Okay, I knew this was coming, but still … I was not ready to walk as much as I am.

Let’s set the scene here.  First of all, I don’t have a car.  My car is still up in Alaska, and won’t get released to ship south until the end of the month, and then will be 3-4 weeks until it arrives.  No Problem, I say .. I will live downtown Boston so that means I can walk to or take a cab or take the subway to whatever.  The T-Line (the Bostonian word for subway … which “The T” is the Bostonian letter for Subway) is just a couple blocks away; but that is just the entrance, and doesn’t count transfers.

Next, the pup no longer just gets a door open and he is free to run out to a yard to “do his business”.  Nope.  Now if he gets in the mood, we have to harness up, take the elevator down, go across the street.

Then of course, my full intention to drag my butt back into the world of getting into shape and moreso start losing the Alaskan Pizza & Beer diet effect.

So what’s wrong with any of this?

I just didn’t expect to have so much walking.  Seriously.  Okay maybe I haven’t had “so much” walking, but  …

Well, let’s start with the complication of the puppy.  He is my trooper, having adjusted pretty quickly to his new life, but he is not easy to walk in this new place.  He maybe 2 years old, but he maintains much of his puppy brain; most noticeable by his tiny attention span.   All you need is the slightest distraction and he is focused on something other than “his business”.  Those distractions, of course, include:  people, cars, other dogs, horse drawn carriages, buses, trucks, more people, people that sleep in the street people, more dogs, rain, wind, sidewalks, shiny objects, dull objects, in between objects, and (in case I left anything off) everything else.  So sometimes making a quick run outside has to become a long walk outside until the job is done.

Using the T too requires a fair bit of walking.  Sure you go into a sub station not far away, but then there is the stretch to the actual trains.  Then if you have connections, you have a few blocks between trains – and I am unlucky enough to be on a line that needs to connect a few times to get some places.

But to be honest, the real challenge is that I have some real work ahead of me trying to regain whatever bit of my old ‘wonderfulman’ self is still there.  My weeks of going away restaurants and sitting around waiting for the movers have left me so out of shape that lumbering around is a challenge.  My knee, still messed from ongoing curling injuries, screams after only a short time, and I’ve gone back to wearing a backpack alot to “counterbalance” my front load for my back.  It takes work, real work, to get anywhere.

That’s what’s got to change.

I want to walk everywhere, want to spend time out with my dog, want to use the T, want to see the city.  It just is going to take some changes.

But that is, of course, one of those changes you make when you make it to a new city.