A few years back my brother, a couple running buddies and I met for an early morning tempo run.
A tempo run is a mid-distance run in which you target a specific pace and consistently hold it for the entire run. By all indications, we weren’t expecting anything out of the ordinary; it should be a typical, Saturday morning, out-and-back 10 miler on the bike trail. Get a good run in, get back home by 7:30, relax with a cup of coffee and the newspaper while basking in the rich aromatics of the miasma slowly emanating and wafting from my slowly cooling crotchal region.
The quintessential, family-friendly Saturday morning.
Not so easy.
As I drove over to our meeting point a little after 5:30am, I noticed the temperature gauge on my dash said it was already 88 degrees. Bad sign.
Even worse, when I climbed out of the car, I was hit in the face with the sticky weight of unprecedented (and extremely unusual) humidity, like a heavy, face-first Big-Ball bounce on Wipeout. Sacramento gets hot in the summer (regularly over 100-110), but it’s always a dry heat.
Not this morning.
The four of us nervously addressed the brutal atmosphere as we walked the 1/8 of a mile to the trail. Sweat was already pouring down our faces as we discussed our planned paces, the potential need to refuel our water bottles along the way, and how we thought the heat and humidity might affect our performances.
On top of this, my brother was freaked out because there had been some house invasions in his neighborhood the past couple days and the neighbors were getting panicked, completely on edge. Every sound he’d heard throughout the night had been someone trying to break in, and he hadn't slept very well.
My plan? Hold 7:30’s. But holding 7:30’s was an assumption based upon my ideal, nipple-scabbing chill temperature of 30-40 degrees. It was already going to be a struggle at 50-60 degrees (the expected temperature), but 88?!
I readjusted and publicly stated that my goal was 7:30…but I’d be happy with…just finishing.
We all stood together on the trail resetting our watches… 3…2…1…off! Everyone took off at different paces, ensuring we’d each be running alone, but knowing that we’d pass each other near the 5 mile turnaround while offering words of encouragement.
At first, with the wind rushing by and the early morning rustle of rabbits and birds keeping things alive and interesting, I began to rethink my concern. Heat and humidity? No problem.
By the end of mile 1 I looked at my watch: 7:29. Just gotta maintain. But soon after, absolutely drenched in wetness, it felt like I was running underwater. By mile 2, my splits had changed to 7:45, and as I moved into mile 3 I was quickly losing the ability to recognize my surroundings, let alone increase or (heaven forbid) maintain my current pace.
Which is probably why when I ran past the first drinking fountain/longdrop bathroom, it didn’t fully register in my mind that there was paint splattered everywhere: “fucking kids holy crap I’m dying out here why is there paint everywhere no I really am going to die shriveled up like a mummy’s dusty and dehydrated scrotum…”
I pushed on through mile 3 and 4, my pace well beyond 8:00 and slowing toward 8:30 when one by one the three other guys passed me going the other way as I neared the turnaround point, each painfully conveying in their own fleeting fashion how horrific this all was.
I was on the brink of a comatose, dehydrated death when I passed the same drinking fountain/longdrop toilet on the way back, but this time the dozen police/ambulance/firefighters milling about the now yellow-police-tape-surrounded area caught my attention: “dying dying what’s this all about dying dying…”
I stumbled through the final mile out of my head thirsty and hurting, crossing the finish line like Julie Moss in the 1982 Ironman competition…
The other three were already in full conversation, “Did you see?” “Can you believe?” “What happened!?”
Momentarily putting aside our insane fatigue, dehydration and mental instability, we each had our own story to tell about the fountain/longdrop location. Apparently, what I had seen wasn’t paint – it was blood. One of the guys had actually stopped to get a drink and that’s when he noticed that the fountain, the walls of the toilet and the entire surrounding area were splashed with vast amounts of blood. We must have come across it soon after whatever happened, happened.
We found out later that two homeless men had gotten into a knifefight, carnage ensued, one killed and ending up in the bushes near the river. Brutal. I had struggled to survive in the humidity on my run, I couldn’t even imagine trying to survive in that humidity in a knifefight to the death…
Shaken, stinking and drenched to the bone, we slowly made our way back to the cars. I stripped down to my running shorts and nothing else – but even that was an uncomfortable necessity as I made the ten minute ride home. My brother, on the other hand, took it all off – everything - tossing the dripping heap of clothes in the back of his SUV and pulling away with a hoot and a wave.
Heading home commando-style.
Windows open, A/C blasting, crotchal miasma spreading, he drove home in the still early morning sunshine, relieved to have the run behind him and confident of his ability to pull into his garage, close the door, and walk straight into the shower – nakedness a non-issue. Other than an 18-wheeler trucker sitting up high in his cab catching a glimpse of my brother's sweaty junk, what could possibly go wrong?
