Kyoto, Japan

Kyoto, Japan, at 8 a.m. on a sunday 

spoken by my friend Anne, writer of the TunaToast blog, back in February: hey, you want to go to Japan? i have a friend looking for journalists to cover an event there, and it’s probably something you can do for GEEK.

me: hell, yes, i want to go to Japan! is that a question with more than one answer? what do i need to do to make it happen?

Anne: figured you’d be an easy sell. i’ll send you an email with the info.

emails were sent, possibilities were discussed, two tickets were requested (one for me as the writer, the other for Tico as the photojournalist), the conversation stalled, follow-up emails went unanswered, hopes were dashed and then ultimately forgotten.

then came the reversal about six weeks ago: the request was approved by the organizers of the event, who were flying out a handful of journalists from all over the globe to cover a two-night Japanese pop music event called Japan Night, to be held at Tokyo’s National Olympic Stadium, which would be torn down and rebuilt soon after to accommodate the 2020 Summer Olympics. as this was a Big Fucking Deal for the country, some international exposure was needed. somehow, Tico and i managed to worm our way through the cracks.


a lion-dog guards a temple in Kyoto

“wait, what?” Tico and i said to Anne and each other while scratching our heads. “we’re going to Japan?” that question mark quickly turned into several exclamation points as reality sunk in, prompting plenty of happy scrambling on our parts to make it happen. then, during the entire last week of May, Japan happened. and it was FUCKING GLORIOUS.

i’m going to preface this by saying {spoiler alert} this post is one endless brag. and not even a humblebrag, just a straightforward, shameless, taunting, self-congratulatory, hands-in-the-air-suckas brag. but to add some counterbalance, this wasn’t entirely an all-expenses paid trip. the organizers of Japan Night covered the flight and five nights at a Tokyo hotel, which was, admittedly, the lion’s share of the cost. breakfast at the hotel was also included, though i wish it weren’t because i’m pretty sure that’s where i got a violent case of food poisoning (to be complained about in the next post).

but as far as transportation, other meals, tickets to events and attractions and hotel the first two nights of our trip, it was all out of pocket and all very PRICEY, as Japan is pricier than New York. as this trip came on the heels of a mini remodel project (also to be complained about in a future post), i wasn’t expecting this expense and am now patiently awaiting thank-you cards from my various creditors.


alleyway in Kyoto

after a relatively smooth 11-hour flight, Tico and i arrived at the Narita airport on a Saturday afternoon and were surprised to see organizers from the event greet us by yelling “GEEK magazine,” which made us feel very official, a stark contrast to how we looked and felt. the organizers kindly helped us board a train to Tokyo’s city center, where we got lost after getting off the train and enjoyed a quick meal of yakitori (roasted food on skewers) ordered via iPad and based solely on photos that taught me the important lesson that while liver and beef look very much alike in a photo, they do not taste alike at all. then we did something incredibly stupid.


makeupless, humorless and jetlagged in the Shinjuku area hours after arriving in Tokyo.

after dinner, we boarded an overnight bus to Kyoto. while visiting Kyoto was not a dumb move, as we heard only awesome things about it and wanted to see as much of the country as possible, taking an 8-hour bus ride on the heels of an 11-hour flight, with luggage and gear carried on aching tailbones and sore backs, was Darwin Award-level stupidity. when we finally did arrive, at 6am, after another night of struggling to sleep while sitting upright, we begged for an early check-in at the Super Hotel so we could finally shower and lie horizontally for the first time in two days, but were allowed only to store our stuff until check-in at 3pm.


