Category: Funny

Confession

Forgive me, Blogfather, for I have slacked. It has been 5 days since my last run.

Thursday, I decided to rest ’cause I ran big on Wed. Friday, I was busy. Saturday and Sunday I spent about 16 hours on a ladder trying to paint the house. Tomorrow I run.

——–

So, here’s kind of a digression, an idea, a riff, building on Friday’s “Pick up the Phone” post: Phil Knight and his waffle iron as Martin Luther and the door of the Whittenburg Cathedral.

Discuss.

Was it “Right Place, right time” in both cases – just an outspoken person grabbing on to an undercurrent (Luther – the idea that the Church needed reform couldn’t have been his and his alone; Knight – Swingin’ 70’s, with everyone wanting to look good and feel that pep), or was it something more – divine inspiration, lone guy going against the flow…

And will it happen again?

We watched “Space Jam” (the 1996 Michael Jordan vehicle) with the kids Saturday night. The good: MJ’s dog named “Charles” (as in Barkley); the NBA players who lost their talent (the Round Mound of Rebound, Patrick Ewing, Muggsy Boggues, etc) and the other NBA players not wanting to play (Wow – Vlade was young once); Bill Murray in an underrated re-enactment of his role in Caddyshack; Charles Barkey in general. The Bad: MJ betting on sports, and the team’s reliance on MJ’s “special stuff” to win the big game.

Watching Jordan play hoops, even in a movie, was just amazing. Took me way, way back. There’s something missing in the NBA today – a magic that was there in the late ’80s and early ’90s that is akin to Baseball on either side of WWII.

For the Dumb Idea File

Using the weed-eater (string trimmer, whatever) on poison ivy while wearing sandals; then sitting on a plane wearing same sandals without first steam-sterilizing them. The ivy’s some weird stuff – had an incubation period of about 4 days before the rash got really, really bad. But I went and checked where I ran the weed whacker, and yes-indeedy! “Leaves of three, let them be.”

Let them be sprayed with round-up, if I weren’t violently opposed to using serious chemicals in the yard.

Fertilizer doesn’t count. Weed’n’feed will count after this summer.

Tried to go run today; feet hurt too much to get more than a half-mile. Grrrr.

Had the last t-ball game today; went surprisingly well. Think I’ll miss the kids…

Scott Adams on “Losing Weight”

If you haven’t caught it yet, Scott Adams of Dilbert fame has a blog. Today’s bit was on Losing Weight:

First, buy a scale and use it daily. As soon as you find yourself 3 pounds over your target weight, begin the Scott Adams Dietâ„¢.

…

Week 3
——–
Stop eating bread and white rice and potatoes. Eat all the vegetables you want. Pasta is good too because it doesn’t spike your sugar like other carbs.

Week 4
——–
Adjust your schedule to allow exercise every day at a set time. When that time comes, no matter how tired you feel, put on your sneakers and workout clothes. Then exercise as much or as little as you feel you can handle. The idea is to make it a routine. There is no other objective at this point. Once it’s a routine, you’ll automatically start getting better at it. That part takes care of itself.

There’s more – it’ll make you laugh.

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Confession

Forgive me, Blogfather, for I have slacked.

It has been 10 days since my last post. In that time, I have run slightly over 10 miles.

The reasons why are personally important, but do not lessen my transgressions. Compounding my lack of mileage has been a complete and total disregard for the type and quantity of fuel which I have put into the temple that is my body, including, but not limited to, Taco Cabana fajita salad; barbecue chicken, sausage, beans, slaw, and bacon/potato salad; Whataburger; and sizzling beef fajitas.

I request absolution.

My son, you have attempted to squander the training and hard work which you have done so far this year. After a good result at Bluff Point, you should have built on that base and continued in the way that leads to a smaller waist, larger lungs, and wide-open arteries.

As penance, you must perform 2 hours in sneakers in meditation on St. Sebastian; one hour in homage to the Madonna del Ghisallo; and one hour performing the rite of St. Adjutor. This penance must be complete by Sunday.

