Not Your Usual Athlete

My guy Mitch

Mitch Hutchcraft - who I met in Croatia - accepts Mission: Impossible, completing the world's longest triathlon, starting with the English Channel, biking 10,000 kilometres across Europe, the Middle East and India to Nepal, trekking/ running to Mount Everest's base camp and, finally, climbing the mountain's peak. In all, it takes nine-months and collects several hundred-thousand Instagram followers, including me, who become invested in Mitch's success.

Mitch nearly bonked on Day-One taking 17 hours to cross The Channel and, admitted by him - it was touch and go.

A Typical Ultra Swimmer 6

My campmates each has a story to tell.

Mitch, on the left below, is ex Royal Marines and is training for a never-been-done 'triathlon' in five continuous stages: 1. swim the Channel; 2. cycle 12,000km from Calais to India crossing 12 countries, including Iran, and two continents; 3. run 900km from the Indian coastal town of Digha to Katmandu; 4. trek 350km to the Himalayas and the Mt Everest base camp; and 5. climb Everest (8,849m). All this in six-months beginning in September. Mitch is a wonderfully affectionate and humble dude and causes none of us solo Channel swimmers any shame.

Alex, middle of the photo, gets short-changed by me when I learn he is from one of those forgettable middle England cities like Grimsby or Hull. Only later I learn that he was on the elite army bomb-disposal squad with tours in Afghanistan and Iraq in the early 2000s, taking down the really nasty explosives that blow up tanks. Afterwards he did the same in London for MI5 including "neutralising" a multiple bomb threat on the London underground during daytime peak hours. 

From there, Alex sought adrenaline as a "saturation diver" when, in six-hour shifts 150-200m below sea-level, he jack-hammered undersea infrastructure or assisted deep water rigging. To avoid the bends (and need for timely decompression), he remained in "the bell" for two-weeks at a time ("nothing to do but read"). 

Alex has founded five ongoing businesses. And is getting married in a couple of months. He is doing the Channel solo.

Rosey works for the UK Foreign Services and is a project manager in Nigeria. She is swimming the length of Loch Lomond (36km) almost entirely in the darkness of night.

Green Boots

Eitan shows us his new boots. He is now a size 'four' in juniors. I recall when his feets smaller than my hand. Our favorite flowers vase has the boy's foot imprints from age one month - Katie did this for us when she first met him. So any ways, Eitananticipates his semi-final Cup game in West Horsley or about an hour's drive off the M25. Late game time kicks off at 1:30PM.

We visit Mitch and Rachel and their friends for dinner and wine last night. Camille a costumier for film and has all sorts of table-engaging histoires. We talk about movie sex scenes where the actors tape flesh coloured under-pants over their bits - g-strings apparently do not work since the backside booty crack visible. Only recently, Camille taped a merkin onto Nicole Kidman's patch. Now that is intimacy. And, should you think such scenes sexy, imagine at least 20 (mostly men) on set and maybe four or five takes. For someone like Kidman, who charges over $1 million a day, the pre-takes performed by her 'double' right down to the covering. No time wasted and nothing left to chance. Apparently she and most actors are friendly and professional when it comes to the tape-job.

Mitch and Mike also have good stories - they met at Selfridges dept. store (London's Macy's) straight from college in the Exports and Accounts Department where they issued VAT reclaims. Now all first jobs generally horrible and this one especially offers humorous opportunity. In one instance, Mike informed his colleagues (often ladies at Selfridges for >30 years) that he was an Intuit with certain religious obligations --on a certain day, Mike wore a skull cap and brought a rug to work and told his colleagues and customers that he had to face the North Pole and rock in prayer on the top of every hour. We crack up. This brings back loving absurdities from my summers painting houses in Providence, Rhode Island, which remain some of my favorite treasures today.

Kids have gotten into pop music and we all bust up over the radio song "gotta get that boom-boom-boom" by the Black Eyed Peas.

Hard Knock

A sunny afternoon yesterday and Eitan must decide what he wants to do: backyard gardening, football at the common, quiet play in his room... he chooses none so I drag him to the drug store. He is clearly pissed off and I tell him: "In life, if you don't decide somebody will take the decision for you."

Mitch and I go to quasi metal band The Deftones at the Brixton Academy in South London. The Deftones are from Sacramento, cA, and influenced by hip hop. Their music is loud and satisfying . I get home around midnight buzzy and tone-deaf. Sonnet takes a pass on this one - which is just as well as she would have bolted for sure.

