Our first run

I meant to post this a little while ago, but here it is now.

I finally got The Behemoth in the mail on Friday. Andrew was super excited to see it arrive. He's been begging to go running for quite some time now and had just gotten his head around the notion that we were going to do it this week.

At some point on Saturday; I'm not sure when, I was at work, Matthew started fussing a little bit and Liz desperately had to go do something else. She asked Andrew to keep an eye on his brother for just a few seconds. Usually, when she leaves the room, Matthew starts to whine and cry. He's turned into a real momma's boy right now. This time, however, he seemed to get quieter. She returned to find Andrew hovering over him, telling all about running at the park. He was telling Matthew that he'll have fun in the stroller watching the trees, they'll play at the playground afterward, he might see some animals; all the things that Andrew loves about running in the park. Liz said it was the cutest thing she'd ever seen.

The three of us were supposed to go out for our first run together on Sunday afternoon, but Matthew was super-duper tired and ended up going down for a nap before we left for our run, so it was just Andrew and me that day. He was a little disappointed that we took the old stroller and not The Behemoth, but happy we went, nonetheless.

I had to work on Monday, so I promised Andrew that on Tuesday we would go running no matter what. What a bad idea. It started off well, Andrew kept asking when we were going to go out (he's been asking the same questions over and over and over and over again for the last few weeks) and kept me honest. Tuesday morning rolled around and everything tanked.

Bullet list of the morning's activities:

• Liz had to leave for work early because she had a dentist appointment. That meant I was responsible for feeding Andrew breakfast. This invariably means waffles (Daddy makes waffles, mommy makes pancakes.)
• I had to gather all of the accouterments for our run (my iPod, towel, change of clothes, Clif Bar, drinks, ...), but in my haste I forgot the camera.
• I had to convince Andrew to get dressed, not always an easy prospect and this morning was no different.
• I had to feed Matthew second breakfast, always easier than getting Andrew dressed, but time consuming.
• I had to change Matthew's diaper.
• I had to get dressed for the run.
• I had to convince Andrew to brush his teeth -- usually easier than dressing, but not this day.
• I had to finish putting together The Behemoth. That just involved putting the front fender on, but I put it on backwards first and had to re-do it.
• At this point, Andrew started complaining that his stomach hurt. This was just a ploy to stay at home, he wanted me to play with his Thomas the Tank Engine Lego set.
• I had to convince Andrew to put on his shoes, which first involved convincing him that his stomach did not hurt. I finally told him that we were going to run and if he wanted to come directly home afterward, we could skip the playground.
• I had to figure out how to get The Behemoth in my car. You know, they don't build duallie strollers to fit into 2-door coupes. I had to use the bicycle rack. You know, they don't build bicycle racks to fit onto 2-door coupes either.
• I had to convince Andrew to get in the car. Not easy since he was distracted by, oh heck, I have no idea what caught his attention, but he wasn't getting in the car.
• He was just about to get into the car, when we both saw our neighbor at his door. I love these neighbors; an elderly couple who live and breathe for the 4 young children on both sides of their house. Unfortunately, a visit with the Jones usually lasts at least 30 minutes.
• I finally got out of the house, on our way to run, at about 10:30, an hour later than usual.
• We got to the park, I set up The Behemoth in just enough time to catch the sprinkles falling from the sky. The weatherman had predicted a 20% chance of rain to our south, so this was just a minor extension of that weather pattern.
• I woke Matthew up to move him from the car seat to the stroller.
• We left for our run and my iPod's battery is dead.
  
• 1 mile in and the road was closed for a tree-felling. Turn around.
• I head up the hills @ about 2 miles and the heavens open up. It starts pouring. Matthew starts screaming. I start slowing. We have 1 uphill mile left no matter which way we go, so I press on.

We finally got back to the car and no one was happy. We were all soaked to the bone. I tossed Andrew into the car and told him to strip. I put Matthew in, took his clothes off, and put him in the car seat. I changed clothes and got in and turned on the A/C and bumped the temperature up to warm us up.

All in all, it was a miserable morning, but I can't help but look back on it a day and a half later and chuckle.

I just hope Matthew doesn't remember that day when we go for our second run.

(c) 2008 Scott Everett