Vlog the Inhaler, or The Occasional Video Blog Musings of Jim Thornton

We all swim for different reasons.

Yesterday, at the 1650 meet at Carnegie Mellon, I saw my old teammate from Team Pitt, the lovely and brilliant Mee Ra Ram Zook Singh (the last name pronounced like an exotic bird call: Ram Sook Sing!)

Here is a picture that shows Mee Ra's motivation for this meet:



Mee Ra, I should point out, is a descendant of former citizens of the island nation of Trinidad. She came to Pittsburgh to study neurobiology at the University, and then decided to double major in this subject plus German literature, with perhaps a snifter of Slavic languages thrown in for good measure.

She taught me how to say my now deceased father's favorite tennis expression:

Er, der ein Grab für andere graben würde, muss in ihm selbst liegen *

He who would dig a grave for another must lie in it himself

* I have lost Mee Ra's original, and better, translation and will have to ask her again. The above is from Babelfish, but I add it just to give you a sense of how my father hated it when an opponent on the tennis court tried trickery.

Mee Ra knows more about CRF and glutamate in rat brains than any dozen other people I have met in my life put together.

No wonder that I have trademarked a phrase to be used in conjunction with wonderful Meera-like individuals:

Who's your Trinidaddian!!!???

Anyhow, Mee Ra brought her camera to the meet, and I will paste in a few snaps of me, followed by a few snaps of her as a reward for those who must scroll past me to get to her:



Jimby models the 2009 T-shirt. He did not understand the design till someone explained it was the lap counter doohickey thing, double orange signifying the last length to go, staring back at you with not exactly sinister eyes.



On the back of the T-shirt, the meet record holders are honored with their times and age groups. This is the only T-shirt in the history of Thorntondom with the name Jim Thornton on it whereby said T-shirt is actually likely to be worn by people not exclusively named Jim Thornton.



Hope springs eternal. Last year, when Jimby swam the same event at CMU, his time would have made the TOP 10, but alas the meet was not sanctioned by USMS so his accomplishment evaporated into the ether. This year, his slower time is very, very unlikely to make the TOP 10, but it would have squeaked in last year, so he fills out the paperwork necessary to get credited for what is likely to be, at best, a TOP 17 placement.



Lovely rat brain scientist "who's your Trinidaddian?" Slavic vodkaphile, Mee Ra, does an excellent impression of Latika from Slumdog Millionaire.

Who's Your Trinidaddian, indeed????



Mee Ra lookalike and Gunga Jimby wannabe before the Polish Vodka celebration begins.

Final super exciting Vlog promotional note for those who have waded down this far!!!!

To wit, Thornton Twins Productions is thinking of starting a regular MUST SEE TV feature available only here on Vlog the Inhaler Video:

Sunday Night Movie Feature Extraordinaire

It was scheduled to premiere last night, but then we realized that the Oscars were on, and we didn't want to draw too many viewers away from the Industry with whom we have the same intense Love Hate relationship as a dependent infant who is A) starving and B) lactose intolerant has with the teat of a voluptuary.

So, the premier of A Tale of Two Jimby's is being postponed till tomorrow night.

Set your clocks and calendars, please!

Sunday Night Movie Feature Extraordinaire

officially premiers this Tuesday, February 24th, sometime most likely in the evening.