“weakly radioactive water quality”?

our hotel, like many others in Kyoto, had an “onsen,” which is a natural hot springs and spa. though we were assured by the hotel manager that this was a poor translation and that nothing in the pools was radioactive or related to the nuclear meltdown at Fukushima (several hundred miles away), we still decided to pass.

then we dumped our stuff and threw water on our faces before proceeding to enjoy (maybe “endure” is more like it) a day of shrine-hopping in punishing heat and stifling humidity. the shrines were oh-so-spiritual and shit, but after the third one, i was over it. thankfully, we found a farmers market (conveniently held at a temple) to break up the monotony and provide a sample of local flavor. and we sampled the hell out of their samples, while also doing a bit of shopping and downing coffee drinks to stay awake.


area to wash hands before approaching the temple.


photographing Tico photographing a temple. i’m original like that.


at the start of the line was a bell, which folks rang to awaken their ancestors. i thought of ringing it, too, until i realized my ancestors didn’t live/die nearby and i probably shouldn’t be the kind of tourist who tried to appropriate local culture. then i rubbed my belly and yawned.   


outside of each shrine stood a giant “torii” that signified the area as a place of worship. clearly, this one was also a place of commerce.

the farmers market: HOLY SASHIMI! i had never seen one so vast before. not only did it have the standard food, clothes and jewelry stands, but also antiques, instruments, insects frozen in amber, goldfish for kids, carnival games, kabuki masks, dishes, books and all manner of knickknacks that probably made it more flea than farmers market. Tico bought a robe for 10 bucks and i bought a bunch of native seeds for the garden. bok choy for years!


his dried fruit was delicious. i bought a pound and finished it in an hour.


boiled, beautiful Oden


cashier tallies up my seeds purchase on a wooden abacus. like a boss.


i considered donning a few disguises so i could come back here all day to try the salmon sashimi samples. 


i should have bought a few of these but felt too lazy to carry them around all day.

Kyoto was one of the only cities not bombed to smithereens in the second world war, so it’s old and intact. it’s also sizable, with a population of just under 1.5 million and a temple count of about 2,000. most temples are buddhist but some cater to the shinto religion as well. many of them are world cultural heritage sites with the most impeccable gardens you’ve ever seen. seriously, not a single leaf was out of place. i had major garden envy the whole time and asked Tico to take some cuttings so we could replicate our own zen garden back home. he reminded me there were Japanese gardens in Los Angeles and then suggested i drink more coffee. 


think i could sell this as a postcard?

the Golden Pavillion, or Kinkaku-ji (the “kinky temple,” as i like to call it) is plated in gold leaf. it’s clearly the hotness, meant both literally and figuratively as the heat that day mingled with the huge sunday crowd and worsening sunburn and two-day-old sweat and yuck. i know we should have been marveling at its singular beauty, as it’s one of the most exquisite structures in the world, but we lasted 10 minutes before ditching it. 


but not before taking the requisite romantical selfie, which is my current facebook profile picture. (awww, aren’t we the cutest patootest? ok, enough of that.)


lunchtime here, where we enjoyed grade A+++ quality kobe beef. no patty melts here! (note: clearly, i suspended my pescetarianism in Japan, because the food, oh my god, the food was so amazing. i have since resumed it since returning stateside. thank you for not judging.)

the highlight of the first day for me was visiting the rock garden at Ryoan-ji, another world heritage site. without getting too LA asshole about it, it’s a zen meditation site where a monk laid a bunch of rocks of various sizes among pebbles after finding enlightenment. people sit and stare at those rocks, presumably for hours, maybe even years, in search of their own enlightenment. we arrived about 20 minutes before they closed so i had to find nirvana (and a toilet) fast.


rock garden at Ryoan-ji Temple, an example of Japanese kare-sansui (“dry landscape”).


i think this might be the most japanese picture i took on this trip.


well, they were super cute.


this monk about to get on his scooter is also super cute.

i’m sure i might have come to a different conclusion if i had years to stare at it, but after lying alongside the rocks to stretch my back, i ranted to Tico about the white space representing the mundane that we swim in every day and the rocks representing the big events that define our lives, with the biggest one bookended by two smaller rocks (our birth and parents) and other groupings to signify the clusterfucks in life that give us direction. he listened thoughtfully, probably while trying not to yawn, before saying, “that was profound, honey. should we go back to the hotel? we can finally check-in and shower.”


