TMST FAQ

"Where did you get that fancy Blogger template?"

I found it on Google, which is a popular Internet search engine.

"Is this the same Sean Hawkins from high school/college/Europe/who I met at camp/dated once/crashed my car/drank my last beer?"

Yep! Wasn't that awesome?! (But I'm not the one who built your patio cover. That is a totally different Sean.)

"How do you find time to write and run every day? You're lucky!"

I usually don't go to work until 10:30, and then I work until 6 without breaking for lunch. Mrs. Ditchman understands that the writing is important to me, and she gets a happier husband if she gives me some time for it. Same with the running. I find that I have more energy and a better attitude if I write and run every day or so. This enables me to accomplish more with my time, but between the business and the kids, there is barely time to watch an hour of Lost and Dancing With The Stars once a week. By the way, I encourage Mrs. Ditchman to play bunco, get a pedicure, eat Golden Spoon, and go to Jazzercise as much as possible. And, yes, I am the luckiest person you know.

"Who is Mrs. Ditchman? Isn't your last name 'Hawkins'? Isn't she your wife? Did she keep her maiden name or something?"

She is my wife. It's a pet name. Studies show that pet names are a sign of a healthy marriage. This seemed like the easiest way to go about having one.

"But why 'Ditchman'?"

On our honeymoon we stayed in a renovated turn-of-the-century bungalow on an old coconut plantation on Kauai. On the door of each cottage was a metal placard that had the name of the original family who lived and worked there. Ours said "DITCHMAN", the multiple meanings of which I find fall-over hilarious.

"I love it/hate it when you write about aluminum patio covers/your kids/the suburbs/Macs/running/movies/literature/history/pop culture/politics/God/Star Wars/the End Times. Why don't you write more/less on this?"

If I wrote less, I would get sick. If I wrote more, everyone would get sick.

"I was totally offended when you wrote THAT the other day. How could you?"

I try not to be insulting. I really do. I never want to insult anyone, or have to, as long as I live. As far as "offending" people, there's really only so much I can do about this. Everyone in life chooses what to be offended by from moment to moment. I know some people who are offended by everything, and I know some people who are offended by nothing. Generally speaking, those who are less often offended by things are happier, more mature, and have a more developed sense of humor than those who find themselves more often offended. It's true. Look around and laugh about it.

"You have a lot of opinions about things. I disagree with most of them."

Is this a question? If it's not a question, then it belongs on a post entitled TMST FSC (Frequently Stated Comments). Maybe next week.

"Why do you have so many dumb opinions about things?"

Everyone who is putting pen to paper and fingers to keyboard is stating an opinion, even (and sometimes especially) novelists and journalists. People with opinions will motor upriver to the source, (though sometimes they will take a wrong turn) and people without them will drift downstream without purpose to the unrelenting chaos of the open sea. It takes guts to have an opinion. Those who say they have no opinion are either apathetic, ignorant, or lying. Anyway, that's my opinion. Everyone reserves the right to change their opinion about anything at any given time, and should be respected for it.

"How come you deleted all your sidebar links?"

You know, I'm sorry. I was just trying to streamline things for the page at one point and I had so many people asking me why I didn't link them that it was just becoming overwhelming. If you post something that I find cool and that I think my readers will find cool, I will always link you. Please don't take it personally, but I try to create my own content. Perhaps in the future I will have one link to a blog of all my links. If it makes you feel better, I don't even link my own wife's blog. (Which, by the way, is http://themundanedetails.blogspot.com.)

"How come you turned off the 'Comments' functionality?"

Several reasons. Though I was initially a big proponent of the fun comments, I found that I was constantly checking back to the blog to see if I got any comments, and it started to rule my life. And then, if I didn't get any comments, I wondered who I had offended that day. So I just quit on it, and resolved that I was offending everyone every day. Yes, I am that insecure. I figured if anyone was so moved, they could just email me. The address is in my Profile. Also, I tired of the comment spam and those feckless, anonymous cowards who feel the need to be a heartless, faceless critical voice, like someone tossing a grenade out of the jungle.

"Wait a minute, do you even care what I think about you, or not?"

Of course I do. But I try not to. I guess it depends on how respectable you are.

