A Case Western Homecoming race in honor of Stephanie Tubbs Jones - and Josh's first 5K!
Distance: 3.1 miles
Temperature: 55º
Weather: overcast & cool - not miserable.
Start: 8:30 am
Time: 00:42.16
I came in dead last. And yet I came in second in the 40-49 age division. I have a medal to prove it.
The important thing is that Josh, who has never run 5 kilometers in his life, nor run any kind of race at all, can longer say that. I am extremely proud of him, and say that he managed the entire thing without worrying me about his physical safety. He wasn't even very flushed. Piece of cake. A walk in the park. A dash around campus.
Way to go, man.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Weakly
Weekly it is, weekly it must be. I am fatigued, I yearn for sleep every day, my arms have begun to ache when called for exertion. Not kidding, this is how inactive I am when I do not run.
Having said that, it has been an awesome weekend. I have become wildly motivated, and did an awful lot of housecleaning, rearranging - and instead of wasting time on the Internet, I have placed my sketching materials at arm's reach. When my mind is wandering, I pick up the book and go at it, and then return to useful work.
One major event lately has been the writing of a new script, which you can check up on by visiting my new/old blog. I had one for my play THE VAMPYRES, which fell into disuse when that show closed. As the new play is on a similar topic, I just picked up where I left off.
PODRUNNER: LATEST MIX: 172 BPM - “HEAVEN'S GAIT”
The plan, if there were a plan, was the go through all the PODRUNNER mixes starting from the beginning. I think this was just because I was a fan from the beginning, and needed an excuse to listen to the first mixes. However, at the rate of one run per week, I have been daunted by the idea of ever catching up, and I wanted to hear what they sound like today. Today I used the latest mix, which you can download by clicking on the mix title above.
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 45º
Weather: brisk ... yet sweaty.
Having said that, it has been an awesome weekend. I have become wildly motivated, and did an awful lot of housecleaning, rearranging - and instead of wasting time on the Internet, I have placed my sketching materials at arm's reach. When my mind is wandering, I pick up the book and go at it, and then return to useful work.
One major event lately has been the writing of a new script, which you can check up on by visiting my new/old blog. I had one for my play THE VAMPYRES, which fell into disuse when that show closed. As the new play is on a similar topic, I just picked up where I left off.
PODRUNNER: LATEST MIX: 172 BPM - “HEAVEN'S GAIT”
The plan, if there were a plan, was the go through all the PODRUNNER mixes starting from the beginning. I think this was just because I was a fan from the beginning, and needed an excuse to listen to the first mixes. However, at the rate of one run per week, I have been daunted by the idea of ever catching up, and I wanted to hear what they sound like today. Today I used the latest mix, which you can download by clicking on the mix title above.
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 45º
Weather: brisk ... yet sweaty.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Thank you.
Waking up one weekend morning with a headache is a tragedy, but two smacks of carelessness. It's not fair, excuse me for whining, but there was an awful lot of potential in this weekend and I have had little chance to scratch any of it.
I chalk it up to too little sleep and that damn comforter. I hate being cold, or even cool, but during these transitional months is is necessary for me to sleep as chilly as possible or I begin hibernating. Like a bear. Waking up is like swimming upstream through mucous, fog and dirt.
I struggled through the morning, taking an eventual nap ... and then a run. Finally. A run. And finally I was able to clear my head - the true definition of the word brisk, this run. Lawnmowers, campaign signs, foreclosed houses being restored ...
This year began with a great deal of uncertainty and fear, and I am just talking about here at home. Work, school, community, home and art were all in flux. The solid bond of my marriage and relationship with my children was about all I knew were not going to shift beneath my feet. Moving through my community, which nine months ago seemed on the verge of collapse, along with everything else, alive with activity, with repair and maintenance, having at long last a personal connection with so many of them I had never even seen let alone met before.
It's not Thanksgiving yet. But it feels like it. And right I am so thankful my head doesn't hurt.
Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Going Concerns (164 BPM)
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 47º
Weather: as I say, brisk
Weight: 158 lbs.
I chalk it up to too little sleep and that damn comforter. I hate being cold, or even cool, but during these transitional months is is necessary for me to sleep as chilly as possible or I begin hibernating. Like a bear. Waking up is like swimming upstream through mucous, fog and dirt.
I struggled through the morning, taking an eventual nap ... and then a run. Finally. A run. And finally I was able to clear my head - the true definition of the word brisk, this run. Lawnmowers, campaign signs, foreclosed houses being restored ...
This year began with a great deal of uncertainty and fear, and I am just talking about here at home. Work, school, community, home and art were all in flux. The solid bond of my marriage and relationship with my children was about all I knew were not going to shift beneath my feet. Moving through my community, which nine months ago seemed on the verge of collapse, along with everything else, alive with activity, with repair and maintenance, having at long last a personal connection with so many of them I had never even seen let alone met before.
It's not Thanksgiving yet. But it feels like it. And right I am so thankful my head doesn't hurt.
Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Going Concerns (164 BPM)
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 47º
Weather: as I say, brisk
Weight: 158 lbs.
Sunday, October 04, 2009
Remarkable
Friend Tim P. is running the Twin Cities Marathon as we speak. At the halfway point he was keeping a 12 min. mile - very respectable. I could stay in no longer, I needed to get out.
Slight cramp in my right knee partway through, walked for a bit, kept on. Twice a week? Can we shoot for three?
Had an epiphany right at the start, it made my day. That's for all you writers out there, I ran. I wrote, in my head. I will have half a first-draft in good stead in two hours.
How did we spend the morning? Winterizing the house, ending summer, playing. Later I will sketch. This wasn't supposed to be a remarkable day, suddenly it is.
Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Surge (144 BPM)
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 55º
Weather: cool, awesome.
Weight: 157 lbs.
UPDATE: Josh pointed out the last sentence of the first paragraph is misleading. He thinks I actually ran the Twin Cities Marathon with Tim - and that I dropped out halfway through. What I meant was, "Tim's effort has impressed me on this cold fall afternoon - I could no longer stay indoors, I needed to get out onto the streets of Cleveland Heights myself."
Slight cramp in my right knee partway through, walked for a bit, kept on. Twice a week? Can we shoot for three?
Had an epiphany right at the start, it made my day. That's for all you writers out there, I ran. I wrote, in my head. I will have half a first-draft in good stead in two hours.
How did we spend the morning? Winterizing the house, ending summer, playing. Later I will sketch. This wasn't supposed to be a remarkable day, suddenly it is.
Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Surge (144 BPM)
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 55º
Weather: cool, awesome.
Weight: 157 lbs.
UPDATE: Josh pointed out the last sentence of the first paragraph is misleading. He thinks I actually ran the Twin Cities Marathon with Tim - and that I dropped out halfway through. What I meant was, "Tim's effort has impressed me on this cold fall afternoon - I could no longer stay indoors, I needed to get out onto the streets of Cleveland Heights myself."
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Bitter fruit
Not too impressed with the Pomplamoose cover of Single Ladies. I usually trip on stuff like this - disaffected boy-girls singing atonally. Astrid Gilberto. Tracey Thorn (I take that back, Tracey - you've never been atonal.)
But the way this singer can barely get the word "years" out stretches patience, and the bridge is, let's face it, insulting. "Don't make me sing this part of the song - the lyrics are so bad ..?" Funny with a start the first time you hear it, and then you realize how tedious and repetitive the rest of the recording is. Don't make you sing it? Honey, who asked you to cover Beyoncé anyway except you wanted this to go viral.
These f*cking hipsters.
Now thass more like it.
And News Flash - Cleveland got the 2014 Gay Games! Yay, Cleveland! We're not Detroit! We're not Detroit!
And you know what happens when the Gay Games comes to your town? Everyone turns gay!
Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Beats Walking (154 BPM)
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 54º
Weather: rain
Gear: rain jacket, rain hat, shorts - could have used gloves.
