Geriatric Guinea Pig

Last week = Good week. I finally (and I say finally with a sigh of relief) had a good run. More on that later. I was part of a medical study at UT. I was the "Old Fart Baseline" for a study in Arterial Aging. It was very interesting to say the least. Let me tell you, UT has lots of high tech gadgets and toys. Not sure of the names of these devices but they had lot of cables hooked to me, moving graphs, charts and the all important blinking lights. The study took about 4 hours. From it all, they took blood for analysis, ran a BMI test, VO2 Max test, Max HR, and about 4 other things that I have no clue about. The students that were running the tests were very professional and knowledgeable. As they went about their testing, I was amazed at the skill they showed. I had it easy, all I had to do was lay there and let them have their way with me. I had to laugh when they were drawing my blood. These students were doing everything to make me feel at ease, especially when it came to the blood draw. The student, who was going to do the draw, explained everything as he was prepping my arm. He had my arm stretched out, a rubber tube tied around my bicep as he talked. He had me make a fist a few time. As he started lining up the needle with the vein in my arm, he noticed my eyes get a little bigger and sensed that I was tensing up. He backed up a short way and started explaining again and telling me that he has been drawing blood samples for two years. Again, he started his approach; he moved closer and started aiming for my vein with the needle. I stopped making a fist, and he urged me to keep pumping. Again, he sensed my discomfort and went on to explain how quick and painless this actually was. I have been donating blood since I was 20 so I was not uncomfortable with being stuck with a needle. What I was uncomfortable with was how close to my hand his crotch was. Each time he moved in, his crotch was close, too close to my hand for me to ignore. As I clenched and unclenched my fist, there was a near miss between my hand and him. I can put my hand near a fire or the hot muffler and not feel as uncomfortable as I did now. I finally relaxed and let him put the needle in my arm. I ignored that his crotch was within an inch of my hand. I knew it would be over shortly. That was, until I heard him say, "Oh Darn". Let me just say that "Oh Darn" is not a phrase you want to hear when there is a needle in your arm. The vein in my arm had "rolled" and he missed it with the needle. He grabbed my other arm and said, "Let's try this other arm". So, here we go again, complete with hand – crotch proximity stress. He finally got the blood drawn and we were onto some other less stressful tests.
I probably won't ever see the outcome of this research, and I would not understand it if I did but they did give me some results. Weight 175, Max HR – 150, % body Fat – 19, BMI – 25.2, MPG -23 in the city, 26 Highway.   VO2 is 50 something or another per some other stuff.
Friday we had a 13 mile run on the schedule. With two really suck runs in the past three weeks; I needed a good solid run. Mentally, I prepped myself for this run. No matter what, I was going to run the whole way, no walking. I got up early, ate a small breakfast, drank some water and then headed downtown. My plan was to start out with everyone but would be willing to let them go as soon as I sensed things going into the toilet. Luckily, that never happened. There were about 6 of us running and due to traffic lights, pace and strength, everyone took off except Elizabeth and I. We fell into a good pace. We were able to run together the whole way. We are both accusing each other of hanging back for the other. I claim that she was hanging back to make sure I had a good run, she claims that she was having a tough day and that I was hanging back to help her. Overall, it does not matter; we both had a good morning. It was one of those runs that later in the day, you look back on it and are appreciative. You are thankful for your health, your abilities, and most of all your running partners. It was a special day.