Had BU, Lost a A Sock, Gained a Massive Blister

WARNING!!! IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO OR OFFENDED BY STORIES ABOUT POOP, DON'T READ THIS POST!

Today I had planned on running 15 miles. I had it all planned out and was excited to try a new route. The first 2.6 miles were fine through neighborhoods and I felt good. But the next 2 mile stretch was not good at all. I had thought that the road I chose to run along had a sidewalk...well, I thought, that was the problem. There was no sidewalk and it is a fast road, 55MPH speed limit. Unfortunately, the only alternatives were not very convenient to get to, so I stuck it out. I ended up running on the shoulder of the road against traffic only 4-5 feet away. I made sure to move over an inch or two as cars came by. Eventually though, I made it to a sidewalk and was safe again. Ironically, only seconds after I made it to a sidewalk I passed a business named Pure Safety, ha! I'm definitely not their poster boy. About a mile later the story goes to the toilet...literally.

So I'd been feeling some gas build up in my belly for a little while and about 5.5 miles out I decide to let a little 'gas' out. Oooooops! It wasn't all gas! Just a tad little bit of something else came out. Not enough to soil my pants, but enough to know I wasn't going to make it 9 more miles with it there. I knew that there were a few restaurants about a mile up ahead so I stuck it out fully intending to take care of business there. When I get there, it was 10:04pm and guess what? Yeah, they all closed at 10:00pm, go figure. So now I'm thinking "BUSH, there has to be a bush I can use with soft grass!" I go one more mile only to find myself surrounded by upper class homes and very landscaped open yards...not a good place to drop my pants.

I head back towards my house again, writhing in gaseous pain, feeling the little bit o' something still there, hanging on. I zealously searched every building and yard I passed for a spot with some privacy and soft grass. How would I ever find something in upscale suburbia?!? Just then I see off in the distance a beacon of light, seriously, there was a big building with a beacon on top! It was a self storage unit on a large plot on land with many bushes. I swung to the side and despairingly admitted that all the places I could find, were exposed to the cars driving by. DARN IT!!! I started off again but only a few seconds later noticed an angelic looking line of trees going down the side of the property...PERFECT! I hustled over, found a spot behind two trees close together with lots of soft luscious grass on the ground, pulled my pants down, and wooooosh! It was as if someone had let a firehose off but aaaaaaaaaah, relief!

I picked small bunches of grass and cleaned up the best I could (I really appreciate toilet paper now), but instantly realized that I was still about 5-6  miles out. That is a long time to run with not a perfectly clean bottom! So I resigned to taking my right sock off and using it for the final touches, it worked well. I flipped the sock inside out and put it in an empty Cliff Bar wrapper for safe storage and off I went. It didn't occur to me that running without a sock has some problems until about a mile in to the sockless run. I slowly started to feel the outside of my right ankle starting to wear away from the shoe rubbing on it. I tried re-tying my shoe different ways to reduce the friction to no use. I just tried to get home. It really started to feel very painful about 3.5 miles out but I kept going, trying to make it home, but realizing that I was probably creating a blister on my ankle. About 1.7 miles from home I couldn't take the pain anymore and had to stop. I ended up calling Julie and she came and picked me up. Bum deal man! I still made it 13.3 miles in 2 hours 5 minutes, not bad, but a little slower because of the ankle thing.