Brisk 6 AM run, the weather ... is hurting me. I love fall, I really do, the kids make every day an adventure - school, soccer, homework, Halloween, just everything. But the cool snap closed my right sinus and last night I was a crippled mess.
I slept from nine until eleven after taking medication, felt much better and then I was up for an hour ... and woke at 3 AM and couldn't get back to sleep. By four I was up and around, cleaning dishes, folding laundry, lulling two children back to sleep, reading Dracula ... the wife did not think a run would be a good idea, but I thought it would be worse not to. I'll be sleepy early, but the air did me massive good. So, I believe, did the rain.
Nice bpm. Really slowed me down enough to miss most of the puddles.
But the way this singer can barely get the word "years" out stretches patience, and the bridge is, let's face it, insulting. "Don't make me sing this part of the song - the lyrics are so bad ..?" Funny with a start the first time you hear it, and then you realize how tedious and repetitive the rest of the recording is. Don't make you sing it? Honey, who asked you to cover Beyoncé anyway except you wanted this to go viral.
These f*cking hipsters.
Now thass more like it.
And News Flash - Cleveland got the 2014 Gay Games! Yay, Cleveland! We're not Detroit! We're not Detroit!
And you know what happens when the Gay Games comes to your town? Everyone turns gay!
Listening to: PODRUNNER Classic - Beats Walking (154 BPM)
Distance: 3.25 miles
Temperature: 54º
Weather: rain
Gear: rain jacket, rain hat, shorts - could have used gloves.
Brisk 6 AM run, the weather ... is hurting me. I love fall, I really do, the kids make every day an adventure - school, soccer, homework, Halloween, just everything. But the cool snap closed my right sinus and last night I was a crippled mess.
I slept from nine until eleven after taking medication, felt much better and then I was up for an hour ... and woke at 3 AM and couldn't get back to sleep. By four I was up and around, cleaning dishes, folding laundry, lulling two children back to sleep, reading Dracula ... the wife did not think a run would be a good idea, but I thought it would be worse not to. I'll be sleepy early, but the air did me massive good. So, I believe, did the rain.
Nice bpm. Really slowed me down enough to miss most of the puddles.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Lightning Pains
Distance: 4.25 miles
Weather 69º sunny with big fluffy clouds - gorgeous!
Chunk Style Playlist
Birdhouse In Your Soul - They Might Be Giants
Dry County - The B-52s
The Power - Snap!
She Drives Me Crazy - Fine Young Cannibals
Elephants & Flowers - Prince
Party Machine - Hoodoo Gurus
This Corrosion - The Sisters of Mercy
The things about listening to your record collection from a certain era is ... the songs don't change. Funny. I guess that's the point. "There is no other music."
You know when I was younger, I thought he had a point - that today's music (i.e. in the early 80s) is garbage. I have since come to the conclusion that almost everything on The Big Chill soundtrack is pretty facile, too. That's the thing. The movie is a big, dark joke. A lot of people don't get that joke.
Last week I noticed (minor) deep pain on one side of my back, lower back. The wife said it sounded like a hamstring problem. Right side. I always ache on the right side. Right side lower-back, right side below the shoulder blade.
Yesterday night, it was the outside of my right foot. Up through my right calf and into my right thigh - on the outside. The right side is where my meralgia rests.
Why?
Weather 69º sunny with big fluffy clouds - gorgeous!
Chunk Style Playlist
Birdhouse In Your Soul - They Might Be Giants
Dry County - The B-52s
The Power - Snap!
She Drives Me Crazy - Fine Young Cannibals
Elephants & Flowers - Prince
Party Machine - Hoodoo Gurus
This Corrosion - The Sisters of Mercy
The things about listening to your record collection from a certain era is ... the songs don't change. Funny. I guess that's the point. "There is no other music."
You know when I was younger, I thought he had a point - that today's music (i.e. in the early 80s) is garbage. I have since come to the conclusion that almost everything on The Big Chill soundtrack is pretty facile, too. That's the thing. The movie is a big, dark joke. A lot of people don't get that joke.
