18. Running, weather, potential and realized calamities, wide-angle lens

A. Dog On The Run

This morning as I hobbled to work (in the light! today was 2 minutes and 42 seconds longer than yesterday!) I saw a loose dog, always a worrying sight. Loose dogs always run like they know where they're going, but they really don't know where they're going and they often end up changing course and veering out into the road with no warning. Last year I apprehended two loose dogs and returned them to their owners - one of them was my favorite dog in the neighborhood who never barked and always jumped up on the fence for me to pet him when I walked by. He was running towards the interstate on-ramp. The other dog was some wandering retriever I found running towards the river. I don't know what happened to that dog renegade this morning - it was black and fuzzy and running with its head down and determined, heading south on the sidewalk on Higgins. I hope it didn't run onto the street. Higgins is stupid busy - why do so many people drive?

B. Hobble and malarkey

I was hobbling because I have a blister the size of the Great Lakes, if my foot is America. Because I am a lady I will not discuss how I have had to repeatedly lance this very large blister, and I will not discuss the surprising amount of fluid that seeps out every time I lance it - such details should remain the purview of people like my dad who look back with fondness on halcyon days of working as medics in the Navy and participating in surgeries on hemorrhoids and popped-out eyeballs. Ladies such as myself do not mention unmentionables like this. Instead of all the horrid details - so horrid you would squirm - suffice it to say, I have a blister on the bottom of my foot, and I limp.

And I have a race tomorrow morning. Will I be able to run? Will my archrival be at this race? Can you hobble and run at the same time? What if my enormous blister pops during the race and swamps my shoe with ooze? If I get a slow time, and I probably will, can I blame it on the blister? Will people be sympathetic to that? These are all questions I will have answers for before 10:30 tomorrow morning.

C. Weather

Here's how the winter's been in Missoula: it was warm, and then it was very cold, and then it was warm, and then it was cold again, and now it's warm again. I'm kind of done with winter. It's not wintery anymore and I don't care about it. My house is warm, my heating bill is low, each day is longer than yesterday. Last winter seemed really long and dark and horrible - I started my job in January and it seemed like I walked to and from work in thick darkness for months and months. But this winter, here it is still January and I walk to work in blazing pre-sunrise daylight and see sunsets after work. Is it because I've moved to a more southerly location? It's a different climate on the south side of the river, for sure, but I didn't know daylight hours would be so different. Well gee.

D. Calendrical forecast

Unless I am wrong, and I am never wrong, I will be spending the next few weeks in darkened theaters watching movies. When I emerge at the end of February it will almost officially be springtime. In addition to the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, there is a series showing on campus that will be very enjoyable. I always go to these campus film serieses thinking they'll be good and they end up being not good - a French film series, for example - you'd think a French film series would be enjoyable, wouldn't you? But no, it wasn't at all, and one of the films was so bad it gave me a two-day headache. A Japanese film series - that would be interesting, right? But no, it wasn't. So bad. So disappointing. I nearly despaired of ever seeing a good film series again. But this upcoming series is a classic film series and it will be rad. I will buy candy, maybe popcorn.

E. Desires

All I want is a wide-angle lens, for my Canon or my Argus. Is that too much to ask? I want other things too, but there are too many to list here.

17. Weather, running, senselessness.

In Missoula this month for no reason at all it's incredibly springlike. There is still snow on the ground and ice on the streets but my dad says he saw robins last week. Yes that was in Idaho and not in Missoula but same difference. My point is, it's unseasonably warm. I am unseasonably warm. Every night I wake up at 3 a.m. sweating. I wear extra clothes to work out of habit and every afternoon at 3 I'm sweating. It gets up to 80 degrees in my office, for no reason at all.

This month's unseasonable springishness is startling because last month was cold, unseasonably cold - colder, they were saying, than it's ever been anywhere. Ever. One day I walked to work and it was so many degrees below zero every single thermometer in the state had broken. It was so cold ducks were freezing and falling out of the sky with nary a quack. Do you know why our tears are salty? It's so our eyeballs don't freeze. I made that up but I'm sure it's true.

I have gotten a membership at the campus rec center for no reason at all. Or, rather, I had one reason - the weather/darkness/general terribleness of outside - which became moot when it turned so springlike, is what I'm saying. Know what I'm saying?

