Today I finished the last day strong, but not without a last set of unforgettable experiences...

Laying in my tent attempting to cool down that long stage 5, it was still 44 degrees celsius (111 deg. F). That's INSIDE the tent in the SHADE. We tried to stay as close to the ground as possible as it was a little cooler near the floor. We traded long stage stories and waited for the sun to drop.

Later that night, it was much cooler, and we but suddenly the wind starting picking up. Within minutes I was coughing, sand was entering my nose and ears. The wind was now blowing hard. A desert sandstorm. Looking through the tent flaps visibility was almost zero outside. I heard shouting outside as the camp workers were trying to secure the medical tent that was starting to blow away. Someone needed to go outside our tent and close the windows so we didn't get filled up with sand. Jen from our tent (the #1 female runner) volunteered to do it. Thanks Jen. Then, a rain storm. Extreme weather seems fairly common here.

The next morning we all awoke and all our gear inside the tent was covered in sand.

The final day was here. Dianette, our friend and tent-mate (and also a fellow Eco-Challenge 2000 Borneo racer), woke up feeling better but here feet were far too devastated to continue even through the last 14km of the final day. The 80k had really taken its toll on her. My feet were pretty bad. I had several large blisters from the day before that the doctors helped me with. By far this was the worst foot issues I have had in any race. Just putting on my shoes was a fairly dramatic moment.

After the extreme heat of the finish yesterday I was glad that there would probably be cloud cover for us through to finish. This is a big positive, because the instant I feel the desert sun hit me full force in this it seems to cut my will (and movement speed) down a third. Also, the course today would take us through a slot-canyon, basically a trail wide enough for only one person at a time where the desert walls coming up on both sides. Under the full desert sun, the walls basically become like on oven and you fell like you are being cooked from all sides.

Because this such a "short" day, the top 36 lead runners would start one hour after the rest of us. This way we would all finish more or less closer to to one another. So 8:30 I and rest of of us started, and 9:30. the top 36 would start. I was limping along from the start, but feeling good. The race turned away from civilization into the canyons. This was one of the most beautiful days of the course. Great weather, very interesting navigating the canyons and, just fun. About 2 hours later, , the lead runners started catching up to us. It's amazing to see how fast they move over the terrain, they are in extraordinary physical condition. We cheered for "the rabbits" (our tent mates) as they passed.

Although I was in foot pain, and generally exhausted from the weeks events, this day hardly registered on the scaling of being challenging. It was a good end to a very difficulty week. Suddenly, coming over final ridge, I saw the domed shape of a village in the distance and could make out the red Gobi March 2011 banner in the distance. The finish line was at an ancient Buddhist village, still pretty much kept with its original buildings. Very, very cool. I was looking forward for this the whole thing to be over.

I crossed the finish line about 3 1/2 hours after starting the day. I arrived to the cheers of the other competitors, the locals and the volunteers. Gobi March Complete. As crossed the finish line where the medals were being given out, they knew I wasn't an official "finisher" so I wasn't handed one. This was the start of some mixed emotions.

Such an extreme set of experience highlights . We were all "playing the game" of going from the start of this race to the end. The medal was the prize for play all the parts of the game.. Now, I know I gave everything out there. I've already described in my previous blogs my experience of quitting the last half of day 4. I felt a mix of emotions here at the finish line. Joy and relief at completion. Just plain tired wanting to sleep. And sadness at not getting the medal, not finishing the whole game. This feeling was accentuated when seeing other competitors who I shared the race course with walking around with their medals, looking to see where mine is. Many were surprised that I did not have one. The common words were "congratulations" whether or not somebody was wearing a medal or not. I would have like to have received some kind of "participation" medal, to receive something after crossing that finish line. I sat in the "party" fairly quiet and to myself. I ate some food and just reflected on the magnitude of the events in the last week.

Total course length Gobi March 2011 230 km (20k were removed from day 2 due to no visibility).

I completed 190km of the course. 83%

Bottom line... I did the Gobi March. The ups, the downs, and everything in between. I looked at myself straight in the face, saw my weakness, was moved to tears by my profound strength. I saw the face of humanity, on my friends, my fellow competitors, on the little children on passed along the way. I developed a deep respect for the forces of nature, raw, powerful, and beautiful.. And finally, I have a clear appreciation for this thing we call life and what a privilege it is to live it.

