Turn down the heat!

Today was hot, humid, and mostly sunny. Too hot for the dog to run, even early in the morning. So I had a cunning plan: I would sneak out of the house early enough that he wouldn't be roused. If I get up early enough, he doesn't move, and I can leave him without guilt. Unfortunately, this wasn't to be. So I collected the appropriate accessories, water, poop bags, etc, and we headed out. After about a mile, he was looking rather hot, so we walked for the rest of the hour-ish.

A lady we met told us that pitbulls can climb trees. This was news to me. However, they're not so good at getting themselves back down (she had to rescue one up in a tree at one point).

My run had to wait, at any rate. The hoped-for rain puttered out after a few minutes, but it stayed nice and overcast and I was able to get about six miles in without too much discomfort. The more I jog in the heat, actually, the more I like it...so far. We're not hitting the usual south-of-Dixie 40+C humidex, plus we're in July and haven't had much hot weather so it's more bearable than having a month or more straight of it and knowing there's at least a couple more months to go. Anyway, the heat makes everything nice and loose and lets my mind wander, in a way. I think it helped too that, after being out in the morning, I've been drinking a lot of water. My body has been through enough spells of hot weather that it adjusts pretty quickly to it. Mind you, I cannot race well in anything above 10C, but if I go with the flow and just ease things along gently, even 40+C humidex is ok for jogging.

Anyway, this evening, I ran along the river for a bit and came across a bike sprawled across the path. There was a man on the ground too. At first I'd thought he'd fallen. Then I thought he was fixing something, and then I realized he was trying to repack his belongings in what looked like a ripped sheet or pillowcase. He was rather weather-beaten. I was afraid that he'd fallen so I asked him if he was ok. He said he was. There were a couple more sentences from the both of us and then he asked "Are you the heat?" I automatically substituted the most likely word: "Yeah, I'm feeling the heat." "No, are you the heat?" Did I mishear again? "I'm feeling it, but I'm not the heat." "The heat, you know, are you the heat?" Ah. He went on, saying that I was in that security gear, and sometimes he had no problems with the heat, not with the alcoholics (which raised my eyebrows) but other guys gave him problems, etc. I told him that I wasn't the heat. He wasn't convinced. I told him I was just running around, but this wasn't good enough, so I bid him bye and went on my way, not before I noticed that he had an open can of beer sitting beside him. I wonder how long he'd been sitting there. It didn't look like a comfortable spot, but what do I know?

I was wearing black shorts and a pretty snazzy OBX marathon singlet. If that's all it takes to look official, then we're all in a lot of trouble.

After that, I grabbed a quick shower then went to a yin yoga class. I've been really delinquent with yoga these past few weeks....I've done some home practicing, but not much, and none at all at the centre. I have to use up X number of classes before the summer ends, so that's good motivation. The thought of trying an ashtanga or hot yoga class again is more and more appealing--these past few months have been all yin yoga, which has suited me, but maybe I'm getting into too much of a rut.