temperature check

(the song stuck in my head the entire race.)

saturday, nov. 15, 2015
grand ridge half marathon


this time was different.

my last experience at grand ridge ~ a dim, dreary, exhausted slog a year ago ~ was not fun. from the moment i arrived to the moment i crossed the finish line, i just wanted to be done. looking back, it's not so much that the experience was bad...it's that my attitude sucked.

bygones.

today, as noted, was different. bright, sunny, and cold. cold as a new york city winter. colder than the siberian (not-so-permanent) permafrost. but not as cold as the internet reaction to kim kardashian's butt.

still, it was cold.

mile 3-ish. i was warm.
(photo courtesy of takao suzuki)

the starting area was in the shade until a few minutes before the start, and runners milling about shivered and kvetched on frozen ground.

by 9 a.m., however, the sun rose high enough over tree and hill to blast the north side of I-90 ~ the difference was spectacular. cold-weather gear-related note: black running attire heats up quickly in sunlight. metabolic-physiology note: running generates heat, as well.

aside from knocking a few minutes off last year's time, my goals this day were modest:

1. finish
2. have fun
3. don't fall down a lot

these are not audacious goals, i realize, but achieving them is always better than not. falling on the frozen trail would've been particularly noisome ~ not too different from tumbling on broken concrete. it would've made for some interesting road rash, though.

according to the nice folks at evergreen trail runs, there's about 2000 feet of elevation over the half marathon course. it seemed like more, but that's probably because there isn't a lot of flat ground at grand ridge. you're either running uphill or downhill most of the time. plus, there's a lot of avoiding other runners heading out-and-back on singletrack trail, which adds to the illusion of extra effort. 

no, come to think of it, it wasn't an illusion. in the name of good trail running etiquette, i spent a lot of time sidestepping and smiling and saying "thank you" and "nice job." i'm polite that way.

sidebar: as it's only a half-hour from our house, why don't i run grand ridge more often? aside from the fact that discovery park is three minutes away, i mean.

***********

in conclusion, i did finish, i did have fun, and i did improve on last year's time (sort of). late in the race i saw my friend kira walking up the hill, and since i hadn't seen her in months we walked and chatted for a few minutes. yes, it was a race, but it's not like the digression cost me a spot on the podium.

so, on a technicality, two minutes slower than last year. but who's counting?

***********

results:

2:26:27
42/249 (overall)
3/15 (M 50-59)

general weirdness

"gentlemen, i wash my hands of this weirdness."

"i have no sympathy for any of you feculent maggots, and no more patience to pretend otherwise."

~ captain jack sparrow

***********

for eight years, republicans endorsed every act of piracy committed by the bush administration.

it got so bad that americans would've elected a tree stump, it seemed, rather than tolerate more years of national humiliation and depredation. instead, in a brief moment of clarity, we elected a brilliant, charming, steady constitutional law professor from illinois. and for a few shining moments it seemed the pendulum might swing back and away from our self-inflicted calamity.

that didn't *quite* happen.

time and again the brilliant law professor, self-cast as conciliator-in-chief, extended a hand across the aisle to work with the loyal opposition (if by "loyal opposition" you mean "ravening band of hard-right zombies still in search of brains amongst themselves or their constituents").

each time, he pulled back a stump.

and yet he tried. well beyond the point that a reasonable person might say, "bite me once, shame on you. bite me dozens of times, sod off you rabid obstructionist anti-american faux-christian cretins." 

or, you know, words to that effect. because he's a diplomat and i'm not.

but he didn't do that. he just. kept. reaching. even as the opposition kept gnawing. their stated goal: to thwart every initiative, every attempt to govern, every exhortation to do the jobs for which legislators are elected.

time passed, stuff happened. and despite the efforts of the zombies, the pendulum did swing. wars were (mostly) concluded. broad-scale healthcare was implemented (sort of). the economy recovered (for some people) and the stock market soared (for rich people). 

and, as they adorably do every 15 minutes or so, americans forgot the past.

they forgot how long it took to dig out from under the pile of crap heaped on us by the last republican administration. and that, actually, we're still digging.

they forgot the last time the GOP was in charge, america tortured helpless prisoners.

they forgot that the GOP hates women. and gays. and minorities. and poor people. and healthcare. and the environment.

they forgot that for the past 6 years republicans did everything they could to stall the economy and shut down the government...including actually shutting down the government.

and so, because americans have a tragicomically short attention span, in november, 2014, they put the GOP back in charge of congress.

