Rest and Recovery

I woke up dreaming about using a microwave oven to prepare a hot dog. I can't believe that the dream was motivated by actual hunger; I've eaten enough in the past few days to fuel an NFL team, including the coaches. And if the bathroom scales are any indication, I really need to spend a few days eating nothing but items you could find on Carmen Miranda's hat.

But in my dream, I had split the hot dog down the middle so that I could stuff it with ham. I was also planning to cover it with mustard, jalapeños, and sauerkraut. I have no idea why I would dream about sauerkraut; that is not something I ever eat in real life. Jalapeños, sure...a natural hot dog condiment if you ask me, but there's something about sauerkraut that supresses my appetite. Probably the name: I tend to think of Eva Braun (or sometimes Major Hochstetter) when I hear that word.

Toppings aside, the plot point around which the dream revolved wasn't the food, but the preparation. It was a nice summer afternoon, and several of us were trying to get our lunches made between innings of a ballgame. I think we were at Coors Field, but instead of vendor stands on the concourse, there were townhomes with microwave ovens. My dad was using one of them and Regis Philbin had commandeered another, so I was forced to go next door to use the one that was hidden in the dishwasher.

You can imagine the challenges; after all, hot dogs, ham, and buns do not each nuke at the same rate. But I was confident that I'd have found a way to perfectly heat my meal...if I hadn't woken up.

The real surprise isn't that my dad and Reege were hanging out -- I suspect that they'd get a long just fine in real life -- it was that I slept as late as I did this morning. Since there was no urgent work to do at the office yesterday and I still needed to recover from some late night and weekend work on a very frustrating proposal, I came home from work early yesterday. I won't bore you with the details, but I will say that I deeply enjoyed the time I spent at home, and it was all very relaxing. So relaxing, in fact, that I ended up taking a 3-hour nap. When I finally woke up, it was time to head back out to Waterton canyon for the Sheepherders race. Even though my head was still foggy from the nap, I threw on my running gear and boogied out the door.

I had been doing well on my hamstring stretching program...until the late-night proposal work messed me up. I fear that too much uninterrupted computer facetime had caused me to revert to my previous tightness, and that I would find any attempt at running to be marred by the same asymmetrical hobbling affliction as before. Therefore, I wasn't sure I wanted to run at all. But my brother was going to be there, and we had agreed to meet -- so I went out to the canyon anyway.

I arrived in a mellow mood, figuring that I'd just hang around and wait for Pat to finish. But as anybody with a competitive background knows, it's tough to just be a spectator. Especially when you can only see about 100 yards of the racecourse (not much to spectate)...and the weather is gorgeous. And everybody else is running. And really, when you come right down to it, your leg doesn't hurt that badly, and anyway, it's only 3 lousy miles, and you can always walk if you need to.

So when my designated start time arrived, I put my toe on the starting line and took off down the dirt road.

As my recent running history might predict, it wasn't pretty. I finished dead last. And the last mile included several twitches, hitches, and spasms that would make witnesses wonder if I was being intermittently tasered.

The good news is that I burned a few calories. And my legs were loose and my stride was normal for at least a small portion of the run. After all, I actually saw the guy in front of me cross the finish line, so I wasn't that far behind. All hope is not lost; I just have to become positively religious about my stretching and rehab, and not let conditions at the office dictate whether or not I take care of myself. And since you are my friends and supporters, I know that I can count on you to remind me to stop whining and just do my yoga, right?

Hey, thanks. You're swell.

Anyway, Pat ran an excellent race, and was very pleased with his time. Afterwards, we chatted about politics while we ate tacos, and concluded that the world would be a better place if we were the absolute dictators of the universe. But I guess that's not news to anyone, is it? In the meantime, I am continuing to digitize Tanner's piano videos, so I'll leave you with one more for today. If things go as planned, I might have some "fall colors" photos, or maybe even an outdoor video to post by the weekend. Stay tuned, and have a great day!