Last week I noticed (minor) deep pain on one side of my back, lower back. The wife said it sounded like a hamstring problem. Right side. I always ache on the right side. Right side lower-back, right side below the shoulder blade.
Yesterday night, it was the outside of my right foot. Up through my right calf and into my right thigh - on the outside. The right side is where my meralgia rests.
Why?
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Death By Stereo
It's the big uggh today... though not a bad place to have it. Life has afforded little chance to run. Early mornings, late evenings. And worst of all ... I don't want to. Why? Perhaps because the weather has turned. In fact, that may be a big part of it. When it's hot, and I just can't sleep any long at 5 in the morning, well. Let's go!
When it's cool, however, and you were up until 12 midnight folding laundry, drinking bouron and watching Glee on Hulu, and there's a warm body next to yours who also indluges in the snooze bar. Well. Let's not.
Wednesday night, I couldn't sleep, fretting over the CPAC grant, and Friday night I was up late completeing the thing. Waking at five yesterday all I could think was that, before I had the chance to sleep again, I would need to ride through a long day, pack the car and drive four hours to Athens.
But at least then I would be in Athens. And here I am.
The woke woke me long before I chose because he wanted comapny on the front porch. Morning, coffee, front porch, and heavy rain. Not bad. Not bad at all.
Distance: 4.25 miles
Weather 65º and damp
HEALTH IS OUR GREATEST WEALTH! DILUTE! DILUTE! OK!
Pefect run by the Hocking. Cool and cloudy and student-free. I don't know where they all were, 4 pm is pretty late to be in bed with a hangover but I was running past Sotuh Green.
I always run past South Green. In my mind, I am always running past South Green.
I feel the slackening as days go by without a run. I see it. In my belly, my thighs, I can feel my butt just drop. I look in the mirror and appear puffy and old. The pants stop fitting properly - and fast.
Everything in its right place.
Chunk Style Playlist
World In My Eyes - Depeche Mode
Pump Up The Volume - M/A/R/R/S
Smooth Criminal - Michael Jackson
Doin Da Butt - Gap Band
Don't Wanna Fall In Love - Jane Child
I Wanna Be a Flintstone - Screaming Blue Messiahs
Higher Ground - Red Hot Chili Peppers
Good Times * - INXS & Jimmy Barnes
House of the Rising Sun - Tracy Chapman
End Of The Line * - Traveling Wilburys
Post-run outdoor shower, last of the season (well, until tomorrow.) Dr. Bronner's, steam whips up, pagan thoughts. Ran into someone from school I hadn't seen inwell, since then. Going on eightteen years. Said he remembered I was quite a player. A Player? Moi? But I spent so much time - my entire life - cultivating a sense of neurotic detachment. I just wanted love and acceptance, it wasn't some kind of hustle, that wasn't me ... was it?
See: "Cultivate." Poor me. Charlie Brown. Introspective. So sexy. Player.
Sorry, my mind is everywhere today. Everywhere and nowhere ... there's a dog here, there's always a dog here, usually more than one. I get serious sinus pain, leads to migraines. I have been fighting this all day. The run helped, big time. And it put me into this place of self-examination ... I mean, it usually does, Jesus, just hit the "Athens" label at the bottom of this entry.
I began smoking (if you do not count the sasfrass leaves we dried and crumbled into rolling papers in fifth grade - that put off real ciagrettes for five years) when I was fifteen. One cigarette a day, on average, for three years. When I left for college, that increased to five a day (on average) until I was almost 33. I was never a chain smoker, but I know there were pack a day periods in school, when I was cartooning.
But let's say, to low-ball it, that's over 30,000 cigarettes. How many days did that strip from my life? If I do not develop some kind of tobacco-related cancer, how much strain did that put on my system, how many days lost? My grandfather lived to be 94. Do I get that? 80 years? 70? Does my running make any difference? Do I get to put days back onto the calendar that I destroyed by inhaling smoke?
