There are certain moments in my life where I am very thankful that I have a place to share some of my experiences and know that you all understand and can laugh with me and not at me. You know, like whenever I lock myself out of the house twice in one day.

Tonight I had one of those moments on my run.

Dave and I set off on a run and around 3 miles, Dave went home and I continued one to the trail. I was planning to do six miles. My house is Exactly one mile from the trail, but I didn’t hit the three mile mark right at my house, so I knew that I needed to do some math to figure out how far I had to run on the trail.

My math was off. I was about 4.5 miles in before I realized that I set myself for a 7 mile run instead of 6 mile run. No biggie. I was feeling excellent. I was running an easy pace (about 9 min/mile) and felt like I could run forever. However, the Pens game started at 7, so I didn’t want to run any further than 7 miles. So basically, a little past the 1 mile mark on the trail, I turned back. That would put me home at 7 miles.

Well, right after I turned around, I HAD TO GO TO THE BATHROOM.

I was 2 over miles from my nice, clean bathroom at home and 1 mile from the nearest port-a-potty. I figured I would walk for a little, let it pass, then run some more. I was feeling so good that I was terribly disappointed and wasn’t ready to throw in the towel.

Well, life rarely goes as planned and I couldn’t even run 1/10th of a mile without having to stop. I ended up walking the entire mile to the port-a-potty. I was just praying that 1) I could make it and 2) that it wasn’t terribly disgusting.

I did think about stopping to take advantage of nature, but I didn’t have toilet paper. In the past I have used my socks in worst case scenarios, but I was wearing my $8 UnderArmour socks. $8 socks are hard enough to justify; $8 one-time-use toilet paper is out of the question. Even in the face of the dreaded runner’s gut.

Well, I made it. Thankfully the port-a-potty wasn’t disgusting. And thankfully there were two full rolls of toilet paper…

THAT WERE SOAKED WITH RAIN WATER.

What did I do?? I laughed. I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I made a huge mess of those TP rolls, but the good news is that that was the only mess. I could have been much worse.

And as soon as I came home I showered, seeing that I was a little concerned about picking up some parasite from that little episode.

What have I learned? Well, I always carry TP on my long runs, but apparently I need to carry it for every run…or at least on days when I don’t wear cheap socks.

What about you? Do you carry TP or wear cheap socks?

After finishing the Shaara books on the Civil War, I wanted another book regarding the Civil War. Turning to a biography about my favorite Civil War general seemed the next logical step.

Er, that is, two biographies about my favorite Civil War general.

There’s no need for alarm now, but when I start trading in my long runs for Civil War reenactments, then you need to send help.

…Hi, my name is Abby and I’m a Civil War addict.

(Although the Gettysburg Marathon does sound amazing…)