"How did such a thoughtless dork like you end up marrying a beautiful woman, running a successful business, and having such cute kids?"

Again, I am the luckiest guy you know, but I suspect I'm not as thoughtless as you suppose. And I try to see the world through the prism of my blessings, and then build on that.

"Oh, please. I thought you didn't believe in luck?"

I don't, actually, but those who do would have a hard time with my theories on life, so I just simplify to be agreeable.

"I don't think you know anything about gardening."

Again, not a question, but you're on to me, aren't you?

"You seem like such a nice, funny, and intelligent guy. How could you vote for George W. Bush both terms?"

I vote for someone based on their principles, not their personality, and regardless of what the polls say. I didn't vote for Arnold Schwarzenegger. I don't care if you're an actor, an a$$hole, or an optimist, I just want to know what you honestly stand for and whether or not we agree. I will accept the outcome of an honest election.

"How come you spell some words and vu!garities with $ymbols?"

To throw off the search engines, bots, and parental controls.

"Do you really think the end of the world is coming, possibly on December 21st, 2012?"

The end of the world comes every day for someone.

"How many hits a day do you get?"

Not very many, really. Google Analytics tells me that most days it's 20-30 "absolute unique visitors", usually peaking on Wednesday and Thursdays, (interestingly) and sometimes I break 100 -which usually has to do with you linking me. (Thanks! It's the highest compliment in all of Blogdom!)

"I'm that person who reads your blog every day in Carlsbad/Beverly Hills/Arizona/Thailand/Starbucks! Do you know who I am?"

No! Send me an email!

"You're an excellent/sucky writer! You should write a book/get off the Internet!"

I'm working on it.

"I went back and read one of your posts for a second time and it was totally different. What gives?"

I'm a big re-writer. I love to re-write. I find it easy and fun and I'll re-write anything and everything. It relaxes me, like channel-surfing does you. Sitting down with nothing and starting anew is difficult and painful. In a few days, all of these questions might be replaced by something unique, creative, thoughtful and brilliant! (But don't bet on it.)

"Whatever happened to 'The Suburban Conservative'?"

It was the project that broke this camel's back. I have too many projects! I may bring it back some day. Maybe today!

"Does the world really need more mouthy, beer-swilling, conservative Christians like you?"

Yes. Have them call me. I need someone to hang with.

"I don't get it. What is "the most significant thing"?"

Fifteen years ago or so I got sick of writing the same thing in my journal every day: "I'm tired... I'm bored... I'm depressed..." so I decided to record simply the most significant thing that happened to me that day. I would put some thought into it at bedtime, and sometimes it was a world event or a death or a nasty breakup, and sometimes it was a sunset or a profound thought or a comment overheard in a coffee shop. This eventually changed my perspective on things: items in life often indicated as "significant" aren't necessarily important, right, just, trustworthy, or true, and they're usually merely the most obvious or memorable quality of things, however manufactured. (Television news is an excellent example of this "perceived significance".)

Anyway, I came up with the seven most significant things in my life. In the midst of this pop world, they would be considered ironic, but in fact they are indispensably and truly significant, and the lack of the pursuit of any one of them on any given day makes me feel incomplete, (and I usually get a bad night's sleep as a result.)

They are, in no real meaningful order, as follows:

Faith
Family
Friends
Health
Work
Country
Passion

To say any one of them is the most significant would be overstating it, and if you've read the blog for a while, you know how I tend to overstate things. Anyway, that's the joke. And -except for the days when I am tired and bored and depressed- most of the posts fall into one or several of those categories. And "7" is a nice prime, biblical number.

But let me know if you have an eighth.


~

P.S. Someone suggested "Beer" as the eighth, and it was a terrific suggestion. But, after some thought, I realized it would conflict in a tie with "Wine", so they both hereby fall snugly under the "Passion" category.

Hope that clears a few things up.


~

In case you're wondering where the stuffed Pluto is, it's in the refrigerator sitting on top of the leftover pasta.

I think it was a couple days before I noticed. I mindlessly moved them over, reaching for the pickles or beer or something, my tunnel-vision finely honed to a pinhole in my lasting tiredness this week. (Alright already! You're tired! Get over it!)