{steps back, takes a deep breath, considers options}

or, maybe i'm wrong. 

maybe american voters are extremely bright. maybe electing 31 GOP governors and handing the united states senate over to republicans was done intentionally and with great premeditation. because things worked out so well the last time these folks were in charge, i imagine.

at this juncture, i'm extremely content to let you decide. because for the next year at least...i'll be over here trying to wash off the incredulity.

***********

“Take a look at this: gas under $3 a gallon. Unemployment under 6%. Stock market breaking records every day. No wonder the guy is so unpopular.”

~ david letterman

first-world frills

kristin armstrong (famously and formerly mrs. lance armstrong) writes a column for runner's world magazine. i sometimes begin her essays by rolling my eyes, as her themes can be, uh, cloying.

but i read them. because by the end she almost always wins me over with her relentless sincerity and a genuinely perceptive insight or two. and i think, "she got me again. i don't know how, but she did."

this one, for example:

"There is a vast difference between giving up and letting go. Giving up implies a spirit of 'I don’t care,' ~ letting go implies 'I care so much that I won’t do this anymore.'"

today, it was this innocuous thought experiment:

"I decided to write down a list of little luxuries in my gratitude journal, thinking I would have about ten or fifteen. Once I got started I simply could not stop...and I suddenly remembered everything I loved. We forget sometimes, in our rush to do everything and be everywhere for everyone."

at first i dismissed the whole thing as silly. a 'gratitude journal'? is that even a real thing? (editorial note: it is a real thing, and i know it's a real thing, but...seriously?) then i read her list and thought, "whatever, fine, it might be interesting."

it turns out i have a list...

recently washed dogs. an unexpected and spectacular progress report from the boy's school. nonchalant scholastic overachievement by the girl. grocery shopping. being the designated dinner-maker. a closet full of running gear. new running shoes. breakfast at serendipity. the magnolia farmers market. friday afternoons. sleeping in on sunday. time devoid of commitment. moments of clarity. fresh pineapple. crispy kale. running in the rain. a quick commute. telling someone, "nice job" and watching them light up. helping out the homeless guy at the i-5 on-ramp. helping out any homeless person. writing. carving out time to read a book. updating my running log. researching two 50k races for 2015. two cats in the yard. crossing a finish line. naps. hugs from the girl. an occasional smile from the boy. not taking any of these things for granted.

and finally, this twitter account... https://twitter.com/A_single_bear 

there are more, and i've discovered i could spend a long time compiling them. not that i needed a reminder how ridiculously fortunate we are that any of the above are true. i'm aware of them every day. 

it's a good list.

she got me again.

why we can't have nice things...

in one priceless rant, a self-professed christian-american patriot demonstrates why we can't have nice things in this country...

"I don't give a crap if folks are atheist because, well, they are idiots. But why do they get their panties in a wad anytime someone says a prayer or there is a mention of God anywhere?

"I'm beginning to think all these atheist groups are really secret Christian groups because all they do is rally the believers.

"Oh, separation of church and state, blah blah blah. Oh, the poor kid who doesn't believe feels sad and ostracized. Blah blah blah. Guess what - everyone feels like the odd man out sometimes. We are all offended by someone or something sometimes. It doesn't mean that everything has to be dumbed down to the lowest common denominator.

"My rant for the day. It's been building."

***********

how much un-american, un-christ-like, unthinking goodness did you spot?

1. atheists are hyperventilating idiots

"you just don't get it, do you?"

2. to hell with the u.s. constitution 

3. to hell with kids who feel ostracized

4. some people dumb things down to the lowest common denominator

let's add one more from the article linked in the rant:

"The granite monument at the Madison County High School football field contains the Bible verses 'If God be for us, who can be against us?'"

5. god cares which team wins high school football games

jesus and the founders would be so proud.

running the 'hood

"am i the first old guy to go past here?"

this was a good day, mostly.

the magnolia run the bluff 10k, absent in 2013, came back strong this year. the course passed right by our house, which would've been convenient had i decided to bail after 2 miles.

thankfully it didn't come to that.

the top finishers put up a sub-5:40/mi pace, which is moving pretty quickly for a neighborhood 10k. especially in this neighborhood, which is built on some respectable hills.

i was not among the top finishers.

technicality: let the record show i finished first...among the old guys (50-59). there's something to be said for that, but i'm not sure what.