you see what i see, right? easy as harakiri!


en route to the hotel, we got lost among Kyoto’s cute streets and alleyways. 


i love this guy!

when we finally arrived at the hotel, we peeled off our smelly clothing to examine our new sunburns, mystery rashes and travel bruises before respectively enjoying The Shower to End All Showers, taken in a stacked-on-top-of-itself bathroom where you could literally use the toilet, wash your face and soak your feet in the shower stall all at once. after a quick nap, we walked around for an hour near the hotel, devoured perfectly prepared 7/11 food (no slurpies there) and then slept the sleep of 1,000 dead villagers before getting up for another action-packed day.


Karasuma street, a main thoroughfare very close to our hotel. an hour later, it would be packed full of cars and people. 


taken near the Togetsukyo (“moon crossing”) bridge, on the western outskirts of Kyoto, in the most beautiful place we visited while in Japan: Arashiyama. 

we enjoyed the 2nd day in Kyoto far more than the first given the night of rest and rainstorm that helped break up the heat. when planning the trip, Tico had really wanted to go to Jigokindani in the Nagano prefecture, where Japan’s snow monkeys sit in a hot tub, as shown in the opening scene of the film Baraka. but that was too far from Tokyo and several friends urged us toward Kyoto instead, which had a snow monkey park of its own: Iwatayama Monkey Park. on the second day, we made it our first stop. 


this marks our second international trip where we played with monkeys, the first being in Costa Rica last year. taking suggestions for a third. 


feeding time at the Iwatayama Monkey Park, where wild monkeys roam within inches of unruly children who are begging to be mauled.


feed me, seymour!

next to the gift shop was a caged enclosure where you could feed the monkey for about a dollar’s worth of apples or bananas. the greedy little bastards would sit there pointing at their mouths, chasing off competitors and pawing at your hands, similar to how the howler monkeys behaved in Costa Rica, confirming to me that monkeys are essentially assholes.


but the babies were so cute. i didn’t mind feeding them. 


snow monkey grooming, with music by Captain & Tennille.


after filling our photo cards with variations of the same monkey shot, we took a fortuitous wrong turn and happened upon a sculpture garden full of hundreds of stone Buddha statues. 


every statue was different and interesting in its own way. we got our photo fill here as well.

then came the most stunning gardens at Tenryu-ji temple, another world heritage site and the last temple we would visit in Kyoto, which we may have missed if we didn’t get lost (again) on the way to the bamboo groves. this place was divine, especially during the rainstorm, which forced us to stop and stare at the pretty trees while holding hands and waiting for the rain to let up. our only regret is that we hadn’t arrived a month earlier when the cherry blossoms were in full bloom. this provides yet another reason to return.


koi pond in the garden.


meditating men in the temple hall

i’m not sure why, but at no time during our hundred-temple hop through Kyoto did i consider entering one of the rooms to meditate. clearly, i should have as there is no better backdrop to find serenity, but all the zen was incredibly stimulating and i couldn’t imagine quieting my jumpy mind or keeping my darting eyes closed for too long. i wanted to keep drinking in the city so i breezed through all these zen landmarks without so much as an “om shanti om.” 


then the zen found me.

i had seen so much breathtaking beauty in Kyoto by that point that i was certain my “awe well” was tapped out. so when we turned a corner and walked into the bamboo grove, where stalks of bamboo stood as high as my beloved redwoods, i could muster no more beyond “holy fuck.” words and photos are poor substitutions for standing there, feeling like an ant, among natural beauty that eclipses anything technology could ever cook up. it was magical.


naturally, we took a (blurry) photo.


i wanted to pitch a tent and stay forever, certain hobbits would appear at night. 


it’s obscene. put on a burka, Kyoto. quit making the rest of us look bad. 