I'm looking forward to this weekend and its promise of the semi-normal. It's the first weekend sans BIG EVENT since February, when the days were shorter and we could while away our time strolling the Costco aisles, watching the big screen tvs and lounging in the patio furniture, inhaling cheese samples... Though Mrs. Ditchman does have to work all day Saturday, diminishing the normal to "semi" levels. Oh well. I predict we'll all be tired all weekend.

The garden is drying out and plants are dying off, so some corrections must be made as a result of the recent heat. This will occupy my spare moments for the next 72 hours. We are officially in DROUGHT EMERGENCY now, and I need to get on top of the sprinkler system. I'm currently buying in to the conspiracy that the local city officials have turned everyone's water pressure down about 20 psi without telling anyone. On a run a few weeks ago I noticed some non-descript white service vans parked by the water towers. Men in dark sunglasses were furtively carrying large wrenches with a certain menacing intent that told passersby not to stare and to keep walking. Anyway, now my tankless water heater doesn't click on for the kitchen sink, since the pressure is so low.

So what'd I do? Got my own wrench and hiked open the release nut on my house's pressure reducer under cover of night, that's what! That'll show 'em! If I disappear and you find that my cel phone is disconnected and these blog posts are suddenly deleted, don't contact the authorities -don't get involved! The conspiracy is too vast! Anyway, I'm hoarding old Sparklett's bottles filled with tap water in my garage. (How else am I going to water my doomsday garden? How else will we survive?)

I'm not crazy.

Have a clandestine weekend! (Meanwhile, don't trust anyone with fake plants.)

P.S. And, there, I fixed it. Everyone happy? Good, because you only get one change and -hey, hasn't that waterfall been running all day? I don't want to have to report you.

Before:


After:



~

I'm tired. You're tired. We're all tired. Everyone's tired. I'm tired of complaining about being tired. I'm tired of hearing about how tired everyone is -tired of it! Stop being tired already! Put some coffee on! Work less!

As if we could. Why do these kids get up so early? Why do they scream all night? When does anyone sleep around here? Of course, I have no problem just falling asleep dead and away at any given time. It's the ladders. I'm convinced it's the ladders. And the heat.

Aren't your sweat glands like one big muscle? So if you're sweating all day, aren't you exercising that muscle all day? I don't know the science, but hot work days make me more tired. Today will be a hot work day, so dear family, expect me to be extra tired tonight. I'm not looking forward to it, either.

Headed out to Valley Center, California. A semi-rural community with no actual center, as it happens. Every time I go out there, I'm looking for the main drag and a "center" to the valley. The town is actually pretty spread out atop a large mesa, probably to dissuade visitors, and sometimes you'll cross intersections that don't appear on the GPS screen. Perhaps this is why John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Fred Astaire, Bill Murray, and Benji built their mansions out there -to confound the paparazzi. The place is also remote enough that I can't get any radio reception, so it's a Podcast day.

I really do like the heat, it just makes for challenging work conditions. I'd much rather work in the heat than the cold, so, yes, I am much more suited for volcanology than arctic research. It's just as well. The radio wouldn't work there either.

I better get going. I've gotta get a run in before work!


~

Decided against the run this morning. ALL YOUR MITOCHONDRIA ARE BELONG TO US! That, and I think I woke up every thirty-eight or thirty-nine seconds last night, for one reason or another. The Little Ditchman came in and tapped me on the shoulder for something, then she climbed into bed next to me. At least, I think. Mommy bolted upright, clapped her hands and pronounced, "OUT!" Or something. Anyway, it was dark, and there is no family bed here.

Later, it was the mommy who was poking me and saying I was getting up. I was? (And this was no illusory Facebook poke -it was the real deal.) You want to say something like, Well, you were out working until 8:45 and I had to do all the kid stuff after work and I'm exhausted, but then you realize that the shoe's reversed most other days so that argument won't fly. Still, you're Dad. Play dumb. Act useless. It's what you're good at. (I slept another hour.)

