With apologies to Nathan Adrian and everybody else in these United States, I was not rooting for us to take the gold in the 100-meter Olympic freestyle competition. Not that I am unhappy he won... far from it... many happy congratulations to Adrian and Team USA. It's just that I had a different favorite for winning the race.
Two months before I landed in Sydney last September, James "The Missile" Magnussen had become the 100m Freestyle World Champion at the FINA competition in Shanghai. This made him a very popular fixture in the world of Australian sports, and a lot of predictions for Olympic gold were already being talked up...
James Magnussen World Champion 2011, Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images AsiaPac
One evening while re-packing my suitcase (in Cairns, I think?) with the television on, I caught some kind of documentary/interview with the guy, and he was everything you'd want a world champion to be... kind and generous with his words, brilliant in his skills, and extremely confident in his abilities.
But the thing that struck me most is how it was repeatedly stressed that he was the best hope for the Aussies bringing home 100m Freestyle gold, which hadn't happened since Michael Wenden won it 1968. Not even the "invincible" Ian "The Thorpedo" Thorpe could manage it in 2004.
That's when I stopped packing for a minute, and tried to fathom how a 20-year-old guy could sit there with the hopes of an entire country heaped on his shoulders and not crumble on the spot.
How does one even deal with that being in their head?
And so I wanted James Magnussen to win gold, just so the lofty expectations set for him... and by him... would be fulfilled and maybe he could have a short time without all the pressure he usually has to endure.
Unfortunately Team Australia didn't medal in the Freestyle Relay earlier and, even more unfortunately, Magnussen didn't get a gold medal in the 100m Freestyle tonight. He lost to American Nathan Adrian by one-one-hundredths of a second...
So now I was even more worried for the poor guy. He missed his dream by - literally - less time than it takes to blink an eye. Though shattered, he was taking it as well as one could expect... "It hurts. I did my best tonight and and it was not quite good enough. To lose by that amount stings but I've had a lot of great support the last few days from people from back in Australia."
I hope so.
He's young and he'll be back in 2016 at the height of his game (and with Olympic experience!), so that'll be something to look forward to...
In the meanwhile, the press is having a field-day with tearing Magnussen down, just as Phelps before him. If I have to read one more "The Missile was a Dud" headline I'm going to scream. The guy is still a World Champion swimmer. He has a silver medal from the Olympic Games. If that makes him a dud, then the rest of the world might as well give up right now.
As for me? I'm just going to get some sleep.
What a horrible day.
Never have so many disappointed so thoroughly in so little time.
Guess I'm going to tune into the Olympic Games opening ceremonies and be done with it.
To all Olympiads from all nations all over the world, best of luck in your competitions!
And to London, one of my favorite cities on earth, thank you for hosting what is most certainly going to be a wonderful event (DANNY BOYLE?!?). It could not have been easy to find the finances during such trying economic times, but Britain Will Prevail... and God Save The Queen!
This afternoon I barely managed to escape death when I jumped out of the way of a car that tried to run me down in the parking lot.
Well, maybe not "death"... but certainly "injury." And probably not really "tried" but more like "accidentally"... but the big picture is this: The car that nearly hit me had a big ol' bumper sticker on the back which said "SEE BICYCLES."
Which has me wondering if I should slap a big ol' bumper sticker that says "SEE PEDESTRIANS" across my ass...
And now for something interesting... that bright yellow "SEE BICYCLES" bumper sticker that's popping up everywhere was actually created by a guy in the city just down the road from me. Apparently he is a cyclist who was injured by a pickup truck back in 2004, and is now trying to raise awareness and make the roads safer for cyclists.
There's something to be said about a guy who takes personal tragedy and uses the experience to try and make life better for others.
If only there was a way I could turn the tragedy of this crappy frozen burrito into making life better for others.
One week later and still lovin' it.
My morning routine is five minutes longer now...
It's Flag Day today!
I may be having serious issues with the polarizing state of this self-destructing country, but I still think our flag is a pretty one.
According to Wikipedia, Flag Day in the United States of America commemorates the adoption of our flag on 14 June 1777. Want to know even more? Wikipedia also has a really cool entry with all kinds of information on the American flag.
ZOMG! WHAT HAVE I DONE? WHAT WAS I THINKING? I CAN'T BELIEVE I MADE SUCH A TERRIBLE MISTAKE!
How could I have forgotten to pack my lucky boxer shorts?
This will be a tragedy that haunts me for the rest of my life. If my plane goes down on the flight home Monday, at least now you'll know why.
And now for some questions/comments that have popped up since getting a tattoo yesterday...
• Why not Bad Monkey? Six year ago when I was joking about getting a tattoo, I thought it would be funny...
