The one bright spot was going to be for Knowles’ defeat of Murkowski in Alaska, but it looks like that went down the tubes, too, along with pretty much everything else last night. More than half of the people in this country chose that which has an extensive, proven track record of being detrimental to their health, safety, well-being, income, job security, and everything else. They have no right to be surprised, now, when the next four years are more nightmarish than the last four. I haven’t switched from mourning to cold realization of just how bad it will be; I hope to wait that one out a little longer. I thought the bright spot could also be for Barack Obama’s win in Illinois, but that was never in doubt, so it doesn’t even seem as bright. I’d much rather make it stand for the news Amanda called me from Seattle with, far and away the best news I heard all night. I’ll leave it at that.

I can’t remember when I started following election news every day; it was some time before the Democratic primaries, so almost a year has gone by in which I’ve experienced the ups and downs, the paranoia and optimism, the anger and satisfaction that comes with paying attention to one thing for too long. The circles of fear and hope are getting ever narrower today; after not thinking about it for a few minutes while doing something at work, I suddenly remember that today is Election Day and I’m flung back into the number-crunching fear and loathing and all the rest. Thanks to Daily Kos for keeping me informed, afraid, and excited over the last year, making me lose sleep over the prospect of more W, and learn much more than I ever thought I would about Senate and House races across the country. There’s such thing as paying too much attention, I think, and I couldn’t help myself, but it’s better than my self-imposed media blackout after the mess of four years ago. Today feels like a sort of weird, weightless experience, as we sit back and await the results. [Insert non-jinxing closing sentence here].

Aimee and I returned tonight from a weekend wedding in Sarasota, Florida, and having finally been a part of the big event she had helped plan with Abby and Dave over the last year, we’re now fully ready to worry about the election for the next two days. My unofficial straw poll of bumper stickers in and around Sarasota ended with a plus 4 victory for Kerry. It was a particularly interesting experience, being in a state whose electoral votes are up for grabs, as sign-wavers for both sides crowded street corners, bizarre advertisements flooded the airwaves, and talk of the election was everywhere. I’ll keep this short, just a few photos, with a recap tomorrow.

My soon-to-be nephew and I practice throwing shells into the water.



So a priest and a rabbi are standing next to each other under a huppa…



A quiet moment at the reception



A study in scarlet



Some of the great architecture and signage in Sarasota:







On our way to the Tampa Airport, we stopped by the re-built Ybor City neighborhood this afternoon. It boasts itself as “The City with a Past,” whatever that means; Aimee’s take on it was “The City with a Hangover.” It had just hosted (endured?) “Guavaween” the previous evening, and the sidewalks were littered with broken beer bottles and mardi gras beads. My favorite relic, though, was this example of something that is just not done in polite company: beer with a straw. Why not? Who knows.



And it was too bad we were there too early to find out what’s Alaskan about these tacos

I didn’t know David Sedaris was such a fan of monkeys before we went to see him at Symphony Hall tonight, but it was certainly clear by the end that he’d be happy to have a monkey make him toast, rummage through his pockets, and scratch his forehead if it itched. The last time we saw him, he was on his Dress Your Family book tour, and I guess this was yet another leg of that tour, only in front of a much larger crowd. He read “Baby Einstein” again, as well as the amazing boil story, plus more selections from his diary, some repeats and some new. It’s amazing how a crowd makes things more funny, or how a few thousand people laughing makes it easier to laugh. As he read the boil story, which he said would appear in The New Yorker soon, I imagined reading it on the page, and I found myself laughing at things he read (and yes, it’s partly his voice) that I couldn’t imagine laughing out loud at if I read them on the page. It’s all degrees of hilarious, though; no argument that he was wonderfully funny and always great to see.

