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How many calories for eating a brain?

Let's file this story under the heading "Only in Maine..."

I went out for my morning run today in a thick Maine fog. The sun wasn't quite up yet. No one else was out on the street. It was eerie, yet peaceful. In other words, a typical Maine morning.

This was my fourth straight day of running, so my body was sore. In order to urge myself through the exercise (torture?) I promised I'd go at a slow pace and only do three miles. My body agreed to those terms.

About a mile and a half in, as I struggled to take the steepest hill on this course (Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders I am not!), I heard this freakish scream behind me (no, the view of me from behind is not at all frightening!).

I turned just in time to a see man with a crazed look in his eye and a massive axe in his hands, running straight for me (and, yes, I was jealous that he was running much faster than I had been!).

I was able to dodge the axe, but he came at me again. This time, I used my incredibly long monkey boy feet to trip the lunatic and send him sprawling. I hurriedly picked up his axed, and then stood over him, axe in hand, and sweat dripping down (I sweat a lot when I run!).

"What the hell are you doing?" I demanded in the thickest of Brooklyn accents (I like to bust it out when I need to intimidate someone... like a dude trying to behead me).

"I saw you trudging along all limping and moaning in the fog," he replied in the voice of a man who was pissing his pants. "I thought you were a zombie!"

Oh. Well that made perfect sense. I apologized for turning his own weapon on him, helped him to his feet, and explained that I was just a half-asleep runner with a bum ankle.

We laughed, I thanked him for his dedication to keeping the streets safe from zombies (this is Maine after all!), and he invited me to his weekly "Walking Dead" watching party.

It's always nice to make new friends and possibly convert someone to the religion of Modern Philosophy. I finished my run and now type this with a smile on my face, knowing that I live in a really safe neighborhood.

To my fellow Modern Philosopher joggers... we live in an anxious time. If you're going to run on a foggy morning, be ready, for there are men with axes who might mistake you for the undead.

This is why we always stretch before we run... a limber Modern Philosopher is a Modern Philosopher who keeps his head in a crisis!

Credits - WorldwideRunning.com would like to thank the blog The Return of the Modern Philosopher (http://moviewriternyu.wordpress.com) for the authorization to reprint the article "The Jogging Dead: How Many Calories for Eating a Brain?" by Austin Hodgens.