happy trails, hawaiian-style...

"if we run, we can make it before dark,"
he said. that's when the dinosaurs attacked.

the pre-race briefing was simple.


"follow the blue ribbons out, and the pink ribbons back. everybody got that? blue ribbons out, pink ribbons back."


yeah, i got it. everybody got it. trouble is, the pink ribbons lied.

***********


a half marathon is plenty challenging. a half marathon trail race is half an order of magnitude more challenging. ("this one will seem like 16 or 18 miles, everyone! have fun!")


a half marathon trail race on the toughest course i've ever seen ~ with another 2.6 miles of steep up-and-down tacked on because someone mis-marked the course ~ is awesome.


i was not prepared to run 15.7. i certainly didn't train for 15.7. in fact, i wasn't really prepared for 13.1, since i got hurt and lost two weeks of training right before the race. instead of piling up the miles, i hobbled up and down the stairs. i saw a chiropractor and an MD and a sports medicine specialist. their diagnoses ranged from a strained soleus to shin splints to a stress fracture.


prescribed therapy, in every case, was rest. three to six weeks. which i obviously didn't have time for. doctors, did you not hear the part where i said i was going to hawaii? to run 13.1? off-road?


i needed, like, robotic laser hyperbaric cryo-micro infusions, stat. 


unfortunately there's no such thing as robotic laser hyperbaric cryo-micro infusions. so i got compression sleeves. for both legs. i got double doses of NSAIDs to combat the inflammation. i got slow, shuffling, two-mile "training runs" that ended with me walking back in. it was pitiful (except when compared to things that are actually worthy of pity, of course).


and yet somehow in two weeks (not three or six) i experienced a recovery i had no reason to expect. the pain gradually became more tolerable, and i was able to put in some longer training runs. with a week to go before hawaii, i ran a 12k race and put up a time that was five minutes faster than the previous year.

it wasn't the 10 or 12 miles i needed do ahead of a half marathon, but it was pain-free and therefore cause for great gladness and gratitude and oh-i-don't-know, godzilla. ("look out, it's godzilla! run away with speedy rapidity!")


i flew into honolulu the thursday before the race, and ran five miles to get acclimated. no pain. the next day i ran three miles to pick up my race packet. no pain!

the next day, the day of prevaricating pink ribbons, there were other kinds of pain ~ but i didn't think about my legs once.

***********

the 2012 gunstock trails half marathon course ranged over a working cattle ranch, complete with uncorralled horses, free-roaming cows and wide-ranging cow pies. the trail was rocky and dusty and steep and narrow and completely unsuitable for running. which is to say, it was fantastic.


the scenery, what little i saw of it, was beautiful. the blue pacific ocean, lush green valleys, galloping horses...i really wish i could've looked at it. if i had, however, i would've tripped and broken my head, immediately and a thousand times over. with rare exceptions, i was constantly looking down, watching where my next step was going, thinking, "quick feet quick feet quick feet" (which was kind of funny, given how rarely in this life one has a real need for such a thought).


on the way out, we all followed the blue ribbons and the painted arrows and the helpful locals telling us to go this way and that way. on the way back i remember thinking i was going to beat my goal time by a good ten minutes.

under two hours? on this course? after being hurt and undertrained? this was going to be a hell of a race, by golly, for an aging, aspirational running person.


everything was going perfectly!

i went off course mile ten-ish, i think. one minute i was feeling good and proud and fortunate and the next i was milling around with a pack of people (including the leaders) wondering where the finish line was.

"we went to the top of that ridge," the leaders said, pointing to a ridge way up thataway. "the trail just kind of fizzles out. so it's gotta be back the way we came." the thing is, there were pink ribbons all along the path we were on. and the woman definitely said, "blue ribbons out, pink ribbons back." at no time did she say, "oh, but not THOSE pink ribbons."


"this is just like an episode of 'lost,'" i said to no one in particular. a couple people laughed. i was grateful.


at that point, our options seemed limited. we could've waited for the rescue chopper, ("get to the choppah!"). we could've been chased by dinosaurs ("we can make it if we run!" "no, we can't...we're being hunted."). we could've floated to civilization on a bamboo raft ("wilson! i'm sorry!"). but no one seemed inclined to do any of those things.

so instead we saddled up, figuratively, and ran back down the long hill we had just climbed.
 we were met halfway by a race official on a trail bike, sent to find us. "sorry about this, everyone. head back to the junction and make a left."


we headed back to the junction, noting its ambiguous, ubiquitous ribbonage ("see? the pink ribbons go both ways!") and made a disgruntled left. with that, we were back on course. out of water, out of gels, out of our minds, but back on course.


the rest was uneventful, except for the raw, bleeding blisters on both my feet. those happened by mile five and did not improve as the race wore on, strangely enough.

people were cheering as we late-arrivers crossed the finish line. i think they were just relieved we weren't dead. someone took my timing chip and handed me a finisher's medal. it was a small dog-tag on a chain, reading "gunstock trails half (or somewhat longer if you follow the decoy pink ribbons. ha!)"


i milled about dazedly after that, eating sliced oranges and bananas, not really hearing the award presentations to people who had stayed on the course. i didn't want to leave, but after awhile there wasn't any reason to stay...except to make sure i wouldn't have a seizure while driving. it would've been a shame to survive the race but perish in a one-car collision with a hallucination.


i made it back to the hotel, showered off the head-to-toe red clay dust and cut away the flayed skin that previously had been part of my toes. i downed liters of water, and flopped into bed.
 later, i had a beer. and lots of pasta. 


the next day, i went on a seven-mile hike through a hawaiian jungle.


it seemed like a walk in the park.


***********


yes, i'd do it over again. i'd bring more water, mind you, and half a dozen more 
gels...but same deal next year? yeah, sign me up.


i know, it's a little nutty. 
but the thing is, after the event it felt like i had done something special.


almost (almost) like i'd run a marathon.


and wouldn't that be something?

off the clock

Hardwood floor-a-creakin'
Bedroom door squeakin'
She's standing in the kitchen
I thought she was still sleepin'
Kiss her on the forehead
Ask her how she slept
She says, "Honey it's so early.
We prob'ly shouldn't speak yet."

