Eric “Nohand” Crapton takes his solo. | Photo by Herself
One of the interesting aspects of occasionally wandering away from straight writing into “multimedia,” by which I mean short videos, podcasts, and what have you, is seeing how one thing can become another if you use a big enough hammer.
It’s not always a better thing. But it’s inevitably something different. So what we have here is a podcast that grew like a weed, a wart, or a boil from a couple of short blog posts.
When I blew up my ankle last Friday my instinctive reaction was to write a long blog post about the first time I did that, in 1983. I was a depressed 29-year-old fat bastard who had just quit one job in Oregon for another in Colorado, and suddenly, boom, there I was in a walking cast, on crutches, 1,400 miles from my new home.
A fiberglass foot makes it tough to drive stick. Hell, I couldn’t even load the truck. Stairs were involved. Plus I had two dogs who were nearly as ill-mannered as I was.
And then there was the time I broke a collarbone midway through a long-loop mountain-bike race. Lemme tell you, that shit will affect your finishing time. My cyclocross training proved useless. Couldn’t even shoulder the bike and run. Couldn’t drive then, either, and it was a long haul back to Bibleburg from Gunnison.
Happily, in both instances, I got by with a little help from my friends. Until this last time, when I was on my own.
Golly gee, Mister Dog, what happened then? There’s only one way to find out, sonny, and it’s not by reading — you gotta listen to the latest episode of Radio Free Dogpatch!
P L A Y R A D I O F R E E D O G P A T C H
• Technical notes: This episode was recorded with a Shure Beta 87A microphone and a Zoom H5 Handy Recorder, then edited in Apple’s GarageBand on the 13-inch 2014 MacBook Pro. Post-production voodoo by Auphonic. The background music was assembled from various loops in GarageBand by Your Humble Narrator, while the various sound effects were gleaned from G-band and the iMovie effects bin.
Tags: broken ankle, Radio Free Dogpatch
Mad Blog Media 
February 27, 2020 at 12:34 pm |
I suggest you stick with the OEM ankle parts if possible, mi amigo. Would a different pair of running shoes help once the healing is done? I know, always willing to spend your money. Take heart because me and my guitar buddy are going to Rainbow Guitars and shit in Tucson tomorrow. Wish me luck, because they give him lots of swag to bring me up there.
February 27, 2020 at 1:23 pm |
I dunno, Paddy me lad. I’ve given that ankle a lot of abuse over the years. Especially while racing cyclocross, which I did quite a bit for many a year. Unclip that right foot, swing it around, land on it at speed on uncertain surfaces, pick up the bike, and start running. In fact, I seem to recall spraining the ankle once doing just that.
Lots of trail running, too, in a variety of shoes. These Vasque Constant Velocity shoes have been good to me so far, so I guess I’m inclined to think the injury was just something that had been waiting to happen for a good long while.
February 27, 2020 at 12:34 pm |
You’re lookin’ more Richard Thompson than Eric C in that photo.
February 27, 2020 at 1:24 pm |
I do, don’t I? Only without all that irksome talent ’n’ stuff.
February 27, 2020 at 3:03 pm |
My smarter half said Patrick looks like George Carlin.
February 27, 2020 at 4:12 pm |
Again, without all those redeeming qualities, like ability, insight, and wit.
Incidentally, “George Carlin: 40 Years of Comedy,” is finally available online. We watched it the other day and I continue to maintain that it’s some of the best work he ever did. Also, you get to see some serious worshipful sucking-up by a young, black-jacketed Jon Stewart, pre-“Daily Show.”
February 27, 2020 at 12:39 pm |
If you don’t have a dog you are not going to get dog help are you boyo?
I think you need a dog, and a big one to help your sorry ass back to blogging effectively – not to mention the obligatory walks with a plastic bag (big dog – big bag). You’ll feel better.
February 27, 2020 at 1:26 pm |
No dogs. I have given instructions. There are to be no more dogs, ever. Needy little bastards. Worse than Democrats. We can get all the dog fixes we need from the neighbors, same as we do our kiddie fixes.
February 27, 2020 at 3:08 pm |
I heard that. Needy little bastards, heh? Bring that ankle over here, I’ll fix it for ya!
February 27, 2020 at 3:26 pm |
Dogs are not Democrats, other than they are not organized, but that sounds like Democrats don’t it.
Ah, but you have libertarians and Republicans in the house posing as cats.
February 27, 2020 at 4:05 pm |
Cats are more like royals, and the old-school lot, too. Largely ornamental, and if they don’t get what they want it’s off with some of your bits.
February 27, 2020 at 3:33 pm |
Wow nowadays if a drunken guy with a bum ankle tries to wheedle a ride out of the cops he’d probably be either tased or beaten senseless. I used to run but never got anywhere near that fabled “runners high”. But I did get about every runners injury known to mankind so eventually I said nuff o this. Now the only time you’ll see Herb run is when there is only one barstool left at the brewpub.
February 27, 2020 at 4:22 pm |
Well, I’m sure it helped that I was of the Caucasian persuasion. Though I’m not certain there were any people of color living in Oregon in 1983. So they might have had to kick the shit out of me because nobody else was available. And to keep in practice, of course.
