I'll go ahead and put it all out there.

My favorite joke of the day:

So two guys walk into the Hospital ER and one has an injury involving his ass...

Monday, Wells and I were riding in the hills outside of town and I hit a medium size white dog square on, going downhill, at full speed, with maybe a little skidding and diversionary steering involved. I somehow managed to eject from the bike and eventually end the crash on my feet...but not without first hitting my crack violently on something sharp on the pavement. Except for removing a cookie sized piece of flesh from my crack, I was without any other sign of crashing.

Zero road rash. Nothing, nada..just a hole in my shorts and my camera ground through the rear center pocket on my jersey. My ungloved hands didn't even have a single mark...though I wore through the tread on my shoes from skidding across the road on my heels for X amount of feet.

Bike, bottles, and anything else that scattered during the yardsale was left in the road while I stumbled around and tried to figure out what hurt so bad and why I wasn't bleeding anywhere else...Todd picked things up and the local neighbors kinda noticed something was going on...after a 10minute cuss and get it together session, I made my way to Ciclo Mundo where Aldy proceeded to dedicate his entire day to my ER visit. I can't say enough amazing and thankful words to the people of Mayaguez and their treatment of me. Before I knew it, nurses, doctors, and assistants were coming out of the woodwork to help usher me through the hospital system and get me sewed shut and taken care of.

If you've ever wondered about ass cheek surgery, I'll diffuse your interest right now. It sucks. Worse than you imagined.

The inch deep and 50cent piece sized disc of flesh was sewn back into its proper place and I enjoyed a semi pain free next day on the boat Tuesday...but from too much sitting the stitches were ripping out of place and things were turning for the worse.

The hectic pace of life that sometimes blinds us from human compassion and friendship has been put in its place by the generosity and kindness that again was shown today (Wed) in helping me find another surgeon to evaluate my injury...the sutures were removed and life's a lot better now...that is until I look in the mirror at the wound and almost lose my lunch. The stitches were tearing and I'm pretty sure my thong modeling career is a bust, but maybe with a little photoshop there's hope?

There won't be any bike riding for awhile, but...Luckily I'm in a pretty cool place with friends who I continue to make me blush with their compassion, dedication, and cruel, cruel, CRUEL humor in my most vulnerable hour.

Back to the photoblog...

At the Puerto Rican Olympic training center, Todd and I stepped up to test ourselves against some of the state of the art equipment. The predownhill dog version of Sager holds the testing center record high speed score.

While on an athletic High, we moved the UCI license target to a better location - hanging from a tree in the back yard.

Which was great for shooting practice, but bad for the bullets that were punching holes in the flower garden behind the target. Nothing like a woman standing up for her flowers.

Kicked out...we moved on in the search for something to shoot at.

Tuesday's trip to the mangrove islands was amazing....

I drove the boat for awhile and didn't run into anything which was pretty amazing, all things considered.

The islands were mysterious in that there's little if any "land" to them...they're made of roots and coral, with inlets between the protected bays and the ocean where water flows from the outer depths to the shallows and is at least 10 degrees cooler on one side than the other. Wells found a rope swing that required Tarzan skills to get onto...luckily no one else ended up in the ER.

The food chain sets up well in these areas, so you can feel like you're swimming in a fish tank...but we just won't acknowledge the part where we're likely the food, too.

Blake and Harriet arrive on Thurs...as do the rest of the gringo racing crew. It should be nice...I'll be doing anything but riding, or sitting.