I Went For A Walk

It was a lovely day for a stroll around the end of the world

After an invigorating morning of back-to-back Zoom meetings, I decided to go for a walk. Sitting hunched over a computer all day is giving me “tech neck,” a sharp pain that confirms that I am allergic to work.

The first thing I noticed as I stepped outside was the loud cheering coming from inside my house. I have been told that I speak into my computer at the same volume of someone trying to talk to Uzbekistan via tin cans connected with a string. My family is now sadder when a new meeting pops up on my calendar than I am.

The second thing I noticed as I stepped outside was that the air didn’t smell like caged children and leftovers. I don’t know about you, but we are terrified of throwing out any scraps of food just in case supply lines suddenly dry up. “I don’t care if you dropped that glop of yogurt on the floor, wash it off and eat it!”

Leftovers don’t at all age like fine wine, and for some reason, I have become the designated “Does this smell right?” guy at my house. A few days ago, my wife Lisa presented me with a half-eaten salami log that our son Gus went to town on. Does it smell right? she inquired. That begged the larger question: does salami ever smell right? Either way, I am definitely adding “salami sniffer” to my LinkedIn skills.

So anyway, I stood on the stoop, breathed in deeply, then coughed. Then panicked. Then remembered it is spring and the air is 98% pollen and moved on.

Off I went on my walk, or Batshit Crazy Zig-Zag Circus Funtime, as I like to call it now. Six-feet for social distancing? Amateur hour. If you are within a football field of me, I’m darting across the street. I walk like I am trying to shake a tail from the Feds. Cross, double back, run into traffic, circle the block twice, kill a guy, then keep moving.

I walk like at any minute, I am about to step in a pile of dog shit. And depending on the block in this town, that is a very real possibility. (Oh, I see you, Dude-Who- Didn’t-Scoop-Up-His-Dog’s-Fresh-Turd. And honestly? I don’t blame you one bit.)

You have to stay alert out there on these walks. At any minute, you can have a kid on tricycle barrelling down on you at 2 mph…

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