~ lyle lovett

***********

the missus is on sabbatical.

mostly because she's too young to retire. and too stubborn to surrender.

she had a rough go, career-wise, the last couple jobs. all the corporate cliches were in play: the more she gave, the more they took. no hours were unreasonable, and no time was off the clock. just for fun, there was the persistent undercurrent of snide disrespect and gender discrimination.

she didn't believe it could happen to her. she thought, not unreasonably, that her intelligence and kamikaze work ethic would insulate her.

plus, she was raised to believe that if you did what you were supposed to do and followed the rules and sacrificed time at home, rewards surely would follow.

she was hugely mistaken. she learned you can be all that, do all that, and still wake up 30 years later beholden to a job you don't really want for its barely adequate salary and the healthcare insurance you can't go without.

the scope and scale of her mistakenness came as a shock to her.

but once that lesson is learned, there's no unlearning it.

you can, of course, continue to participate in the corporate kabuki, with full knowledge of the faustian bargain. if you can stand it. or you can say, "thank you, no. i'm out."

at that point you wail and throw things and beseech the gods of revenge.

or you go on sabbatical.

you seek universal truths and inner calm. you acknowledge the choices you've made and what they cost you. you go to classes. you go to france. you come thisclose to buying a little bakery. you breathe. you get healthy. you go to france again. months go by, and you realize there are many other things you could be happy doing.

that's when things start to look dicey at your spouse's employer. and you realize you might have to get back into the game. just in case. so your family doesn't find itself without the salary and healthcare it can't be without. you grit your teeth, update your résumé, and begin the process...

the missus is resilient. and restless. and relentless. soon she'll be back at it, improving efficiency, cutting costs, and increasing shareholder value. all the adorably business-y things the corporatocracy reveres. in its nonstop grinding masticating way.

that lesson is learned, and will not be unlearned. no matter how much good wine is ladled over it.

but for now...the missus is on sabbatical.

wells fargo's revenge

Butch: What happened to the old bank? It was beautiful.

Guard: People kept robbing it.

Butch: Small price to pay for beauty.

***********

in its 162 years, wells fargo has endured numerous robberies. stagecoaches and trains and banks, oh my.

it must've cost the company, literally, thousands of dollars.

so you can't blame today's wells fargo for wanting to recoup its losses ~ with billions in interest.

multinational corporations are people, after all. they only want what's fair.

and what could be more fair than uncounted billions in taxpayer funded bailouts, bonuses and boondoggles? ninety-nine percent of the 99% are willing to ignore such things, most of the time. until it affects them directly. then folks get irritated enough to complain, a little.

thanks to social media, occasionally those complaints generate a desired response. not often, but sometimes.

in the "not often" column, there's the wells fargo role in the subprime crisis, racially discriminatory lending practices, and ravening foreclosure factories. the company has deepdeepdeep pockets, see, and no qualms about driving its customers to ruin of varying and permanent degree (and by permanent we mean death).

the company has been sued, to be sure ~ repeatedly. but such cases, when brought by individuals, rarely are decided against mega-billion dollar corporations. larger parties, like blue cross-blue shield of minnesota, and the cities of baltimore and memphis, seem to fare better. go figure.

also, wells fargo is not afraid to eat its own, if by "its own" you mean garden variety and therefore completely expendable employees...

Wells Fargo fires Des Moines worker over 1963 Laundromat incident involving fake dime

Richard Eggers, 68, was fired in July from his job as a customer service representative for putting a cardboard cutout of a dime in a washing machine nearly 50 years ago in Carlisle, Iowa, the Des Moines Register reported Monday.

Big banks have been firing low-level employees like Eggers since new federal banking employment guidelines were enacted in May 2011 and new mortgage employment guidelines took hold in February, the newspaper said. The tougher standards are meant to clear out executives and mid-level bank employees guilty of transactional crimes - such as identity theft and money laundering - but are being applied across the board because of possible fines for noncompliance.

Banks have fired thousands of workers nationally, said Natasha Buchanan, an attorney in Santa Ana who has helped some of the workers regain their eligibility to be employed.

"Banks are afraid of the FDIC and the penalties they could face," Buchanan said.

wait, banks are afraid of what? the fdic? penalties? do you think natasha said that with a straight face? or do you think she said it with a snort, rolling her eyes? good one, natasha.

as noted above, the purpose of the "guideline" under which mr. eggers was fired was "to clear out executives and mid-level bank employees guilty of transactional crimes ~ such as identity theft and money laundering."

unbreaking news: employees fired over a 1963 dime: one. wells fargo executives fired for their role in the subprime crisis, reverse redlining, and predatory lending: zero.

"thanks to social media, sometimes those complaints generate a desired response."

yeah, this is not one of those times. mr. eggers filed with the fdic to be reinstated to his job, but it'll be months before his case is resolved. this despite the fact that his story has gone viral, internet-wise. google it. eggers was featured in an abc news story, and was even contacted for an interview by the colbert report. that's almost as good as walter cronkite. better, even, since uncle walter is not currently alive.

"kid, the next time i say, 'let's
go someplace like bolivia,'
let's go someplace like bolivia."

upon a time, people robbed banks (and stagecoaches and trains) because it was sort of easy. pull a gun, blow open the safe, ride off with the money. then the people with the money got wise, and made robberies much more difficult. and dangerous. over time, and for the most part, the robberies ceased.

or, at least, they ceased to be a problem for wells fargo. which has learned the lessons of history and ridden off with the real money.

which, one might easily imagine, is the best revenge.

Butch: I couldn't do that. Could you? How the hell can they do that? Who are those guys? 

cool running

we ran on labor day.

and despite labor day generally happening during "summer," labor day in seattle doesn't necessarily feel like "summer."

let's face it, entire summers in seattle often don't feel like summer. they often feel like late winter, or mid-fall, or any day in northern canada.

anyway, we ran on labor day, the girl, the missus and i. we had to gear up a bit, because pre-race temperatures were in the low 50s. and by "gear up" i mean, "stand around in our running shorts, shivering."

that's not entirely accurate. i did have on a long-sleeve tech shirt. and i ran around the parking lot to stay warm. the missus and the girl did most of the shivering.

technically, the labor day half marathon is in redmond, wa., home of microsoft and a couple other things, i'm sure. let's see, there's...um...redmond ridge winery! and the famous black raven brewing company. (full disclosure: i've never heard of either of these establishments, and if you have, you're thirstier than i.)

the girls were running the 4-mile event, which was notable in that neither of them had ever run four miles consecutively. they were game, nevertheless, and i'm pleased to report that both set a PR for this distance! which, really, they couldn't help but do, even if they had staggered across the finish line the next day.

they had fun! they had respectable times! and about the time they finished, the clouds parted and the sun broke through, as if in celebration of their achievements! glorious.

meanwhile, i was still running, and no longer cold. i was, in fact, overly warm. i remember thinking, "it's hot now," even though it was probably all of 68 degrees.

all the while, the girls were filling their swag bags with a plethora of nutritious gels and bars and drinks and having a big ol' time. laughing, listening to music, enjoying the not-so-hot sunshine. la ti da.

meanwhile, i was still running. i had a goal in mind, and the only way to achieve it was to continue this way until the finish line, at which point i would stop running for a while.

i glanced at my watch at about mile 7 and thought, "you're running too slow. if you're going to make that goal time, you'll have to run faster than this." so, miles 7 through 13.1 i ran faster.

the people i had been following, i began to overtake and pass. this is difficult, i have learned, because late in a half marathon you've already expended a bunch of energy, and the runners ahead of you are often better runners than you. plus, they're usually quite competitive and don't feel like being passed.

i appreciate this fact, and felt a little bad for the people i was passing. i felt like i should apologize for passing them so late, since they undoubtedly trained hard and had run a good race thus far. then i remembered this was a race, and passed them anyway. next time, given the chance, they'll pass me. i won't be upset.