But as he turned into the neighborhood near his house, a crowd of people standing in the street raised their arms…
STOP.
Holy crap! What in the hell was this throng of frazzled people, completely on edge in the wee hours of the morning doing…? What was going on?! Did this have something to do with the bloody carnage we'd just witnessed not to far away...?
He stopped the car about twenty yards from the group and rolled down the window, “What’s going on?” he asked innocently, trying his best to sound as non-chalant and normal as possible…
“Someone just broke into that house down there,” a guy pointed to a house three down, “and the owner scared him and he ran off. We’re all looking for him…” The guy eyed my brother suspiciously, “Who are you?”
It all ran in front of my brother’s eyes at that moment like a bad episode of Cops: angry mob, looking for the bad guy that had just broken into their house, stumbles upon an unknown car, approach to discover a random, sketchy looking guy driving around, casing the neighborhood, 7 in the morning...
Completely nude.
Dripping wet.
The dozen other neighbors, sensing my brother’s hesitation, started making their way over to his car…
Surely you’ve found yourself in a situation like this…right? Well, maybe not wet, stinky and nude, and surrounded by an angry mob assuming you were a child-molesting, home-invasioning, sick, psychotic lunatic, but, you know: the wrong place at the wrong time?
Survivor is all about the wrong place at the wrong time. What makes it interesting, is that it’s a rare occasion when the person caught in the web of the angry mob actually realizes they’re about to be throttled. Usually it’s a blindside: tar and feathered, dragged from the car, beaten to a pulp, extinguished torch…
Andrea was in the wrong place, wrong time last night. Full dismissal of the competing tribe complete, it was time to start picking off their own, and someone had to provide even the flimsiest of reasons to have the neck exposed. Andrea has a thing for godboy? See ya.
So let’s talk about the godboys for a second.
It is so comforting to learn that with all the turmoil, sickness, poverty, injustice, war, death, love, births, NFL wide receiver accomplishments, last second NBA shots and teenage boys pledging for God’s enduring servitude if they can just get to 2nd base with the braless hottie from Geometry class, that God has instead dedicated His attention to the reality TV show: Survivor.
Well, more specifically, to two contestants on that show: Matt and Mike.
You guys are so frigging special.
Too bad you’ve been voted off a combined 3 times, losers.
Still, their belief is so strong, even I was surprised when Matt’s special someone that came to meet him on the island wasn’t God Himself (alas, it was only his lame brother). Can you say “letdown”? Perhaps God had more pressing matters in a piece of toast soon to be listed on Craigslist Tijuana…
And Mike? How fortunate that he learned from the bible just moments before the challenge that God wanted him to break some tiles with a ball in some hokey, meaningless game in order to continue living on a desert island purely to line the pockets of CBS and its advertisers! (What was that biblical passage again? Summerseve 5:16?)
Oops, sorry, how dare I misrepresent Mike’s deeper religious connection! My apologies to all. It wasn’t that God wanted him to make good TV, it was that God wanted him to win a million dollars!
How very Jesus-like!
When my youngest daughter was 3 years old, we went to the funeral of the priest at my parent’s church who was beloved by the community. We holed up in the kids annex where we could hear the ceremony, but the noise of the kids didn’t disturb the rest of the standing-room only congregation.
About halfway through, McKenna had to go to the bathroom, so I picked her up, told her she needed to be completely quiet, and walked into the church, hugging the side wall all the way to the back where we could exit to the toilets. The ceremony droned tonelessly on on as we plodded down the thin purple carpet.
As we walked past the endless stunning stainglass windows lining the wall, McKenna suddenly saw the Stations of the Cross statues on the pillars in between.
“Daddy!” she whispered. I ignored her.
“Daddy!” she said louder, thinking I hadn’t heard her. Wanting to keep her quiet, I mouthed, “What?”
She pointed to one of the statues, and, thinking that my silent response meant that I couldn’t hear too well, shouted, “BUDDHA!!!”
It echoed throughout the giant holy space, “BUDDHA-OODA-OODA-OODA-OODA-OODA!”
Clearly, she had associated the word, “Buddha” with “statue,” as we had a small Buddha garden in the backyard and she didn’t understand the difference.
But the shocked looks from some of the people…wow. It was like we had let out an evil fart or something…
The point is this: get off your high horses, Matt and Mike.
You’re on a reality TV show. You’re playing for money and fame. If God was really talking to you, He’d be saying, “What the Hell are you doing wasting your time with this drivel? Get out there and help some poor people. Got it? OK, now, gotta get back to that teenager in Geometry class…”
Nobody's special here. Except maybe Rob.
And me. Oh, did I forget to mention that God told me how fantastic I was about predicting Phil's final tribal council speech and strategy?
Hey...do you suddenly smell something evil...?