after the bamboo grove, we had to say our goodbyes to Kyoto, with regrets about missing its fish market and Gion park, where geishas are known to roam. our last journey through town was bittersweet as Arashiyama in particular hypnotized us with its beauty, making us sad to leave. it was also brief as we had to return to the hotel, grab our luggage and haul ass to Kyoto Station, where we would catch the bullet train (Shinkansen) into Tokyo.


ride through Kyoto, with music by The Smiths.


tired but happy--and always consulting a map.

when we learned the bullet train would take under 2 hours to reach Tokyo when the overnight bus from Tokyo took 8, we wondered why we hadn’t used this option on the journey in. oh yeah, because train tickets were 4 times more expensive and we figured we’d also use the bus as our hotel that night. but if i had to do it all over again, bullet train both ways, baby.

we sat on that train bewildered that the previous two days had passed so quickly, and worried that the next five would also breeze by us as we trailed behind them trying to squeeze the life out of every second. we had work to do in Tokyo--work we, honestly, didn’t want to do. we also had new people to meet, who were sure to burst our happy travel bubble with their foreign energy.

but before i could lament to Tico much more about my latest super depressing first-world problem, i fell asleep on his shoulder, my drool running down his sleeve, while he snored loudly against the window. moments later, we arrived in Planet Tokyo, where my mind would be blown countless times by things i never thought were possible on Planet Earth.

This Year So Far

hello again, blog! sorry i’ve neglected you for so long. i’m not really sure why i did. it wasn’t intentional or conscious, more accidental and needlessly cruel. but i have thought about you often. on the running to do list i keep on the dry erase board on my fridge, you’ve remained a bullet point for weeks as they stretched into months. you’ve sat quietly and patiently, never once mocking me, as i’ve bypassed you in favor of other items like “buy car seat covers,” “research patio furniture” and “call insurance company.” none of those are as fun or creative as you, yet still you got back-burnered. well, no more. we are together at last, and i promise not to abandon you again.

i have missed the way you document my life for me so nicely, allowing me to flip back through older posts fondly, and some not so fondly, as i reminisce. there has been plenty going on this year and i regret not sharing those things with you earlier. but if you will allow me to now, i’d like to catch you up on things i’ve been doing without you, so that there may now be a record of them in you. and sorry again, beautiful blog. i hope you’ll accept this love letter to you and know that we are still BFFs, just like those two halves of a heart necklace we both share confirms. also, your hair looks great today.

 
the new car: i bought it last year when i got fed up with the old car giving me endless transmission problems. (we are not buying a Volkswagen ever again, blog.) the new car is roomy, though it eats gas like a thirsty little bitch despite having only a 4-cylinder engine. it’s a 2012 Toyota RAV4, by the way. drives great and i love it so far. i bought it used from Hertz Car Sales, so it had low mileage and great maintenance records. however, as this was an unexpected purchase, i didn’t have much money to put down, so the new car payments are hefty. the old jetta, which didn’t even make it to 100K miles, was sold to some used car lot for a pittance. as i was leaving that lot, the owner asked whether i wanted to take one final photo with the car, as many people do, and i waved him away while running out of the place. i’m sure he knows why by now.  

 
the holidays: they went exceptionally well (if you don’t count my frequent tears over spending them without my beloved Pinko for the first time). i spent Christmas at Tico’s twin sister’s house, where she erected a velcro bounce house in her yard for the guests and her own set of twins (she has 6-year-old fraternal boys). there, we bounced, drank, ate, laughed and passed the time in a lovely fashion. Tico gifted me a silver bracelet, which i’m wearing right now, and i gave him a GoPro Camera, which he used to take videos of Juice. new year’s eve was spent lying in bed in his arms instead of out on the town, which i guess is characteristic of people approaching 40. no complaints whatsoever. 