But reeking as I did of cigarettes, Paddy’s and Guinness, I expect I reminded the John Laws of their sainted mammies. Indeed, I may have been singing “Mother Machree.”
February 27, 2020 at 4:34 pm |
PO’G: Gotta ask and show my ignorance: What’s with the beret, mi amigo /Mon Ami? You now into French foods? No more posole? Hatch chilies running low? Duke City gone cosmopolitan? Etc.?
Do you now have a PT assigned?
Get well soon!!!!! 🙂
February 27, 2020 at 4:43 pm |
That’s my old Salsa beret, JD. I may have gotten it from Ross the Boss hisself. One of my favorite mechanics, Brian Gravestock, often wears one, too.
I was gonna go with a green Irish flat cap, but the beret involved a shorter hobble.
No PT yet, but soon. I’m less than a week from the injury and still trying to get the foot to loosen up a bit. The swelling is way down and I’m able to get by with one crutch and (very occasionally) none.
February 27, 2020 at 5:18 pm |
Great news! I’m assuming the Salsa cap is Salsa bikes. ???? Luv ’em!!!!
February 27, 2020 at 5:22 pm |
The same, JD. I visited Ross Shafer and the gang at the original shop in Petaluma way back when, on a junket for VeloNews, writing something for a “Made in USA” deal they had going on at the time. This was before he sold the op’ to the Midwestern crowd and starting futzing around with making things other than bicycles.
February 29, 2020 at 12:07 am |
Holy shit!
There should be some form of reinforcing behind that logo so that it stands upright!
Logo or badge over the left eye & the fold of the beret no lower than halfway over your right ear & that crease better be razor sharp mister!
I’m leaving it to the Turk to deal with disciplining his subordinates.
Typical, take your eye off the sandbox & everything goes to shit.
February 29, 2020 at 7:54 am |
Dern civilians playing dressup. It’s not Halloween, f’chrissakes. …
February 27, 2020 at 10:06 pm |
Don’t know how long you’re going to be on the crutches, but those armpit things suck, for any length of time, and hopefully it will be a short time.
The ONLY way to go for crutches are the forearm ones like these:
I spent six months on real crutches with a blown-up Achilles tendon and couldn’t have imagined living with those stupid underarm pieces.
February 28, 2020 at 7:00 am |
Thanks for the tip, David. I’m not a fan of these underarm deals either. For starters, they’re aluminum, not Reynolds 853. And I don’t see a Steelman or Nobilette decal anywhere.
I might ring up the doc today, see how aggro I can get with putting this ankle back on the job. I don’t want to overdo, but I don’t want to be Gimpy the Wonder Pooch any longer than necessary, either.
February 29, 2020 at 9:39 am |
Funny that – we had a guy many years ago manage to drill himself into the ground in Italy and then insisted we find him a pair of the armpit crutches rather than the modern forearm versions. Why exactly I don’t know…we just honored his request.
Meanwhile, our trip to the USA has been put off due to the mania in the USA about Covid-19. Rather than be shunned, stunned or quarantined I’ll just stay here in Sicily for awhile and ride my bike in the sun. :-)The wife’s study-abroad program has been cancelled due to a serious case of CYA at the college so the kids will be shipped back ASAP to where they don’t bother much to test for the virus and the college can wash its hands of the whole affair.
You know what my wife says (and she’s saying it a lot these daze)….
February 29, 2020 at 11:57 am |
The Professor knows best.
February 29, 2020 at 2:06 pm |
Ah, well. If you gotta be stuck someplace, there are worse places, amirite? You don’t want Mike Pence snapping that rubber glove on and saying, “Bend over.”
February 29, 2020 at 2:54 pm |
February 29, 2020 at 3:05 pm |
Ya got that right!! Rather than fly to LA just to be shunned, stunned or quarantined I’ll stay here in Sicily. Once the students are shipped off, we can then plan to come back and take care of all of our biz during one visit – assuming they’ll let us in of course. Q-tip (aka Mike Pence) should have it all cleaned up in a jiffy right? Just like he did with Indiana’s HIV crisis. Gawd help us all – Morons are Governing America.
February 29, 2020 at 5:21 pm |
Larry: Hoping that the “wash its hands of the whole affair” college CYA move you mention has actually been encouraged/mandated (REALLY … WASH YOUR HANDS, FREQUENTLY!) at the college (and elsewhere) for everyone and that the kiddos/faculty/staff follow thru.
Sad to see that such precautions “inconvenience” so many.
Surely there’ll be a pill one can take soon that makes viruses obsolete. DOESN’T WORK THAT WAY! Mother Nature always wins in the long term! She seems to be the best strategic thinker ever, eh?!! Possibly because She doesn’t face 2/4/6-year election cycles? 🙂
March 1, 2020 at 12:37 am |
Yep, I’m sure the folks back in Ioway have their fat buttocks well and truly covered with many layers. They specifically directed La Professoressa NOT to send ’em back to the college, but to their homes wherever those might be…and not from here but from wherever they just went for spring break!!
A huge (and expensive) fuster-cluck to say the least. But what do I know? You know what my wife says…
March 2, 2021 at 10:41 am |
[…] of those plans and had Himself a good old hee, and also a haw. And the next thing you know I had a broken ankle, a dead cat, and a strongly worded suggestion from the State that I (and everyone else) stay put […]