Until next week,
PB
A tempo run is a mid-distance run in which you target a specific pace and consistently hold it for the entire run. By all indications, we weren’t expecting anything out of the ordinary; it should be a typical, Saturday morning, out-and-back 10 miler on the bike trail. Get a good run in, get back home by 7:30, relax with a cup of coffee and the newspaper while basking in the rich aromatics of the miasma slowly emanating and wafting from my slowly cooling crotchal region.
The quintessential, family-friendly Saturday morning.
Not so easy.
As I drove over to our meeting point a little after 5:30am, I noticed the temperature gauge on my dash said it was already 88 degrees. Bad sign.
Even worse, when I climbed out of the car, I was hit in the face with the sticky weight of unprecedented (and extremely unusual) humidity, like a heavy, face-first Big-Ball bounce on Wipeout. Sacramento gets hot in the summer (regularly over 100-110), but it’s always a dry heat.
Not this morning.
The four of us nervously addressed the brutal atmosphere as we walked the 1/8 of a mile to the trail. Sweat was already pouring down our faces as we discussed our planned paces, the potential need to refuel our water bottles along the way, and how we thought the heat and humidity might affect our performances.
On top of this, my brother was freaked out because there had been some house invasions in his neighborhood the past couple days and the neighbors were getting panicked, completely on edge. Every sound he’d heard throughout the night had been someone trying to break in, and he hadn't slept very well.
My plan? Hold 7:30’s. But holding 7:30’s was an assumption based upon my ideal, nipple-scabbing chill temperature of 30-40 degrees. It was already going to be a struggle at 50-60 degrees (the expected temperature), but 88?!
I readjusted and publicly stated that my goal was 7:30…but I’d be happy with…just finishing.
We all stood together on the trail resetting our watches… 3…2…1…off! Everyone took off at different paces, ensuring we’d each be running alone, but knowing that we’d pass each other near the 5 mile turnaround while offering words of encouragement.
At first, with the wind rushing by and the early morning rustle of rabbits and birds keeping things alive and interesting, I began to rethink my concern. Heat and humidity? No problem.
By the end of mile 1 I looked at my watch: 7:29. Just gotta maintain. But soon after, absolutely drenched in wetness, it felt like I was running underwater. By mile 2, my splits had changed to 7:45, and as I moved into mile 3 I was quickly losing the ability to recognize my surroundings, let alone increase or (heaven forbid) maintain my current pace.
Which is probably why when I ran past the first drinking fountain/longdrop bathroom, it didn’t fully register in my mind that there was paint splattered everywhere: “fucking kids holy crap I’m dying out here why is there paint everywhere no I really am going to die shriveled up like a mummy’s dusty and dehydrated scrotum…”
I pushed on through mile 3 and 4, my pace well beyond 8:00 and slowing toward 8:30 when one by one the three other guys passed me going the other way as I neared the turnaround point, each painfully conveying in their own fleeting fashion how horrific this all was.
I was on the brink of a comatose, dehydrated death when I passed the same drinking fountain/longdrop toilet on the way back, but this time the dozen police/ambulance/firefighters milling about the now yellow-police-tape-surrounded area caught my attention: “dying dying what’s this all about dying dying…”
I stumbled through the final mile out of my head thirsty and hurting, crossing the finish line like Julie Moss in the 1982 Ironman competition…
Actual photo of me on the run...
The other three were already in full conversation, “Did you see?” “Can you believe?” “What happened!?”
Momentarily putting aside our insane fatigue, dehydration and mental instability, we each had our own story to tell about the fountain/longdrop location. Apparently, what I had seen wasn’t paint – it was blood. One of the guys had actually stopped to get a drink and that’s when he noticed that the fountain, the walls of the toilet and the entire surrounding area were splashed with vast amounts of blood. We must have come across it soon after whatever happened, happened.
We found out later that two homeless men had gotten into a knifefight, carnage ensued, one killed and ending up in the bushes near the river. Brutal. I had struggled to survive in the humidity on my run, I couldn’t even imagine trying to survive in that humidity in a knifefight to the death…
Shaken, stinking and drenched to the bone, we slowly made our way back to the cars. I stripped down to my running shorts and nothing else – but even that was an uncomfortable necessity as I made the ten minute ride home. My brother, on the other hand, took it all off – everything - tossing the dripping heap of clothes in the back of his SUV and pulling away with a hoot and a wave.
Heading home commando-style.
Windows open, A/C blasting, crotchal miasma spreading, he drove home in the still early morning sunshine, relieved to have the run behind him and confident of his ability to pull into his garage, close the door, and walk straight into the shower – nakedness a non-issue. Other than an 18-wheeler trucker sitting up high in his cab catching a glimpse of my brother's sweaty junk, what could possibly go wrong?
