Virtual Buffet

Last night was our midweek sorta long run of 9 miles. Yep, we usually run in the mornings but sometimes life (exhaustion) gets in the way and we have to adapt. We started our run just after 6:30 pm and we really realized how summer is quickly coming to an end as it was dark for the majority of the run. We also realized that the lake shore path becomes infested with gnats after sunset. I think, between the three of us, we swallowed an entire swarm. Nasty!

It was actually a really nice run. At one point, I put some imaginary blinders on and looked straight ahead and felt like we were running on the paths of the English Garden in Munich. Kris, his parents and I did a Mike's Bike Tour through it on a mild day and between the misty cool weather and the lamp posts, I was in the mood for a pint of beer and a large pretzel.

This brings me to what became a discussion of a "virtual buffet." None of us ate dinner and around mile 6, hunger settled in and a dialogue of what we wanted to eat kicked in. I have to tell you that it was a nice change up to our normal running conversation which usually weighs heavy on the frat house late night topic discussions. Here is a little sample of how things went last night:
Kris: I'm starving, I really could go for something heavy
D: If we keep running on Fullerton, we could stop at Burger King
Starr: That's disgusting, sick, gross, I'm gonna throw up.
Kris: I want matzo ball soup, a big heavy matzo ball (side note: I'm not sure Kris has ever had matzo ball soup and his Norwegian Christian family does not serve this up)
D: I want sushi, roll your own sushi from Dirks
Kris & Starr: Oooh, that sounds good
Kris: Papa John's!
Starr: I want the new cinnamon dough. Only $12.00 for 2 large pizzas and cinnamon dough
D: That's it, I'm doing roll your own sushi on Friday.

In the end, Kris and I ended up having a pot of Mac N Cheese because that's all the energy we had in us.