Ran out of screws yesterday! Euphemism, symbol, irony, or metaphor? Yes, all those things, as well as redundant. Again! How is it possible that I could run out of screws two whole days in a row? Look, it's a "Spanish Brown" thing, you wouldn't understand. Anyway, it was an honest error as they were two totally different sizes of screws. One is a #8 x 1/2" Hex-headed Tek screw, and the other is a #10 x 2 1/2" Hex-headed HWH SMS washer screw, both with painted ends. (The order form calls the #10 a #9, actually, but silly goose, there is no such thing as a number 9. Even I know better.) See how boring? My job is more screws than a chicken ranch and not half as entertaining.

So I've got to get back out there today. The landscaper wants me finished and gone so that he can do his job, though we aren't really in each other's way. I guess he just wants the property to himself so he can do his magic. (I can respect that. I'm the same way.) Also, he was complaining about some of the jobs he has right now: "Difficult people! Real a$$h0les! I'm the kinda guy who won't take work from people who yell at their kids wrong -I just walk away! But, you know, with the economy like it is..." Yeah man, I tell ya: I'm the same way. Why, just the other day this guy was clubbing baby Harp seals on his back patio and I just had to suck it up and ask him where he wanted the shade.

Good news: Mrs. Ditchman sold a job where the customer is so handy, he wants to build it himself! My work consists of ordering the materials and bringing it over and picking up the check (however smaller.) But awesome! Note to self: Build less, pick up more checks, get tan somewhere else.

Tomorrow's job is quite the opposite, however, so that the Fates can make up for it. See the picture-perfect, enchanting patio cover up top that I built last month? Well, the nice customer would like the column on the right to move over about 11 inches. So tomorrow it all comes down, it takes a jump to the left, and we do the time warp. It was not a mistake. And it's supposed to be the hottest day of the week.

It's all screws at my job!

~

CULTURAL REFERENCES IN THIS POST EXPLAINED:
(BY WAY OF THE WIKIPEDIA)

"all your mitochondria are belong to us"
"family bed"
"Facebook poke"
"chicken ranch"
"clubbing baby Harp seals"
"the Fates"
"a jump to the left"


~

Still hurting some. No injuries, no real pain per se, just a general crying out from every last mitochondria: ENOUGH! Perhaps that post-marathon patio cover I built yesterday was over-doing it. Marathon event coordinators never promise Monday off of work.

Back today to finish it up, to be honest. Never in my life have I ever been so thankful to run out of screws. I actually ran out of screws yesterday! Which is like a computer programmer without an electrical outlet or a Disney animator without a pencil (or an electrical outlet, I guess, nowadays.) These things don't just stack together by themselves, you know.

They say the recovery time is longer as you get older, though you can still handle the feat itself. Something about this doesn't make sense, but 48 hours after a marathon, I ain't arguing. I really feel like running right now, too, which seems odd. I just kind of want to be out there on the quiet suburban streets, which is a nice feeling to have. How about a long slow run/walk, as it's described in the books? Perhaps tomorrow.

And there's the rub. A day off to recover and you feel great. Some days after a long run I can still feel the energy -the endorphins or whatever- 24 hours later. But take three days off and the lethargy of life sets in. I can't get up off the couch, as my psyche dances a pathetic pity/pride samba: "Get up off the couch, loser!" "But I ran a marathon the other day." "That was nearly a week ago, you quitter!" "I could go out and run fifteen right now, if I wanted to." "Yeah? Let's see it!" "But I'm recuperating. Don't want to get an injury, you know." And so forth.

The best thing you can do is put the next race on the calendar, do a full power-down and re-boot. I'm thinking about it. No, I am. Really. I'll be thinking about it all day, while I'm schlepping aluminum up and down the ladder under the hot Cinco de Mayo sun.

But I'm no dummy: I picked up some margarita mixer on the way home from work yesterday. There's always room for more celebrating.


~

Never underestimate the prolonged difficulty of running a marathon. Seriously. It's far. And the marathon begins the day before -when you pick up your mother-in-law, load up the kids, and drive a hundred miles to the event. Check in to the hotel, figure out everyone's dinner, get your goodie bag at the expo and a few hours of uneasy sleep, and then try to find your way from one end of a point-to-point course to another at 5 AM without a map. There were a few problems. Hotel shuttle left early without us.