 
New York City: if i were less lazy, i would write an entire blog post about this, as the trip made many epic memories for me, but i’ll just relegate it to a bullet point for now. but yes, Tico and i conquered new york city in january and it was an obnoxiously, all capped AMAZING TRIP. we also spent a night in Newport, Rhode Island, at my dear friend’s John John’s house, who we passed most of the time with while in the city as well. we made new friends, walked through central park, hit up interesting tourist and local spots, stayed up late every night, ate and drank way too much, and even got caught in one of this winter’s wild snowstorms that cancelled our flight and gave us an extra day to explore the city.  

one of my proudest moments: though i stopped short of faking an orgasm in a restaurant (my parents didn’t raise no beast!), Tico and i did re-create the When Harry Met Sally scene at the famous Katz’s Delicatessan. then we went down the street to the famous Russ & Daughters for bagels, lox, cream cheese and herring. we also had Lombardi’s pizza and visited the Ghostbusters Firehouse. i came back to LA with an extra five pounds and a renewed love for New York, where i would love to live — if i made millions of dollars.


Russian River: after New York drained our bank accounts and energy, Tico and i headed to russian river in february for a long weekend of sitting around and not doing much. we stayed at my friend Sharon’s cabin, who joined us for two nights, and spent our days visiting antique shops in town and Armstrong Woods National Reserve, which has a 1,400-year-old tree. with a recharged battery, i returned home and quickly planned another trip back to the wood for later in the year. i cannot get enough of those redwoods. they are majestic.

 
me hugging a tree like the (secret) dirty hippie i am: moving to Russian River has become one of my many escapist fantasies, and i’ve begun thinking i should buy a vacation home there like my friend has. during the drive back to LA, this daydream played out in my head like a perfect movie, not of the romantic comedy variety ‘cus those all suck, but more like some sleeper hit with wine tasting and Tuscan suns or something. anyway, i even became obsessed with scouring real estate listings on redfin.com, squealing in delight each time a cheap fixer appeared on the market. then i got a letter from the city about my own cheap fixer and the daydream quickly dissipated into the familiar breathy sighs of first-world problems. 


three weeks later: this is the current state of my concrete back yard. apparently, my next-door neighbor called the LA department of building and safety, whom i have a sordid history with, and complained about a few things affecting our property line — things that were grandfathered in with the house and that the numerous inspectors who visited my house in past few years never once mentioned to me. but now i had to fix them. so i’m fixing them and trying to be all zen about it though the truth is i want to [redacted in case i actually do go postal one day] to my neighbor. as this is my first visit to the high road, i can report back that it is a humorless and lonely place. there will be a longer blog post about the repairs coming shortly. in the meantime, i'm taking many deep, breathy sighs.


the year ahead: oh, right, it’s almost april already (sorry again, blog). yet i’m still in the throes of figuring out the rest of the year, as i have a few things i’d like to see happen. so i consulted the lava lamp at my work cubicle, which doubles as a fortune-telling apparatus, to see what’s in store for my charmed life. 

• hawaii! this is booked already and just the thought of it brings me to my happy place. i’m going with the flight attendant friends i went to Italy with two summers ago (hooray for buddy passes) and staying at my parents’ time share, so it promises to be a very cheap trip. this is the only type of trip i can take because... 

• money: after the double whammy of unexpected car purchase + home repairs, i am firmly in the broke boat. i need to get out, and i will get out, if for no other reason than to purchase my dream vacation home among the redwoods. so i’ve begun to hustle accordingly. i’m looking at renting out the garage i never use while also selling the items sitting idly in the garage to make space for someone else's car/boxes. i would make a joke about selling my body, too, but i think i would need to pay for someone to use that. insert another joke about getting old and wrinkly.

• food: i stopped eating meat so my tacos lately are veggie only. (good thing potatoes are a vegetable.) i went meatless in february and my body has thanked me with rapid weight loss, easy digestion and no more food comas. i’m still eating fish, cheese and eggs so i haven’t lost my mind completely and if a restaurant dish i want has some meat included via chicken stock or clam chowder with bacon (note: clam chowder should have bacon), i’ll eat it without reservations. this is a very fluid pescatarianism and there could be momentary lapses should i find myself in a high-quality steakhouse. so maybe it’s more meat reduction than absolute meatlessness. whatever you call it, my body feels better than before so i’m sticking with it.