He once again talked up Adrian LeBlanc’s Random Family (which Aimee read after hearing him recommend it the first time) as well as Jeffrey Frank’s The Columnist (“Lying and cheating your way to the top and refusing to admit you ever did anything wrong aren’t qualities I like in a president, but in a conservative columnist, they’re a lot of fun”). There was also a new addition to his suggestion list, Germany. Not a book, but the country itself, as a welcome and friendly destination for travel. Toll!

We had hoped that the more stately surroundings would have meant we’d have to do away with the q & a period at the end (rats!), but no, they managed to put up the lights and he fielded a few questions anyway. They weren’t too bad, though, and he even informed everyone of the score of the World Series game in progress: “It’s inning three, and the score is Cardinals zero, Boston three.” That’s a score read by a person who’s never watched a baseball game if I’ve ever heard it. We headed briskly back to Aimee’s to drive me home and avoid the post-game self-identity meltdown/anarchy that is sure to follow; lucky it’s an away game. The lunar eclipse was a nice touch, too.

I venture into Harvard Square too infrequently, apparently, if I am to judge by the changes I see whenever I do head over that way. Today I passed by the location of Cappy’s Shoe Repair, which I knew was going out of business, and found out it has turned into the first ever Cross Retail Store, selling pens, paper, and other paraphernalia. The store is full of delicious stuff, like tiny briefcases, expensive digital camera cases, minuscule colored pencils, and funky European notebooks, but in the end, it’s pretty useless. It’s like Black Ink across the street only worse: it’s great that it’s here, and it’s really fun to browse, but I can’t imagine buying something there and not feeling a little ripped off. Harvard Square has too many stores like that, stores that are nice to peruse but too abstract and expensive to make a purchase from. Plus, the store seems to be laying claim to the mysterious address “Zero Brattle Street,” which, if it isn’t weird enough that it simply exists, is already in use by the neighboring Tealuxe (check out the virtual tour from the front of the store to see to now departed Cappy’s next door).

Down a few doors from the Cross Store, I stopped into Wordsworth Books, a Harvard Square institution. After 28 years, the store filed for bankruptcy last month and will close forever on Saturday. I remember hearing Richard Linklater speak there after a screening of Waking Life at the Brattle; it provided a nice venue for speakers and gatherings, in addition to being a good, well-stocked bookstore. From now until they close this weekend, everything is half off, so I picked up some early Christmas presents, a back issue of The Believer that I was missing, and Celluloid Skyline, the terrific book we used as the main text for the NYC on Film class I TA’d last year (a great book, and a great website, as well).

I wonder what will replace Wordsworth in that terrific central location. Now even the Abercrombie & Fitch that replaced The Tasty has been replaced… by a Citizens Bank. I’ll have to wait another few months before I go back, and see what else I won’t recognize.

Sondre Lerche brought a pop-tastic conclusion to my week of concert-going at the Paradise, as Aimee and I joined the other eighty-odd people not watching the baseball game to see his second show at The ‘Dise (can it be your web address if no one calls it that?) in six months. The last time around, he was accompanied by his band the Faces Down, but this time around, he played most of the show alone, with just his shiny Gretsch and his ailing voice, constantly plied with Throat Coat.



Despite the fact that his voice wasn’t at full strength, he played a great set, stripping down the lush arrangements found on his records with his precise, clean guitar parts. He writes great melodies, and his songs have some of the best ESL lyrics I know. He played eight or ten songs on his own, and then was joined by the thoroughly underwhelming opening band The Golden Republic, who backed him up on six or so more songs. It was a strange arrangement, which makes me wonder: were the bands coerced by Astralwerks into playing together? Did the Faces Down drop out, forcing him to get a new backing band? Or was he so smitten when he saw them in concert he thought they’d work well together? Somehow I don’t think so. Anyway, they were better suited to backing up things like “Sleep on Needles” (still one of the best pop songs of the last five years) and “Virtue and Wine,” his attempt at mixing two cultures: “Brazil, and punk rock.”



