Keep Your Fingers Crossed

So, in the Reality Show of my life (maybe titled "What's Wrong With Me Now"), I have come down with a case of poison oak. In case you have never been afflicted by poison oak or poison ivy, or are one of those people who gets a small itchy rash when you come in contact with these evil plants, I can't even begin to describe the misery that is me when I manage to come within 10 yards or so of a poison oak leaf. When I get poison oak, I end up looking like a villain in a comic book, shortly after he's been doused with flesh-eating acid and just before he gets his evil mask to cover up his hideousness. Let's put it this way: the last time I got poison oak, I had scars for a year. I won't even show you pictures, it's too horrifying.

So on this week's camping trip, twelve of us went on a hike through the forest. It was a pretty green forest (lots of moisture) and fairly high elevation, so poison oak was a dim possibility at best. Still, I scoured the vegetation at every step of the way for the Evil Three Leaves. Never saw it (and as you might guess, I'm pretty good at spotting the stuff). No one else on the trip got it. I did.

So when I get poison oak, it is really difficult to exercise because (warning: gross description ahead) it gets scabby and oozes and my flesh melts off in big sheets and it basically really hurts and clothing sticks to it. But remember, I've got a half-Ironman in less than a month? And I'm already behind on my training? So now I can't swim, fortunately that's the least of my worries in a race. I haven't been running this week, I've been biking on my trainer in the basement in my underwear. I'll spare you a photo of that one too. At least I discovered I could do this the last time I got the poison oak affliction, and maybe it will help me through this race.

Today I finally did get to go run, and actually had a very nice pleasant evening of it. I put big non-stick pads over all of my remaining patches and wore some long running shorts and nobody stared at me so I guess I covered it up pretty well. I went for 1:45 at a slightly sub-10:00 pace, so I'm feeling pretty happy about that. I think my early-season plan of keeping my long runs at 1:30 even through training for shorter races has saved my bacon here.

In the meantime, please keep your fingers crossed for me that toads don't rain down out of heaven on me or something between now and my race day.