• everything else: despite the urging of well-intentioned friends, i don’t see a new dog in my future this year. i could be wrong, of course, and catch sight of a puppy that makes me feel the familiar pinch of cupid’s arrow again, but as of today, i’m not ready. i also don’t see any sweeping changes with Tico and me this year. we’re doing great, approaching the year mark and still keep separate residences despite spending most of our free time together. i love him whole-heartedly, want him to remain in my life and have been feeling very good about where things are, which is why every pregnancy and marriage innuendo i’ve heard has been replied to with an eye roll as they imply that something is lacking. rest assured, it’s not. things are super. he is great. i am lucky. we are happy. sincerely. 

awwww, the shmooptie pooptie cuteness! hearts, rainbows, unicorns! 

ok, enough of that. back to work, turkeys.

My First Half-Marathon

i suppose the title implies that there will be others and i assume this much is true, though i still can’t seem to click on any Sign Up buttons just yet. my fingers always navigate away from the webpage before it can happen, likely encouraged by the lingering pain in my foot, the soreness of my shins and tightness in my hips that my body still feels almost a week after the fact. i guess this is what “muscle memory” is all about. but let’s go back to the beginning.


Vegas, baby.

my cousin, Gitella, and i had been talking about a girlie getaway for ages, finally solidifying plans this past spring to meet in Las Vegas for a weekend. i’m not sure how the Rock ‘n’ Roll Vegas Half Marathon made its way into our plan, which was, in her words, “to get away from men and children,” but it did. i agreed to it because i wanted to get into better shape, and a half-marathon seemed just the push off the couch i needed. so we signed up and started training.



about an hour before the horror show began.

well, her training started and (smartly) consisted of completing a few other half marathons in addition to the full Portland marathon. my “training” consisted of weekend hikes at my local trail with my dogs and intermittent jogging, but mostly walking, around the Rose Bowl. at no point in my training did i complete the full 13.1 miles involved in a half-marathon. the greatest distance i ever traveled at one time was eight miles and that was only once, with a handful of six-mile walks also completed.


view from the hotel room makes it look like i’m in Paris — if Paris had obese Americans eating at buffets in every hotel.


casual friday on the Strip

let the record reflect that i really hate Las Vegas. everything about the place reeks of unhinged gluttony and douchebaggery to me. the hotels are overpriced, gaudy and smoky, and the visitors seem hell-bent on creating a “whatever happens in Vegas stays in Vegas” secret they can recount among their friends and future offspring to prove they had a crazy youth, when the reality is closer to a visit that produced more empty pockets and hangovers than wild tales (with the occasional side of VD). 


nothing like a saturday night in Las Vegas to remind me why i never visit.

trash-talking aside and included, it had been roughly 13 years since my last visit to Las Vegas, a long enough time to ease my hatred and make another trip palpable. more importantly, the half-marathon (and also full marathon scheduled for the same day) took place on the Las Vegas strip at night, a huge draw for my non-morning person self who didn’t want a 7am start time.


seen on T-shirts at the local fitness expo, where we picked up our runners’ packets and stuffed our pockets full of Power Bar samples. 

 
incredible dinner with the most tender filet mignon cooked medium rare to perfection.

we went to CraftSteak, the restaurant of famed Top Chef head judge Tom Collichio. the service was impeccable, wine amazing and portions giant. we left with stuffed bellies and several to-go containers after enjoying a night of girl talk and giggles. then we fell onto the hotel bed with pants unbuttoned and complaints about how much we overate. it was an incredible dinner, to be sure, the type you want to have on a Saturday night in Las Vegas, but probably not the type you want to have the night before a half-marathon.


the point in the weekend when i should have said, “how about we just go drinking instead?”