more importantly, i established a PR for the 10k distance, 7 seconds faster than my time at the columbia winery 10k in august. that course was flat as a pancake, flat as a board, flat as the globe at the offices of the flat earth society. which is to say, pretty flat.

so, a new PR on an un-flat course is kind of gratifying.

about mile three (at the top of a semi-long climb), my stomach started to protest. and i thought, "it's a good thing i didn't eat anything this morning, because i'd be seeing it again." i also knew i'd feel better five minutes after i stopped, so i stayed focused on my turnover and tried to stay out of my own head. surprisingly, this worked pretty well for the next couple miles.

which brings us to the part that wasn't so good...

with about a mile to go, i saw my friend jon and his dog go-go, who had been running ahead of me from the start. go-go (a big boxer and surprisingly strong trail runner) was clearly distressed, and plopped down at jon's feet. he picked her up and tried to urge her along, but she wasn't having it and plopped down again. actually, "collapsed" is the word that went through my head, and i had a really unpleasant flashback to the moment one of our big golden retrievers went down a few years ago. that didn't end well.

jon and go-go.
(photos by glenn tachiyama.)

"jon, do you need help?" i asked as i approached. "no, she's just overheated. thanks, though."

i kept going, but didn't feel good about it. turns out go-go ended up in critical care for "extreme dehydration." the vet gave her IV fluids and plasma overnight, and this morning jon reported that she was coming home and "should be back to 100% soon."

***********

with a half mile to go, i felt surprisingly strong. my stomach was no worse, and my pace was as good as i had any right to expect. coming around the last turn to the finish line, i could hear someone behind me, and decided i didn't want to be passed this late in the race. i crossed the finish line at as close to a sprint as i could manage, smiling. 

all of which brings us back to where we started...it was a good day.

***********
magnolia run the bluff 10k

44:48 (7:14 min/mi) ~ PR
31/175 (overall)
1/8 (m 50-59)

家に来なさい !!

japan is a long way from seattle.

and when the missus journeys there on business for nine days, she may as well be on the moon.

recent discoveries about japan:

• text messages must swim to get there; it can take days for them to arrive
• an 18-hour time difference (plus two busy schedules) makes phone contact nigh impossible
• there are beer vending machines in japan. beer vending machines!
• at the monkey park it's the people who are caged

"aww, look at the cute human. she's almost simian!"

other things i know about japan:

when the missus is there, i sleep a lot less. i go to bed later and get up earlier, trying to keep the wheels on our life.

when the missus is there, getting a mortgage refinanced is a lot more complicated.

when the missus is there, completing a tax return takes much longer than the CPA (who is heading to fiji) has time for.

when the missus is there, i have to clean out the litter box.

it's that last one i enjoy the least.

no matter which of us is gone, nine days is a long time ~ especially to be unreachable halfway around the world. but, this is what we've signed up for, what with our corporate careers (such as they are) and our insatiable expenditures.

and by that i mean, the children.

mid-meeting call from loving daughter: "can you sign me up for ski bus, because sign-ups have started and it's really filling up fast."
me: "not right this second, i'm in a meeting."
ld: "oh, and can we get mexi food for dinner?"
me: "goodbye."

later...

text to loving son: "do you want me to sign you up for ski bus this year?"
ls: "yeah, but only if i get new skis to go along with it."
me: ...

i'm not sure i could survive a tenth day. hurry home, loving wife.

half full...

"you, paparazzi. see this face?
this is my cranky face."

i don't like getting up early.

and i hate being cold.

one might think these would be significant barriers to running trail races some 30 months in a row.

to be fair, not all those races were run in cold weather, but the getting up early part is a constant.

and yet at least once a month i roll out on a weekend morning, dress in the dark, gently kiss my snoozing wife, and shuffle toward the door ~ more or less ready to run.

my brain objects.

"you could be sleeping in, dope..."
"i could, but i'll regret it later if i don't go now."
"it's gonna be cold. you know it's gonna be cold."
"see the bag? the bag is full of layers. polypropylene layers, down layers, short sleeve layers, long sleeve layers, vest layers, hat layers. we've got layers for every possible contingency, including donner pass."
"remember the time it rained the entire race and you forgot a rain layer?"
"shut up."

it's become a thing, this streak i'm on. i didn't mean for it to become a thing, but it has. and so i have events lined up for the next four months (which, for those who keep track of such things, are the coldest months on most calendars in the northern hemisphere).

if i were smart, i would have scheduled events in warm-weather places for those months.