What I'm saying is, I've started running again, inside, on a tiny track. You have to go around 10 times to go a mile. It's almost dizzying, or would be if I went any faster. It's hard to keep track of the number of laps. I use the chron on my watch, it's what it was born to do. Running on a tiny indoor track is boring and almost claustrophobic, and there are too many people, but at least it's something, right? Am I right?

For no reason at all, I went to a talk last night about the marathon. I've done it, or, I've done the half, every single year the Missoula Marathon has been in existence (two), and so I totally already know everything there is to know about it, and about running in general. And I was already excited about the beginning of another running season, so there was no reason for me to go to the talk last night, no reason at all. But the talk made me so excited I went home and wrote in my journal (a.k.a. diary) and underlined words and used multitudinous exclamation points.

The training group starts at the beginning of March. Last year I also did the Snow Joke Half Marathon training group, which started in January and led right into the Missoula Marathon training group in March. The Snow Joke training is what is not happening this year, as expounded upon previously, and so I am footloose and fancy-free until March.

The training program last spring was tough but it was great, and the results were so great that now I don't even think about how tough it was, I just think about how great it was. Here, you see, I had just finished the big race in July and was walking over to Anders, our coach, who was right there cheering everyone on, who gave me a hug even though I was slightly sweaty (only slightly, because I am a lady). And not to be weird or pathetic but that was one of the high points in my life, those few seconds right around when that picture was taken. I almost asked for a copy of that photo for Christmas because it still makes me kind of giddy to look at. Instead, I asked for a copy of this incredible photo (please note the water droplets suspended in mid-air awesomeness).

So, like, totally looking forward to formal training again. Etc.

In other news, tomorrow on my radio show I'm going to play bands that start with V. Benjamin Franklin, that son of a bitch, is still in England. Length of day tomorrow will be 1 minute and 53 seconds longer than today.

16. Status and progress report, 1-8 January 2009

Resolution Area #1: Have not had drip coffee in two (2) weeks. Ostensibly, progress on this front is significant and commendable. However, the unstated intention of this resolution was to drink significantly less coffee, and while that is technically true, I have been going to the market for lattes like three times a week (during four-day work weeks), which is silly and is a trend that cannot be continued, although, to be fair to myself and everyone involved, last week there was a guy working at the market who was nice, new, and bored, who gave me multiple stamps on my card multiple times, so it would have been stupid and improvident not to be getting lattes, know what I'm saying? I got my free one on Tuesday (because Monday I was out sick!)! I really needed a free latte on Tuesday because I was terribly moony and lattes combat moonishness. By 'moony' I mean I looked like the moon, and my head was all... moony. 'moony' is a real word.

Resolution Area #2: Very good progress made, good job.

Resolution Area #3: Nothing to report.

Running: Miles logged so far this year: 0. Running group? Not happening! I am devastated! My friend June and I are going to do our own running group but it's not the same! After the half marathon in December I decided I wasn't going to do any runs longer than 3 miles for the rest of the month, and I stuck with that decision so well I ended up not doing any runs longer than 0 miles for the rest of the month. I feel fine.

Weather: It's spring! Tomorrow will be 1 minute and 33 seconds longer than today! Missoula is full of water and ice, tiny lakes at the four corners of every intersection. Take care while walking and driving.

Food: I have been getting incredible deals at Safeway. Everyone is invited to my house for dinner, or for tea, whichever you'd prefer. (Please choose tea, I don't cook.)

Deers: What are they doing? They're all over the place, even in my new front yard. Don't they know it's dangerous? Morons!

2009 Year In Review (in progress): I have been sleeping with the light on. I have started reading The Poisonwood Bible, which my sister loaned me three years ago in Costa Rica. It flew back to Seattle with me, unread, it moved to Missoula with me, unread, a few days ago my hand picked it up to put in the to-be-donated box, but then my head changed its mind. In truth, I'm only reading it to avoid that prolific bastard Benjamin Franklin, whose phantasmagorically boring biography I've been reading since 2002. Today I made the alarming discovery that what I think of as a tuba is actually a sousaphone! Descended from the helicon! I think I'll make lasagna on Sunday.

And now, please to enjoy song I've been listening unceasingly now two weeks.