He’s changed a lot since I first saw him early last year; it’s like we’re watching him grow up before our very eyes. He’s getting bigger, his voice is getting deeper, and he’s looking more like a rock musician (and Heath Ledger, actually) and less like a scrawny, sun-deprived Scandinavian young singer-songwriter every time. All in all, it was a great show: classic songs, played by a talented performer who enjoyed interacting with the attentive, enthusiastic crowd. Chalk another one up for the Paradise, the best venue in Boston. My only question, though, after three shows in a week: where’s Paradise Guy? Should I be worried?

I returned to the Paradise last night (isn’t that a movie or two?) for a second show in three days, this time to see Sam Phillips. [Not much exists out there on the web on her; this site is pretty out of date. I think her fan base is just a touch too old to document her every move online] Aimee came with, as I thought she’d enjoy the music. We both did, though the performance was very short (less than an hour) and included exactly zero songs from the only album of hers I own, Martinis & Bikinis (1994).

Some artists, it seems, only ever produce one album that really stands out. In my book, it has to be an album that really rises above an artist’s other work, and even other artists’ work as well. Their other albums can be bad, mediocre, or passable, but this one album is bigger than, and almost independent of, the artist. These are often not my favorite bands I’m talking about, because I feel like bands like Wilco, REM, Blur, Radiohead and others have produced at least two or three great albums. Albums like Morphine’s Cure for Pain and Camper van Beethoven’s Key Lime Pie are examples; my guilty pleasure, Pete Yorn’s Musicforthemorningafter, is another. They’re albums that work as albums, and they also define for me the period of my life in which I listened to them for the first time.

Anyway, to get back to where I began, Sam Phillips made one of those albums, for me, and I was hoping last night she’d play at least one song from it. From what I’ve read, and from what she said, she is a different person from the one who made that album, someone whose work has changed so radically as a result of changes in her life. She spoke on stage of her painful breakup of a year and a half ago, and I feel like she no longer reaches back to that earlier era. For the most part, her songs last night were torch songs, “Torch as in ‘tortured’,” as she put it. She was great, and I enjoyed her music, but it wasn’t exactly what I was expecting.

I noticed that she had what looked like two opening acts when I checked the website, but neither name registered with me. When we got to the Paradise, the sign listed the opening artist, and then “Sam Phillips and the Section.” OK, so that’s actually her backup band. Got it. Funny, I thought; the string quartet that did that Radiohead cover album I got awhile back was called “The Section.” Still no connection made, though. Sam Phillips came onstage and introduced herself a second after we got in, and after the first song, introduced her violinist, Eric Gorfain. “Hmm. I recognize that name. I wonder where from?” Still, nothing. It was only when she introduced the string quartet as they took the stage to join Gorfain as “The Section Quartet” that I finally put it all together. They recorded Strung Out on OK Computer (which they’re performing live in New York tomorrow), and they’re on tour with Sam Phillips. Bingo.

They worked very well with her sound, as did her keyboardist, splitting time between simple piano and wheezy organ lines, and her percussionist, who specialized in the Tom Waits-esque sounds of people walking on creaky floors and the sound of things being dropped. Add to that her a cappella performance accompanied by dictaphone, and it was a great evening of interesting music.

Talk about the wind being taken out of the sails… I came to work this morning to find that now eight months after losing our boss, the one man we’d pegged our hopes on to take his place has taken a job at another institution. Kudos to him; he’s a smart, eminently qualified guy who deserves all the best, and frankly, he’s probably made the right choice. I wouldn’t take this job, either, if the hiring process was as dragged out and unprofessional as this one was. Since none of us in the office were included in the committee to choose the new head of our office, it was left up to those who have very little idea of what we do to choose a replacement. And when they were faced with the perfect candidate, they decided it would be better to look around for (nonexistent) other qualified people, and then, having not found them, make a half-hearted offer that was naturally declined. And so we struggle on, headless, as each day that goes by adds to our reputation as a place impossible to lead, with an uncertain future. Thanks, search committee. We hope you understand what you’ve done to us; we certainly do.

