get through this. You’ll be fine, and then we’ll forget about cancer forever.”
Meanwhile, back in the living room in our apartment, Lori was mortified.
I told her later that night that it was OK; she couldn’t have known. We’d have to get used to hearing about cancer. I didn’t realize at the time how sensitive I’d eventually become to the word “cancer” in the following months and years.
Parting Gift
Susan’s mom was coming to help out the following week, so Lori got ready to go back home. I think if I could have found a way, I would have kept Lori with us permanently, though. There was something incredibly reassuring about having my sister with us. Smart, funny, practical, and — above all — kind: that’s Lori.
The day she left, Lori gave Susan the painting Lori had been working on while she was with us:
It’s a small painting: about 10″ x 8″. I don’t think it has a title.
But it expressed, perfectly, what we all wanted.
Comments (30)
« Previous Page — « Previous Entries Next Entries » — Next Page »
