How can I focus on updating this blog when my fantasy baseball team could make the league finals in two days (which would, were it to happen, mean some money for me) and I’ve got a big twelve-mile run to complete tomorrow morning before work? The quick answer is, I can’t focus.
This is the part of my marathon training schedule that’s going to really frustrate me. Next week I’m running a half marathon, and then in two weeks I jump to 15 miles on Saturday, which would be the longest distance I’ve ever run before. And it sucks because my friends all want to hang out on Friday nights and I’m pretty much unable to because the only time I can take my long-runs is on Saturday mornings before work. And, I don’t know about you, but I’m not so good at motivating myself to go out after getting loaded at 6 or 7 o’clock in the morning and running more than ten miles. I’ve done five or six or seven miles hungover before, but that’s been on a day-off from work. I can’t sleep in, nurse my hangover and go for a run on a work day. No joke, I think I’d die if I ever attempted to run ten or fifteen miles with the kinds of hangovers I reward myself with when I booze.
At least it’s starting to cool off in LA. I probably won’t have to run in 85 or 90 degree heat anymore. Which is a shame because I always get a kick out of stepping on the scale before and after a long run to see myself lose five-to-ten pounds in a couple hours. Not getting to see my friends on Friday nights already sucks, and this is the first of ten weeks that I won’t be able to go out on the town and rage with them.
I guess I could always give up on running the marathon. But I wouldn’t feel right doing that just because I’d rather get drunk. Maybe if I injured myself and just happened to return to my life as a semi-functional alcoholic I wouldn’t feel so bad (well, except for the injury…)…Ah, who am I kidding. I guess I can handle my friends calling me a pussy and not respecting me for the next two months. I’m going to run a fucking marathon. What the hell are they doing with their lives? Aside from making more money than me and being more happy with their jobs than me.
I guess the good news is if I’m going to burn close to 1,500 calories tomorrow morning I’m going to have to replace them…and alcohol provides the body with calories, so I can blackout tomorrow after work just like I did last Saturday night!
For now, though, here I sit. Alone in my house. Everyone going out and reveling and boozing and having a good time. But I’m better for staying in, right? RIGHT?
I think I’ll spend the next two hours building up my long run playlist on my iPod.
Oh, and I’m going to update all the Mekong Delta Blues I’ve written over the past two months. These post-its and notebook pages are piling up and I don’t quite have the weird pictures to match with them. So in case you haven’t checked that page in a while, there are lots of silly poems and thinly-veiled metaphors for my sex life for you to read!
Dark Day – Raven’s Wing
September 18th, 2011
As a former hardcore partier/drinker I can tell you that you ARE better for staying in.
I know the pressures of peers and my 20s and probably half my 30s were run by it… Drinking was what I looked forward to and the weekends most especially. Then I realized that weeknight drinking was getting difficult. The hangovers I once defeated with a couple aspirin were far worse and involved not just head but GI tract and generally my whole being. Sometimes they’d keep me out of sorts for several days.
I also realized that while getting faced with friends could be fun, alcohol was a very dumb drug. Higher pursuits like reading or writing did not go with booze. The hours spent drinking were intellectually empty.
I found that opiates allowed me to feel good and still be able to read, to learn. That music sounded better and movies were infinitely more interesting.
I stopped drinking. I now rarely drink and then keep it moderate. I haven’t been drunk in nearly a decade.
Yeah, tolerance is something opiate users need to keep in check and supply isn’t as easy to maintain as booze… especially if, like me, you insist on pharmaceuticals only.
But I prefer this life and I know those closest to me prefer me like this too. No longer am I out late at night, drunk and disorderly. Now I’ve got my interests and hobbies and waste no more time completely blotto OR debilitated by hangover.
Your mileage however may vary.
NP – Julian Cope / Black Sheep