Making plans (for David.)

You ever have one of those nights when every creak keeps you awake? Yeah. Maybe four hours of sleep. Ridiculous.

Distance: 2.17 miles
Duration: 18:31
Avg Pace: 8:32
Route: Up the road and back.

This is the thing. If I am going to run eight miles, say, 4:30 isn't actually early enough. Because I have to leave the house no later than 5:00 AM in order to return by 6:00 AM. I have to return no later than six because that is when the children wake up and I have to be part of that process.

That means drinking water, eating some kind of breakfast, drinking coffee, suiting up and stretching. And also that one other thing. If I do not do that one other thing in the house, I will need to do it in a bush, say, or an available port-o-john.

I did go to the bathroom when I woke up. But just because it's 5:05 and you haven't left yet, doesn't mean you shouldn't try again. Because since you woke up you had the coffee.

So, anyway, no disaster, except for the waking up at 4:30 so you can run one mile out and back, instead of eight.

Temperature: 75°
Climate: humid
Weight: 157.5 lbs.
Intake: yogurt & granola
Hydration: yes
Water Stop: no
Stretches: yoga (5 min.)

Also, I hit my head on a thick, low-hanging branch while running on the sidewalk in the dark. Other people hit their head all the time. Bald people get to have a visible scab that shows everyone how uncoordinated they are.

Hurry, boy. It's waiting there for you.

So I'm driving with the kids in the backseat and Africa comes on the radio. I ask if they know this song and they don't, so it's time to play Daddy's favorite game, What Year Was This Song Produced?

They think for just a moment before the girl says, "It sounds like something that didn't make it into Animalympics."

Total win.

Distance: 4.27 miles
Avg Pace:  7.56
Route: Forest Hills Run

Still got turned around in Forest Hills, but I think I got it. Ended up at Superior instead of the bridge, which also took me right through a family of geese with their young. You don't want to run past geese with their young.

Next time, if I get it right, this may be my clean 4 mile route.

Temperature: 72°
Climate: humid and damp
Weight:158 lbs. (-2.0)
Intake: fruit yogurt & grape nuts
Hydration: 32 oz.
Stretches: yes

Training begins tomorrow. Hot today, ate properly before heading out but I was tired and hungry by mile three. It didn't help that I felt all turned around.

What's That Lyric?
Africa - Toad-O 

Dellavedova, drink your coffee.

I have been running too long.

Three o'clock is a deadly time for those working in a traditional office setting. Or anywhere, really. When we are in rehearsal for the residency, 3 PM is generally when everyone goes insane and cannot concentrate. When you are at a desk, it generally means your brain falls off.

Yesterday a colleague came into my office around that time and asked if I felt I had any additional energy since I stopped taking sugar. I thought about it a moment and decided, yes, I really do.

In the morning, I used to drink two or three cups of coffee. Without sugar to entice me further, barely finish one. I enjoy coffee, but it's not something I need to have and have a lot of. Hot beverage, tastes good, thanks that's enough.

In the recent past, I might buy another coffee as soon as I get to work. Or one in the afternoon - around 2:30 - or worse yet, a cola. These days, I don't get sleepy. I don't get irritable. I don't need an afternoon pick-me-up, I just keep going.

I don't get tired in the afternoon, I get tired at night like a normal human being. I used to be edgy at night, now I want to go to bed. I think this is a good thing.

Temperature: 36°
Distance: 3.38 miles
Avg Pace: 7.57
Climate: cool but calm
Weight: 161.5 lbs.
From Goal: +1.5

Wednesday Alcohol Units: -0-
Thursday Alcohol Units: 1.0

Thursday was a lesson in control. Opening the door a little can be a dangerous thing. Also, stretching was a daily exercise which was good for me in a number of ways and now I miss it.

The annual playlists were a motivator, and provided a goal which is gone, like training for a race. I have a race to train for ... in 162 days. Now I need to run because I need to keep running. And yesterday it snowed. I am tired of cold. Very, very tired of dull, boring, uninspiring cold.

Man. Don't run for one day and I get all freaking depressed and anxious.

Playlist:  Calvin Harris Radio

Love now.

Your ankles are swollen.

Giant's Causeway, Northern Ireland (2007)

The children are staying with their grandparents in Athens for Spring Break. We are home attending to work. For the past two nights we have been binge watching Mad Men. All that remains is Sunday night's episode, and we will, for the first time, know as much as anyone else. We have finally caught up.

I watched the first episode of Breaking Bad last week. I understand that was very popular.

Temperature: 52°
Distance: 3.38 miles
Avg Pace: 8.06
Climate: Rainy

In college and through my very young adulthood I took coffee black. My wife introduced me to the joys of sugar and cream, and I have been drinking it that way for twenty years. She stopped taking sugar in her years ago, but now I have. I thought it would be rude adjustment, but it's not. I enjoy coffee without any sweetener.

However, not as much, apparently. Without noticing it, I realize I am drinking one cup in the morning. That's it. Not two, as were usual, nor a third once I get to work. I drink water at work. One cup of caffeine, no additional pick-me-up at 3 PM, no soda pop at all.

Not sure if I ever will drink soda pop again. That stuff will kill you.

Baseline: 178.5 lbs.
Today: 165.5 lbs. (-0-)
Goal: 170 lbs.
Ideal: 165 lbs.

Did I mention that my doctor, believing perhaps that I would find it difficult to just stop drinking soda (I just stopped smoking one day, almost 14 years ago and never looked back) actually suggested, in fact encouraged me to drink diet soda? I mean, seriously, she said that's fine.

Not sure what to do with that information. It's ridiculous. 

