Shirts I have found while excavating:

• Social Climbers team T-shirt for the BEST-NAMED *EVER* Hustle up the Hancock stair-climbing team
• (motto: We like it on top)
• AIDS Marathon team tank top that I personalized with GO JAKE GO
• (Putting GO JAKE GO on the front of your marathon shirt is like giving a handy script to 26.2 miles of people who are ready and willing to cheer you on at the tops of their lungs)
• The back of the T-shirt I wore for my first marathon
• (Putting MY FIRST MARATHON on the back of your first marathon shirt guarantees 26.2 miles of back slaps and atta-boys from every runner who passes you)
• The GO JAKE GO T-shirt I wore for many subsequent Chicago Marathons
• The GO JAKE GO T-shirt I wore for the New York Marathon
• (New Yorkers always wear black)
• (Because they’re all artists and tortured intellectuals who snap when they hear poetry)
• My Pigman Triathlon T-shirt
• (The pig head used to glow in the dark)
• My Forever Plaid T-shirt
• (That’s me on the bottom)
• (Notice it doesn’t say GO JAKE GO)
• (Because the character I played was named Smudge)
• (But that’s the only reason)

Flashback Friday: Hustle Edition

Fun fact: “Hustle up the Hancock” is a cool name for a race up the almost 100 flights of stairs in Chicago’s John Hancock Center.

Other fun fact: “The Social Climbers” is the coolest Hustle up the Hancock team name ever invented by a team captain named Jake and emblazoned in a custom design on the team’s T-shirts.

Fact: Climbing almost 100 flights of stairs on a freezing February morning is really not all that fun.

Other fact: Though is feels like 700 hours of gasping and quad-screaming, the climb actually lasts only 20ish minutes.

One more fact: John Hancock Insurance removed its name from the John Hancock Center in February 2018, leaving the building with the stirring—and instantly memorable—name 875 North Michigan Avenue ... and this year causing Hustle Up the Hancock to be renamed the less alliterative but more badass Hustle Chicago.

Flashback Friday: Hustle Edition

Nine years ago this week I climbed 95 floors’ worth of stairs in Chicago’s annual Hustle up the Hancock race. Which is actually a damn LIE because some of the “floors” are TWO FLOORS TALL. John Hancock probably didn’t even actually sign the Magna Carta.

Anyway, the John Hancock Center abruptly de-named itself last week—TRUE STORY!—and the building is now officially called 875 N. Michigan Avenue. And Hustle up the SOME OF THESE STORIES ARE DOUBLE-DIRTY LIES is a better name for the race going forward anyway.

Day 4 of 7

Seven days of black and white photos about me. No people. No explanations.