Appointment book verses cell phone...no contest, Tom

Thursday, January 06, 2011

So I’m standing at the copy machine this morning and a fellow employee and friend (we’ll call him Tom to protect his anonymity…and because that’s his name and he likes to see it in print) starts jabbering away about how wonderful his cell phone is as an appointment book. Now…we’d already debated the merits of my hard copy ‘weekly minder’ I use verses his cell phone thing. I’d told him I liked mine better because I could open it up and view a week easily…seeing all options at one time.

“My phone calendar can do that,” he said. Okay…so I’m thinking he’s going to try and convince me that his phone with a screen the size of a big match book cover is as easy to see as my open appointment book…which measures 16” by 12”.

“Tom…how could it be? You’re saying the screen on that silly, little phone is the size of this appointment book…opened to the week I’m scheduling?” I was pretty sure he wasn’t going to dispute the dimensional thing…but he did.

Well…when we met at the copier and continued the discussion, another human with a real brain walked up. I told her what we were discussing and after Tom pulled out his phone and started pushing buttons…about 8 moves to cover the week…she said, “I kinda have to go with John here, Tom. I think it would be easier to just look at the whole week in an open book.”

And that brings to mind the whole reason he was looking at his calendar…which was that he wanted to go out to lunch and talk baseball. When he did, I suggested Slyman’s. “They’ve got the best corned beef sandwiches…in the world,” I said.

Now Tom is kind of like me….he always wants to be right…which is different since I always am right. Anyway he says, “the best corned beef sandwich was made by that place that closed on St. Clair.”

“Tom…think about it. If it was the best at anything…wouldn’t it still be open?” He sputtered some answer that wasn’t clever…something I’d never do. I’ll take him there…he’s never been…and then he’ll understand the ‘Slyman’s’ thing.

I was thinking about another double when I arrived at the Metroparks for a run. There was a light snow falling and a little over an inch on the ground already. I thought I’d go for 30 minutes then head home for a ride. I began the run feeling better than I had in a couple of months…nothing was hurting, though I was worried about overdoing the calf/achilles. I was running comfortably on the bridle trails when I hit a patch of ice…covered in a dusting of snow. I went down so fast that I only had time to utter “oh…” of the phrase “oh shit”. I landed hard on my left elbow and butt cheek. The cheek is well protected, but the elbow hurt like a mamma. I got quickly to my feet and began running more cautiously and to the side of the trail where there was no ice.

I suppose the cold was numbing the body parts upon which I’d landed because it didn’t really hurt as the run continued. I hit my turn-around and realized I’d have at least a 35-minute run if all went well. By the time I neared the car, I was still feeling great and decided to continue to the 40-minute mark and bag the ride back home.

It worked out. I’ve been patient in returning to running…having laid off for over 3 weeks since my achilles flared on December 10th. I don’t know that I’m completely healed, so I’ll continue to take it easy. As discouraged as I was when it happened, I’m happy that I took the break from running and moved to the cross training combination of hiking and biking. It may be what did the healing. Anyway, its been a long time since I ran 40 minutes…almost 2 months.

Run duration: 40 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 140 bpm.
Calories burned during workout: 675.