(who am i kidding? yes, i will.)

confession: i've been kicking around the idea of running a marathon. just kind of daydreaming about what kind of time committment and physical torment would be required. and, rounding into the last half mile of the second half marathon in a row i thought with great sincerity, "thank god it's not 26.2." i'm not ready for a marathon. yet.

a couple hundred yards before the finish line, there was one more runner ahead of me i thought i could pass. i caught her on the turn into the parking lot, on her outside shoulder, and was a couple steps ahead of her before she knew i was there. i don't think she liked that very much. she kicked it up a notch and we ran neck and neck for a few strides. then i kicked it up a notch and beat her by several steps. "i'm sorry about that," i totally didn't say, because it was a race, and besides, i was busy looking at my watch and wondering if it was right.

if it was, i had beaten my goal time by more than three minutes, and my previous PR by nearly seven minutes. i chugged a couple bottles of water, found the missus and the girl, and we traded high-fives and smiles. they showed off their swag bags, and we wandered over to the post-race area near the vendor tents.

we stretched, we relaxed, we filled up my swag bag. free stuff! woo hoo! finally, i went over to the official timing/results tent and entered my bib number into the keypad. turns out my official time was faster than my watch-time.

don't get me wrong, i'm not fast. but in 2012 on a late, sort-of summer labor day outside seattle ~ the girls and i had the time of our lives.

oh, boy...



"one day i'll go off 
to high school and
make you second-guess
everything you've ever
said or done!"



"courage is fear holding on a minute longer."  ~ george s. patton

***********

i dropped the boy off at freshman orientation this morning.

he played it all cool and jaded and above the fray ~ but he checked and rechecked the visor mirror, and fiddled with his hair the entire ride over.

maybe he wasn't anxious and a little scared. maybe that was just me, projecting.

once upon a time this wary, weary boy was sunny and gregarious, all smiles, all the time. he changed ~ which is to say he grew up ~ as people often do. but because i so vividly remember the earlier version, i often have a hard time reconciling v.1 with v.now.

i miss that boy.

he still peeks out, every so often, like today. as he closed the car door and walked away, i sat and watched him go. as much as i think he may have been intimidated by the uncertain and the unknown, he still waded right into the thick of it. then he was through an open door, and gone.

just before he got out of the car, i didn't say, "i love you."

but i thought it.

me dislikey

i shouldn't do this.

it falls into the same category as drunk-dialing and angry-emailing and, oh-i-don't-know, searching for mitt romney's soul.

i shouldn't post while sleep deprived. nothing good can come of it.

therefore i will do it anyway, because my judgment is impaired.

***********

have you seen this? it popped up on my facebook page recently (originally posted by someone called "being conservative," which is a terrible name...what were his parents thinking?).

wow. you're dumb.

at that time the image had over 600,000 "likes" associated with it. i have to assume it has even more now, since several days have passed and there have been no reports of "conservatives" abandoning the internet en masse.

certainly they have reason not to "like" the internet. its existence makes it so easy to share stories about interesting people in strange places (or strange people in interesting places), like todd akin from missouri and frank szabo up in new hampshire and judge tom head from the great state of texas.

go ahead, read their stories. those are some wacky conservative guys "being conservative"!

but we stray from the all-important and heretofore unannounced points of order. which are really just casual observations anyone might make, about anything, anywhere. these points, however, are about the photo above and its terribly clever caption.

 

point of order #1: this bit of rhetoric is not the conservative viewpoint. the conservative viewpoint would be, "i pay for a social safety net as a hedge against being thrown out of work or disabled or some other random act of unkindness. the universe is full of unpredictability, so this preparation makes good, conservative sense. but you want me to take a drug test to use the safety net i helped pay for? no. or, put another way: you'll get my urine sample when you pry it from my cold, wet fingers."

 

see? "being conservative" is complicated!

point of order #2: who forced you to take the urine test referenced above? hint: no one. you willingly submitted your pee for the privilege of supporting someone else's lavish lifestyle and early retirement. yay! if you're upset about this insult to your integrity and personal liberty, please redirect your anger at corporate employers that treat you as suspect and potentially criminal as a condition of employment.

no one said "being conservative" was easy!

point of order #3: a massive drug testing program is unconservative in that it doesn't make economic sense. given the number of long-term unemployed in this country, testing them all presupposes a huge new government bureaucracy spending countless billions of dollars to save a pittance paid to people who are down so low that they can't help but fritter away their pitiful weekly "welfare check" on illegal drugs.

have you seen photos of meth addicts? do they look like they're out on a golf course somewhere drinking champagne and laughing in a harvard accent? hint: no, they look like they're ready to donate their bodies to the nearest cadaver lab.

no one said "being conservative" is actually conservative!

spiteful sidebar: if you're going to propose spending new billions on the unemployed, why not slap electronic bracelets on them so we can monitor their every move?  that, of course, presupposes billions more spending on welfare/urinalysis enforcement squads (think halliburton and blackwater/xe/academi. tagline: try to buy drugs now, poverty-stricken scum!).

liberal alert: or we could spend that money on mental health services and job training and actually putting people back to work.

useful factoid: in florida, where they've actually implemented a drug-test-for-welfare program, they discovered that just 2.6% of welfare recipients tested positive for illegal drugs. compared to 8.1% of the general population. go figure.

to sum up, corporations buy our elections and our politicians to rig the future in their favor, while we squabble like hens over barnyard scraps. we're informed we can't afford teachers or firefighters or cops, but authoritarian government and corporate welfare are okie-dokie.