Add to this the continued day-and-night futility of the Yankees and the fact that the 25 film journals I ordered were, counter to the guarantee I got from the salesperson, the wrong kind, and the old style journals are probably gone forever. Minor problems, all of these, and I’ll get over them – but I’ll just bank on a Kerry victory to make it all better.

The legend of The Libertines precedes them (link to their broken website; very rock ‘n roll) – just take a look at a few of the news stories about them from the past year or so: drug busts, jail, rehab, riots, bandmates breaking into each other’s flats, and the like.

I saw them at the Paradise last night, with a decidedly young crowd who tried to be as rock ‘n roll as the band. They screamed along to the PA system music in between sets, they flipped off the roadies as a sign of recognition, they moshed as well as they could, and they lit up a joint during the show even though smoking cigarettes is banned, robbing them of their smokescreen, so to speak. And they got kicked out about thirty seconds later. Me, I had my earplugs in and felt like a bit of an old stick in the mud, but I enjoyed the music, delivered with little charisma by their lead singer, Carl Barat (a.k.a. Alan Cumming with a guitar, though the photos don’t do the resemblance justice). They were loud, fast, and sounded like a cross among the Sex Pistols, Pulp, and the Monkees. The sign proclaiming the name of the band in giant letters behind the stage, though, was a little much.

Having missed both Tim and Mari’s wedding and George’s 30th birthday to run the marathon last weekend, I tried to make up for the only one I could, and made the trip to Manhattan this weekend to celebrate a little late. Aimee and I have driven the last five or six times we’ve come to New York, so I hadn’t had a chance to try to the Chinatown Bus in awhile. I chose the Fung Wah once again, which has since moved operations from Chinatown to South Station, so we no longer line up on a sidewalk outside a Chinese hair salon, or wherever it used to be. I hadn’t been to South Station in ages; it’s still under the same never-ending construction that it was when I used to commute through there for work. The ride down was fine, including a stop at a Roy Rogers (I don’t think I’ve ever been to a Roy Rogers before; I passed on the “Holster Fries” and “Double R Bar Burger”). The ride took about five hours, but I’d left early enough that I still made it in time for the great dinner party Anne threw for George at her place. The ten of us enjoyed good wine and hearty stew, and tried not to gang up on the one Republican at the table. It was hard.

Saturday morning, George headed back to PA for the day, and I took off on a day alone in the city, a wonderful guilty pleasure. I decided to put my newly-minted museum ID card to the test, and headed to the Met to see the Andy Goldsworthy exhibition.



Free entrance to any museum around, not to rub it in, is a liberating thing. I popped in for forty-five minutes, enjoyed what I was looking for, stopped at a few other familiar sights, and headed out again. At the Guggenheim, an exhibition on Aztec culture might not have grabbed me, especially with the massive lines that filled the lower level of the museum. But with nothing to lose, I flashed the badge and headed right in. Turns out, of course, it was a great show, with some amazing stone sculptures and some cool Arumbaya fetish-esque figurines. I continued up Museum Mile to the Cooper-Hewitt, where I enjoyed an interesting small exhibition on the revolutions of 1848, in political, social, artistic, and cultural spheres. I wasn’t as taken with the Design ≠ Art show, but hey, it was free anyway.

I took the train back downtown and had a delicious sandwich at Lemon, and noted their photobooth. I headed to Trailer Park in Chelsea for another photo booth sighting; Elvis, Liberace, Ann-Margret, and Ed Sullivan were all in effect, but the booth was out of order.

People selling balloon animals, activists arguing with park-goers about voting for Nader, and people with too many dogs were just some of the folks I saw as I read some of my new Wilco/Tweedy book in Union Square. By late afternoon, it was time to head out to Astoria Queens to pay my first visit to the Museum of the Moving Image and catch a screening of Billion Dollar Brain, part of the Ken Russell series there this month. BDB (hey!) is one of those films that has been on my list of movies to see for so long that I’ve forgotten how or why it got there in the first place. But when you get a chance to see it on the big screen, you don’t ask questions. It was a truly strange film, a Cold War spy thriller overrun with goofiness and a very scary pre-W Texas oil man crusading against Commies and making pre-emptive military strikes to preserve the American Way.

