Saturday

I made a cup of Ethiopian and sipped it while eating an apple and driving to the trailhead. I stopped and got a cup of shitty gas station coffee after finishing my good stuff because my quads were sore from my first flat tempo effort in months and this, this was supposed to be a hilly long run. I choked it down and arrived to a nearly full parking lot.

One baby loop, and I was back at my car. It had only been six miles but for some reason, things never opened up. I never felt fast or slow or much of anything really; there was neither a runner's high nor a runner's low. I sat there and listened to someone on college radio doing a Bob Dylan impression, took that cue and drove to campus.

I ran six more miles around the football stadium, a big empty building with a suspicious amount of Escalades parked out front. I imagined there was some sort of mob meeting going on inside but just kept circuiting the hills anyway, sometimes taking the stairs, sometimes trudging up the grass. I turned and sprinted down, arms out, fingers open, pretending to be Killian Jornet, and then feeling immature since he's less than one year older than me, and shouldn't we leave that shit in grade school?

I know that I ran six more miles after that, all on flat road, but I can't really recall. I know that it happened because I saw my reflection in the windows I went by, and I received that sensation that is unique to seeing and then hating one's own running form. I finished and ate probably too many rice cakes with peanut butter, some berries, an apple, a pear, and then two shots of espresso. Blunted by the sugar I had just ingested, the shots tasted like not very much, which was okay since the shop I purchased them at only usually does a mediocre job.

I went to three bookstores but didn't buy anything, drank an iced tea instead while watching a homeless man do a crossword puzzle.