"mile 12. i'm warm."
(photos by takao suzuki.)

ha ha, no.

i've begun plotting an exit strategy.

the current plan is to get to 36 consecutive months, declare victory, and sleep in until july.

***********
the tehaleh half marathon is a very civilized course winding through woods, greenbelts, and quiet residential lanes. there are sections of rocky single track that are challenging, and a few manageable climbs ~ but overall the course is fast and runnable. 

despite this, i did manage to roll an ankle ~ twice ~
along the way. no permanent damage was noted, fun was had, and there was a nap in the afternoon.

as always, the folks at evergreen trail runs did an excellent job, putting on an event accessible by runners of every ability.

***********

tehaleh half marathon

1:54:44
15/68 (overall)
2/5 (50-59)

business models

there is a debate, in some quarters, over "the standard of beauty" in society.

in one corner you have the health and beauty industry, which tells us "beautiful" is rail thin and body-fat-free. most humans don't fit this description, but trying to achieve this look has led some to "extreme makeover: anorexia edition" behavior.

in the other corner are people who insist beauty is independent of outward appearance. "let's not use models as the standard of beauty!! we are all beautiful because we are."

to wit:

both corners miss the point.

models, no matter their description, exist for one purpose: to sell you something.

and countless millions have bought it. 

free advice: never believe a model. 

below are the only measures of beauty that count:

1. are you healthy?
2. do you feel healthy?

own that ~ take responsibility for that ~ and no other standard will matter.

share the road

ambling, meandering run in the rain.

i could've gone faster, but there were lots of snails and slugs on the trail.

faster feet (and wheels and beaks and claws) may find them.

but not mine. 

different measures

"if you want different results, you have to do different things."

~ somebody

i have a hard time letting go.

this is a symptom of refusing to quit because, you know, quitters quit, and no one likes a quitter.

or something.

so i hang on, and hang in, and persist, and do many silly, useless things rather than do the smart thing. which would be to step back, take a deep breath, and perform a ritual (metaphorical) amputation.

"One of the hardest lessons in life is letting go – whether it’s guilt, anger, love or loss. Change is never easy – you fight to hold on and you fight to let go. But oftentimes letting go is the healthiest path forward. It clears out toxic thoughts from the past. You’ve got to emotionally free yourself from the things that once meant a lot to you, so you can move beyond the past and the pain it brings you. Again, it takes hard work to let go and refocus your thoughts, but it’s worth every bit of effort you can muster."

~ Marc and Angel Chernoff, "1000 Little Things Happy Successful People Do Differently"

"free yourself from the things that once meant a lot to you."

it can be done. i have, in fact, done it.

but it ain't easy...

first-world weird

"be the ball? i can't even see the ball."

i have a recurring nightmare that will get no sympathy.

some people have anxiety dreams about walking around naked, or showing up to class and it's finals day and they haven't studied, or being chased but unable to run away.

those sound familiar, right?

i have stress dreams about playing golf at pebble beach.

i know, boo hoo.

the theme is always the same. somehow i'm at one of the hallowed cathedrals of golf (a game i used to play with some enthusiasm), and i'm completely unable to hit the ball because i haven't touched a club in years. most often it's late in the day and we're trying to hurry around the course before dark. of course there are groups behind us, also wanting to finish, completely exasperated by my incompetence.

it's awful.

i wake up tired and stressed, wondering what the hell that was about. 

but i suppose it's better than being chased by monsters.

action seeking opportunity

my daughter and i gave five bucks to a homeless-looking guy on the corner. he handed her this...

anybody need an IT guy?

will run for wine

this race.

i ran a little race on saturday.

i needed some kind of organized event to keep my streak going (now at 28 months, but who's counting), and the columbia winery 10k was it.

it was my first non-trail event in a long time. the last one was the lake chelan marathon, which was september 2013. apparently i like trails.

anyhoo... columbia winery. a fundraiser for seattle children's hospital.

the course, in part on the sammamish river trail (which i run often), was flat and fast. much faster than i'm used to running.

this trail.

on unpaved trails i generally run 9- to 11-minute miles. saturday i ran at a 7:15 minute/mile pace. not fast compared to most, but for me it was moving right along.

turns out it was good enough for a PR at the 10k distance.
***********

this wine.

no, i didn't drink wine afterward. it was 9:30 in the morning.

but i did notice columbia makes a grenache rosé, which i am going to have to check into.