What was almost more riveting than the film, though, was the fact that two of the original Cinemania cinemaniacs were in the audience, being, well, themselves. If you’ve seen the film, have no doubt, they weren’t acting up for the camera. They’re like that all…the…time. Roberta was fussy and sour, and Harvey (“Running-Time Guy”) shouted out the correct, Harvey-measured running time before the lights even had time to come up at the end of the film. I have to say, it really deepened my experience at the movies. The theater is great, the print looked terrific and was well-projected, and for fifty bucks a year, you can get in to every single movie they show. What a deal. Too bad it’s in the middle of nowhere.



What followed was a transit nightmare of a particular New York variety: the weekend cutbacks in service to the outer boroughs. It took me an hour and forty-five minutes to get from Queens to Brooklyn, using five separate trains on three different lines. I finally got to Brian’s place around 8:00, and enjoyed a blueberry-chocolate chip waffle with him and Dave before I headed back to Manhattan (via Buttermilk for another photobooth) to watch the rest of the game. I’d heard dribbles about the score – 3-0, 3-3, 6-6 – as I made my way though the city; it’s one of the things I love about being in New York during baseball season, especially the post-season. Everyone’s watching the games, everyone’s talking about the games, and everywhere you go, you’re kept up to the minute on what’s going on.

By the time I got to the bar to meet George, Anne, and Anne’s mom, the score had ballooned to 11-6, and from that point on, the game was not that interesting. We stayed at Failte, watching the game less than we were listening to the quality dj playing The Killers, Modest Mouse, and some old Cure tunes.

This morning brought egg and cheese sandwiches and hanging out at George’s place before I headed back down to Chinatown for the return bus ride. I had a ticket for the 2:00 pm bus, but I arrived at 12:30 and got right on the bus about to pull out – Fung Wah had exorcised my transit woes, and we had a quick and uneventful ride back.

My sophomore year in college, I took a film class at Hampshire, and as part of the class, we were required to keep a “film journal.” I picked up a journal at Hastings in Amherst to use as my journal, and before long, I’d started writing a little something about each film I saw. That was 1994, and I’m now about to finish up my eleventh film journal. My sense of nostalgia encouraged me to let my somewhat frequent trips to Amherst coincide with my need for a new film journal, so I could pick one up at Hastings (as well as some Antonio’s, some ice cream at Bart’s and so on) each year. When I moved to Cambridge, I was happy to find a kindred office supply store in Bob Slate on Mass. Ave., where I found my beloved National Brand 43571 Chemistry Notebook (a notebook beloved by others as well).

Two weeks ago, as Aimee and I visited Amherst, I thought I’d buy another notebook as I’m nearing the end of my current volume. Hastings had replaced the notebook with a flimsy, flexible notepad in weird colors; whatever it was, it wasn’t the same.

This morning, I decided I’d go by Bob Slate and pick up one, or maybe even two or three just to make sure. Lo and behold, as I found the shelf that used to house the notebooks, a purple (purple?!) impostor with the same product number was in their place. It was a “National Brand” notebook, but was bound and covered differently than the original. And in bright purple, no less. I spoke with the guys at the back and they confirmed that indeed, the item I was looking for was gone, never to return, and had been gone for eight months. Apparently the company had been sold to a Canadian company, and they had re-designed the product. Disastre!

