It’s the big day

That’s right! The big day! The day after completing the Marine Corps Marathon in and around our nation’s capital in an “asterisked” time of 5 hours 55 minutes and some (painful) seconds.
We asterisk it because our running partner and “Gym Set” teammate Jim Henley suffered a mid-race injury, with his knee giving out on him at Mile 12. Jim soldiered (or marined, as the case may be) onward, but by mile 16, he realized that the risk of serious damage to the knee warranted, and wisely adopted the distance runner’s adage: “He who runs and runs away, lives to run another day.” The time between Mile 16 and Mile 17 was… a little longer than usual (although, stretching while Jim’s knee was being wrapped at the medical tent will probably pay dividends in post-race recovery). Conditions featured a most unseasonably daily high of eighty degrees, on the often unshaded course. Hopefully, Jim will recover quickly, and finish the marathon distance in the near future, before he turns his attention to other, more sensible pursuits.
I, of course, will do no such thing, and hope that the 80 degree day (and the fact that I appear to have lost eleven pounds) will serve me well coming into next Sunday’s ING New York City Marathon.
So, that’s news from “the big day”.
It also looks like it’s Election Day tomorrow, so go out and vote for whoever it is you’d like to see win elective office. And Semper Fi.