All that from a week spend running around the desert? Absolutely.

So that is it from me from the Gobi. This experience has come to an end, and I eagerly look forward to more to come. Thank you for reading and sharing this with me.

Like my father says to me every time we part ways...

Siempre Adelante

-R

Last night we had a talk with the people on our tent.   Gian from Australia has a very hard day on Stage 4 (same one I dramatically described yesterday) . He dropped on Checkpoint (CP) 3. He was sitting in our tent, couldn’t keep any water down, so he was given a (very warm) Pepsi.     He had a long distant stare, he did not want to continue. One of the Spanish racers in our tent asked if I was going to continue.  I said, “I’m looking for a reason”, he said, “the reason is very simple.  You paid to do this race and have the experience, you should do it.”  I nodded my head, but I didn’t want to hear that.  I was looking for any solid reason not to continue.  So I had  a talk with Alex and basically I came to the realization that we had to try.  “That’s who we say we are”  They can take us off the course, but we can’t quit today.

I raced day 5 today.  80km  (50 miles). 

First my hat off to Alex.  The race director was not going to allow anyone that got pulled off the course yesterday to continue.  Alex masterfully used a delicate mixture of logic, guilt, and a few “come on!”s and got us permission to continue.   The medical director came over and said we owed her one…  Thanks Alex, you made it happen.

This was a long, long day.   We started at 8am as usual, and the cut-off was 2:00pm the NEXT day (30 hours later).

I started with Alex, he was feeling strong.  We moved 3 hours to the first checkpoint (CP 1) and kept going, feeling good.

Then the rain started.  It RARELY rains  in the Gobi, but today it came down hard for about an hour.  This was GREAT, nice,  cool and refreshing.  We took that chance to move very quickly to CP2, about 2:15 to go 10k.  Nice.  Drank water, joked a bit at the checkpoint about what is really the point of running through the desert when we have perfectly good automobiles or even camels.

But then the sun came out.  After passing some locals with a herd of camels, we moved on.  The heat kept increasing… within an hour it started to border on uncomfortable.  Alex was not doing well with the temperature.  He started to overheat, pouring water over his head and shoulders for cooling. He went from his normal jubilant self to a quiet upset man :).  But he is strong and he kept moving fast.

Alex and I didn’t talk much all day, both in our separate worlds. I spend a lot of time thinking about quitting the day before and all the mental gymnastics around whether I should have or not, was I really unsafe or just really uncomfortable. 

So this is what I learned about myself and although it’s not the 1^st time I’ve noticed this, it was very clear to me after these recent experiences…  When taking on any  agreement, challenge, or even personal or work task, I am either committed to that result or  I am not. If I am committed, I will find a way to continue, overcome, meet the deadline. Whatever it takes.  When it gets hard for any reason my commitment is tested. Depending on the intensity of that challenge or discomfort, there may be many reason to quit.   Once I quit, there are all sorts of reasons that will come after to justify the decision, but what happened was I quit.  Anyway, enough mental ramblings.

The first cut-off time of the day was 7:30PM at CP3.  On the way Alex were very overheated.  Since we were on a road, there was good vehicle access.  As the medical director drove by we flagged her down. Since there is NO shade on this road, they pulled the car across the road to create shade.  He laid down on the road and  poured 5 or 6 bottles over himself.  This helped revive him for  a while and we trudged on.  At about 5pm we got to CP 3 well ahead of the cut-off.  We took care of foot issues, rested a bit and continued the 11km  to CP 4.   

A good way to describe the terrain is WASTELAND. It was  called “salt flats”.  It is very cracked ground used for gathering salt I guess.   No place to rest except out in the sun.

One thing to note is that China has ONE time zone.  For such a large country this means that “high noon” varies a lot depending on the city.  Here it is about 3:30pm that the sun is highest, and thus hottest.  At one point we did find an abandoned broken down building and took shade for a few minutes. A lady from India saw us in there and joined us.  We kept walking but even as the sun set, the heat stayed and since we were already so overheated It did not  feel much cooler. I was feeling ok on energy, but in bad upper-back pain due to the weight of the pack.  Although now much lighter (about 20lbs) it wears on my shoulders and my muscles had been in spasms for a few hours.   The Indian lady we meet gave me a couple muscle relaxants and with a  couple advil I pressed on.