I immediately went online to check out my options, and found a number of places still stocking the item – though I couldn’t be sure, perhaps they’ve got the old item online and the new one in their warehouse. I finally spoke with someone who called her warehouse to confirm the item, and I promptly ordered 25 of them. Kind of crazy, I know, but what’s even weirder is the fact that I had a hard time deciding how many to buy. Will I only be doing this for another 25 years? They will certainly be unavailable in 25 years, so why did I not buy 50 more? Do I want to carry around or store x number of blank journals for the next 25 years? I don’t know. Anyway, I bought in bulk, and I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten the one I need. I’ll be ready to make a switch to a new kind of journal in 25 years, I think.

Aimee pointed it out, and she was right: every building in Chicago seemed to have a revolving door. Aside from a blog entry or two about it, I couldn’t find any info on why Chicago buildings share this unusual feature. A move for energy conservation in the building code is my guess, but I don’t know for sure.

Besides the four hours spent running from one end of Chicago to the other, we had a nice three days spent exploring and relaxing. I didn’t want to walk around too much for fear of tiring myself out, but on the other hand, I didn’t want to sit around and dwell on the race, either. So we did some low key neighborhood exploration, found a few photo booths, watched the ball games and the debate, and caught up with a few friends.

We enjoyed another meal at the Salt & Pepper Diner in Wrigleyville with Piero, where we ate with him last time we visited in the summer of 2003. Once again, he was spotted by four or five people whom he knew; between his stints at ImprovOlympic and French restaurant, not too far from the hotel, which we followed with drinks at the John Hancock, next door to our hotel. As Piero had told us the day before, it’s better to save the ten dollars it costs to visit the Hancock Observatory, and instead just buy a drink at The Signature Room one floor up, for a better view.



Millennium Park was our destination for our last day in the city, where we marveled at the Frank Gehry band shell and bridge, as well as the giant, untitled Anish Kapoor sculpture. Well done, Chicago.

More on the rest of the trip to Chicago later, first a marathon recap. While I can’t negotiate stairs with any kind of grace, I’m feeling pretty good 48 hours later, and I’m happy with the way things went. The day was really perfect, considering all of the factors involved in something like this. I got a good night’s sleep and woke up in the dark at 5:30 Sunday morning. After a litlle breakfast, Aimee and I joined hundreds of other runner-types and their companions and fans, as we walked quietly down State Street towards Grant Park. The sun was rising as we walked, and we enjoyed beautiful views of the Tribune Building and the Chicago River as we funneled into the start area an hour before the race began. On a strange, serendipitous note, Wilco’s “I’m a Wheel” (featuring the classic lyric “Once in Germany someone said ‘nein’/ 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9”) was playing on the race PA as we walked into the park. The very same song was playing as I ran back into the park to finish the race four hours later. A “wheel,” indeed.

After spending a good half hour in line for the bathroom, I dropped my bag off at gear check, and made my way to the 9 minute mile pace section of the start area. It really was a sea of people, runners and onlookers all mixed in, waiting for the starting horn to sound. The sight of thousands of pieces of clothing being launched from within a crowd of people a minute before the start was unforgettable; those of us on the sides of the crowd were pelted with cheap windbreakers and expensive lightweight shirts as people stripped down and prepared to start. The horn sounded, and after ten minutes of walking, we finally crossed the start line and began running. We ran under the beautiful and impressive Gehry-designed BP Pedestrian Bridge, and as we headed under the overpass beyond, a roar of cheering from the runners went echoing through the space, and gave me the chills.

I stopped to stretch out my hip three times during the first few miles of the race in a pre-emptive measure to avoid the crippling pain of my 20-mile run, and I guess it worked. I never realized how much of the race would involve trying to make my way around people in front of me. It wasn’t that I was passing them, but people were walking, stopping, running across the road, and not all moving at the same pace, so it was a bit of an obstacle course in places.

Miles one through twenty were, if not a breeze, at least very consistent and, from a pain/injury/energy standpoint, fairly uneventful. I spent most of my time trying to hold back, stay on pace, and enjoy the surroundings. I enjoyed the bands who were playing (especially The Powerknobs and the polka band playing on the Polish Marathon Club of Chicago stage), and the crowds (over a million, by the news estimates) were great, always cheering and occasionally handing out gummi bears and bananas.

