Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Runner's Hankerchief

You know, where you plug one nostril and blow out the other?  I have it down to an art form.  I can do it and not miss a stride.

But when you can feel the snotball exit your nose, and hear it splat on the ground, you have to stop and see what the hell just came out of your sinuses.  It was almost the size of a kitten, I swear, and I think I saw it move under it's own power at least once.

I hate LA air.  Smog, dust, and pollen.  I have black boogers half the time.

2 comments:

Rivrdog said...

Au contraire, monsieur, that move is known as a French-Canadian Handkerchief...

A true story about SoCal air quality. Date, Spring of 1979. Again on TAD with the USAF, I was ordered to March AFB in Riverside. First night of duty, I went for a PT run of 3 miles. I did those in 20-22 minutes back then. Very nice running thru the orange groves along a canal.

All night, I had a bad cough, and next morning, it got REALLY bad, so I went to Sick Call, after notifying the Shirt I wouldn't make Officer's Call.

The doc listens to my chest, and pronounces me a chem-inhalation case, not bad enough to have to live on oxygen, but bad enough. He questions me about where I might have sucked in that poison air. I told him about the PT run. He looked at me as if I had just failed Basic, asked me why I hadn't called to check air quality before running, etc. Since it was the "smog season", he told me to check with the Duty NCO before any more after-hours runs, or drive by the base gym and observe the handy flag system there for that purpose. It turned out that I had gone on a vigorous Run and Puke in a Stage Two smog conition.

Ragin' Dave said...

Yep. The air has gotten better since then, but there are days when I can't see the mountains because the air is just brown and thick.