Vegetables

Tonight, Marty and I went on a date. I needed to drop a car off at the garage to get a few things fixed. So, while the kids watched the Madagascar Christmas special, Marty drove a car and I drove a car into town. After dropping off one car, we proceeded to enhance our date by going to Cub to find dark chocolate. We ended up adding a few things to our cart: red cabbage, yellow pepper, celery, honeycrisp apples, and cilantro.

Vegetables.

After reading Born to Run, we've been eating vegetables for breakfast. Yes, for breakfast. There are a number of things, enhancements, to our lives that have come from the ultra running world such as wool, salt pills, night running, eating while running, eating lots while running, eating lots after running, eating Pillsbury Toaster Strudels before a run, eating Pillsbury Toaster Strudels while running, running in trail shoes on trails, on pavement, on carpet, in the house, and sometimes to the office, Bodyshield and, as of tonight, fighting.

So, it was only natural that we would try vegetables for breakfast.
It's been very...interesting.

During the first week:
I felt light and energetic all day. No need for caffeine. Not even hungry for lunch.

Second week:
Still feel light and energetic. I think about the taste of cabbage all day long. My intestines are clean. I'm hungry by 11am, but don;t feel like eating anything heavy. Marty says she's lost 5 lbs.

Third week:
I'm now eating a little cereal to supplement the vegetables. Still feel very healthy. Still think about cabbage a lot. I'm hungry by lunch but still don't feel like eating much.

Beyond the Headlamp

Why run late, late at night:

• few, to no, distractions
• no need to impress anyone - there is no one to impress
   on a trail at 2am in the morning.
• adventure lurks just beyond the headlamp beam
• an opportunity to practice running tired without
   having had to run for 8 hours
• time to think...

Thinking while running:
It is easy to tell people that I enjoy long runs because I'm able to think things through to a resolution. That sounds so noble. During this last run, I realized that this is not really what happens. Instead, thoughts rush upon me, knock me down; I get up, and then I go at it from another angle, only to have other thoughts rush in. Sometimes they strangle, other times they taunt. It's as if the jarring of each foot strike loosens thoughts and gives them courage for a full frontal attack. I end up thinking about something from all different perspectives, desires, outcomes, and longed-for outcomes. However, there is rarely resolution.

I would love to say that all this undirected thinking helps by clearing my mind to be less burdened during non-running times. Evidently, not this time. Maybe the next run will help?! Hope springs eternal.

So do thoughts.

This is what I ran through early Saturday morning; just add fog, mist, trees, and rocks.

I ran trails at William O'Brien State Park from 1am to 4am. It was glorious and terrifying. When the headlamp was off, I could see nothing. When it was on, I could make out the trail from the forest only because there were no trees on the trail, and the trail tended to have less foliage. The fog dispersed the headlamp light almost before it left the tip of my nose. Thus, the trail that I could see was always just the trail 5 feet in front of the next foot strike.

Because,
• when I get done playing soccer on Friday nights,
   I can't sleep anyway;
• last week, there was a full moon that just
   couldn't be wasted;
• I get itchy if I haven't run recently;
• if I run at night, I'm not running during time I
   could be with the family
• I need to get more experience and improve my
   night-running (I've got my eyes set on
   two runs that require it: Arrowhead, yes Arrowhead,
   and Leadville);
• running at night is almost beyond describing
   (I'll give it an amateur attempt in another blog)

Bono

I have always been a fan of U2. I am growing to like them more and more as I get older.
This interview with Bill Hybels, although I'm not too keen on Bill, is excellent.

I like Bono's salty descriptions of Christianity. For many years, I have shared his distaste for the church. I wish Bono could meet Piper.

Our Trip up North

Check out our photos here.

Barefoot Running

OK. I consider myself quite rational and think of myself as a slow-to-act-on-impulse guy. I'm even slower to act on inspiration.

Nevertheless, I ran barefoot yesterday, in the basement, on the treadmill. Just one mile.

While running, it felt great. As the day passed on, the pads of my feet grew more and more raw feeling. I say raw feeling because I would check them often, and they really aren't raw. They just feel raw.

This all comes from "Born to Run." And since I've been reading it for about a month, I've been thinking about running barefoot for about a month.

Where to go with it now? Well, I'll keep running barefoot on the treadmill for now.

The good folks at Vibram responded to my email and informed me that they do not make a Vibram for people like me with webbed toes, but that I could buy a pair for $80 a crack and modify them by cutting two toe pockets and stitching them together and thereby void any and all warranties for them. It was very generous.

So, I'll look for a cheap pair of racing flats. Remember those from high school track?

For now, check out this great interview with Christopher McDougall.

Eat Like a Poor Person

That's what people keep telling author Christopher McDougall, as he recounts advice he gets about eating to run farther in "Born to Run."

McDougall mentions this advice a lot. It seems to appear when he's talking about Scott Jurek's diet, when he tells the story about some guy (actually a doctor) named Louis who lived among the Kalahari Bushmen for four years, and the advice seems most poignant when he's describing the eating habits of Peruvians or Tarahumaras or American vegans.

"Eat like you're a poor person," seems to mean to eat less, eat less meat, and eat things that you find underground. By avoiding meat and fats from McDonalds, a person can avoid all those types of cancers that all the poor people, ie Tarahumara and various Indian tribes in far away places (and the Japanese until they met the BigMac), don't have.

But I got thinking.
First, do the Peruvians or Tarahumara Indians consider themselves poor? That's a lengthy discussion not to be had here.

Second, McDougall spends a considerable time positing a theory that man developed as a long distance runner in order to enable him to more efficiently hunt animals. Early man needed lots of meat for his growing brain. I don't understand when these far-away tribes traded in their hunting and gathering of meat in exchange for cancer-free, low cholesterol, low blood-pressure living?

Third, I've met a few poor people. Most have been on the streets in Minneapolis or Chicago. I've seen photos of poor people in Calcutta and Mexico City. My best guess is that most poor people find some of their food in dumpsters, or as hand-outs, or steal it, or find it in a black plastic bag in an open city dump. I would venture to say that poor does not equate with healthy eating.

I recently finished reading "Grapes of Wrath." The Joad family was poor. They ate dough, dropped in boiling grease, for breakfast. They ate cheap, greasy hamburger purchased from the plantation store. Hard biscuits. Bacon and bacon gravy. Coffee, lots of coffee. With sugar, lots of sugar. Sometimes, they didn't eat. Near the end, they were eating peaches off the trees they picked. In the end, all they had was breast milk.

I really like "Born to Run." It's written very well, he very accurately tells the story of some aspects of ultra running, and I am learning many new things. However, I don't think I will take McDougall's advice to eat like a poor person.