2007 Playlist
The Moneymaker - Rilo Kiley
Army of Me - Grisbi
Nan You're a Window Shopper - Lily Allen
Certified - Calvin Harris
Cupid Shuffle - Cupid
Stronger - Kanye West
Acceptable In The 80s (Tom Nevis Remix) - Calvin Harris

Mad Men debuted in 2007. Huh.

You got too much soul.

Last night I dreamed I was at a party where I was the least interesting person there. No one wanted to talk to me. Also, I was wearing one of my daughter's bedazzled black hoodies.

Last night I was at an actual party where I was talking to many people, though I cannot account for any interest I may or may not have generated. I spoke with a colleague about his great success in dropping forty-five pounds through the past year.

I knew he had been trying to control his weight, he's been working at that for some time now. What was stunning to me was the recent day where I looked at him and suddenly realized he'd done it. To me, it appeared like he'd done it overnight.

He was so happy, telling me about the day he realized he just had to do something serious and exactly what that was, not just about eating too much, but all the casual drinking, and complete lack of activity. So, he changed his habits. He decided to change them, and here was the result. He looks great.

I mentioned how I have put on more weight than I would like to have, and he politely remarked that I don't show it, I'm too tall, I carry myself tall. That was very nice to hear but it doesn't change the fact that I am in my mid-40s and carrying a tire that as I age becomes increasingly difficult to burn.

As I bounce ideas back and forth inside my head (artistic ideas, you know, we do that) I have considered revising and reviving the marathon play. So many changes in the past five years, I feel that it is not finished. In order to play it, however, I would need to lose twenty pounds. Performing it last in 2011, I was at least that much heavier than when it debuted, and I felt like I was going to have a heart attack one night.

No heart attacks, please.

Temperature: 68°
Distance: 3.25 miles

Sunshiny morning over the Heights, and humid. Feeling good, but breathy. I think this fall the designated beverage at home will be tea, sweet herbal tea. The children have started requesting tea as a regular beverage, and can prepare it themselves. We should make a lot of it at a time and enjoy it all evening.

Sleep has been an issue, all year, all summer long. My sleep patterns have been horrible. Too much caffeine, all day, and any alcohol at all. Friends send me links on meditation and yoga, and perhaps I will visit those articles some day. One thing at a time.

It has been almost a year since I began my experiment in writing, which has been successful beyond imagining. The running happens, but not the races. Four runs in September? It's the second best month for running in the entire year.

The best is, of course, October.

Jane's Getting Serious Playlist
Jane's Getting Serious - Jon Astley
Valerie - Steve Winwood
The Oogum Boogum Song - Brenton Wood
She Bop - Cyndi Lauper
Do You Really Want To Know - George Michael
Save Me - k.d. lang
Straight To My Heart (165 bpm) - Sting

Yes. We are wistful and nostalgic, but also troubled. I wrote a ten-minute play last week. It's either awful or just about an awful thing. We'll read it Thursday and find out which.

I'm ashamed to be running away.

This is my mother.

A certain mental malaise set in yesterday, as I spent the day working rather than playing. A crew had gone to experience the WW&F narrow gauge railroad while I remained behind to read and write, mostly write. And the writing happened. But I also became office-like sedentary, in spite of the majestic ocean view before me, which has remained to this moment in late morning.

The kids are by the water. I am reading and even napping before noon. The nights have been poor for me, waking at least once in the middle of every night, wondering when exactly I will drift back to sleep. It is not the night noises, nor the night air. These things are relaxing. The wife suggests it may be all the caffeine and alcohol. So, what? I am supposed to stop drinking caffeine and alcohol? What kind of vacation is this?

I just miss my bed. And the bed can wait. And rather than waiting any longer, I am going to take a run, because if there's one thing that gets me moving, it is moving.

Temperature: 70°
Distance: 3.8 miles

Bizarre run, full of emotions and thoughts. Passed the girl's L.I. friend on my way out of the cove. She was making her own run, I passed and wished her good luck and put in the headphones.

Trying to figure out two important arguments/plot points for the new work. One splashed into mind, something I can work with, no idea if it were the British '00s pop tunes ... but it may have been. I was about to take a break at the halfway point when Hounds of Love came on, which has a brisk, irresistible BPM.

However, I did pause at the beach on Martin's Point, to drop down and clamber over a few rocks at low tide. Saying good-bye? It's only Monday, but we have been gone so long I feel I should be preparing to leave. I need to stop that, this is my vacation, dammit.

On my way back into the cove I passed L.I. walking. "Good run?" I asked. She said it was, and I appreciated the confirmation.

Pompeii Playlist
Munich - Editors
Giving Up The Gun - Vampire Weekend
Before the Worst - The Script
Hounds of Love * - The Futureheads
She's Long Gone * - The Balck Keys
Houdini - Foster the People
1901 - Phoenix

Woo!

Brisk! Fast! Got a migraine doctor's appointment - gotta run!

Distance: 2 miles
Temperature: 30 degrees
Weight: 156 lbs.

Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Trailblazer (160 BPM)

UPDATE: It is a great feeling to show up for a doctor's appointment an hour after a short run. My blood pressure was fabulous!

A little disturbing, however, to then be asked if I have had an irregular heartbeat. "Uh, no," I said, "why, do I have one now?" The answer was yes, yes I do. Then I was asked if I had been drinking coffee and yes, I had double the dose of caffeine this morning as I polished off the wife's mugs as well as mine. AND they were full-strength servings, as we ran out of decaf it cut it with last week.

Anything to worry about? No, she said. Not if I have been drinking coffee this morning.

Whew. I think.