I saw Aimee at our first two designated spots, in the crush of downtown and then somewhere near the half-marathon spot. I was looking out for her as I approached Mile 20 or 21, happy to be able to tell her that there was no “wall,” as people described it, that in fact I was doing great, feeling great, and I would be just fine. I never did see Aimee there, though, and somewhere in Chinatown, something happened. I started losing steam, slowing down, and hitting the wall I was so ready to dismiss. I think it was more like a steep slope than a wall, but it certainly slowed me down, and I couldn’t keep up the pace I’d kept up to then. For most of the race, I watched the miles roll by as I multiplied everything by nine and stayed on pace. If I were to run the whole thing at a nine-minute pace, that would leave me with about five minutes to spare to make my four-hour goal, so I wasn’t sure if I should run as much as I could at a faster pace and have more room to slow down at the end, or try to be consistent and hope I could maintain the somewhat slower pace throughout. I chose the latter, and it ended up working, just barely.

After the dead zone of New Comiskey/U.S. Cellular Park and the Interstate, where the cheering was sparse and the outlook bleak, the southside blues band and the final water/Gatorade stop brought me back to the moment. The final quarter mile or so featured the only hill in the entire race, an entirely unexpected and very unassuming slope that caused many of the people near me to just stop running altogether. I could see the finish line, and knew I had about two minutes to get up the hill and across the line, so I started my only charge of the day, this horrible-looking shuffle-waddle that took me up on the curb, past the police and the the EMTs picking people up who weren’t going to make it, and right in front of the giant-screen tv showing a live image of grimacing me, into the finish line with a time of 3:59.14.

After stopping my watch and realizing I’d made it, I headed right for the real reward of the race – not the medal, but the shiny Mylar blanket, which I finally felt I’d earned. Only then did I get my medal, as I bowed in front of a young volunteer who draped it over my head. Next stop was the chip removal station, where a volunteer with a razorblade cut the chip off my shoelaces, and then I was free to retrieve my bag, find my cellphone, and call Aimee to reunite. I trained for it, and now I’ve done it. It was a great day.

I spent time on the floor of my office, stretching, this morning. I was never without my Nalgene bottle today, drinking as much water as I could remember to drink. I stretched on the bus over to Aimee’s, and watched as we drove by all my running routes from the past year. As far as the eye could see, I’d run, sometime in the past twelve months of training. Every street, every bridge, every bike path, and now we’re on our way to the airport so I can put it all together on Sunday.

I read an interview with John Edwards in Runner’s World Magazine last night, not that I needed another reason to think he’s an interesting, well-rounded, thoughtful, and determined alternative to Grampa Evil. I also tried to pick up some last minute tips on training for the marathon, though at this point, I’d better not try anything new.

It’s funny to think of what I thought a marathon meant a year ago; it seemed like an impossible goal. But now that I’ve chipped away at the distance over the last few months, it seems like something that will be tough, but that will just require me to do something over and over for a little longer than I’ve done it before. It’s within a realm of possibility now, and I’m excited to get it started. talk to me on Monday, I guess, and see if I still feel as charitable.

In case you care to follow along, that’s my number in the marathon on Sunday. I don’t think they have a cool runner tracker like the New York City Marathon does (which of course allowed us to track P. Diddy as he ran last year). I’ve set up email and text message alerts to family, which ought to give some idea of how I’m doing as it goes along.

I’m feeling well-rested and confident this week, as opposed to the out-of-touch and paranoid I was feeling last week. I’m in full-on eating mode these days, trying to stock up on carbs like pasta, potatoes, bread, and the like in the days before the race. Yesterday, I ate at The Wrap and The Cosmic Caf?; today was Dolphin Seafood and El Pel?n Taqueria. We leave tomorrow evening for Chicago, and have two days to hang out and try to avoid getting too worked up before race day.