VT 2019 – The French Farce (Audio: link) audio:http://www.RunRunLive.com/PodcastEpisodes/Vermont2019.mp3] Link Vermont.mp3 Farce. A farce is a comedy that aims at entertaining the audience through situations that are highly exaggerated, extravagant, and thus improbable. Farce is also characterized by physical humor, the use of deliberate absurdity or nonsense, and broadly stylized performances. … Covered in dirt, sweat and sawdust.  There I was, laying on the table in the emergency room at my local hospital.  A nice thick maroon swell of blood blobbing out of the gash on my shin.  Waiting for the doctor-lady to come back.  You might think this would make me cranky.  But, on the contrary I was having a pretty good day. It was, ironically, Memorial Day.  A long weekend and I had gotten a lot done, including running the marathon in Vermont.  I was relieved to have that off my agenda, be done training and back to working on other stuff.  Like cutting up the trees I had felled in the yard.  Then the machete glanced off a branch and I whacked myself square on the shin bone with that long, heavy, sharp blade designed for slicing. Right on the shin bone.  Nothing serious just a bit of a rent on the protective covering of skin that keeps the red stuff in.  Editor’s note: “Rent”, to divide, usually violently or abruptly from the middle English Renden and Old English Rendan. I staunched it with a rag from my chainsaw box and hobbled inside for some awkward first aid.  I flushed it out with Bactine and taped a bunch of gauze to it, wrapping the tape around my calf, ending up with something that you might see in an old war film or maybe an even earlier mummy movie.  That held it in place long enough for me move enough trees out of the driveway to get my truck out.  I drove to the emergency room. I wasn’t looking forward to the emergency room.  On a major holiday it was sure to be filled with drunken yahoos, with “hold my beer” accidents.  I brought along a book and was going to start working on this report for you in the hours of waiting that I anticipated.  But, I was positively thrilled with service.  I barely had a chance to sit down in the squeaky, vinyl, institutional seat when I was called.  I was attended to by no less than 4 or 5 charming, enthusiastic and competent medical professionals.  It turned out that the doctor-lady on duty’s favorite thing was stitches.  We had a great chat and I was in and out in 45 minutes!  They were impressed that I could tell them exactly how much I weighed.  They were almost as impressed with me having run a marathon in Vermont the day before as I was impressed with myself for, well…just being me.  It’s a curse.  I drove home and finished chopping up my trees.  … The next night I went to the local Red Cross and tried to give blood.  I see you rolling your eyes.  Chris, what the hell?  You run a race Sunday, your put yourself in the Emergency room Monday, why are you trying to give blood on Tuesday?  In my defence they really want my blood.  They are on me serval phone calls and emails a day about how much they want my blood.  But, I’m usually in the middle of a training cycle and can’t really afford to tapped of my basic circulatory life essence.  Consequently, I try to schedule blood donations for after my target events.  The nerve of them.  After begging me for weeks and putting me through all the preliminaries, they turned me away when I told them of my recent forestry mishap.  Apparently there is have some silly rule about ‘no open wounds’. I mean, you’re after my blood, wouldn’t this be a positive proof point that I’ve got some to spare? … No worries.  On to my next thing.  I like to be tightly scheduled.  I’m happiest when I have a nice pile of tasks in my que.  That’s how my weekends go in the spring and summer.  A yellow sticky pad list of chores in my pocket that I try to get done to have that warm fuzzy feeling of accomplishment from washing the car or folding the laundry or … maybe even r