We made it to CP 4 at 10pm.   50% of the course done, about 25miles.   Sun sets here at about 10pm so not it was very dark.  CP 4 was next to some ancient ruins and I could see the glow sticks leading through them (they use glow sticks to make the course at night so you hopefully don’t get lost).  Alex was completely exhausted.  He started saying “Dude I don’t know” which means he didn’t want to continue. After my experience yesterday I was 100 percent committed to finishing the 50 miles no matter what.  I helped get our water refilled, loaded up our front food packs with snacks and then saw Alex had lost the fight to sleep and heard him snore while taking a second off his feet.  I  have no doubt Alex is a strong  willed person, he can continue (and had continued ) all these days despite a lot of challenges.  I just don’t think he had the will to finish this 50 miles no matter what.  I know I did and now it was my turn to get him to get moving.  I tried every trick I knew to try to get him up.  He couldn’t keep himself awake after 14 hours of moving and just wanted to sleep.  LOTS of competitors had already stopped today, collapsed, or just plain quit during the brutal day.

Finally, I got through to him (part guilt, partly like the scene from Dodgeball where Lance Armstrong comes to the lead character who wants to quit and says “what are you dying of?”).  He got moving, he rallied.  We have until 4am  to get to the cut-off at some other ancient ruins/cemetery where we had the option to sleep a bit IF we got there early enough (not likely).  Off we went into the night, headlamps on through some rough desert terrain. But it was cool.  The temperature had dropped quickly after sunset and it was NICE.  We were moving FAST.   We were now last on the course and the “sweepers” that go at the end picking up the markers and anybody that may have stopped moving were right behind us.  The heat was so bad that today they had changed sweepers at every CP so these guys (from China) were moving fast right behind us.  It was 8 k thru the night to  a water stopped they put in before the final push to the 4pm checkpoint at CP 5.

Moving at night through the desert is interesting because all the life comes out at night.   During the day you see MAYBE some flies, ants, and a couple lizards, but that’s it.  At night there are bats, spiders, beetles, scorpions, all sorts of stuff.  There is one particular spider I had also seen in Borneo that has a reflective eye so when you hit it with your headlamp it glows right back at you.

Then  exhaustion hit again.  Alex was slowing down, almost zombie-walking because he’s half asleep.   After 2 hours on trail I started getting tired as well, energy dropping, back hurting again. Feet starting to blister bad.

We made it to the water stop.  I had to go full speed now the final  9k to CP5.  I had to leave Alex in his tired state, but I urged him to continue, then I ran off.  Literally, I ran the next 8km through the pitch black, no on streets to make it to CP 5 at 3:15am    45min before the cut-off.  I was tired not fully like Alex stumbling left  and right using my trekking poles for support.  The course was marked with light stick, but I was now on a local street and the kids had taken some of them.

I was very proud of myself for making it to CP 5 on time.  I really pushed it and gave it my whole  heart.  I kept saying to  myself “I will make it through this day”.

When I got to the CP 5  ruins, I heard Alex had chosen to keep going down the road behind me, which I am proud of him for doing.  In those moments there are SO many GOOD reasons to stop.  During the walk in he was picked up by a medical van but the doctor who thought there was an emergency. He was done.

At the ruins I was able to drop on the concrete and sleep for about 3 hours to before forcing us to move out.  I took that chance that the sleep would help me meet the 2pm final cut-off the next day.    After 3 lovely hours, I packed up, said hi to Alex, who had been dropped of that ruins. And took off running.  I was the last person on the course and had to move.  It was 6:30am so the air was still cool, I had to go 23km (10 miles) to finished the stage.  I was running through a local village. It is so hot here the families have their beds in FRONT of their houses to stay cool in the night air.  It’s almost like you are seeing everyone’s bedrooms.  Families, babies, everything.  I waved a smiled at people as a I passed and the people are very friendly.  What a cool experience.  I was moved my seeing these families and again just how human this experience is.

As I left the city I hooked up with a mother and her son and same Indian woman that had given me the muscle medicine yesterday. We were entering a HARD desert section that required us to move together for safety.   All I can say, the experience was much like Stage 4 on the dunes, 120+ degrees, burning hot, dizzying, but fortunately this time not alone.  We kept on.  We made it to the last CP before the camp  only 8k from the end. We filled up on water, and took off together to that last section.   This was the hardest part of the race yet for me.  Horrible heat, long hours, little sleep.  I poured water on myself to feel better but the water evaporates in just a few seconds.

