Spitting Menaces

You know what I hate? Loogey-spitting Exercisers. I came to this realization yesterday, when climbing North Mountain. I'm huffing and puffing and barely staying conscious and all of a sudden I see a gelatinous monster loogey slowly traveling down the steep grade of the mountain like green hot lava on the side of a volcano. Now, being the hateful martyr that I am, I can't just look away. I have to inspect it, and inspect it well, for this will allow me to fill my heart with more hatred for the mysterious person who so rudely put it there. So, now I'm severely out of breath, dehydrated, AND nauseous. Thanks, rude, loggey spitter!

Of course, I can relate to the need for spitting when one exercises. There's something about exercise that generates a lot of phlegm. I actually suffer from exercise-induced asthma and for anyone who knows anything about asthma, it gives the sensation of having your lungs filled with mucous. I know, I know. That's gross. Tell me about it. Ten minutes into my exercise, and all my organs are coated with the stuff. But do I hawk one on the trail for all to see? No, I don't. I'd rather die of phlegm asphyxiation than join the not-so-elite crowd of Loogey-Spitting Exercisers. I am courteous that way.

Only once can I remember publicly spitting to try and rid my mouth of a lot of viscous phlegm. And I learned my lesson -- the hard way. I was in high school, and had just been asked to run a mile and a half in the middle of September (in Arizona). This was part of "weight training" class which was really a ruse for what should have been called "High School Torture 101." I ran the mile and a half, and ended the ordeal with a large amount of phlegm lining the inside of my mouth and esophagus. While rehydrating at the drinking fountain, I thought I'd discreetly deposit some of the phlegm into the drinking fountain. Gross, sure, but not as rude as plastering it on the sidewalk as a public display of poor manners. Well, discreet it was not, for what was supposed to be a single spit turned out to be a very long rope of phlegm. It was like those magic tricks where a guy pulls a handkerchief out of a hat, but it's connected to another handkerchief and another and another. This was the same exact concept -- the loogey trail that would never end. I had both hands goin' at that thing, trying to break it off at some point, but it was really rubbery and refused to concede. As peers were yelling for me to "save some water for the fishes," I was wrestling an infinite procession of phlegm. That's the last time I tried to spit.

In a few weeks, I will be running in my first half marathon -- the PF Chang's Rock and Roll Marathon. I'm excited about this, except for one thing -- the vast amount of loogeys that I will have to wade through. For anyone who's run in an organized race before, you'll remember that the loogey dump begins about one mile into the run and continues through the end. (This, coincidentally, is the same distance at which the bowels begin to warm up, but I'll save that for another blog!) For me, this means 12.2 miles of loogey infestation. I think I heard they expect like 50,000 people to run in this race. If even a small percentage, such as 10 percent, turned out to be Loogey-Spitting Exercisers, this would still be 5,000 loogies. That, my friends, is a LOT. Imagine if someone could figure out how to put a marketing message in all those loogies. That would be some sweet advertising. If anyone could do it, Microsoft could.

The moral to this story is that disgusting bodily fluids should remain where? Ah, yes, in THE BODY! More specifically, in YOUR body where they belong. Don’t subject the rest of us to these public displays of poor manners – it’s just downright rude!