What’s My Age Again?

My second trip to the physical therapist happened today. The first thing that happened was that the extremely friendly PT assistant came in to do some massage on my IT band. She’s super nice, and talks pretty much non stop and has some good stories. Apparently not that many good stories though, because today she told me all of the exact same stories as last week, verbatum. They were all about her dog. One of the stories was about how her dog likes to drink beer and one time their friend came over with Coors Light and the dog knocked it over and smelled it and then refused to drink it because it was such low quality. This was mostly funny, yet slightly insulting, because I felt like she was just assuming that I don’t thoroughly enjoy Coors Light and similar beers (I do).

The PT was once again primarily helpful in advising me not to go run a million miles. Although today when I went running, I realized that this might not be a problem anymore. In fact, my problem may have reversed into issues of me being in horrible running shape. It’s pretty much impossible to tell though, because I’ve always been bad at running in the heat, so there’s no distinguishing between heat or out-of-shapeness as the potential causes for my slow running and general exhaustion after two miles. I would like to assume it’s the heat, but this may be a problem anyway, since there’s a good chance that during Hood to Coast I may be running in above average temperatures.

I realized I also feel weird running because I’ve been doing all these exercises that work out my weakest muscles, so those muscles are all sore and extra weak feeling now, so my running feels super clumsy and not at all graceful or gazelle like. At least four people in my life have compared my running and/or my legs to gazelles, which is strange to me, because gazelles are such obscure animals. How often do you think about gazelles in every day life? You don’t have to tell me, I know the answer is never. Anyway, today I was thinking about my running in terms of how gazelle-like it was, and I felt that my stride had minimal gazelle qualities. I can now assure you that there is nothing more depressing than going for a run and realizing that you look nothing like a gazelle.

This didn’t turn out quite like I wanted it to, but I spent so much time trying to make a realistic version of a gazelle with my head on it that I didn’t want it to go to waste. I guess it didn’t take that long, but more time than I’d like to admit.

And finally I’d like to tell you about something that has nothing to do with running. Today I started a new job, and the first client I had asked me if I was even old enough to drink, and was then surprised when I said that I am in fact over 21. Somehow I felt slightly insulted. Later I had a client assume I was 28, and again was very surprised to learn my real age. This also slightly insulted me, but the sense of insultion was compounded by the fact that nobody thinks that I’m the age that I am. Even more insultion is happening from my computer telling me that insultion isn’t a word. I guess that means it’s time to wrap things up.

Miles run this week: 3
Miles run in 2010: 448