That being said, I got a new personal best! 3:46:32 (6 minutes faster than my previous record). But when I got to mile 15 I was actually thinking, damn, I wish that was mile 16 -as if it would've made any noticeable difference- and from there I did a slow disintegration. My realistic goal for this race was just to beat my PR, which I did, but I had a secondary, however more lofty goal of landing somewhere in the 3:30-3:40 range. I passed the 3:40 pace guy in the first two miles again and didn't see him again for a couple hours.

I don't know how those guys do it, staying on pace so consistently, but they always do, it seems. I thought he might have passed me when I stopped to drop a few ounces in the Port-a-John at 5, but I couldn't be sure. At the mile 21 marker, in a long straightaway, I turned to see if he was back there and I smacked my head into some poor guy's chest -thonk. I apologized and let him pass, and it was then that I noticed that it was the 3:40 pace guy -so I had been keeping ahead of him all along! I was stoked for a minute or so, and then I just watched him drift off ahead of me, while my legs increasingly cramped up. I guess I added six minutes worth of walking from there on out.

I'm not sure what happened. I think it was partially a lack of recovery time after a tough work week, and I just ran out of gas. But I also had a lot of cramping, so perhaps I had eaten too much the night before or had my body salts all out of whack or something. And I didn't get a final long run in during training, like something around 22, which I hold was a real mistake. Or maybe I just went out too fast -but I don't think so if you scrutinize my split times (bib #1020). Who knows with these things? The weather was perfect. The course wasn't too tough. I was going good and strong for the first half... and then?

Oh well. For the record, the OC Marathon is actually pretty nice. The Half Marathon, which garners far more entrants, runs along Newport Harbor and then on paved paths around the lagoon, which is beautiful. The rest of the race is only partially on the wide, engineered streets of Irvine, (nearly empty on a Sunday) and it then winds around on more bike paths along the concrete flood control rivers and other wild lands. A real surprise. I had expected asphalt and exhaust for 26 miles, and got quite the opposite. Race recommended? Sure.

It had its low points. Whoever set up the fifty Port-a-Johns at the start line in a circle facing each other was either feuding with the race coordinator or completely insane. I'm not sure I can aptly describe that pile of planning, but no one seemed pleased. If you've ever experienced the lines for the bathrooms at the beginning of a marathon, perhaps you can imagine the mayhem on your own. It was awful.

The expo was not particularly wow-tastic, as I'd seen most of the products before. This was a new one, however. I chatted with the company's owner and he gave me more information than I personally required, but I went ahead and bought some. It's pretty good. Evidently, the coffee I'm currently drinking is causing me to "age too fast" -it's what the guy said. (Aging too fast! I knew it!) Anyway, the additives have aided African witch doctors, Buddhist monks, and Himalayan Sherpas for centuries. (So, gimme some already.)

The real champion was Mrs. Ditchman. Up at 4:30 AM to nurse the baby and then out the door in the dark, wondering why she thought she could do this. She popped a few Tylenol and stood there at the start line with me and 6000 other people, bravely mentioning in passing, "my knee hurts." She'd been training as best she was able the past couple months, but two weeks ago she was about 12 miles out and in so much pain that she had to catch a bus back to the car. This kind of shattering disappointment is hard on the psyche, compelling you to quit with a thousand lashes of stabbing pain. She hadn't run in two weeks. The strategy had become to just STAY OFF IT, (impossible, if you're a working mom) take a daily Celebrex, and -come race day- give it her best shot. I left her in the back of the pack when the gun went off. Gave her a kiss and rushed off, worrying about her for the next 26.2 miles.

The Half Marathon ends at the same place as the full, so when you get to mile 13 you see two signs with two arrows in opposite directions reading "Half" and "Full". I thought this would be a good out for my wife if the pain got unbearable, and a few hours later I looked for her at the finish line, but she was nowhere to be found.

"Oh no," I thought. It meant she had tried to go for it, which I was secretly hoping she wouldn't do. Either that, or she was in some ambulance shuttle somewhere, being shuffled off to parts unknown with fifteen other limping dropouts who'd set their goals too high. "Live to run another day and save the legs for the rest of everything," I was thinking, but I know Mrs. Ditchman, and I know that she is not one to be stopped by mere pain. Her legs would have to fall clean off to put her out of the game. (And I'm not sure that would even stop her, as she clawed arm-over-arm to the finish line.)

