SWEATING LIKE A HOMO EATING A HOT DOG

My baby brother is currently overseas doing dangerous things in dangerous countries and it is very difficult not to miss him and worry at a level that almost completely annihilates the ability to function somewhat normally in the everyday.  And so I do the only thing I know to do.  I run.  A passion we both share, wearing his shorts and listening to his music.  And as my tears mix with my sweat I know he will be ok.  He is too loved to tolerate any other alternative.

Don’t fret, it’s not the first time I’ve cried while running.  I mentioned in Tsunami Evacuation Route that I find running cathartic, and the release can sometimes result in tears.  You can get away with crying while you run if you’re a ginga (redhead) like me.  Because it doesn’t matter if it’s 100% humidity and I’m sweating like a homo eating a hot dog, or if it’s the middle of a New York winter and I’m barely avoiding hypothermia, I will still get red in the face when I run.  And since a red face is a standard by-product of a ginga in tears (I am no Demi Moore in Ghost) I am under the illusion that the people I pass will just assume I’m really exerting myself. 

Which is good, because there may yet be tears on marathon day, as I’ve identified a few more obstacles that may stand between me and the finish line.  (These are in addition to the ones mentioned in Ye Old Hills Hoist).

1.  My knees.

They’re not the toughest things I own so I take glucosamine tablets and try to do yoga once a week to help them out.  But Haruki Murakami has me running scared – pardon the pun – as I read in his memoir “What I Talk About When I Talk About Running” that with each step I take I am pounding down three times my body weight onto my poor little knees.  This does not sound very good at all.

2.  What if I make up the 1% per every 100 000 runners who actually dies while running a marathon?  The odds are in my favour I realise, but for some reason I’m giving far more credence to this subject than common sense should allow.

This is the problem with long runs.  They give you too much time to think.