Just on my way back from North Carolina, where TG & I got to spend the weekend with Biggest Guy.

He’s loving training & feeling ready for selection…so I’m crossing fingers and toes that he’s as ready as he feels. He tells me that one of his mates apparently reads this blog – which is a damn funny case of ‘small world’. But boy, as much as I appreciate the audience, if I was there I’ve gotta say that I’d be spending my time running instead!It was a great trip – we started out in Charlotte, where we got to hang out with Mike Hendrix, who comes across as One Of The Good Guys – and is, even if he is far too cool to hang with the likes of late middle-aged me. TG and I got to hang with him and some dear friends of his at his ‘living room away from home’ – “Penguin“. Great burger, great vibe. We enjoyed it enough that the smokers didn’t drive us Californians out – and I think even the children there were smoking…we’ll be back. Mike crushed me though – we share a fondness for writer Larry Brown, and somehow I missed it that he died a few years ago. I’d envisioned him as kicking back on his porch, taking a break from writing and storing up experience for his next books. C**p.

I can’t be in Charlotte without thinking of Tony Early’s great short story of the same name. When I get home I’ll post the opening and closing – two perfect sets of paragraphs.