But as he turned into the neighborhood near his house, a crowd of people standing in the street raised their arms…
STOP.
Holy crap! What in the hell was this throng of frazzled people, completely on edge in the wee hours of the morning doing…? What was going on?! Did this have something to do with the bloody carnage we'd just witnessed not to far away...?
He stopped the car about twenty yards from the group and rolled down the window, “What’s going on?” he asked innocently, trying his best to sound as non-chalant and normal as possible…
“Someone just broke into that house down there,” a guy pointed to a house three down, “and the owner scared him and he ran off. We’re all looking for him…” The guy eyed my brother suspiciously, “Who are you?”
It all ran in front of my brother’s eyes at that moment like a bad episode of Cops: angry mob, looking for the bad guy that had just broken into their house, stumbles upon an unknown car, approach to discover a random, sketchy looking guy driving around, casing the neighborhood, 7 in the morning...
Completely nude.
Dripping wet.
The dozen other neighbors, sensing my brother’s hesitation, started making their way over to his car…
Surely you’ve found yourself in a situation like this…right? Well, maybe not wet, stinky and nude, and surrounded by an angry mob assuming you were a child-molesting, home-invasioning, sick, psychotic lunatic, but, you know: the wrong place at the wrong time?
Survivor is all about the wrong place at the wrong time. What makes it interesting, is that it’s a rare occasion when the person caught in the web of the angry mob actually realizes they’re about to be throttled. Usually it’s a blindside: tar and feathered, dragged from the car, beaten to a pulp, extinguished torch…
Andrea was in the wrong place, wrong time last night. Full dismissal of the competing tribe complete, it was time to start picking off their own, and someone had to provide even the flimsiest of reasons to have the neck exposed. Andrea has a thing for godboy? See ya.
So let’s talk about the godboys for a second.
It is so comforting to learn that with all the turmoil, sickness, poverty, injustice, war, death, love, births, NFL wide receiver accomplishments, last second NBA shots and teenage boys pledging for God’s enduring servitude if they can just get to 2nd base with the braless hottie from Geometry class, that God has instead dedicated His attention to the reality TV show: Survivor.
Well, more specifically, to two contestants on that show: Matt and Mike.
You guys are so frigging special.
Too bad you’ve been voted off a combined 3 times, losers.
Still, their belief is so strong, even I was surprised when Matt’s special someone that came to meet him on the island wasn’t God Himself (alas, it was only his lame brother). Can you say “letdown”? Perhaps God had more pressing matters in a piece of toast soon to be listed on Craigslist Tijuana…
And Mike? How fortunate that he learned from the bible just moments before the challenge that God wanted him to break some tiles with a ball in some hokey, meaningless game in order to continue living on a desert island purely to line the pockets of CBS and its advertisers! (What was that biblical passage again? Summerseve 5:16?)
Oops, sorry, how dare I misrepresent Mike’s deeper religious connection! My apologies to all. It wasn’t that God wanted him to make good TV, it was that God wanted him to win a million dollars!
How very Jesus-like!
When my youngest daughter was 3 years old, we went to the funeral of the priest at my parent’s church who was beloved by the community. We holed up in the kids annex where we could hear the ceremony, but the noise of the kids didn’t disturb the rest of the standing-room only congregation.
About halfway through, McKenna had to go to the bathroom, so I picked her up, told her she needed to be completely quiet, and walked into the church, hugging the side wall all the way to the back where we could exit to the toilets. The ceremony droned tonelessly on on as we plodded down the thin purple carpet.
As we walked past the endless stunning stainglass windows lining the wall, McKenna suddenly saw the Stations of the Cross statues on the pillars in between.
“Daddy!” she whispered. I ignored her.
“Daddy!” she said louder, thinking I hadn’t heard her. Wanting to keep her quiet, I mouthed, “What?”
She pointed to one of the statues, and, thinking that my silent response meant that I couldn’t hear too well, shouted, “BUDDHA!!!”
It echoed throughout the giant holy space, “BUDDHA-OODA-OODA-OODA-OODA-OODA!”
Clearly, she had associated the word, “Buddha” with “statue,” as we had a small Buddha garden in the backyard and she didn’t understand the difference.
But the shocked looks from some of the people…wow. It was like we had let out an evil fart or something…
The point is this: get off your high horses, Matt and Mike.
You’re on a reality TV show. You’re playing for money and fame. If God was really talking to you, He’d be saying, “What the Hell are you doing wasting your time with this drivel? Get out there and help some poor people. Got it? OK, now, gotta get back to that teenager in Geometry class…”
Nobody's special here. Except maybe Rob.
And me. Oh, did I forget to mention that God told me how fantastic I was about predicting Phil's final tribal council speech and strategy?
Hey...do you suddenly smell something evil...?
Until next week,
PB
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