Trump Loves Putin

The path is dark

Even my neo-con friends are scratching their heads over Trump's jerk-off of Vladimir Putin. No Reagan-Brezhnev kiss to the lips is this.  The CIA presents evidence that Russia hacked the DNC website and may have thrown the US Presidential elections and Trump tweets, "Let's move on." WTF ? 

Where is the anger over Mitch McConnell blocking the Supreme Court nomination ? The outright lying and skullduggery by Trump during the election year backed up whole-heartedly by his party ? The 'Lock her up' and now a cabinet of the most unqualified white people one can imagine ? OK, Ben Carson is black but what does he know about housing ? Enough to let Trump in the door to buy the properties once Carson de-funds the program. The wolf is at the door.

I suppose the anger is there and reflected by the elections. But what happens when the voters realise they have been conned ? The appeasement via the political process may have reached its end I fear.

Pick Pocket

TX Republican John Coryn on the left with Kentucky Republican Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader. Big business in little man's pocket is what I see. Can there be any question that the U.S. Senate Republicans block legislation to let upper-income tax cuts expire on Jan. 1, 2011? The US owes over $10 trillion, a figure that rose six-fold during the Bush administration. With the Republicans I agree that taxes should not go up during a recession but this is not Obama's plan : he aims to make taxes lower than Bush for 95% of Americans and up for the top 5% earning more. Even Warren Buffet agrees. Me, I should be fighting hard for tax cuts since I pay Uncle Sam for services I will never see in England+being an entrepreneur means some above-average risk which, in my humble view, should not go disproportionately to the government who has never provided me a dime during the down times. Yet the US has to get its financial house in order, and this starts with the politics.

In the United States, wealth is concentrated in a relatively few hands. As of 2007, the top 1% of households (the upper class) owned 34.6% of all privately held wealth, and the next 19% (the managerial, professional, and small business stratum) had 50.5%, which means that 20% of the people owned 85%, with 15% of the wealth for the bottom 80% (wage and salary workers). In terms of financial wealth (total net worth minus the value of one's home), the top 1% of households own 42.7%. Edward N. Wolff at New York University (2010).

"I think that people at the high end, people like myself, should be paying a lot more in taxes. We have it better than we've ever had it."

--Warren Buffet

Me: "Do you think we are too hard on you?"

Madeleine: "Sometimes."

Me: "Well, tell me what works best for you?"

Madeleine:

Me: "I mean, do you need to be punished or threatened or is it better with rewards? Like a Rusty treat for instance? Help me make it easier for us."

Madeleine: "Rewards. And if you say 'please' sometimes."

Burns Supper

Lars multi tasks 

We join Mitch and Rachel who host a Scot themed party (Burns day, at our around 25 January, celebrates the Scottish poet) and hagus with whisky duly served to the guests. Today Scotland v. England in Six Nations rugby (England wins).

The groaning trencher there ye fill,
Your hurdies like a distant hill,    (hurdies = buttocks)
Your pin wad help to mend a mill
In time o' need,
While thro' your pores the dews distil
Like amber bead.
--Robert Burns

Kit Kat Cowboy

I am invited to Eitan's classroom to share the American West during the school's arts week. Another father, Mitch, teaches Irish song-dance and we have French, German and other nationalities covered.

My "deep experience" results from summer's in Colorado so I play the Cowboy, complete with orange cowboy hat, silver Sheriff's badge and green bandanna or as I tell Sonnet: "the gayest man in the Wild West." I arrive with Willie Nelson a few photo books (thank you Stan and Silver) which the kids pass around to get a sense of America's outdoors then I launch into story with old-time favorite (in our house anyway) of Kit Kat Cowboy and his adopted orphan sidekick Billings Montana (the kids squeal at this - me forgetting Hannah Montana - I'm such a dork). Of course I am in character and ham up my Western 'twang.

Kit Kat now the Sheriff while Billings Montana his side-kick relief and since he is the class-room's age the children can bond with him. I suppose. Then there is Jesse James and his Outback Gang and really my tale about their train-robberies in the fictional town of Freeport, North Dakota or, ominously, "the Badlands of the West" I announce. Kit Kat plays the Gary Cooper as twenty-four hours tick down to the gold-trains arrival .. and Jesse James's stick-up. Nobody in Freeport willing to support the Sheriff but in the end they come to his rescue and Jesse driven from town .. in the midst we listen to "Mama Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys" and "Georgia On My Mind" to set the ambiance. I take a few questions in the end then ride on outta there into the fading sun. All in a days work, yes sirree.