The spirit is willing, but the flesh is... bruised.

"The spirit is willing, but the flesh is... bruised."

I posted that on FB and G+ the other day. As I commented, that was in reference to running. I decided to raise the bar the other day. Why not? I can do anything (in my man-pants), right? I'm still young. I'm still immortal. My wife decided that she was going running outside since it was such a nice day. I said I'd join her. I figured, just once around Holmes Puddle. It's not that bad; just two miles.

Two miles can be a really long distance. I've known it in various forms. First, as the Milk Run. In grade school, I was introduced to this run. I think it was a cancer fundraiser of some sort. End result: the entire school, students and staff, ran/walked this two miles and had a lunch-sized carton of milk at the end. Then I got older and it became part of Spring training in gym class. Had to run the Milk Run (3k, approx 2 miles) four times in the semester, or run the Block Run (1k) eight times. I don't like running to begin with, so I'd rather run four times instead of eight. Fast forward to college and my introduction to The Puddle. I don't consider Holmes a lake. I grew up surrounded by real, minimum-one-mile-wide lakes. Calling Holmes a lake would be like calling Kim Kardashian a celebrity; when you know the real thing, you want to call a spade a spade. Now, I've done some stupid things in my time. One of which was walking around Holmes shirtless in the morning after staying up all night. Not my best idea. I think the "I'm going to eat a stack of pancakes, have an energy drink, and a Mountain Dew all in a six hour span or less" idea was better. And let me tell you, it's really weird taking a step and wondering if you're going to fall asleep before you take the next one. My one satisfaction is that the gravel still did not look comfy. Needless to say, that trip around Holmes was two miles times infinity.

Back to the present. Prior to this latest attempt to turn my legs to jello, I have not done any serious distance running since I last ran around The Puddle with my wife. That was sometime last summer. She's been running regularly at the UNL Rec Center. I've been sitting on my ass at home. Guess who's got more stamina. And that's my running history, in brief. Riveting, yes?