Did Chappy tell you that he made friends with a fish yesterday?

This is my niece’s fish, Rouge, and the first one that Chappy has ever met.

Well, you know he likes making new friends!

Today was a quiet Sunday–gorgeous weather, a nice walk this morning, some housework, and otherwise? Watched the Olympics, did some reading, did some work on the computer … Really, the weather couldn’t have been better.

And, Michael Phelps? Pundits can say all they want about his not being the “greatest” Olympian ever just because swimming allows more possibilities for medals and is less hard on the body than sports like track or gymnastics, but still … Wow. The thing I’m most impressed with? Not just the purely physical accomplishment, but the fact that he kept his head on straight for the entire week. He didn’t let the constant pressure and attention throw him. It seems like we see gold medal favorites in all sorts of sports crumble under pressure, and he managed to hold it together through 17 races. Mentally, I think that’s as tremendous an achievement as the fact that he swam something like 6 miles in races this week, breaking world record after world record. My favorite statistic? One I read the other day, that if he were a country, he would be fourth in gold medal count for these Olympics. I don’t care what country he’s from, that was an incredible accomplishment, and I love that his team-mates seem to genuinely like him. Outside the pool, anyway.

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