Less than 2 hours later,  I made it.  I crossed the line together with the Indian woman, halfway in tears, completely beat.  The cheers of the camp when I arrived got my to really accept the magnitude of what I had just accomplished.  I jumped into the medical tent to cool off and try to recover,  Lot’s of folks came over to congratulate me and the others I arrived with. We were the last ones to finish:  1:15pm  45min before the cut-off.

So now there’s “only”  15k to the end into an ancient Chinese village along the silk road.  I had some bad (and very painful) blistered feet repaired.  Most people are hobbling around the camp in pain.  Some are recovering from exhaustion and the effects of the heat.

My spirits are still high, looking forward to crossing that finish-line. Although I am unranked because  I missed 11 miles of the course due to the missed cut-off on CP4, I’m still very much in this event and giving it  everything I got.

Final report for the field tomorrow.  Off to sleep with the bed in front of my tent.

-R

Today was the first day when I was afraid for my life out here.
 
We started our climbing sand dunes, BIG ones (100+ feet) like you see  in the movies and what you think of when you think "desert".   Thankfully the sun was behind some clouds, but my shoes were full of sand to the point of pain on my feet trying to walk in them, but emptying them out didn't matter because 5 minutes later they would be full again.  This whole experience was exhilarating at first, and completely stunning to see the competitors taking on these massive climbs.
 
But climbing sand dune is very disheartening. You take 2 steps up and slide 1 step back.  You climb over the egde of the dune and see a sea of dunes after that.
 
 I walked with Alex througn the first section  and it took us 4 hours to complete this section. 2 people had dropped out this morning before reaching the first checkpoint.  The sun had come out from behind the clouds 45 minutes ago and the heat was starting to rise. 
 
The heat was terrible.  We got to the 1st checkpoint and collapsed under the tent.  Alex was beat but rallied quickly after I reminded him there was a 6pm cut-off to the checkpoint 3.   We got moving and I was inspired to move fast, I had energy again.  Alex was still completely beat.  He took 5 minutes in the shade to recover, but then turned around and headed back to checkpoint 1.  So I was on my own.  The last one in the race, 3 hours to cover the next 10km to checkpoint 2 across "dunettes" which are a lot like dunes but smaller. Blazing heat, completely alone.
 
This was when the fear set it in.   About 45 minutes in I started to question if I had enough water.  There was NO ONE near me at all.  Although the sweepers  would be coming along eventually,  If I had any issue, it would be 1 to 2 hours before they got to me.  at about an 1:30 into the checkpoint (about 12:30 PM) the heat was above 110 degress, I am low on water,  taking small steps across the hot sand.  I started having thoughts of survival... I could build a shelter with my trekking poles and my emergency blanket?  Should I go to the right 3 miles to the road and find civilization, would that take me longer than just waiting there for help? Why am I doing this? Is this really worth it? I put on my ipod and kept moving.   With that kind of heat and exhaustion you have the urge to sit or lay down which is crazy because the sand was so hot that it was burning my feet as it filtered through the top of my shoes.   I started getting chills.  A bad sign I thought since the heat is ridiculous, and Im shivering, this can't be good.   I pressed on.  Then, almost out of water, I came over a dune and saw a camel.  Odd.  It was a race volunteer with local and a camel, they asked me how I was doing, I said  "bad with the heat", they gave me a bottle of water with electrolytes. I sat down to drink and I burned myself on the hot sad.
 
Then I saw a man from Hong  Kong that had just passed the camel and he was looking bad.  We kept stopping and sitting down. The race volunteer said it was 40 mintutes to the next checkpoint, I told him I would walk with the Hong Kong man to make sure he was ok.  So I caught up to him and we walked.  He was moving slow.  At a pace that I knew I was not going to make the 6pm cutoff for chekpoint 3.   45 minutes later after walking together we got to the checkpoint at 4pm.  Totally exhausted.  No was I was going to make the next 10km in the same conditions in 2 hours or less.   I called it and said I was out. I recovered for an hour and then took a car back to camp.  
 
Then the converstaions in my head started... should I have tried to make it to the next checkpoint?  Did I quit early?  Should I have left the Hong Kong man?  Why didn't I train more? I should have lost more weight.  I'm carrying too much.  Blah Blah Blah.
 
