*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors

It comes every year, like a state holiday. Except instead of park barbeques or extended weekends in Marfa, it’s trying to kill us all. Like clockwork it arrives, and straight from the screenshots of Groundhog Day (a total underrate), it always feels like it’s the first time.

But this year, something really IS special about it. it’s got some sort of chip on its shoulder. The hell that is Austin August is creeping up on us. It’s still over a month away but its bizarro-shaddow is already casting the wavy lines of dehydration off the pavement. Off my forehead.

So I’ve been biking to work a few times a week, just to avoid… keeping dry. I’m not so sure that it’s saving me much in the way of gas because once I get home and remove my soiled clothing, I have to get in my truck to go run all the errands I would have been able to run on my way home from work (had I been in a motored vehicle capable of highway speeds and hauling heavy shit). So I feel like I’m getting it right up the ass no matter which wheels I choose to push.

And to make matters a tad worse, my girlfriend’s car is over-heating. The sun has somehow managed to convince her car to work against me and my two-wheeled ways. They're in cahoots to stop my bike riding. Because I drive a stick, she doesn’t, and so she must be driven.

Or, she could ride on the handle bars while I pedaled us downtown to work. We could sing Partridge Family songs and eat lollipops! It would be so much fun! Until I died from a combination of heat exhaustion and head trauma resulting from the hitting of some immobile object. Perhaps a tree, phone booth, or office building.

So no riding of the bike to work until my lady gets her ride to remember how to cool itself. I get to do the chauffer thing until then. I’m not even going to touch on how fascinating it is that girlfriends always seem to have the most atrocious of auto maintenance records. However, it is somewhat important to note that unless we dudes find ourselves as culinary masters or our bedskills manage to rival that of The Rabbit (look it up, you NEED to know what that is, no matter who you are), auto-maintenance may be the last bastion of reason for women to give two shits about us. At least we have that. I guess.

Sweet.

Unfortunately, I have no idea what is wrong with her car. I replaced some tubing, topped-off some fluids, said some prayers, cleaned the battery, and kicked it a few times. So far, my usual methods of auto repair have failed me. Since I am useless as a mechanic or chef (no comment on any possible competition with The Rabbit), I am relegated to the position of chauffer. More like a rickshaw, since Red Rocket has no air conditioning or “suspension”. I think the “springs” might be better described as “lead pipes”.

Since I’m no longer Fighting The Power by biking to work, I have to find alternate means of embarrassing myself in public. So I take my wheezing, crying ass to Town Lake and shuffle the trails for some suicidal cardio.

And I think that the August heat had been planning this all along. It wanted to get me off of my early morning bike ride, and onto those blazing afternoon trails. So it could kill me. First, it killed my girlfriend’s car, and now it’s crosshairing me. It knows I can’t get out there BEFORE work, as that would require me getting up when everyone else does. Which would in turn require me to be in bed by 9pm. Which only happens when I’m either overly high or overly diseased.

It knows that I’ll be out there in the early evening. It waits for me all day long. I think it might even salivate. Like weepy melanoma. Waiting to beat me like my address reads: Guantanamo.

Mile One: I’ve got some youthful pep. My stride is respectable and my breathing is pleasantly patterned. I actually feel like I’m moving forward at a decent rate. I am still capable of admiring the admirably fit shapes of those running the opposite direction. My gear is clean and my facial expression is normal. “Good health!” Is repeated from my mind’s mouth.

Mile Two: Still have some steam, but it’s becoming more labored. I’m hobbling a bit, and my breathing is much more pronounced. I don’t feel that I’m making impressive headway, yet I’m nowhere near giving in. I am still capable of noting the stares of curiosity/fear of those who watch me as I huff by. Various pains, sores, and tightness are becoming indistinguishable from one other as they blend together in one cacophonous complaint. “Goddamn I really need to stop smoking!” Is repeatedly bellowed from my mind’s mouth.

Mile Three: I don’t know what the hell is going on anymore. I’ve entered what I’m guessing is known as “The Runner’s High”. I’m pretty sure my mind wanders off to consider shit like my taxes or whether being a trapeze artist is really a “career” in “art”, because my brain can no longer process all the simultaneous pain signals, pulsing from every joint and muscle fiber of my lower body. I’m completely incapable of focusing on anything with all the sweat pouring into my reddened and stinging eyes. “I would eat a Pegasus hoof!” Is repeatedly slurred from my mind’s mouth.

Mile Four: Frustrated by a lack of pain-recognition, my physical body has chosen to slow my pace to that of leaf-growth in some last-ditch effort at self-preservation. I’ve graduated from “Runner’s High” to “Runner’s Delirium” in that I’m convinced that my speed has actually increased since Mile One. There is no obvious evidence of this, as it is but an impression of a jerkied-mind. This delusion is only broken when I happen to notice that it takes me four strides and ten seconds to clear a tree, or that I’ve been passed by breeze-blown trash. But typically, I am incapable of noting these references since my brain has sacrificed any effort toward sight in favor of propping up my lawnmower-engine-speed heart. If I piss myself, it goes without notice and is easily cloaked by the gallon of sweat that is already darkening my shorts. “Of the, instant pleeeease of make, ah-ohhrrr, yes and fer the worksmithing conduit of aaaauuuh, that is oooooooor ripped uuuuuuunnnnk…” Is the beginning of a probably never-repeating series of unrelated sounds which fall from my mind’s mouth, and may actually be moaned aloud.

At the completion of my recreational death jog, I stand beneath the pissing shower below the Mopac bridge, leaning pathetically against the valve button. There, as my coherence and eyesight return, I notice that everyone else, standing around the water coolers, appears to be similarly spent and properly sweaty. But they’re staring at my soaking, heaving frame with the same horrified expressions I would assume they’d have if I’d just set a baby carriage on fire.

Ah, the trails. See you there. Can’t wait until August!