But I run marathons!

I'm going way back, all the way to late April or early May. The sordid events that I am about to explain happened so long ago (at least in blog time) that I can't remember when they occurred, other than the generic "awhile ago."

Eugene and I are very busy people. We work long hours and are always running off to one activity or another. As a result, we aren't as proactive as we could be about yard work, proactive being a kind euphemism for lazy. I'm far more guilty of this than Eugene. At any rate, we decided to have a big Memorial Day barbeque because we figured that it would motivate us to really get things done.

And it did. I attacked the garden patches with unprecendented fervor. I spent over five hours on my hands and knees one Saturday relentlessly weeding. Note to self: don't let weeds go for two years; it's not pretty. At the end of the day, I was in pain like I had never been in pain before. My wrists were screaming, and I felt like I had been hit by a truck. I was sore for days. I felt worse than I usually do after marathons that I run without really training. I was shocked to be in so much pain because as a person who has run a few marathons in a state of woeful unpreparedness, I figured that I had a really really high tolerance for pain. I never would have imagined that a measly five hours in a garden could cause me that much pain.

Ironically enough, I was reading Better Homes and Gardens and saw an article on pre-gardening stretches. Ordinarily, I would have scoffed at such a wussy idea like stretching before gardening. Now, I am a true believer and will definitely do my pre-gardening warmup stretches.