arrived 3 p.m.

I was on the phone with my buddy Tom yesterday evening, about three hours before I was to embark on my long walk. "No disrespect," said Tom, fully intending to disrespect me, "but do you still think you have it in you?"

I had told Tom about my 2008 Troutdale-to-Cascade Locks walk, which was about 36 miles. I had done that walk with a 60-pound pack on my back, and I was eleven years younger when I did it. Well, today, Tom's question got answered:

I arrived at the River House Motel at exactly 3 p.m. on Holy Saturday, an hour earlier than predicted. The pic's filename is basically a date/time stamp, for anyone who might be a doubting Thomas (see what I did there!? Easter humor and Tom humor!).

I also started late on Friday night: 10:22 p.m. instead of 9 p.m. So instead of walking an anticipated 19 hours (estimating 9 p.m. to 4 p.m.), I walked only 16 hours and 38 minutes.

But what I'm proudest of is this:

I walked 98 minutes before midnight last night, so you need to mentally add 9800 steps to the above total. Adding steps or not, the Saturday step total alone was enough for the pedometer to announce I had made a new record, which won't be broken anytime soon.

I'd love to say more about the walk, but I'm dead tired, my feet are screaming, and I'm barely able to see straight, so I'm going to wrap things up for now and continue tomorrow, when I'm more coherent.