Okay, this obviously isn't a picture I took. But it is a part of my life as a Truck Driver. In 1992, at 45 years old, I had a Heart Attack. I ended up in the WakeMed Heart Center in Raleigh, NC (about 1200 miles from home). Imagine having to make that phone call to my wife: "Hello Honey, I'm in a hospital in North Carolina because I had a heart attack. But other than that I'm okay. So how is your day going?" Yep, that phone call went about as well as you would expect. But I thank the Lord daily for the wonderful wife he blessed me with. I called her at about noon. By 10pm she was in Raleigh, NC standing beside my hospital bed. The doctors said the heart attack was a fluke. They said their 'best guess' (don't you love when doctors guess) was it was caused by a Rouge Blood Clot. They told me that people that sit for a living (drivers, pilots, secretaries) can develop blood clots in their legs, and these clots can wander around the body and cause problems. Anyway, they pumped me full of blood thinner and the clot broke up and went away. There was no permanent damage to my heart, I had no stents or other angioplasty or bypass done. They checked my blood to make sure it didn't clot too quickly: It didn't. The doctors said the chance of me having the first attack was one in a million, and the chance of me having another is one in two million. (I'm not overweight, I don't drink or smoke, I don't have Diabetes or any other contributing health problems). But because of this I have to see a Cardiologist every year and I have to do a Stress Test every other year just so I can continue being a Professional Truck Driver. Stress Test = Get on a treadmill. Start with it level and at a slow walking pace. Every three minutes increase the speed and the incline dramatically. At nine minutes you start jogging up the streets of San Francisco. I lasted ten and a half minutes. My heart rate rose to 169 beats per minute. DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. ;-) Now I really don't mind doing this, as it is a real good way to keep myself healthy. But my big gripe is this: There are a number of (overweight chain-smoking) Truck Drivers that would have a heart attack and die simply by taking a stress test. Yet they are allowed to drive with no restrictions.

The sculpture 'Inclined' by David Phelps near the Bricktown Canal, Oklahoma City, USA. The sculpture features the upper body of a man pushing a ball up a pair of rails, symbolizing the area's railroads and the post-and-beam construction of its historic warehouses.