Fainting spells

I exercised yesterday. Do I expect a medal? Why yes. Yes, I do. I spent some time stretching, did some ab work, and took off for a run. At this early point in my new exercise regimen, I don't have to run for long until I start to feel like a loser (though I look like one from the start), but I lasted a couple of miles before I called it quits. Then I came home stretched for a minute and hopped in the shower. Showers always feel extra good after some exercise and it is tempting to stay in them forever, but you must fight that temptation or no one will ever see you again. Unless they look in your shower, which is creepy.

But anyway, I was feeling fairly refreshed as I sat on our brown living room couch and feeling self-satisfied because I had been proactive about running. But it wasn't long until I started to notice a little knot right where the neck meets the shoulder. It was also around that time that I realized that I needed to get up and go make some dinner. So I leapt up from the couch (as one does when he is feeling particularly athletic) as I scrunched my shoulder towards my ear and bent my head sideways to put pressure on the knot in my neck. I made it a couple of steps and then blacked out.

I couldn't have been out long. Mozart's Violin Concerto 3 had been on when I had gotten up from the couch and it was still on the same movement when I woke up on the floor, tingling and confused. As the starry haze dissolved from my gaze I tried to make out what in the world was going on. The music changed to the next song on my playlist, a celtic sounding jig, which only made everything more surreal. It was the same sensation as waking up from a deep sleep and not knowing where you are. Some books were on the floor, from when I crashed into the bookshelf as I fell. I could taste blood in my mouth from biting my tongue. The whole room was spinning. Oddly, the first words out of my mouth were: "Que coño ha pasao!? Pero donde estoy?" ("what the *&^ just happened!? But where am I?"), which in my sleepy slur came out sounding like I was an old and drunk Castilian peasant. You know what is weird? Though I do tend to use ... unrefined figures of speech, shall we say, in Spanish, "coño" has never really been in my vocabulary. Odd.

It must have been a delayed "head rush" that hit me after a couple of steps coupled with my deep stretch (which, suspiciously, meant squeezing my carotid artery). It was partly scary and fun. My wife, for whom the anecdote was nothing short of terrifying when I told her, would be angry at the fact that I kind of enjoyed the whole episode, though it left me dazed and a bit concerned. But I had never fainted before, and I had always been curious about it. Being much wiser about all things anatomical than I am, the first thing Jessica asked me was how much water I had drunk that day. I had only had half a glass.