The big question now is, should I continue tomorrow? I can continue as a non-ranked person and finish the course.   But why? Why do it?  Because I'm here? I think Alex is looking to me where we are going back out there or not. I am not sure.  I guess you and I will find out on the next post...

Dear friends and family,
 
First, thank you for the blog comments and kind messages.   Just know they are very appreciated especially as the days progress, and the challenge becomes more and more, well... challenging.  Although, it's fundamentally ridiculous to run 7 marathons thru the Gobi desert (yes, in Spandex Ashley, its a perq) the high and lows we experience are extreme and it's great to know others are thinking of you back home.
 
Secondly, you probably already know this from his blog, but Alex is fine.  We raced again together again and he was feeling very strong.  Although he's no longer officially in the "race" he is well enough to continue the rest of the course.
 
Today I was very sick. Last night before bed, I started feeling nausea which in a normal world, I would stay home, take it easy, eat some chicken noodles.... well today my recipe for recovery was getting up at 6am to run 40km (about 23 miles for you gringos) through the desert.  Like I mentioned, Alex was travelling with me today which helped, this was his turn to babysit me as I inched along at start of today.
 
We started running down a very large riverbed, this required about 10 river crossings which completely soaks your shoes.  This can be VERY bad because you will have to continue with wet socks and feet which can turn your feet into hamburger as you run over rocks, sand, and such.   My secret weapon is a combination of a light liner sock with Seal Skinz water blocker socks which legendary adventure racer Cathy Sassin taught us to do.  The result is that while a lot of people stop to take of their shoes to cross the water, I just run across like it was nothing. 
 
This is all great, but the nausea continued to get worse while racing and I couldn''t really eat anything solid, which again is VERY BAD because this affects your energy, general mood, and makes it highly unlikely you can continue a ace like this is the following days.  We turned left into a road which I didn't realize was actually a mountain pass. For the next four hours I just climbed, pretty slowly, but steadily.  I felt miserable.  Of course Alex is feeling great and he's listening to music and dancing around socializing with all the racers that passed us during this death march.  (in 40 degree Celsius heat).  This of course pissed me off to no end but it helped pass the time while I was trying not to vomit.  After 20km of brutal climbing, we finally hit the top of the mountain pass, which I know was going to be great because there's a downhill on the other side.   So we ran down, passing a lot of people. My nausea seemed to disapear as we ran and I felt really good until the last checkpoint.   Alex made me stop at the checkpoint in the shade for a few minutes to cool off, but the nausea was back. I ate half a protein bar and immediately knew this was a bad idea.... we started on the last 7km section to camp and 50 yards from the checkpoint I (warning, graphic description) threw up all over the Gobi desert.  however I felt much better right away. The problem is that this 7k was HOT and all of a sudden turned into another climb.  So now Im totally hurting and to make matters worse, Alex hit a mental wall as well do we are just a coulpe of complaining brats,  with tired feet, backs, legs and spirits, doing the final horrible march
 
And then we reach a village,  I see the Gobi March banner and am very relieved.  A little boy is drumming to welcome us into the villlage which is always great. Tonight the local villagers have offered us their homes to stay in, so no tents, actuall homes, patios, very culturaly fascinating yet of course no one speaks English so there is a lot of nodding and thumbs up.
 
Still very happy to be here. I am now SUPER exhausted, the though of going out there again for another marathon tomorrow is mildly terrifying.  The thought of doing 50 miles the day after that seems on the edge of ridiculous. But, we continue on. The French woman typing to the lef to of me from France is typing here messages and is crying. moved to tears from the emotional intensity of this event and connecting with her loved ones.
 
I look forward to sharing with you all tomorrow more of this adventure.  Thanks for reading and following,
 
Love,
 
-Ruben

We woke up in a cloud.  We couldn’t see more than a few meters in front of our face.  This made it too dangerous to start the race because we wouldn’t be able to see the little flags that mark the course.  So instead of 8, we started at noon.   Because of the delay, they cut half of the course so it was only 12 miles, instead of 20+ miles.  So I guess you could call it “easy”… except it started raining, so I ran the whole thing in freezing cold rain.  And today I actually ran about half the course.  There was not the ridiculous hill climbing like yesterday.   I ran the cource today in 3:15.  My pack is a bit lighter as I am eating  the weight of the food.