"being conservative." hmm...i don't think that means what you think it means.

embrace change

my daughter has braces.

they're pink and yellow, and apparently they look like something worn by katy perry in some music video.

maybe so. i don't know.

to me they look like a future where time passes at an exponentially accelerating rate, and i'm helpless to do anything but watch as it races past.

this feeling doesn't suit me, so i'll not dwell on it beyond these few words.

just a couple years ago, it seems, this child was born to much fanfare, within the limited scope of our little family. hers was not a routine birth, in that when she was born she wasn't breathing. i remember, in the aftermath, the doctor saying something about a reaction to the pain meds mrs. spaceneedl was given during labor.

but in the moment, all i recall is the girl being snatched away by the nurse, multiple people hovering over her, a bag-valve mask, and someone saying loudly, "breathe, baby, breathe."

the missus and i both began crying at that point.

i remember a needle and an injection and then the girl was crying, too. i remember this like it was yesterday, even though it was almost a dozen years ago.

the time in between has passed in the blink of an eye. in the interim, this child has been fearless and ferocious and full of joie de vivre. hardly a day goes by that i don't quietly shake my head in amazement and avert my eyes  so as not to give away how easily i might be folded and spindled to her every whim.

she goes off to middle school in a couple weeks. i remember how i scoffed at the orientation meeting when the boy started middle school. "this is going to be a tough transition for you parents," they said. "you won't recognize your child, or his behavior, sometimes. but you'll get through it."

yes, it was tough. it still is, even as the boy gears up to start high school. i don't look forward to a similar transition with the girl.

in the meantime, she has braces. eventually the incisor that sticks out at a familiar, endearing little angle will fall into alignment and look like someone's idea of perfection.

me...i liked it the way it was.

shouting at butterfiles



butterflies hate to be yelled at.

after not very much contemplation, it's easy to leap to the conclusion that many things don't make sense.

upon further review, it becomes clear that nothing makes sense.

so, why fight it?

***********

92 isn't really hot.

but in seattle it is record-breaking hot. and people here can't handle it.

"it's so hot!"
"can you believe how hot it is?"
"when did we move to hell?"

it's summer, people. it's supposed to be hot. instead, we've had one day above 90. and one day above 80. this week? back into the low 70s.

the rest of the country, famously, is broiling. or burning. or poaching. half the counties in the u.s. have been declared disaster areas.

interesting, unsurprising factoid: july 2012 was the hottest month ever recorded in the contiguous u.s. please don't think this is due to global warming, because lots of people insist there's no such thing as global warming, and we have to respect their beliefs. rather than try to do something about global warming.

92 isn't really hot. (still, i'm not going running in it.)

***********

in wisconsin, a guy walked into a house of worship and killed 6 people. he didn't use a knife or a pool cue or a garden hose. he used a gun. which made it easy for him to fire a lot of shots, killing and wounding many people in a very short time.

pat robertson blamed athiests.

the nra sent out fundraising letters in colorado three days after 70 people were shot in aurora, co ("the obama administration wants to confiscate your guns."). makes you wonder how soon the nice folks at the nra will try to cash in on the deaths in wisconsin.

please don't talk about gun control now. there's no good time to talk about gun control, but especially after lots of people get shot.

***********

eat at chick-fil-a. or don't eat at chick-fil-a.

i mean, avoiding fast food in general is a good idea if you want to be healthy and live a long time.

come to think of it, opponents of marriage equality should eat a lot of chick-fil-a. every day.

***********

this is a photo of mars, which happened while anti-sciencey people were denying climate change...

i bet this isn't even mars. it looks like utah.

***********

since may of this year i've participated in at least one running event a month. actual, official events, i mean, with sponsors and t-shirts and lots of other runners. turns out this sort of thing is kind of fun. so i've signed up for four more races between now and october 13.

• a 10-mile trail run through a rainforest (no rain no rain no rain no rain)
• a labor day half-marathon that starts and finishes at the redhook brewery
• "run the bluff," a 12k event held right in our neighborhood
• the gunstock trails half-marathon on oahu...pineapples yes, guns no

this will put me at 8 events in 2012. why? i have no idea. and really, if nothing makes sense, why look for explanations? it is kind of fun, though.

***********

uncertainty is an unhappy, uncomfortable feeling. but given a world where every second is an exercise in improbability, it's the only logically defensible state of mind. people filled with self-righteous certainty are silly, illogical people.

this morning on the freeway i passed a youngish man who was stumbling along against traffic in the breakdown lane. maybe his car was disabled, but it was nowhere in sight. and he was heading the wrong way to get to a gas station. cars were passing him fast and close.

one doesn't expect to see a pedestrian going the wrong way on a freeway at 7:30 in the morning. so i called 911. i have no idea if help reached him before something bad happened.

***********

late update: turns out the wisconsin shooter attended the same high school in colorado that i went to. i find this news disturbing.

nothing makes sense. and that's no fun at all.

************

here's a picture of cute animals...

dogs and fawns don't usually play together.



one small step



"he who falls behind will be left behind."

done.

the running event i watched in 2010 thinking, "i can do that."

i can. i did.

redirect: in august, 2009 i had an acl reconstruction on my right knee. in july of 2010 i was still rehabbing, still struggling to get back to where i was pre-injury. it was pitiful and sad, unless you compare it to things that are actually pitiful and sad. in which case it was just silly and self-indulgent.

as we sat on the curb waiting for seattle's seafair torchlight parade to begin, a parade of runners went by, part of the annual 5k/8k event. and as unfit as i felt physically, mentally i wanted to compete.

not eventually. immediately. right that second. i mean, there were old people and overweight people and children running, right there in front of me. "if they can do that, i can do that," i thought, sullenly. "why am i not doing that?"

the moment passed. and a year went by. in that time, i returned to playing basketball, got into basketball shape, then realized i didn't really like playing basketball any more. about then, i stopped playing basketball and started running.

fast forward a year and hundreds of miles and half-a-dozen races. oh, look, it's time for the 2012 seafair torchlight 5k/8k. "let's do this thing," i didn't really say to myself. but i did sign up for the 8k, because it was there.

a half mile into it, my stomach started hurting something awful. it kept hurting the next three miles, and i was pretty sure my time was going to be just as awful. i started feeling better the last mile and a half, stomach-wise, but by that time i was spent. i crossed the finish line, stopped my watch, and didn't bother to look at it. after walking and drinking nuun and eating some blueberries i finally looked and saw "36:30." at that moment i experienced a small but finite interval of yay.

my target time was 40 minutes~~and if everything went perfectly, i thought i might manage 35 minutes. things didn't go perfectly, or anywhere close to it, so 36:30 felt like a gift.

doesn't matter. what does matter is that i ran with the people i once watched. and i was faster than several of them. not that i'm competitive or anything.
**********

NO                1929
NAME            Michael Miller
AGE              51
SEX               M
DIVISION        M 50-54
OVERALL      187/3744
DIVPL            13/96
SEXP             155/1872
CHIP              36:30
PACE             7:21

posers, guns and money



"we drive while texting and smoking and
drinking and applying eye liner. we're
the people who should be packing heat?"

the national rifle association says it's a civil rights organization.

it says it defends america's second amendment right to keep and bear arms.

the national rifle association is full of big, fat liars.

what they really defend is the unfettered ability of weapons manufacturers to make piles of money flooding america with arms and ammunition. the nra will not rest until it has put a gun in the cold, dead hand of every american killed in a frenzy of constitutionally protected gunfire.

it's what the founders would've wanted, after all.

funny thing about that second amendment. it doesn't say every american has a right to an arsenal. no, what it says is this:

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

back in the day, see, when the framers were farmers and farmers were fighters, there existed the real possibility that the british or the native americans or, oh-i-don't-know, the jamaican bobsled team, might try to squash the nascent nation and its annoying declarations about "freedom" and "self-governance" and "no taxation without representation." there was big money at stake, and no lot of ignorant colonists were going to disrupt the flow of cash back to the royal treasury!

so, given the times and the context and the disorganized state of the states, it made perfect sense that the populace should be armed and ready to fire wildly, make a lot of noise, and generally run around in confusion. kind of like today's hunters.

in order to form a more perfect union, then, it was agreed that your garden variety colonist would be encouraged, indeed expected, to keep a musket and balls and powder. in the event of an actual emergency, they would be instructed where to assemble, which direction to face, and at which red coat to shoot.

two hundred and fifty years later, times have changed. yes, really! america is the proud owner of the most powerful military in the history of history. we have enough guns and explosives to render the world uninhabitable many times over. we spend more on high-tech weapons of mass destruction than the next 20 nations combined (and most of those countries are u.s. allies). because this is true, there is zero case to be made~~none~~for a civilian militia as described in the constitution. and if there were, it would be called...wait for it...the national guard!

which brings us back to the second amendment...

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

a well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, etcetera, etcetera. a well regulated militia. even if you could make the case, with a straight face, that every american is responsible enough to be trusted with an ak-47 with armor-piercing ordnance in a high-volume magazine (you can't make that case, but let's just say you could), you would also be required to argue, second amendment-wise, that these armed disparates constitute a well regulated militia.

you can't make that case, either. i mean, let's face it, most of us can't figure out a television with two remotes. we can't, generally, safely handle uncooked poultry. and we can't, collectively, keep from shooting ourselves and each other with guns (over 30,000 u.s. gun deaths per year, in case you wonder).

anyone who tells you different is selling something. in this case, it's the nra, and they're selling america death while hiding behind the flag. wiping away crocodile tears with one hand after every fresh massacre, madly punching keys at the atm with the other.

our elected officials, meanwhile, piously send prayers to the victims and their loved ones, while simultaneously promising the gun lobby nothing will be done to curtail the flood of arms or the river of blood.

there's big money at stake, after all, and no lot of ignorant constituents will disrupt the flow of cash back to the corporate treasury.

**************

did that sound bitter? it felt bitter coming out of my fingertips. i'm tired of the killings, which are entirely predictable and increasingly too close to home. i grew up about ten minutes away from where the shootings took place in aurora, co. which means not far from the site of the shootings at columbine. we live not far from the cafe racer, where five people recently were killed, and right up the hill from where two teens were shot last week.

i'm tired of the louis gohmerts and russell pierces and "american family associations" of the world telling people that the wanton killings in the land can be blamed on too few guns and too little jesus. too few guns and too little jesus. right. because jesus clearly would be preaching the gospel of the .357 magnum. note to louis and russell and family folks: fuck you. no, seriously. your faux christianity and mewling obeisance to the gun lords makes you no better than the psychos pulling the triggers.

**************

there's no end to this post. no neat, tidy wrap-up. because the latest tragedy will result in no meaningful action whatsoever. because our legislators are inert, we will all go back to our collective televisions and wait for the next inevitable atrocity. after which we will have this conversation all over again. and so on and so on.

we americans are well regulated, that much is certain. but not in the way we imagine. not at all.

upside down, right side up, and somewhere in between

i had a good weekend.

no, i had a bad weekend.

no, come to think of it, i had a great weekend.

backstory. the weekend was full of mostly not-blog-worthy activities. i ran. we walked the dogs. we loaded up at the farmer's market. but, you know, we always do those things.

we watched the mariners shut out the rangers. seven-zip. that hardly ever happens. we attended a ridiculously good concert, lyle lovett at chateau ste. michelle. that was noteworthy.

oh, and for awhile i thought a friend was dying.

then i found out he's not.

the dying part was devastating. i mean, obviously. i cried like a child. i mentally composed a blog post that made me cry more. i was crushed.

later that evening it turned out that i had completely jumped to conclusions on the basis of very incomplete information. and viola! he's not dying. yay!

that's where things get odd. there was no "yay!" moment. once the good news was conveyed, i quickly folded it into my world view, and went busily on. without missing a beat. the turnabout was almost comical.

only after many hours did it hit me what had happened.

the ordeal was a product of my imagination, but still, as far as i knew it was completely real. my reaction reflected just how important this person is to me. what's unreal is how quickly i recovered when the bad news turned into good news. he's not dying? okay, cool, hey what's for dinner?

in less than 24 hours, i experienced a stunning, even miraculous turnaround. in a few blinks of an eye, untimely death turned back into life. whiplash-like i went from full-on grieving to...business as usual.

where was my equal-but-opposite emotional reaction? nowhere to be found.

somewhere between death and life i was cheated out of a jolt of joy. or a rush of relief. even a bolus of endorphins would have been acceptable. but i got {crickets}.

i suppose i know why. once i got the homerun, i took my eye off the ball. i didn't take time to acknowledge and celebrate something actually worth celebrating. the most important event of the last hundred weekends was brushed past in favor of what? trifles.

this is, however, a teachable moment~~and i am willing student. the lesson for me is this: there will be plenty of times life will turn us upside down and shake us. if we're going to give the times of grief their due, we better give equal time to the yay moments as well.

while we have the chance.

"You know, we just don't recognize the most significant moments of our lives while they're happening. Back then I thought, well, there'll be other days. I didn't realize that that was the only day." ~~archie graham, field of dreams

this one goes to 13.1

the 2012 seattle rock n roll half marathon is in the books.

so is the 2012 seattle rock n roll full marathon, but i didn't run that race, so we'll speak of it no further.

at least three very good things happened during the race i did run:
1. i finished
2. i finished in less than 2 hours
3. it didn't rain

you might think, "those are some very good things, all right, but were there any that weren't about you?" yes! there were other good things, things that had nothing whatsoever to do with me...

for example, i ran with three people, a friend and two of her friends. they all finished, and one of them established a new PR for the half. it didn't rain on any of them, either.

also, none of us fell down or had a myocardial infarction or ran off the course in a state of delirium. (ed. note: that set was kind of about me, but only tangentially.)

i don't know if bad things happened to any of the other 22,000 runners. that's a lot of runners, though, so just by sheer volume you'd have to think that somebody might've thrown up or fallen into a storm drain or been chased by a rabid bat. something.

the people from the rock n roll race series did a good job here in seattle (this is in contrast with the job they reportedly did on their las vegas event, which like many a trip to las vegas, did not end well. this post is not about las vegas. why do i keep typing "las vegas"?)

the people from the rock n roll race series did a good job here in seattle. there were bands playing on every mile of the course, there were lots of nice volunteers handing out water and gatorade, it didn't rain, and i saw not even one rabid bat. which is just as well, because people and rabid animals don't mix well under many circumstances, and a distance race is one where they don't. i can't think of any where they do, at the moment.

