Death to the Common Man- For the day

Had to get out of my chair for a run yesterday, sat too long. I decided on LSD (Long, Slow, Distance) run. My intention was for an hour, nothing tough, a few hills.

Well I knew where I going just not exactly sure how to get there. At the apex of my normal running loop which is the Mill Avenue Bridge and Tempe Town Lake I decided to cross the street and run up Mill Avenue and then head uphill (a long uphill) to Papago Park and then run back down to the office via the canal bike path, ending a great run with some watery scenery.

Well I forgot how hard the hill was. It was mile 17-18 for the inagural Rock n' Roll marathon in 2004 and a rightous butt kicker (they thankfully changed the course for 2005). So I make it up the hill, past the zoo and the animals I visited just two days before and ran into the Desert Botanical Garden, thats where it goes sideways for me.

Now I thought I could run through the park and simply jump the curb and be on the canal path; no, no, no this was not the case. Okay, well there has to be a pedestrian entrance somewhere so I will just run along the fence line. Well several minutes later and some scrambling through scrub brush I find the canal path, firmly in place on the otherside of an unclimbable fence.

After much gnashing of teeth I run along another edge of the fence find a suitable climbing area and back track to the canal. Well, all told my 60 minutes becomes 90. Did I have fun? Absolutely- I got cut and had blood on my shin-and like the saying goes, "Its not fun until somebody bleeds." Maybe only guys say that? But at least you have heard it before in some form or another.

I could have just packed it in early and turned around and been secure in set patterns but that is the Common Man Syndrome (CMS) at work. An extra 30 minutes of running- that'll put the pesky demons to bed for a day.