Thursday 25 June 2015

Musings of a grounded runner


Ask any runner, the most frustrating thing for them is not being able to run due to a small niggle. We are broadminded and do not minded being grounded for fancy ailments like Plantar fasciitis, but, to be kept off the daily dose of Endorphins due to a pain in the Bu**! I am not sure if it was the calisthenics called Yoga I experimented with in the call of duty last Sunday that has anything to do with the malfunctioning booty!
Last two days have been very frustrating, I get up at the usual hour go through the motions complete with hydration and dear Biscuit (my going on 7 year old Labrador pet, for those of you yet to be introduced!) giving up his air-conditioned comfort in the aid and support, all for yours truly curling up in bed (one day after having tested the road for a few paces!). Biscuit has been very accommodative in letting me a small portion of my side of bed for the stolen few hours before plain misery overtakes me on getting up at 7 AM! To come from such a state to office to see runner friends on facebook posting (or taunting!) ‘Did you run today’, is plain hell nothing less.
The lone cuckoo (yes the place we live has a lot of greenery and tree cover to support cuckoos!) has in recent times advanced its ‘Morning Raga’ rendition from its prime time of 4 AM to 2 AM (if not earlier!). I know this must be sheer agony to Biscuit’s roadside canine friends who do not get to sleep till after midnight( blast the incessant traffic on the Sterling road!). They any way get up out of a sense of duty to chase water lorries and milkmen by 4 AM. This is definitely not good news to their complexion given that WHO recommendation (as reminded by PGW in many of his epics!) is something of eight hours!
For reasons of adhering to some minimum standards of reporting, I shall resort to narrating events of the run last Tuesday.  I have been observing one emulatable behavior of my bovine friends from Marina. I have noticed that the cows that have crossed the ingesting phase to cud-chewing phase (by which time they settle down on the ground from their standing position!) invariably refuse my offering of banana peels. I usually compare this with my generally permissive ingestion policy, where to please my wife (and more often due to the excesses of the tongue!) I have known to gobble without restraint.
The other instance was my exchange with the Madras Transport Corporation (MTC) bus driver( this was different from the ones I have had with this fan base of mine till now!), who came straight at me, albeit slowly, when I was running along the divider against the traffic. He stopped next me and smilingly asked why I run against the traffic. Now amongst runners the question of whether to run along or against the traffic is as big a question as the one which set of a war in Liliput (which end to break the egg from!). I told him my plain logic, if he decides to knock me down when he sees me in the eye on a straight road then what hope do I have from his colleague who gets to have a go at my back when I run along the traffic. He appreciated my point and left with a big smile and wave, hope he spreads the word among his tribe!
I know I would have a go at the road tomorrow whatever the state of my royal back, I only hope I am good for the weekend runs. I also hope that the Corporation of Chennai got enough time to relay the road on my running route and I do not have to do an encore of Basanti!

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