The dry run, Part I

... Though truth be told that title's a total misnomer, as this, my inaugural five-mile walk from condo to office, was to be neither dry nor a run.

Even at a slackened pace — if not quite leisurely, today's rate of speed was a far cry from my usual clip, which onlookers have likened to that of a meth addict toward the end of a four-day tweak — even slowing things down this good couple notches, I still would've failed the Sure/Unsure test by, oh, about the time I reached the Navy Annex:


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Like I said, I'm a right sweaty bastard. Thing is, today was actually chilly at 8 a.m., when I started this test-walk, cold enough to gnarl the fingers on the hands between which I passed the one-gallon jug of Deer Park I fill from the cooler at work and sometimes take home at the end of the day, which may or may not be in contravention of company rules, it's kind of a gray area — but, oh yeah, so anyway, no more than three minutes in on this nipply morn I was still suffering from sweat down my back like a layer of frost. (And yes, I'm plagiarizing "Trainspotting." Big whoop. Wanna fight about it?)

Point being, I shudder to think what's going to happen if the Orioles pull their usual dog-days swoon.

That said, I have to report that the, er, sudorifery notwithstanding, I quite enjoyed the walk to work. I rag on D.C. a lot — how it's got no skyline, how it's got no native inhabitants, how the inhabitants it does have are oftentimes total tools — and while I don't want to get too misty-eyed and gushy here, suffice it to say that it's tough to beat the view from the hillside just east of the Air Force Memorial in Arlington, where Columbia Pike curls north and crests down toward the Pentagon — a view that includes, in one wide panoramic sweep, the southern boundary of Arlington National Cemetery, row after perfectly spaced row of identical white markers on a sloping verdant bed; the southwest wall of the Pentagon, its new section patching where the plane went in a touch more lightly shaded than the surrounding concrete; and off across the river, of course, the Monument and Capitol beyond, shadows shrouded in the gauzy a.m. sunlight.

Ah, shit, that did get kinda misty-eyed, didn't it?

To be continued ...