This was always of interest to me, since I, a decent high school basketball player, had aspirations (delusions) that involved my competing in the Macabi Games. For those of you unfamilar with the Macabi Games, they are essentially a Jewish Olympics, though my friends and I at the Jewish day school I attended thought of them more as a Special Olympics, or, at best, as an athletic affirmative action program. None of which dimmed our hopes that we would someday compete in them.

Years later, when I was giving a reading at American University, I learned that the other Joshua Henkin was alive and well and was, of all things, the stepson of Henry Taylor, the Pulitzer-Prize-winning poet, who taught writing at American. For several years I forgot about JH, and then, thanks to Google Alerts, there he was again, appearing in my inbox every morning: "Joshua Henkin Sandbag Fitness Program." Joshua Henkin is now apparently a fitness trainer in Arizona and he has created and patented something called the Joshua Henkin Sandbag, an object whose specific contours I'm having a little trouble visualizing but that appears to make the owner of said sandbag a stronger and generally more fit person. Whatever the Joshua Henkin Sandbag is, when I turn on my computer I am often greeted with testimonials to the wonders of the Joshua Henkin Sandbag and the wonders more generally of Joshua Henkin himself. Though I did awake one morning to the following headline in my inbox: JOSHUA HENKIN IS FAT. It's pinned above my desk now, and when I find myself sitting too long, at work on my new novel, I get up and go for a run.