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“Good people drink good beer.” — Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
“Amazing people illegally mail it.” — Me
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It’s a Friday evening. You find yourself without kids, without a car, without a care and without any semblance of a social life that allows you to take advantage of the circumstances. So you do what you try to do whenever you find yourself with nothing to do. You run.
In spite of wearing sunglasses, you continue running away from home as the Sun starts to freefall over the trees on the horizon. You pace out a consistent rhythm on the flats. You walk uphill. You let gravity do the work once you crest the apex. It’s an echo of the distance training you followed months ago.
At times, it feels like you could run for 12 hours straight. Good thing, too. Because that’s exactly what you’ll be doing five weeks from today.
You sign up for ultraruns. It always seems like a good idea at the time, especially when the race is wait-listed. Then a couple of months go by. You get slammed unexpectedly at work, cutting into your training regimen. You have a surgery which leaves you completely runless for a few weeks. Then you get a congratulatory email from the race promoters that your credit card has been charged and you’re in. Then you freak the fuck out, because you’ve eaten nothing but frozen pizza and the occasional Five Guys burger since you signed up. And you may have had a few beers during that time, too.
Originally, you wondered what it would feel like to run for 12 hours. Now, as you make the turn toward home—still wearing sunglasses, even though every car is burning its headlights—you know what it will feel like. It will suck. It will suck a whole fucking lot.
When you hit the trail on that Friday night, you revisit an old friend—an album you’d loved since the first listen, but an album that referenced running far more often than you remembered. Running. To stand still. Down streets with no names. Through God’s country and red hill mining towns. Up hills with one tree. The album itself had run on a loop since you left home.
But in spite of all of the running, it’s the song about falling that sums up your week. For months, you’ve been walking aimlessly. Three weeks ago, you write something. Two weeks ago, you have a good week thanks to it. Somehow, this week was even better. So you ran and you ran and you ran. Then you fell, calling out.
It’s been a pretty goddamn good week.
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DO NOT BE ALARMED WHEN I ASK FOR YOUR THOUGHTS AND PRAYERS AND XANAX
Nobody’s sick. No cancer. No pneumonia. Not even a sniffle.
But I did just hand my car keys to Kid One for the first time and watch her drive off by herself.
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Kid Two’s chorus had its final performance tonight. For most of the show, there were 300 kids on stage. At one point, they all disappeared except for her. I’m pretty proud of her.
(For the few of you who know Kid Two and actually take a few minutes to listen, stick with it. She finds her volume at about :30.)
Six more days and she’s a freshman. <Word that begins with F, G, J or M>!
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RZA & GZA sit down with Bill Murray.
This is beautiful.
I mean, goddamn.
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I’m writing tonight. I needed a reference for a TV medical show. St. Elsewhere and E.R. were antiquated, but I couldn’t think of any other titles. Medical shows were never my thing. But I did remember Dr. McSteamy’s name. Not his actual name. Just the name “Dr. McSteamy.” I couldn’t think of the show, though, so I went over to google.
I began typing in the name. When I got to “Dr. McS-,” google’s predictive search started filling in the blanks for me. It’s first guess?
Dr. McStuffin Toys.
I hesitated for a second, but I had to click it. Right?
Totally not what I was expecting. Kind of disappointed.
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Super-long, super-weird week. Capped off by finding out late yesterday that a thing I wrote at Medium was the main feature on the Harvard Business Review’s weekly internet roundup.
I’m pretty sure that my six roommates in 1992 who voted me “Most Likely to Get Shot” probably never saw this one coming.
(Seriously strange week. Confoundingly odd.)
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(via minorfall)
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I love to fucking laugh.
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- Tell you what: while you’re at it, compose a 750-word essay on why you’re not quite ready to make payments online and include it on a 3-by-5 card (write legibly).
- Be sure to write your 16-digit account number on the 3-by-5 card.
- Still not quite ready to make payments online? How about now?
- Oh, actually we’re gonna need that 16-digit account number on the outside of the envelope too.
- Got any cute photos of your kids? We like to hang them up around the office. Glossy finish, 11x17 or larger recommended (do not fold). Having insufficiently cute kids could delay processing.
- Be sure to write your 16-digit account number on the front of each child before taking photos.
- Last but not least, could you throw in some of those crackers you bought at SAFEWAY INC on 2013 APR 05 (reference no. 55432863L00RY5BZB)? The chicken-flavored ones? Yeah, those.
- Don’t staple or paper clip crackers to the payment slip.
- Maximum check payment amount is $10.00. Excess funds will be applied to a future Not Quite Ready To Make Payments Online Fee in the amount of your check minus ten dollars.
- Be sure to include an audio recording of yourself rapping your 16-digit account number to one or more def beats.
- I mean they taste just like chicken, it’s so weird.
- How about now?
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“Thou shalt not piss on thy ex-wife” isn’t specified in the Ten Commandments, so I think he’s technically still cool with the Big Guy. I’d like to hear his bedtime pep talk, though: “Good night, kids. Don’t forget to pray to Jesus…just not for your bitch-ass mother. Sleep tight.”
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☛ The Boston 1000: What is the Boston 1000?
If you run or know a runner, maybe you could read this or pass it along.
At its heart, the Boston 1000 is simple. Make a personal pledge to run at least 1,000 miles before the start of the 118th Boston Marathon on Patriots’ Day 2014. That’s it. You never need to tell anyone. You don’t need to do anything except keep a running tally of your mileage.
But we hope…
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Fuck you, Holden.
(via abundanceofcalm)
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Pretty sure I’m running the wrong direction.
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Kid’s on her way to prom, and well on her way to making me feel really old.