i'm stalling here, can you tell?

it's because i didn't do as well as i wanted to and expecting to, and i don't really want to get to that part of this post. but i'm pretty sure i can't expect you to keep reading about bad things that didn't happen and the fortuitous lack of rain in seattle.

i didn't make my goal time.

there, that wasn't so bad. but there's more.

not only didn't i make my goal time, i didn't beat my time at the half marathon i ran six weeks ago. in fact, i ran seattle a full 60 seconds slower.

these facts have left me feeling a little disappointed. a little cranky, even.

how stupid am i?

the fact is, out of 22,000 runners, i finished 1,164th. i'm no mathematician, but i think that's pretty good. if ever math and statistics could make me happy, this should be one of those times!

there's more...

pace over the first 5k: 8:36
5k-10k: 8:26
10k-10m: 8:14
10m-13.1m: 8:04
look at that! the second half of the race was significantly faster than the first half. this is a good indication that i did something right training-wise and conditioning-wise.

so, i really shouldn't be all disappointed and demoralized…

still, a full minute slower!

***********
okay, it's now three days later, and i'm not as disappointed. i've reconciled the fact that my finish was the result of what experienced runners call "bad race management." if i had started at a better pace, there would be only joy and satisfaction, instead of lingering regret.
 
i ran. i finished. i will run again.
 
these are good things.
 
the end.

***********

(still...sixty seconds!)

cher and cher alike

you know who's had an improbable, implausible life?

cher.

(don't pretend you saw this post coming.)

imagine pitching a screenplay of her life...you'd get laughed out of every gin joint in every town around the world.

"so, here's what i'm thinking...it's a rags-to-riches story about a girl who comes out of nowhere to date warren beatty, marry sonny bono, and record hit songs across six decades. she stars in a hugely successful variety show on tv, wins emmys and grammys and oscars...incredible, right? but there's some bad stuff, too. she gets divorced from sonny, marries and divorces gregg allman, then speed-dates a bunch of other people, from gene simmons to tom cruise. later, sonny dies in a tragic skiing accident, after being elected to congress as a republican. there's probably no relationship between those two things, though...i'm still working on that part."

"there's also a part where her child transgenders from an adorable little girl into an overweight guy (not that there's anything wrong with that)."

"eventually she becomes an american icon, instantly recognizeable by her first name, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, minus a few hundred grand for tattoos and cosmetic surgery...all this from a girl with a big heart, a big voice, and a big nose from nowheresville. well mr. demille...what do you think?"

"it's completely implausible, kid. no one would ever believe such a cockamamie bunch of baloney. get out of here!"

****************

anyway, the girl and i were watching "burlesque" this week, and it occurred to me that of all the fictional female characters in all the movies ever made, most don't compare to cher's real life. that, and at 65 she can still belt out a song.

****************

"If I'd had as much plastic surgery as they say, you know, like I've got ass implants and calf implants and cheek implants. I've had the same cheeks my entire life. No butt lifts. No ribs removed. Having said that, if I want to put my tits on my back, it's nobody's business but my own."

~~cherilyn sarkisian

a boy named sue

come and play with us danny.
forever and ever and ever.

apparently you can sue someone for scaring you.

it says here that 10 passengers are suing jetblue airlines because a jetblue pilot went, uh, slightly off-course during a flight.

which is to say he wandered through the cabin babbling incoherently about things other than flying over the grand canyon, cruising altitude, and keeping seatbelts fastened.

this frightened the passengers (and probably the rest of the crew), and understandably so. because, while it's disconcerting to see a homeless person on the street babbling incoherently, it's also kind of expected. when the captain of your flight does it, it's disturbing. in a scary way.

but do we really have a legal right not to be scared?

if we do, i'm hiring a lawyer, stat.

guy on the freeway drifting into my lane at 70 mph while talking on your cell phone? you're totally sued.

pajama-wearing teenager spending all day on the computer, drinking soda and eating popcorn? sorry son, you're sued.

pit bulls. guns. chain saws. you can't handle the truth.

severed achilles tendons. torn knee ligaments. idiopathic thoracic pressure? lawyer up.

the word 'avulsion.'

screenwriter, director and cast of "the shining"? sued. (especially those twins with the huge foreheads. sheesh.)

overpaying for mediocre wine.

aneurysms, stroke, cancer. fuck you, and please enjoy this nice legal document.

you know, come to think of it, one needn't actually be frightened to sue for emotional distress. on that basis, i could sue the seattle mariners for being so awful for so long.

months of cold, dark, wet pacific northwest weather? we'll see you in court.

onions? i've hated you for a long time. decades. you bastards owe me.

if this jetblue thing turns out to be legit, the possibilities are endless.

but i'm afraid it won't.

i should sue.

desaturation point

the dirty water washes down

poisoning the common ground

taking sins of farm and town

and bearing them away

the captains of industry

and their tools on the hill
they're killing everything divine
what will I tell this child of mine?

~don henley

***********************

it's done.

i just cleared out my twitter account.

i couldn't take any more politics and propaganda and dogma-porn. so i unfollowed 25 sources of news and opinion tweets.

i know: woo hoo.

but every so often you have to climb up out of the cesspool and shower off. with disinfectant soap.

soon i'll be as unqualified to comment on political issues as 99% of americans. i will be a low-information voter.

next: unsubscribing from the email lists.

that will take longer.
***********************

disclaimer: historically this won't last. eventually, inevitably i start jonesing for another hit of ginned-up hysteria and faux drama. and i jump back in.

bring me the head of bambi garcia

it was a cake, but it was more.
with the addition of the hunter, and his prey,
it was a reflection of all that was good in birthdays,
and cakes, and killing badly outgunned prey.

"Fish," he said, "you are a friend of the old man and he kills you. It is love, this killing. I cannot knot. If you cannot knot, you cannot truly kill your love."

The young man thought that if only the old man were here, but he is not. He remembered the last words of the old man: "Cuidado los quitos!"

~hemingway's nephew

******************

he liked things to make sense.

but in those days, fewer things seemed to make sense, and more seemed to resemble a hemingway parody contest.

this was troublesome at a time when good sense was increasingly insensate, or insensitive, or in absentia, and the examples were marching, legion.

for one, there was the ongoing and inexplicable and chaotic combination of guns and children. could there have been any doubt that children + guns was among the worst ideas since, say, lindsay lohan + tequila?

there could not. but that was just one opinion, of course. other people, with differing opinions, believed kids + guns = a party.