I’m feeling pretty good ,a bit wind burned on my face from the cold rain.  It was a sharp change from the 90+ degrees dessert heat yesterday. I woke up with a very sore back, so starting was a little slow.  My spirits are still high.   The group here is really starting to bond.  With each day, we share new experiences with each other and get to know each other a little better, so egos are dropping, friendships are forming.  This will only continue as we start pushing ourselves to the edge of our physical limits and beyond.

Well, 5 more marathons to go.  Tomorrow is supposed to be quite challenging.  Alex should be back on the trail tomorrow, so we’ll see how we do.  I’m off to sleep and recover, and enjoy the beautiful view.  We are now on a large cliff overlooking a river, again breathtaking.  Things I never would have seen without taking on this race.

-R

1st done.  This day was brutal in so many ways.  It has been the hardest thing physically I have done in a long long time... and this was expected to be an easy day.    Imagine running  (and I use the term running loosely).  22 miles  through a VERY HOT dessert above 5000-6000 feet.  It was tough, took me 11.25 hours.
 
At the same time Alex was having to most severe stomach cramps he has ever had (no one knows why), so moving was slow and very painful for him at the 15 mile checkpoint (after some crazy climbs and desscents) the medical team wanted to pull him from the race for fear that he had apendicitis.  Alex talked them into letting him continue if we waited  and travelled with the 2 "sweepers" who are 2 volunteers that follow all the races to try to provide a saftey net from the back.  We started moving with them but in 1 mile Alex got worse.  At the same time there was only 2.5 hours to get to the end of day1 in order to not be disqualied by missing the cut-off time.
 
At this point, I knew Alex was safe,  and I took off by myself to travell 7 miles through the most extreme (and beautiful) ddesert terrain I have ever seen.   Travelling  alone through such challenges is much more difficult because you are more concerned for your own saftey and there is no one to snap you out of it when you hit the mental walls.  Although I ran out of water during the trek, I made it TEN minutes before the cut-off.
 
I was so happy to see the camp on the last descent that I started running and camp into camp moving really fast!
 
So Alex didnt make it he rode to the end on a horse (cool) and is still very sick.  He may continue unranked tomorrow if he is better, but hes not sure if that will happen.
 
So we are all together now at camp next to some ancient ruins, my feet are well, my spirits are high.  Im worried a bit about tomorrow since Ive never run 2 consecutive day llke this, but Im going to put one  foot in front of the other and continue living the amazing experience...
 
Emma, Diego, and Natalia I love you very much and miss you!

Made it to checkpoint zero.   I'm here at the starting line of the Gobi March 2011. The view is spectacular... desert as far a the eye can see with snow-capped mountains in the background.
 
I am really happy to be here.  We are really on the edge of nowhere,right at a small town hours away from Urumqi that already was far from what yoou would consider the heart of China.   At the starting line there were dozens of locals that just came to hang out and look at us.   I guess the whole thing must seem really strange to them.  The local kids got racing the planet frisbees and were playing all around our camp.   I really wanteed to play with them, but I didn't.  I miss playing with my kids.   Its clear to me how similar we all are as people regardless of our culture.  Parents, grandparents, babies, its all very touching, veery human.
 
On the way to the starting line we stopped for a bit at a local festival.  Lots of local culture, dances, etc.  I could not understand a thing that was being said.
 
Another interesting thing to note is the lack iof billboards on the roads.  Coming from the land of billboards as far as the eye can see, its rather odd.
 
I had fun meeting  my tentmates. I am in tent #15 with  2 Americans, 2 Austrailians, 3 Spaniards, and me.  The Spanish has some great
 
I am not too worried about the race, I am sure it will be both great fun, probably great pain and everything in between.  It is really just an exercise  of being here, and experiening these moments as much as possible.
 
Well that is it.  Tomorrow, we run marathon #1.  More reports from the field as they unfold.
 
-R

Got my gear checked. It's fantastic to see so many like-minded people from around the world getting together for this event. I just mean people from Colombia, England, Spain, and Turkey. My pack weighed in at 25lbs WITHOUT water. So that would be about 30+ have to dump some food before we get on the course.

Really? 42 Days. I'm looking forward to this very much. Is someone reading this post? I wonder. -R