Comment catch-up, the Swim Meet Edition

Many thanks to those – there are tons of you, enough that I have to rudely condense it here (though Anonymous has been oddly silent as of late) – for the encouragement before, and mix of encouragement and sympathy after, my Masters Swim Meet Saturday, particularly my come-up-short 500 freestyle. I’m sad to say I settled no scores in this morning’s time trial during swim practice, coming in at a sorry 8:02. I wore a little timer under my swim cap that beeped at 45-second intervals to remind me to stay on a 1:30 per 100 pace, though what it really did was point out that I can hold that pace easily – and I truly do mean easily – for 200 yards, at which point things get ugly. Maybe it’s lactate, maybe it’s focus, but however murky the causes, the results are pretty cut and dried. So, then, is the plan for much of this winter’s pool training: Lots of short repeats focusing on the form that makes the first 200 go easy, and regular 500-yd time trials to force my brain to learn to concentrate and my blood to clear lactate.

I do owe one commenter a more specific answer, though. Nöel asks about the cat in the photo atop Monday’s entry “Old Doo-Dee-Doo-Dee-Dooteronomy goes swimming.” Something about suspicions of irrelevance and kitty porn. That’s actually one of my own cats, Mars, who sits that way a lot. Who pretty much just sits a lot, if you couldn’t tell from his figure. I needed a cat photo because of the T.S. Eliot references. Eliot wrote "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" -- the musical was based on it -- and Old Deuteronomy was one of the key cats in the poetry collection and the play. And Mars had just the gratuitous “What are you looking at?” visage I needed. As far as porn goes, I'm not sure what neutering or obesity or furriness or alternate speciesness do to one's prospects as an actor in that profession. Word is there's something out there for everybody. And a hyperlink for no one, at least not on this blog.