But the only serious option I ever considered was the skull and crossbones. Bad Monkey would make for a cool tattoo, and maybe one day that will happen. But first it's got to be what I've been wanting for 26 years. In any event, I think Lil' Dave and Bad Monkey would approve...
• Where'd you get that design? I drew it. Which is kind of odd, because I was pretty dead-set against designing my own tattoo for the longest time. But Michael encouraged me to send in my ideas, and eventually he kind of led me to where I needed to be. Ultimately, it kind of makes sense, so I'm glad things ended up that way. But it was not an easy process. I drew dozens of different versions before I had answers to the questions that were keeping me up at night... Bones behind or bones under? Eyepatch or no eyepatch? Cheek bones or no cheek bones?
No eyepatch. Yes to cheekbones. Bones under so it would fit better on my skinny arm. In the end it couldn't have been any other way.
•It's bigger than I thought! I get that a lot, thanks. OH... YOU MEAN THE TATTOO! Yeah, at first I had pictured something around 2-inches tall. But Michael said that I should take a look at something bigger, so I made cutouts at my hotel that morning and played around with how the sizing would look. I quickly found out that he was absolutely right... the bigger I made it, the better I liked it. This was the opposite of how I thought it would work on my bony arm, but it felt right. Eventually I printed out four different sizes of big and let Michael pick which he felt was the best fit. It turned out so badass awesome that now I can't imagine I ever considered it having it inked so tiny.
• Did it hurt? No. Not even a little bit. I was the first person to think that I'd be sobbing uncontrollably and screaming like a little girl, but it never happened (at least not during the tattooing). The outlining felt like somebody was dragging a needle across my skin, scratching it. The filling-in felt like somebody was dragging a popsicle stick across my skin. It didn't hurt at all. I was told that eventually it would feel like I had a bad sunburn, but that never happened. Then I was told it would sting in the shower when water hit it, but that never happened either. If it weren't for being able to look down and see it, I wouldn't know that I had it done. I chalk it up to my mutant healing factor, because this is apparently not typical.
• Weren't you nervous? No. And I wasn't excited either. The whole time it felt like this was something that had already happened and I was just reliving the moment. I can't explain it any better than that, but it was a bit surreal how unaffected I was over getting something permanently marked on my body. I guess I knew it was meant to be all along.
• How long did it take? One hour, forty-five minutes after we decided where it should be placed and got the stencil applied.
• Will you get another tattoo? It's strange... after wanting this so badly for 26 years, I thought that finally getting my skull & bones would get it out of my system and I wouldn't think about tattoos anymore. But now that I have it, all I can do it think about how I would like to add something to it and expand the design down my arm just a bit... or try something different somewhere else. Maybe the feeling will pass but, as of right now, I can't imagine not getting another piece of ink.
Annnnnd... it's time to get out and enjoy the incredible weather going on here in the Bay Area...
As far back as I can remember, I've had a bit of an obsession with pirates. This led to an infatuation with their "skull and crossbones" symbol, which I've been drawing on my stuff for decades. Ultimately, it kind of became my personal symbol, and was even part of my signature at one point.
So, on a trip to Maui 26 years ago when the idea of getting tattoos was floated, I knew exactly what I wanted... the skull and bones.
It never happened, but the idea of getting a tattoo was planted.
But there were always excuses. "What if I change my mind in five years and regret getting skull and crossbones?" or "What if a total stranger gives me a crappy tattoo?" So I never got one.
And then I slowly came to realize that I hadn't changed my mind in 26 years as to wanting a skull and crossbones for my ink, so I probably wasn't going to change my mind five years from now.
And then I started seeing the amazing stuff that my Facebook Friend Michael DeMatty was posting to his wall, and all my excuses vanished. So today was the day...
Now, I'm not nearly macho enough to pull off a badass "realistic" skull and crossbones... but a DaveToon skull and crossbones? Definitely more my style...
Done!
I couldn't be happier with it...
And so at long last... after 26 years of dreaming about it... I finally have my first tattoo. Thanks to Michael at Black & Blue San Francisco for working so hard to make it happen!
Sometimes I regret that I'm a "daily blogger."
The reason I write daily is because I know my blog would die a long, slow death if I started skipping days. First I'd skip once or twice a month... then skip once or twice a week... and then, before I even realize it, I'm struggling to write two entries a month. At which point Blogography is dead. I've seen it happen with other blogs many times before. And so I continue to post something every single day, even if I don't have anything to write about or I'm going through something that can't be blogged.
Like today.
I got nuthin'...
Fortunately, I can totally blog about nuthin'. You're welcome!
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