Now go in peace, my son, and slack no more.

ran, ran, ran, ran, ran

Also known as “A Heartbreaking Tale of Relying on the Kindness of Others”

Monday, I’d written a post so breathtaking, so stunning, so mind-bogglingly beautiful that I seriously considered not posting it. It had pathos, it had descriptions so true to life that the woman walking behind me while I wrote it had to be broken out of her reverie with old-school smelling salts. I was contemplating the “Post Me” and “Delete” buttons with equal consideration after I heard our IT guy sobbing tears of enlightenment while reading it, and heard his computer’s overload pop when the screening software recognized for the wonder of modern literature that I had created.

As I recognized that the clouds were going to part and pass a heavenly chorus to touch the earth, and I was going to hear the angles sing, I decided that I had a moral obligation to share my enlightenment with the world. Anticipating the slew of book offers and speaking engagements about to be hurled my way, I grabbed a box into which to pack my personal effects as I knew I would not have a chance later. I ran a comb through my hair and chomped on a mint, then made sure my shoes were tied so I could outsprint the women who were sure to begin to throw themselves at me once the post went live.

With a deep breath, I hit “Post” on the Blogger interface.

“We’re sorry, but we’re experiencing technical difficulties. Our software engineers are working diligently to correct the problem.” Whaaaaa??? I wondered?

I hit the Back Arrow on Firefox to see if I could salvage the post, but all that remained was a blank page. “Nooooooooo!!!!!” I screamed.

For a heartbeat I considered attempting to reconstruct the post, to pass on my enlightenment to you, the unwashed masses. But the moment had passed. Truth and Beauty, only seconds ago framed on my laptop’s screen, had again passed into Reality. And my lunch hour (and a half counting actually eating) was past and a meeting awaited.

So I apologize. And I promise I will use pen and paper next time if my beloved iBook is not handy, with MacJournal fired up. (Seriously, MacJournal is quite possibly the best bit of software I’ve run across in a while – interfaces with MT, Blogger, WordPress and a bunch of others if you want, and works like a champ as standalone. PC’s may have a million applications, but the 10,000 for Macs are much higher quality). But don’t worry too much – my muse seems to have headed north; you can get most of the gist over at Brogan’s Blog.

As for me – I’m going to switch to WordPress or something similar (There’s a scandal brewing over the guy who runs WordPress’ page gaming Google to increase their AdSense revenue, which kind of bums me out – the Complete Running blogs are all beautiful, and the package looks easy to use) next week, once I’m done with taxes (not my fault, I’m waiting on the Navy to fix a bad W-2). I can’t bash Blogger too hard, after all, I got far more than I paid for from their free service. But, I’ve been meaning to learn some server-side stuff, and this seems to be a great way to do it.

Oh, yeah, RUNNING:

Re-focusing this week seems to be working. Monday I banged out 5 miles in 42 minutes (average of 8:22/mile), and felt good. I tried the whole “running on my toes” thing, but it felt like I was scraping the bottom of my shoes when my feet would touch down. It’s a good thing on the bike, since pushing forward at the top of the stroke is adding power, but in running my guess is that the little “Shhhhhsh” sound with each step is wasted energy that’d be better used to go faster/farther. So I fiddled around with my stride, easily avoiding striking my heels by virtue of a dull ache remaining in my right heel from my incident at the pool. List it as a good run.

Today, I scraped out 3.75 miles in about 32 minutes. Yesterday’s run took more out of me than I’d thought, plus, I really pushed the first two miles (15:05 for the two). I started out kind of sore from Monday, but running again today did wonders for stretching out the muscles. But it was beautiful, and there was NO WAY I was spending lunch indoors.

I’m still chasing the Runner’s High – somehow I haven’t found it the last couple of months, but I keep getting closer.

Oh, and I’m cycling tomorrow. A guy from one of the other contractors and I kept “meaning to” ride together all last year; this year, we’re not taking excuses.

Wow. I didn’t realize exactly how great things were going. The bluebird of happiness seems to have arrived with shorts weather. Hope y’all are doing as well (Don’t think CT is going to completely beat Texas out of me; besides, English is sorely lacking a second person plural pronoun, and y’all is much better than “youse guys” or just “you”. Try it.)

And no lie – go read (or re-read) Chris’s post on FOCUS. Chris, as always, rocks.