this will surely sound stupid but i’ll put it out there anyway: completing a half-marathon was a lot harder than i thought it would be. it’s not that i thought it would be effortless, but i did think that having two working legs would be enough to get me to the finish line. in theory, this proved true. but in practice, i grimaced through every mile and felt every step.


some of the colorful characters who raced alongside us.

in my “training,” my shins always hurt the first mile, and in this half-marathon, they decided to nearly cripple me during the first three miles, rendering me wobbly-legged, expletive-laden and slightly panic-stricken, as i worried i would have to bow out of the race during mile two. if only i had done my research and discovered a miraculous product known as a shin support, which runners often use since shin splitting is a common issue.

 
another T-shirt from the fitness expo that sums up what i was feeling throughout most of the half-marathon.

after i (heroically) Pushed Through the Pain of the first three miles, my left foot went numb, which was a blessing as that meant i no longer had to deal with the shin issue. naturally, i decided to start running because, at that point, i figured i was already tampering with my body’s wellbeing so why not just go for total annihilation?

the running was intermittent but helped us make up for lost time, taking our initial and pathetic 20 minutes/mile average to a slightly less pathetic 18 minutes/mile. clearly, my Cousin the Marathoner could have smoked me during this race but kindly stayed near my side offering encouraging words aimed at moving me the hell along.


Elvis greeted us at mile six with offers of a quickie wedding. i think we disappointed him when we told him we were cousins.

at mile seven, i ate some Power Bar booster thingy that tasted like apple sauce, hoping it would help me combat the nausea that seemed to intensify after every sip of Gatorade and water i took from nearby well wishers. (it didn’t.) instead, i enjoyed renewed energy likely due to a placebo effect. by mile ten, the energy had worn off, leaving me newly tired, still queasy and suddenly mute.


almost to the promised land.

though counter-intuitive, the last mile zoomed by. at that point, we had been making our way back toward the busiest and most lit up part of the strip, where crowds cheered us along, speakers blasted songs like “Bust a Move” (which now holds a new meaning for me) and the finish line was in plain sight. i felt a light-headedness bordering on delirium and let out a howl that sounded very much like a dying donkey when i crossed that finish line.


only in Vegas: medals modeled after poker chips.

four hours were given to complete the half-marathon (full marathoners got five hours), otherwise some shuttle of shame was said to drive by and pluck you off the path. i’m happy to report that Gitella and i made it in 3 hours and 56 minutes. {crowd applause} this averages to 18 minutes per mile. i realize that seasoned runners can complete a mile in a third of that time. whatever. 

the finishers area held a multitude of free treats that are commonly found at the end of such races, i learned, such as chocolate milk (oddly refreshing), apples and bananas, six packs of bagels, pretzels for nausea, bottles of gatorade and space blankets. we loaded up as much as we could carry and started the slow hobble back to our hotel room, where i proceeded to drop to the carpet to stretch my spasming muscles through gritted teeth. at that point, i felt a blend of pain, pride, foolishness and euphoria. (but mostly pain.)


thanks, Vegas. (sorta) 

i assured Gitella that i wouldn’t need to eat after the half-marathon, given my continued nausea and the bewildered state of my body that rendered a normal activity such as eating too complicated to imagine. she chuckled briefly before excusing herself for a half-hour — a time when i took a hot shower, put on my pajamas and collapsed onto the bed — and returned with pizza and ice cream, which we devoured quickly.

lying in bed afterwards, i’ll confess that whatever sense of accomplishment i felt was not overwhelming enough to offset the pain in my body. i probably could have spent my life never knowing what it felt like to complete a half-marathon and died just as happily (or sadly, depending on how things go).

a week later, i’m not sure my sentiments have changed. i keep telling myself i’ll do another one, one i actually train for so it won’t hurt as bad during and after, yet i still can’t manage to click that Sign Up button. maybe i need a few more weeks to help me forget because, right now, everything about it sounds like a masochistic idea. in the meantime, i’ll fit my workouts in between trips from the couch to the refrigerator.