Business travel blows.
Being away from home, and having to work there, isn't fun. If you're lucky you get some good food and maybe an hour by the pool. Nice. Doesn't begin to make up for it.
There's nothing fun about getting up before dawn three time zones away to catch a cab, slog through security, eat an airport breakfast, and then stand around waiting to board a plane.
Traveling by plane used to be fun. Now it's more like being a subject in a psychological experiment. One where the question is how much demeaning and discomfort a person will endure before revolting. Or killing someone. [The study is pretty advanced, now. The researchers are amazed at how much we'll take. They've run clear through the initial list of stuff to throw at us and now they're just making it up as they go. They're up to charging for checked bags. I'm thinking pay toilets and making actual seats an upgrade are next.]
Arriving home to a gorgeous 70F day sure helps.
I dropped my bag, geared up, hit the door.
One thing I didn't notice about Vegas until I got out on the road here... There isn't really any grass on the strip. None. Sometimes you see something that looks like grass, but it's as fake as the "Good Luck" they always give you when you check in.
I found grass and stayed to it until I made it to the small trail by my house. It's really short, but cushy, and quiet, and still covered in leaves, and HOLY CRAP A SNAKE!!!!
Those who know me well will appreciate the nearly shorts-wetting fear that rocketed through my entire body when I heard a rustling to my right and something long and slender on the ground out of the corner of my eye.
It was a stick, true. But my unnatural fear of snakes reacted (with a series of shrieks and legs kicking high in the air) well before my cerebral cortex could process the stick.
It was quite a sight, witnessed only by me, and most of the Carmel Middle School Track and Field team.
Once my pulse slowed to something south of "arrest threshold", I loped on.
Before halfway I had shaken off that dullness that modern travel coats us in. I was seeing, feeling, hearing, and smelling the world again.
[Speaking of smelling... I fly a decent amount. Not a lot, but enough. I don't fly Southwest. Until this trip. The people on Southwest smell... different. I'm just sayin'.]
A nap would have been fine. Dropping over to the pub for a pint and a sandwich would have been fun, too. But nothing like getting outside, breathing unrecirculated air, and moving across the surface of the earth can bring you back to the present, back to living your life free of "Seatbelt Fastened" lights, and upright and locked tray tables, and boarding zones.
Stretching is always a good idea, especially if you're made of bronze.
Good running,
Doug
Numbers: 2.0 miles on grass, trail, and some asphalt, and with my seatbelt recklessly unfastened.
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