***********
results:

44:53
35/331 (overall)
2/6 (50-54)

mad poetry

People will forget what you said
People will forget what you did
But people will never forget how you made them feel

~ maya angelou

***********
i'm standing here cycling through the many ways robin williams made me feel.

and i keep coming back to one that has been true for years: awe.

when i was much younger, it was enough that he was outrageously funny, in a runaway high-speed train sort of way. i mean, i laughed at the humor in his standup operatics (you absolutely cannot call them "routines"), but it was the delivery ~ the topical theatrics, the manic digressions, the painfully profound wisdom, and the nuclear thread fusing them together ~ that dilated your brain.


even back then, i didn't think of him as a "comedian." the word is too small to describe what he did. and though the G-word is overused and underdelivered, robin williams was a genius of some sort. "mind-bending," maybe. or "effortless" or "profane" or "pure" or some other word that escalates "genius," because that word isn't big enough, either.

that's what we saw onstage or onscreen. a preposterous expression of writing and stagecraft and camera work and editing and a thousand other details. it was like watching a fiercely intelligent blowtorch.

behind the scenes, maybe "distraught" or "stricken" or "broken" was more apt.

***********
as the years swept by, i thought williams' best performances were when he wasn't being funny. the inexorable craft he demonstrated in moscow on the hudson. the agony of the fisher king. the vulnerability in dead poets society and good will hunting. the rage of good morning viet nam. and what dreams may come...that one still leaves me, uh, emotionally compromised.

he had the benefit of brilliant writing in those roles, but it was the all-in fearlessness he brought to them that will always stay with me.

***********
i was stunned the day i heard robin williams had died. i knew he had brawled for years with depression ~ but i guess i thought that fight was behind him. then i read he was in the early stages of parkinson's disease. it's tempting to write, "...and it all made sense." but it didn't. not really. 

no more so than anything else in this life.

today, the shock is wearing off. 

but sense of loss rolls on.

***********
"We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. 

"To quote from Whitman, 'O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless... of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?' 

"Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play goes on ~ and you may contribute a verse. 

"What will your verse be?"

~ from dead poets society

***********

his was one hell of a verse...

outrage + us

dear barry,

as you probably recall, you and i shook hands back in 2006. twice, in fact.

it was out in front of the chicago tribune building, where you had just met with the editorial board. there was a camera crew outside, to whom you gave a couple minutes, and then you worked the pedestrians and passers-by a little bit.


those people really liked you. they smiled and encouraged you to run for president. we shook hands on your way up the street (i said something clever like, "nice to meet you, senator."), and then again as you worked back the other way. no idea what i said that time, but maybe you remember.

in the months leading up to the 2008 election, i campaigned for you and raised money for you. i believed you would lead the anti-bush administration, that you would be the guy who would swing the pendulum from the batsh*t-crazy right back to the left.

and don't get me wrong, you've done some extraordinary things. for one, you turned around an economy in total meltdown. and i really appreciate obamacare, not to mention the supreme court justices you've appointed. they will make a huge, positive difference for a lot of people for a long time.

having said that, barry, you and i can't hang out together any more.

because of this:

twisted.

"...before I came into office I was very clear that in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 we did some things that were wrong.  We did a whole lot of things that were right, but we tortured some folks.  We did some things that were contrary to our values.

 I understand why it happened.  I think it’s important when we look back to recall how afraid people were after the Twin Towers fell and the Pentagon had been hit and the plane in Pennsylvania had fallen, and people did not know whether more attacks were imminent, and there was enormous pressure on our law enforcement and our national security teams to try to deal with this.  And it’s important for us not to feel too sanctimonious in retrospect about the tough job that those folks had.  And a lot of those folks were working hard under enormous pressure and are real patriots."

barry, you're a constitutional law professor. you, more than most, know words have power and meaning. you know this, and yet you just stood up before the whole wide world and said being afraid is an excuse to do unconscionable things. 

you just said that when people are working hard under enormous pressure, anything goes. 

and you characterized a pack of ravening war criminals as "real patriots."

does pointing all this out make me "sanctimonious"? if so, i don't care. because defining-down sociopathic behavior as "patriotism" is more than just grotesque. it guarantees that the same thing will happen again in some future crisis. it also ensures the same behavior will be practiced against america ~ because what's legit policy for the US is legit for everybody else.

i hate to state the obvious, especially to the constitutional law professor in the room, but we're either a nation of laws, barry, or we're not. we either walk the talk, or we don't. (and if you ever want to use the phrase "american exceptionalism" with a straight face, you don't let the war criminals off the hook because they were stressed out.)

