Stench and double-edged swords

It's been a hectic two weeks of profuse sweating. First, I spent four days in Atlanta for the club volleyball national tournament. Indoor volleyball in swamp-like humidity with a few hundred of your closest friends is a good way to lose some water weight. The tournament was held in the absolutely cavernous convention center, which is located in the absolutely desolate downtown area. Looking for good bars and restaurants that might foster a fun social scene? Don't bother with downtown Atlanta, where the most happenin' place to be was the Omni Center Food Court. Your choices for entertainment in the area consist of the food court (which at least sold cheap beer), Hooters, or getting mugged.

Came home for a few days of rest before embarking on another sweat-a-thon, a two-day rafting trip. The blast-furnace heat was actually kinda welcome, since the water was all fresh snowmelt and therefore suck-the-breath-from-your-lungs cold. After two days on the river I smelled like an intoxicating mix of sweat, campfire, pond scum and stale beer. It was fantastic fun, but I'm excited to be home where it's nice and cool as opposed to sitting around, soaking in my own stench.

I've also been enjoying the benefits of being the only remotely technical person on my team; the downside is that people will often request things that they consider to be trivial but are, in fact, a huge pain in the ass. (Somebody yesterday asked me to add two slides into a video of someone presenting a PowerPoint file, which might be possible for Pixar or ILM, but is a little out of my range.) Fortunately, there's a definite upside: occasionally I'll do something that's laughably easy and everyone will react like I've just cured cancer. I got several lauditory emails from various bosses Monday for something that took literally 15 minutes of my time. Now, if my boss asks me, "What have you been working on lately?" I have an answer she'll like (napping and working through Grand Theft Auto IV strangely doesn't count as productive work).

In other news, I'm making a half-assed attempt to eat better. I'm reasonably active and skinny to begin with (aside from the ghetto booty), but have always been curious how my body would react to a diet that wasn't based around bacon cheeseburgers. We'll see how long I can eat bananas for breakfast and apples for dessert; the two toughest things will be giving up soda and drinking 2% instead of my beloved whole milk (with half and half on top of cereal). Wish me luck.