Guatemala

Greetings from Guatemala City, where I arrived a couple hours ago--I think it was a couple hours ago; I've lost all sense of time--and where I'm currently letting my exhaustion wash over me. Last night, for reasons too complicated to explain, I ended up getting salsa lessons at a Caracas jazz lounge called Juan Sebastián Bar. It was a memorable evening, but it didn't end till about 2:30; I then woke up before nine to eat, re-pack, and hop on the bus for Caracas airport, where what should've been a routine check-in turned into an hour-and-a-half-long ordeal. My days have officially begun blending together.

Caracas is a fascinating city; the poverty is extreme and even more visible than in other Latin American countries, and driving past the barrios on the way to the airport was hard to take. How can we allow such poverty to exist in the year 2012? It beggars belief; it demands action. I think it's time I re-read The Motorcycle Diaries.

Greetings from Venezuela!

Full Bore Towards Half a Marathon

Training for a half-marathon's challenging in its own right--but when it's combined with six weeks of travel, three of which are on a different continent, it's even more of an ordeal. (Or at least I'm assuming it is...but that's a reasonable assumption, right? Right. Moving on!) Take this morning, for example. I planned on running 10k through an olive grove before heat (it was +34 when I set out at 8) and dehydration derailed me after six. And that's just the actual running: wanton neglect of sleep patterns and proper nutrition are practically unavoidable, and while I'm always well-hydrated when I travel (especially if I'm a desert climate...o hai Lima!) it's not a lifestyle that encourages the balance that's so vital to race preparation.

Am I glad I'm doing this? You bet.

Back in 2006 I made "train for a half-marathon" an item on my inaugural number-for-age list. I also included a caveat: "Even if I don't end up running it." In retrospect I was reluctant to fully commit myself to something I wasn't sure I could actually do. Christopher McDougall thinks we were all born to run, but it's never been easy for me; indeed, after finishing my first race (a year ago this weekend!) I noted how I was not born to run, my Springsteen obsession notwithstanding. I probably thought that training for a half-marathon was outlandish enough that it'd push me well beyond my physical comfort zone but not as insane as, say, running an actual race. So what changed? First, the Ride to Conquer Cancer made me realize that I'm capable of doing extreme endurance activities. Second, I discovered the Running Room; third, through the Running Room I met a running partner who possesses unnatural levels of zeal. Finally, I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it--because I can, and on May 27 I will. Even if it means working LSD runs into a schedule that's got a twenty-one hour day looming on the horizon.

And I'm not doing too badly. I did run today; I also ran twice in Sao Paulo, including once at the same park where I went biking two years ago. I worked out in Brasilia; if I don't run again tonight (and I might, although I likely won't--I'm about to eat the ocean out of fish) I'll do a 5k tempo run tomorrow that'll leave me weak in the knees and begging, just begging, for sleep. I'm in better shape than I've ever been. And it's exciting to think where I might be in sixty-nine days when I finally cross that finish line. Tramps like me? Maybe I was born to run.

Andean Weekend

Greetings from Lima! We landed here this morning and walked into an absolute mob scene: our arrival coincided with that of a Korean boy band called JYJ, and the terminal of the Aeropuerto Internacional Jorge Chávez roughly resembled an Andean reenactment of JFK when the Beatles first landed in America. (There are some great pictures to follow.) From there it was on to our hotel and then straight to the rooftop pool (I'll remind you that it's Saturday; also, I've been awake since 2:35 Brazilian time, which is 12:35 Peruvian/Eastern time, and the upshot of all that is that I earned this day off, dammit!). Our original plan for tomorrow called for a visit to an Incan ruin; that's been nixed, apparently due to weather, but no one will complain if tomorrow ends up being a reprise of today. The real insanity starts Tuesday, when we wake up in Peru, go to bed in Ecuador...and work in Colombia. Good times! Again, this information's meant to underscore the point that we've earned at least a little bit of downtown...right?

Right. More updates tomorrow! First things first, though: a 10k run through an olive grove. It's a strange life; glad it's me who gets to live it.

Brasilia and Bruce

I'm listening to the new Bruce Springsteen album for the first time, in a hotel room in Brazil's capital city Brasilia. I doubt I could've envisioned my present reality three years ago, when I fell asleep while giving Working on a Dream its inaugural listen, but here we are: I'm underneath the covers in a king-sized bed with the lights off and "Jack of All Trades" playing through my earbuds. It's a good life. And it's a bit of a weird one.

I'd been to Brasilia a couple years ago when our group flew in from Sao Paulo, visited a school, toured the city, and then flew back. This year we checked into a hotel, which is actually more like a compound; it's also one of the more unique places I've stayed, partly because there's a giant zeppelin-like structure hanging over the lobby area. We're technically staying two nights; I say "technically" because my alarm's set for 2:40 tomorrow morning (it's 8:36pm right now...hey, that's six hours from now!) and I'll be on a flight bound for Lima before sunrise. These are the less-glamourous aspects of what I do. Among the more glamourous ones: eating dinner at a restaurant abutting the Pacific Ocean, which is what I'll be doing tomorrow night. Again: it's a good life. It's just a bit difficult wrapping my head around it sometimes.

More this weekend! Boa noite!

Tudo Bem!

Greetings from Sao Paulo, which (so far) has been much kinder to me than in previous years. I just walked about a mile uphill to a music store that didn't have the new Bruce Springsteen album--and so I'm now sat in my hotel room listening to "Midnight Rambler" and downloading Wrecking Ball from the iTunes Store. The trip officially starts in sixteen minutes; this, then, is necessarily a short update, but it's also the first of what will hopefully be many updates as I traipse about Latin America for the next couple weeks.

As for Rio: it's one of the best places I've ever been. There's more life in a single block than in most entire cities, and we barely even scraped the surface. I cannot wait to go back.

Sled Island

I won't be here to see it--but Sled Island announced its headliners today, and man. Oh, man. Feist is the biggest name on the bill, but both Thurston Moore and especially the Hold Steady would've had me camping out at Olympic Plaza. Of course the trade-off might be Springsteen and Pearl Jam (twice!) in Manchester, but this is a line-up I'm going to regret missing.

This time on Friday I'll be in Houston.