And sure enough, an hour or so after I had stopped my clock, I saw her wobbling down the finishers' chute! She had a big smile on her face, and beneath that: steely gritted teeth. She was in a mental battle of superiority, mind over body. The mind had won, but the body wasn't happy about it. I snuck into the corral and got to hug her, amazed by the feat, but she was busy with other runners coming up to thank her -people who had wanted to quit but felt encouraged by my wife and decided to press on. I'm one of those people and I know the feeling. I know it daily.

I asked her later when the knee really started to hurt. "Mile 6," she said. Oh sure, I thought, it's only 20 more miles after that! She said she was tempted by the Half Marathon fork in the road, but opted out of giving in. Why? Who knows -probably because it was right around when the second dose of Tylenol was kicking in- but we were walking away from the line at the beer tent and a man, probably in his fifties, came up with his whole family. He was a big guy who looked utterly thrashed -like he'd just emerged from a human-sized garbage disposal. He was beaming. "Marci! Marci!" He hobbled over and bear-hugged her and introduced her to his family, who looked on in astonishment. "I couldn't have done it without you!" And then he shook my hand. Why did he shake my hand? You tell me, but I think I know.

Why do I do it? Because when I get out there on the pavement, just me and a few simple tools (the shoes) and with the wind blowing off my sweat, I get a feeling in my head that comes from nowhere else. It's the feeling that all the pain in life can be surmounted and overwhelmed by my living spirit, that I can accomplish anything. That it's that spirit that matters only and forever, and that there is hope for a good clean finish, and glory in the pursuit of it. The tiny, daily melancholies that come at me every day don't have a chance out there on the run. There's a feeling I get when I'm miles deep into it and it is simply this: I can take anything. It's the Infinite Loop that makes people call runners "crazy," but I'll do whatever it takes to feel that way, if even for a moment. Life's unworkable otherwise.

Later, I met some people in the hotel elevator. They were all business-like: stiff ties and makeup, saw my shirt and said, "Oh, the marathon was today? I thought that was weeks from now. How'd you do?"

How'd I do? What kind of question is that? It's a marathon, for literal crying out loud!

"I won!" I exclaimed, and their brows furrowed simultaneously. They eyed my medal suspiciously. They weren't sure whether I was joking.

They must not be runners.


~

Avoid crowds, don't be like us, and have a great weekend!

P.S. Had a dream last night that the Little Digger was just up and running around and I was thinking: Where has the time gone? Where have I been? Additionally, in my real waking life, the Little Ditchman has begun using a vocabulary that includes words like "actually", which is a word one only uses when you've gotten it wrong and it needs to be explained to you in simpler terms. Also, she uses the word "Well..." at the beginning of sentences, as if quietly considering what she's about to say, playing some spry, diplomatic contest in parent-child relations. I guess it should be expected, since she just turned 3. And another word: "But" -as in, "But Dad..." or "But Mom..." Nothing good can come of this.

I was serious when I said that about a sense of humor the other day. If it's not even considered within the construct of a philosophy on life, then your philosophy may as well be applied to lizards, fish and other empty-headed creatures like the humorless, hapless manatee. What makes people laugh and why we laugh is utterly profound, when you think about it. Try not to, though. You'll bore us all.

Got a marathon this weekend! No, a real one! I tapered my training this week by running every other day and busting my ass at work. Do you think that was wise? Running 12 miles in the morning and then spending all afternoon on the stairmaster with 6 pound free weights a few days before a cross-country race is my strategy, you know. (I now find it impossible to run any distance over 12 miles without wearing a full carpenter's tool belt and carrying the 18 volt Dewalt keyless chuck hammer-drill/driver, my tool of choice.) Wish us luck! (Especially Mrs. Ditchman, who is suffering an injury currently, and is anticipating having to bow out on race day -always a more painful blow than the injury itself.)

I was up with the concrete guys this morning! Well, actually (hey, that's where she gets it) I was up with the pre-formed, 12-inch concrete pier guys this morning. (Saved some time and money on this go-round.) Full day ahead. Full weekend ahead. Full speed ahead. Full report on Monday.


~