Paytonization, Phase 1

I joined a coed touch football league. First game was Saturday. We got our butts kicked by a team that, in their 15 years in the league, had learned some strategies that are effective in coed touch football (whereas my brain is stuck thinking about “tackle”). Late in the game, figuring “what the hell”, I switched positions with the guy who had been playing quarterback and threw him a long TD pass. Too little, too late, but maybe I'll ask to play QB a little more next week.

By Saturday evening, I was hurting. The foreseeable annoyance was my right big toe that had gotten cut up, because my shoes had no insoles whatsoever, because I forgot to bring my custom orthotics. The annoyance I had not foreseen — but in retrospect should have — was that my shins, calves, thighs, and stomach muscles all ached the dickens, because I hadn't run around like this in months. Sunday, it was all I could do to shift my position on the couch occasionally as I watched the latter pair of this weekend's four excellent NFL playoff games.

Yeah, I have some work ahead of me.