There's a more poetic way to put that, I am sure there is. On our way out of town last month, Eva invited Kelly and I for brunch at her place in Brooklyn. We talked about many things, including this play. I made mention of the nytheatre review, where Denton says he does not get why I am running, it's not clear. I mentioned the cigarette thing. Eva thought I should put that in, that that might od the trick.
When it's cool, however, and you were up until 12 midnight folding laundry, drinking bouron and watching Glee on Hulu, and there's a warm body next to yours who also indluges in the snooze bar. Well. Let's not.
Wednesday night, I couldn't sleep, fretting over the CPAC grant, and Friday night I was up late completeing the thing. Waking at five yesterday all I could think was that, before I had the chance to sleep again, I would need to ride through a long day, pack the car and drive four hours to Athens.
But at least then I would be in Athens. And here I am.
The woke woke me long before I chose because he wanted comapny on the front porch. Morning, coffee, front porch, and heavy rain. Not bad. Not bad at all.
Distance: 4.25 miles
Weather 65º and damp
HEALTH IS OUR GREATEST WEALTH! DILUTE! DILUTE! OK!
Pefect run by the Hocking. Cool and cloudy and student-free. I don't know where they all were, 4 pm is pretty late to be in bed with a hangover but I was running past Sotuh Green.
I always run past South Green. In my mind, I am always running past South Green.
I feel the slackening as days go by without a run. I see it. In my belly, my thighs, I can feel my butt just drop. I look in the mirror and appear puffy and old. The pants stop fitting properly - and fast.
Everything in its right place.
Chunk Style Playlist
World In My Eyes - Depeche Mode
Pump Up The Volume - M/A/R/R/S
Smooth Criminal - Michael Jackson
Doin Da Butt - Gap Band
Don't Wanna Fall In Love - Jane Child
I Wanna Be a Flintstone - Screaming Blue Messiahs
Higher Ground - Red Hot Chili Peppers
Good Times * - INXS & Jimmy Barnes
House of the Rising Sun - Tracy Chapman
End Of The Line * - Traveling Wilburys
Post-run outdoor shower, last of the season (well, until tomorrow.) Dr. Bronner's, steam whips up, pagan thoughts. Ran into someone from school I hadn't seen inwell, since then. Going on eightteen years. Said he remembered I was quite a player. A Player? Moi? But I spent so much time - my entire life - cultivating a sense of neurotic detachment. I just wanted love and acceptance, it wasn't some kind of hustle, that wasn't me ... was it?
See: "Cultivate." Poor me. Charlie Brown. Introspective. So sexy. Player.
Sorry, my mind is everywhere today. Everywhere and nowhere ... there's a dog here, there's always a dog here, usually more than one. I get serious sinus pain, leads to migraines. I have been fighting this all day. The run helped, big time. And it put me into this place of self-examination ... I mean, it usually does, Jesus, just hit the "Athens" label at the bottom of this entry.
I began smoking (if you do not count the sasfrass leaves we dried and crumbled into rolling papers in fifth grade - that put off real ciagrettes for five years) when I was fifteen. One cigarette a day, on average, for three years. When I left for college, that increased to five a day (on average) until I was almost 33. I was never a chain smoker, but I know there were pack a day periods in school, when I was cartooning.
But let's say, to low-ball it, that's over 30,000 cigarettes. How many days did that strip from my life? If I do not develop some kind of tobacco-related cancer, how much strain did that put on my system, how many days lost? My grandfather lived to be 94. Do I get that? 80 years? 70? Does my running make any difference? Do I get to put days back onto the calendar that I destroyed by inhaling smoke?
There's a more poetic way to put that, I am sure there is. On our way out of town last month, Eva invited Kelly and I for brunch at her place in Brooklyn. We talked about many things, including this play. I made mention of the nytheatre review, where Denton says he does not get why I am running, it's not clear. I mentioned the cigarette thing. Eva thought I should put that in, that that might od the trick.
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