"They have birthday parties with go-karts and trampolines -- with proper education before going into a gun range, why not a birthday party?" said Texas gun range owner David Prince.

early indoctrination teaches children to treat guns with respect, they said. it teaches them to be careful with firearms. they (and by 'they' he meant "idiotas de muerta") probably would not use the word 'indoctrination,' because it sounded subversive and socialistic. at a time when those words had lost all meaning.

regardless, a review revealed 30,000 gun deaths in his country each year~~over 17,000 by suicide. about 1,000 accidental fatalities. leaving 12,000 intentionally inflicted gun deaths in the land of the free and the home of the grievously wounded. every year. or, a thousand per month, he thought through a booze-soaked forest of half-thought calculations.

oh, yes, they were very careful with their guns.

but why speak of unpleasantries when once there was talk of parties?

Some parents are already expressing concern over the new party spot. "It makes me very nervous," Dawn McMullan told ABC News' Dallas affiliate WFAA. "I think eight-year-olds, developmentally, can't tell the difference between play and reality sometimes."

let's be straightforward here, he said, where we are among friends and can speak straightforwardly and forthrightly~~there are many, many adults who cannot tell the difference between play and reality. some of them carry guns, and some of them teach children that guns are good and american and manifest destiny.

we can say this here, to one another, he said, because we are bold, and not afraid to speak of such things.

no matter how maddening and tragic they may be.

no matter how little sense they make.

********************

He noticed them first by the sound. You always notice them first by the sound. When you hear the sound, the sound that they make, your insides go all moist and soft.

"Hijos of mothers!" he swore.

They came in a feeding frenzy, lusting for blood, biting, sticking, sucking, defecating. He fought them with the only weapons he had. Arms flailed in wild slashing cuts, hands slapped and splattered red tissue, feet stamped great gouges in the good black swamp mud.

They were too much for him. He was a mass of welts and corrupted flesh. He felt defeated. They had taken his blood but he was not destroyed.

paycation

remember: they don't want to hear about it.

in extremely small doses, maybe, using very short words. beyond that, most people have no interest in your new obsession with {*whatever*}.

mine happens to be running, and every time i talk about it, i try to be hyper-attuned to the listener's tolerance level. typically it doesn't take long for their eyes to glaze over and for the lacquer to start cracking on their polite expression.

and i admit, i've become inordinately fascinated lately with shoes and tech gear and long training runs. i am aware that unless i'm talking to another runner, i may as well be talking about these things in silverback gorilla. the sounds are kind of interesting, in an unintelligible way, but pretty soon people get bored and wander to the next exhibit. muttering, "wow, he seemed almost human, didn't he?"

****************

with that in mind...let's type some more about running!

i'm looking to participate in an organized running event somewhere other than seattle. not just a getaway, a runaway. literally. and there's no shortage of options. running events have apparently become big business. they're everywhere, year-round. you're familiar with eco-tourism? this is, oh-i-don't-know, amble-tourism. from urban roads to backcountry trails, anywhere people can move in the same direction, sort of quickly, and with purpose only they understand.

i want to try it out. the only questions are, what can i afford and how much time will it take?

i mean, i'd like to go immediately to hawaii and run the first tropical trail event i can find. i looked into it...there's an array of such things, on every island, practically every weekend. entry fees are completely reasonable. woo hoo!

it all looks great, until you check into airfare. have you checked into airfare to hawaii lately? it's uncheap. hotels, ditto. if you can imagine such a thing.

no problem. it's a big world, and there are plenty of interesting options out there. for example, there's the rotary unity run, a 10-mile fundraiser for the soldotna, AK rotary club. you fly into anchorage, then rent a car (or hop a bush plane) 147 miles to the kenai peninsula. the trip alone would be reward enough, but then you get to run through some of the most scenic countryside anywhere.

yes, i'm actually thinking the running is part of the reward.

have you looked into airfare to anchorage lately? it's expensive! to fly to alaska! who in their right mind wants to fly to alaska?

in july there's a half-marathon in juneau, on douglas island, in the backyard of glacier bay national park. with views of mendenhall glacier and the gastineau channel. it costs $20 to enter. but with airfare and, say, four nights accommodations, suddenly it's around a million dollars. or thereabouts.

there's a 10-k trail run in whistler, bc, in august. i love whistler. and there's no airfare required! and the summer room rates at whistler/blackcomb are cheap! let's check out the course. hmm, looks pretty cool to me...and it features just 645 meters of elevation gain over the route. that's not much, right? i mean, how tough could that be over a mere 6.6 miles? wait...645 meters is over 2100 feet. so the route is basically vertical?

**********************

not to worry, i'll find something. but the fact that i'm even considering traveling and spending money to run is fantastical. even a few months ago the idea would've been preposterous. but, here we are. i'm actually enthusiastic about the idea of going to alaska. to run.

but...i know you prolly don't want to hear about it. and i appreciate the polite look you've been wearing on my behalf. you may want to touch up the lacquer around the eyes, though...

i know...wanna talk about politics?

i never meta analysis i didn't like

"Stay on pace & don't try to keep up with the youngsters." ~ derek s.

that's good advice, generally.

it's particularly good when you're running your first half marathon.

it's advice i had no trouble taking this past weekend, mostly because i felt like i had no choice. i mean, i had never run a half marathon before, distance-wise, let alone race-wise. the farthest i'd gone previously was a 10.5-mile training run the weekend before...so, i didn't know what to expect, how 13.1 miles would feel, or if i'd even be able to finish.

i thought i could...but (this will shock you, i know): there's often a significant difference between thinking about something and actually doing it.

the good news: the weather was perfect. not a cloud in the sky, start-time temperature about 55 degrees. this is seattle, after all...the chance of cold, dreary and wet any given day is about 90%.

also, mrs. spaceneedl got out of bed at 5:45 a.m. to drive to kirkland with me. on mother's day! crazy. and incredibly endearing.

the bad news? there was no bad news.

lining up in the starting corral (why do they call it a corral? are we animals? moo.), i relegated myself to the section marked, "8-12 minutes/mile expected time." there were a lot of very fit-looking people congregating around me, so however fast or slow i ended up running, i felt like i was in pretty good company. but my goal was to stay closer to the 8 than the 12, and...hey, we're moving!

mile 1: the start was slow. and crowded. there were runners ahead of me as far as i could see...which wasn't far, because there was a hill and a right turn not too far ahead. passing people was not really an option, because the was nowhere to pass to. the upside: not many people were passing me. ha!

mile 2: more hills, heading up. i thought this was going to be kind of a flat course. this is not flat. at all. where's the flatness? or some downness to go along with all the upness? the good news: the pack was thinning, stringing out, as people slowed on the hills. conveniently, i did a lot of hill training over the past few months. the bad news: still no bad news.

mile 3: i don't remember much about mile 3, other than it seemed a lot like miles 1 and 2. with slightly less upness, maybe, and a little more downness.

mile 4: took a first look at my watch. whoa. about five minutes behind my target pace. not entirely good news. but in the big scheme of things, not really bad, either. the better news: the pack stretching out significantly. plus, some flatness.

