"Toughen Up"

Last night I went on my first training ride with my MS150 team. (Accepting donations for MS research here.) We biked 25 miles! I met a new friend named Laura and we rode together and got to talking about how expensive it can be to get into biking and running. Suddenly you need all this gear. Take, for example, padded butt biking shorts. I'm one of the few that has the good sense to cover up that shame with my famous pajama pants, but I wear the padded butt shorts underneath. Anyway, mine are actually "tri shorts", which means I bought them for a triathlon I did a few years back and they aren't as maxi padded as bike shorts, to make drying easier. Think mini pad. I was telling her all of this, and how I refuse to pony up the $50+ it's going to take to get the extra maxi padded butt shorts.

At that EXACT moment in time, we crossed paths with a man who had no legs, and was laying down on one of those cool bikes that is powered by a hand crank. I guess I was staring at him in sheer awe and pride as I told her all about my butt padding, and at the moment of contact as we rode by this man, and I was looking right at him, I concluded my story by saying, and I quote: 

"So, I guess now it's 'toughen up, old friend'", referring of course to my crotch.

I cringed when I realized what had just happened and how all this poor brave awesome athletic disabled man probably heard me say as we whizzed by each other was, 

"Toughen up, Old Friend."

"Not you, Sir! My crotch! I was telling my CROTCH to toughen up!"

Another day, another 3 miles

I had to walk a little bit today on my 3-mile run, but that's OK with me.  I'm running along Rocky Point Road, which has absolutely no shade and no points of interest and it's asphalt and sometimes it's just plain boring. 

At least my iPod was up and running.  But for the first half-mile, the setting for 'shake to shuffle' was on, meaning you can just shake the thing and it puts on a new song.  WELL, when you're running, that's about the dad-gummest most annoying thing in the whole world.  Every three paces a new song.  And then me, trying to keep the iPod as still as possible, while running.  $%^&*^! 

Finally I decided to fix the problem.  Usually I just live with things as they are and suffer.  But I went into the iPod menu, found the settings, found the place where it says 'shake to shuffle' OFF, and VOILA!  I could listen to PJ Harvey's new album in peace. 

Except it's not really for running, and as much as I love her, I had to let her go in favor of the playlist that I made when I hiked Machu Picchu. 

7/26

I ran three miles today, and I hated every minute of it.  My iPod wasn't charged, and so I took to counting light poles to pass the time.

In four languages.  Because that's all I could think of.  English, Spanish, German and French.

ein, one, un, uno
two, dos, svei, deux
trois, three tres, drei
etc.

Sometimes you can make a sentence.  For example...Four.  Four fier cuatro quatre (cat).  "Cat fear for cuatro."  Or Eight.  Ocho eight ocht huit.  "Oct Ocho ate wheat". 
Or sometimes they are all almost the same:  Like...six.  Six, sex, seis, six.

BORING.

But, three miles!  Just 10.1 more to go in 6 weeks.

2.5 Miles. Just for Show

In a town where you need to go and get the mail to "see and be seen", going out to the Highway for a run is kind of a social event. 

But not really.  I was originally just going to run one mile, but saw not one car on the highway, so I kept running, hoping to see Justin Timberlake drive by, but it didn't happen.
In the end, I ran 2.5 miles.  Alone.  Somebody honked.  Turns out it was the cook at work.  I'll call that a limited success.

It's Time for Another Hexum Half-Marathon

Unfortunately there aren't any half-marathons in these parts.  So I'm just going to create one, naturally.

I clocked it in my car the other day and I found a great little course, basically from just past my house up to my job.  Why so ambitious?

Because I ran one mile yesterday and I'm obviously insane.  I haven't run since New Zealand.  Literally.  That was March 2010.  So yah, this is going to be fun.  I talked to my boss and she's on board...so I have less than two months to train and also completely organize this thing.  Now, to scare up some runners and some volunteers and some prizes and the ambulance crew and some water stops.  This'll be easy, right?

The Intern

On Friday, I ran/walked 3 miles in 35 minutes, and the Intern seemed impressed. Then we did another Ab Set. But I was toast after running and so I just stretched while he did hundreds and hundreds of crunches.

Working out with the Intern

I don't really like to work out alone. I don't want to walk ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE PARKING LOT to my Lifetime Fitness and so when my regular work-out buddy Felicia couldn't make it to the gym today I was a little depressed because I knew that meant I wouldn't go either. But I'm fat right now and I'm going to Mexico in about a month, so I casually asked the hot, young, 23 year old college-graduate intern that I have been sexually harrassing for the past 6 months if he had a membership to Lifetime, knowing full well that he did. "I'm going at 3pm," he said, and so of course I told him I was going with him. I also told him I'm a social exerciser and need somebody to at least walk over to Lifetime with me. I agreed to work out on the treadmills. We walked over and when I got out of the changing room, he was already running, with a quarter-of-a-mile on the display at a pace of 8 mph. I walked for about 5 minutes and then casually sped up my machine until we were stomping, right. left. right. left. at the same pace. Depressingly I realized that my machine was only at 5.6 mph to his 8. These darn short legs! We ran "together" for about a half mile on my machine and then he left to go 'lift'. Lift. Doesn't that sound amazing and gorgeous? I saw that he had run 1.38 miles on his machine. In his absence, I ended up run/walking because it's been a while since I have run, and so I was glad when he came back by for a drink of water, I was on my short little run section of the run/walk. "You really picked up the pace!", (6mph) he mentioned and then walked toward the water fountain. Thank you for noticing...and thank goodness he hadn't come by 10 seconds earlier, as I was on the 2.8mph walk that lasted about 8 minutes. When I finally reached 2 miles (30 minutes), he asked if I wanted to do an Ab Set. "YES PLEASE", I answered, not really knowing what that was, but it sounded romantic. And it was. Until we did side planks, me facing the wall and him facing my clenched, shaking butt. Wonder if he'll want to work out tomorrow?