never stop swimming until you reach the ocean

Weight: 166.5 lbs.
Distance: 3 miles
Water: yes
Stretches: yes
Weather: Cool & clear

Playlist:
Come Closer Together - Nine Inch Nails vs. The Beatles
Never Coming Home (Gonna Live My Life Remix) - Sting
Water From A Vine Leaf - William Orbit
You're So Damn Hot - OK Go
Maniac* - Michael Sembello
Fett's Vette - MC Chris
The Ultimate Showdown Of Ultimate Destiny - Lemon Demon
The Generator* - Lilys

Hmn. Two novelty songs in a row. Let's try to not let that happen ever again.

Have my first complete physical examination since 2000 tomorrow, the first with my new physician. I muffed my bloodwork today (I had breakfast) but we can take care of that on Friday or something.

Same course today, the weather has been deceptive. I always wondered who those freaks were who ran in the winter in shorts and I have become one of them. As long as my torso and head are good and protected, my legs don't much care how cold it is.

The diet has been better - it will help a great deal that my wife has now embarked on a campaign to curb the desserts and mid-meal snacking. I have work in the evening right now, which keeps me off the couch, using less of our Netflix offerings and by proxy, fewer tubs of popcorn.

Meralgia Paresthetica Absentia

Weight: 170.5 lbs.
Distance: 3 miles
Water: not yet
Stretches: no
Weather: Cool & overcast. Almost warm.

Accosted by a friendly neighbor on my warm-down walk, and now I have missed my stretches. Must take care of those before I freeze up.

Thought I ate pretty well today, fruit for lunch, and a PowerBar before the run ... but then the wife had made pound cake yesterday and I couldn't keep my hands off of it. Some times I can maintain a healthy diet. But you know, I was on the road for a couple hours today, and that's boring. Eating is interesting.

I wonder which pains will stay and which will go. I pulled a hamstring last summer, causing much distress in my right thigh and glute, favoring my left foot when my right hadn't completely healed. Now the right foot is perfectly fine and the hamstring still troubles me (go and stretch, boy.)

Four years ago I suddenly developed Meralgia Paresthetica in my right thigh (entirely different area, the front and on the side) which caused a terrible sensation not unlike having the blood rush back into an area that was "asleep" - only painful and constant. Or constant whenever I lay down, only standing made it go away. I would wake up in the middle of the night in pain with it, and had to sleep on my right side to quell it.

Why this happened, I do not know. Specialists taxed my insurance co-payment letting me know that yes, I was actually feeling what I was feeling, giving a name to it, and telling me there was nothing I could do about it. Surgery would cause more problems than it would solve, and besides, it usually lasts two years and goes away.

Don't know when it finally went away. Regular exercise always made it feel better, and though whatever pinched nerve caused it still makes itself known in very subtle ways, for the most part I ignore it.

Don't know what caused it. Obesity can, but at that point in time I had actually lost a lot of weight. Anyway. Hope the hamstring also heals. Now about those stretches ...

There's room for maybe just one more.

Weight: 170 lbs.
Distance: 5 miles
Water: yes
Stretches: yes
Weather: Cool & bright with patchy snow on the pavement

Playlist:
Remember the Time - Michael Jackson
Closer to God - Nine Inch Nails
Party Machine - Hoodoo Gurus
All Night Long - Peter Murphy
Burning Love - Elvis Presley
Atom Bomb (Atomix 1) - Fluke
Dead Man's Party* - Oingo Boingo
Run On - Elvis Presley

Comments: Snow's been on the ground for days now, people. Let's clean it up. Hate running in the street with the traffic, but some of these people just can't seem to do their civic duty.

Can't stop running. Never stop running. My daughter has to be older than this before I die.

The Route

Weight: 169 lbs.
Distance: 3 miles
Water: yes
Stretches: yes
Weather: Cold with light snow

I run some of the same, old, boring routes that I have been running for years. Actually, they are only boring when I go short distances, after a mile or so they can get quite interesting. There are a variety of flat areas, and stretches of steady incline.

I first set the basic route around my neighborhood, up one street and down the other, over ten years ago. That's the starter mile. The first quarter mile is up an incline of a couple percent, which is kind of a pain, and discouraging when I am out of shape, but great training for races. I can pull out ahead of a lot of people very fast because I am not used to starting out on level ground.

Coffee & Cigarettes

Weight: 169 lbs.
Distance: 3 miles
Water: yes
Stretches: yes
Weather: Cold, bright with patchy snow

Playlist:
Europa and the Pirate Twins - Thomas Dolby
Can You Feel It? - The Jacksons
Superstar - Jamelia
Six Feet Under (Radio Edit) - Photek vs. Thomas Newman
Mr. Blue Sky - ELO
Crystal Wrists - Peter Murphy
Are You Trying to Be Funny? - Everything But the Girl

Comments: We watched Coffee and Cigarettes the other night. I miss smoking with impunity, staying out late, drinking. I guess by proxy I must therefore miss being 200 pounds and only having sex lying on my back.

Hear This

Gear: Nike Lightweight Sport Headphones
The phones that came with the iPod wore out after about a year. The constant jostling and readjusting blew a connection, and so I was in the market for new phones - phones for running. When I saw these at the local Apple store I didn't think there was any way they could work, they just sit in your ears, they aren't "plugged" into them in any way.

Brilliant. It's like not wearing phones at all. And the cord runs down the back, instead of bouncing around in the front.

Today's Intake: coffee, cold pizza, juice, vitamin, popsicle, turkey, ham & cheese sandwich (half), small leftover fries (lots of fries in two days ...), Sprite & bourbon

Signed up for the 2006 Subway Challenge Series yesterday. I will be out of town for the first two races, and don't even know if I will be in town to finish it, but after my involvement last year was cut short by my accident, I just had to try it again. Can I squeeze in five races between April 22 and the end of the summer?

Intake

Weight: 171.5 lbs.

Why is this? Why am I not losing any weight? Maybe it is because I have not changed my eating habits since before the holidays.

Yesterday - and this is an informal accounting - I had six cookies and an obscenely large bowl of ice cream. That's in addition to three fried eggs and corn beef hash for lunch. Dinner, and breakfast, I believe, were some version of pizza.

It's amazing I am so slim. I must take account:

Today's intake: Coffee (cream & sugar), bowl of Trix with milk, apple, turkey, ham & cheese sandwich (half), fries, Coke, coffee, fish fry, fries, cole slaw, beer

Distance: 3 miles
Water: yes
Stretches: yes
Weather: Cool & wet

Playlist:
All Things (Keep Getting Better) - Widelife
Burn - Nine Inch Nails
Weapon of Choice - Fatboy Slim
Adult Education - Hall & Oates
Get the Party Started - Pink
Hindi Sad Diamonds - Moulin Rouge Soundtrack
Hounds of Love* - The Futureheads