a letter to hal

dear coach hal,

there's something that's troubling me. i don't know what's happening but i'm turning into a slacker. it's, well, all quite disturbing and i feel awful. the truth of the matter is that i've only run 3 miles in the past week. shameful, i know. no doubt you are both surprised as well as very disappointed. as you should be. but let me explain, see, it all started about a week ago when i took this trip to hong kong--the 15 hr flights there and back along with a 12 hr time difference were not at all conducive to training runs. but while i was slacking in hong kong, i promised myself i would make up the mileage when i returned to nyc...but upon my return, i just kept coming up with more and more excuses. "is it really a good idea to go running during an oppressive heat wave?"..."i'm still trying to get over this jet lag, surely it's more important to sleep an extra hour?" and i am still tempted to argue that these actually were not excuses but valid reasons why i had to put my training on hold. but now here's the problem. now i just can't stop making excuses. tonight was the limit. tonight the excuses started to border on rationale for slothfulness. unacceptable! what happened is, i left work on the early side to be sure to make it home in time for a 9-miler. i had promised myself that tonight i was going to get right back on that training wagon. and then... i made it home from work...and after almost 2 hours of chatting on the phone (a good chunk of that chat time was with cube might i add) i realized it was 8:30PM and night had fallen...and so, a new excuse: "it's dark, and absolutely not safe to run in the park now, right?" now, i'm sure you could help me rationalize that it would have been irresponsible to go on a run under those circumstances. this might be true, but enough is enough. no more excuses. i want to get out of this rut. i need to be held accountable! i need some pressure. hal, i want to be a good trainee again. when you say run, i want to shout "how far hal? just tell me how far!" so here, right on this blog, i will commit to you, and to all our loyal readers, that tomorrow morning, before work, i WILL run 9 miles. no more excuses. i'm no wimp. i'm hardcore. i can be the best trainee ever. i mean, i was kicking cube's butt in the nike challenge and now...!!! well, no more! watch out. la chilena is back!

all the best, from your loyal trainee...