"we tortured some folks." 

seriously? you make it sound like the bush administration hazed a few pledges at a fraternity party. 

what really happened is that the united states officially adopted a policy of "...international kidnappings (euphemistically called "renditions") of terror suspects, including completely innocent people the CIA snatched off the streets of global cities, as well as from the backlands of the planet and "rendered" into the hands of well-known torturing regimes (with the help of 54 other countries) and the setting up of a network of "black sites" or offshore prisons where anything went, the CIA tortured up a storm. And it did so at the behest of the top officials of the Bush administration, including the president and vice president." 

barry, i could go on and on, but what would be the point? you know all of this, in gruesome detail. and we haven't even mentioned the war ginned up for no good reason whatsoever.

i don't get how you can shrug all this off, like it's nothing. sorry, i can't. or maybe more accurately, i won't. 

if that makes me sanctimonious...i guess i'll just have to learn to live with it.

chucka-nuts

well...that was hard.

the chuckanut mountain marathon is described as a course that "...will test runners' skill on narrow and technical single track trails, long climbs and descents, a shorter steep climb, with some beautiful views from the Chuckanut Ridge, Fragrance Lake, and Lost Lake Trail. Course has about 4,525 feet of elevation gain."

all true, but it doesn't quite capture the, uh, focus required to take advantage of all the beauty.

chuckanut is a beast.

there's a lot of steep vertical on the course, which makes for a lot of compartmentalization. no point in looking all the way up there (squints at some theoretical top of a burly climb), when the steps right in front of your face will do.

several times i thought of a line recently shared by a very wise ultrarunner, john morelock, in reference to the riders in the tour de france: "All they can do now is drop their eyes and drag themselves on up the mountain." it was a very useful reminder, as was one of my go-to kicks in the behind: 

"you're not puking and nothing's broken, so get going." ~ vivian mcQueeney

despite the many rigors, i didn't really blow up until the aid station at about mile 17.5. within a few minutes of leaving there, my stomach went bad, my proprioception started to fail, and my head went all foggy. maybe i was dehydrated, i don't know. sitting here today, slightly less foggy, i still don't know. and i certainly didn't know at mile 18 or 19 or 20...

...all i knew was, suddenly everything was harder, and i still had a long way to go. running along the spectacular chuckanut ridge i stopped, probably half a dozen times, to self-assess or just collect myself, but nothing enlightening came of it. there was no epiphanous thought other than, "these miles aren't gonna run themselves." so, i kept going.

there was an aid station mile 21-ish, and in retrospect i wonder if i was looking kinda lousy. "are you doing okay?" asked one of the very nice volunteers, looking me in the eye. "yup," i said, looking him back in the eye. i'm not sure why it seemed important to do that. i mean, it's not like he was going to drag me off the course (at least, i don't think so). either way, he seemed to believe me, as i slurped down a couple orange sections.

meanwhile, another runner sat next to the aid table, his head down, looking like he might've recently thrown up. the volunteer called down to the finish line, requesting a ride for the guy, at which point i said, "thank you," and trudged away. "don't sit down," i reminded myself. "whatever you do, don't. sit. down."

inconvenient tune playing on endless loop in my head for many miles (thanks, brain!): 

You asked me

How long I'd stay by your side
And so I answered
With only just one reply

Til the casket drops
Til my dying day
Til my heartbeat stops
Til my legs just break
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
Whoa, whoa, whoa,
Til the casket drops

such a happy little slogging tune!

chuckanut mountain thoroughly kicked my behind this time around. and as i was finishing the last couple miles i was thinking i would never want to run it again. that thought didn't last 24 hours. sitting here now, i'm already thinking what it will take to do better next year. there will need to be lots more hill repeats, that's certain. and maybe a better race day plan than, "____."

maybe bring along some ginger for the belly issues, which should let me hydrate more effectively, which should keep me from feeling like i'm stroking out. 

there. it's a plan.

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arbitrary, unsupported theory: this course has a lot more than 4500 feet of elevation to it. or, maybe i'm just a big baby.

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update: post-race, upon hearing my travails, a concerned mrs. spaceneedl asked if at any point i considered dropping from the race. she thought it might've been the smart thing to do.

full disclosure: i did think about it. but i never considered it. as long as i was conscious, i was going to finish.

reason #infinity why she's the smart one in the family.


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update II: according to my garmin data, the elevation for 26 miles was just over 5900 feet.