mile 5: took another look at my watch. still behind, but making up time. an even distribution of upness and downness. interesting self-diagnostic: i'm actually better on the uphills than the downhills. i pass a lot more people on the up. and the down...hurts. wtf?

mile 6: i have no memory of mile 6. or mile 7, for that matter. i know i ran them, because i never left the course. aside from that? i got nothin'.

mile 8: i remember the mile 8 marker. i remember thinking, "eight miles already? huh. that went by quick." and then, "holy sh*t, there's still five miles to go..."

mile 9: i remember very little about mile 9.

mile 10: it was here i began to worry, a little. as mentioned earlier, my longest run previously was 10.5 miles. we would soon be entering tiger country. (note: no actual tigers in kirkland, as far as i know. then again, maybe they're eating the people who would report on such things. it's possible.)

mile 11: i remember mile 11. the highlight was a steep hill complete with a doubling-back hairpin turn. this was followed by a long, gradual ascent on a stretch of severely crowned road. which meant one foot was constantly, uncomfortably landing lower than the other. or higher than the other, as the case may be. either way, it sucked. additionally, the cones were set up to herd people into a narrow band on the side of the road, where the slope was even more pronounced. most people ignored the cones, getting as close to the middle flatness as possible. yeah, mile 11. not my favorite mile. except when compared to...

mile 12: remember the extreme uphill of mile 11? it was followed immediately and not coincidently by a comparable downhill stretch in mile 12. as unpleasant as mile 11 may have been, mile 12 was more so. my quads are feeling mile 12 today, every time i walk down the stairs. ow ow ow.

mile 13.1: as noted in mile 5, i had considerable time to make up if i was going to hew to derek's advice. and so, the last eight point one miles were an exercise in time management (not to mention an exercise in exercise). the good news: i was feeling surprisingly strong. my pace was quickening, my form felt sound, and there were some youngsters just ahead of me to keep up with. or (raising an eyebrow) ...to pass.

another look at my watch told me i had a good chance of making my target time, if i didn't fall down or otherwise handicap myself. some kind of strong emotion subroutine was running in the background of my brain, but i ignored it. "stay on pace and don't pay attention to subroutines," i didn't really say to myself.

i passed a couple of young women who had been ahead of me for the last two miles or so, leaving one thirty-ish guy to catch.

he seemed stubbornly disinclined to be caught, staying about ten yards in front of me. suddenly, a vision of derek s. appeared. "you don't need to pass this youngster," his voice echoed in my brain. "stick to your plan." 

"i don't need to pass this youngster," i agreed, hypnotically. "i just need to stick to my plan."

plans are good. passing the thirty-something youngster with about a hundred yards to go was better. finishing a minute and a half ahead of my goal? better still.

i left the course, looking for the missus in the crowd. there she was, walking toward me, saying something about not getting the photo when i crossed the finish line. i was oblivious, mostly, because i was busy hugging her and crying.

"what's wrong?" she asked.
"i don't know," i snorfled.
pause...
"are you okay?"
"yes...i feel great."

the good news: the crying thing lasted just a few moments. and then i smiled.

a lot.

the bad news: there was no bad news.

****************

results:
# 794
Michael Miller
division: M 50-59
overall finish: 157/946
division place: 8/43
time: 1:48:30
pace: 8:18

the end of the weekend

calm down. i'm not saying they're doing away with weekends. i'm just saying this one is nearly over. and i'm getting irritable. does this happen to everybody? i could certainly understand and empathize, if that were the case. as long as your little end-of-weekend fit of pique doesn't get anywhere near me. because, you know, fuck you. (see? that's what i'm talking about.) the fact is, i've had a great weekend. the mariners won both days, and we attended saturday's win. felix hernandez threw 8 innings of one-hit ball, and it didn't rain. moreover, kate and i ran 5.5 miles through discovery park, which never fails to rejuvenate. plus i did a bunch of chores that had to be done. still on saturday. then, today happened. and it was even better than saturday. crazy, right? the mariners won again, and i did more chores. i mowed, shopped for groceries, did laundry, and ran 10.5 miles. all in one day! it should be noted that i've never before run 10.5 miles all at once. but i did it today. that alone would have made today exceptional. but as noted above, that was but one part of the larger story! crazy. plus, the weather was tolerable. not great, especially saturday, but not awful, either. it was chilly, particularly at the game. multiple layers and more than one beer were unable to fend off the cold. but at least the mariners won. did i mention that? today was warmer, though still not what i'd call "warm." warm, see, involves more degrees farenheit than 62. still, it was tolerable, and fairly ideal for running ten and a half miles. all at once. now, after an amazing dinner prepared by mrs. spaceneedl, i'm eating a chocolate chip cookie and drinking some decent red wine. and the denver nuggets are beating the hated los angeles lakers. all in all, a truly fabulous weekend day. which will inevitably end with a thoroughly unwelcome and annoying monday morning. which is why i'm irritable. i mean, obviously.

vital signs

i washed my hands afterward half a dozen times.

it still didn't seem like enough.

i dislike cadaver lab.

don't get me wrong...i understand the value of the research. i respect the people who contribute their earthly remains to the cause of science. and i appreciate the opportunity to participate in the work.

i just wish i didn't have to be there for it.

most of the time, i'm fine. as long as i keep my eyes on the instruments and the monitors and the activities of the physicians. but that's not possible 100% of the time. and if i get even a little distracted from those things, i notice the person on the table in front of us. and for just a few moments, my imagination kicks on.

i conjure up a life for him. a smiling, bright-eyed wife. a son he taught to throw a baseball. a daughter he taught to ride a bicycle. a mother who held him when he was a boy.

sometimes a vivid imagination is less an asset than it is a curse.

the unwelcome images flash past me in half a second. their effect on my heart lasts longer. none of it is reconcilable with what's happening on the table. or with the cardboard box, lined with black plastic, on the gurney nearby.

near as i can tell, no one else is similarly distracted. the physicians chatter away with a detached, clinical demeanor. the engineers are professional, moving with purpose from one task to the next. i circle the table, taking pictures, tracking the conversations. i hover over the subject, within inches, as the work goes on.

my iphone contains dozens of images i would like to simply delete. instead, i will have to download and archive them for others to review. much as i'd rather, i can't imagine assigning such a task to somebody else.

the lab lasted two-plus hours that went by in the blink of an eye. toward the end, i was offered, and accepted, one of the devices, and used successfully it on the subject.

by "successfully," i mean "my eyes never left the monitor."

**********

this morning the missus and i walked the dogs down to the village, like we do every weekend. we went to the bakery, as we usually do, ordered coffee and a piece of quiche and a walnut raisin roll.

after a while, a frail, elderly man with a cane hobbled through the door and eased himself onto the bench a couple tables away. he looked over at me looking at him, and gave me a little smile. i smiled a little and nodded back.

but i will tell you, what i really wanted to do at that moment was get up and run out the door.