how big is 3 Millimeters?

so my weekend goes something like this


Friday afternoon go back to the Doctor for a follow up on that bleeding bladder thing and they do an ultrasound on my kidney's and tell me that I have a 3mm kidney stone on the right side which might have causing the bleeding. My first thought of course is the fact that 3 millimeters means absolutely nothing to me, I have never figured out this god-damned metric system and what a time to burn me when basically I gotta piss something out which could be the size of a donut hole, a green pea or a grain of sand but I have no point of reference. They show me a picture from the ultrasound but honestly he might as well have shown me a picture of the surface of the moon.

Of course I do what any Marathon runner would do and assume that as long as he doesn't say anything about not running I won't mention it either.

Sunday morning hits and I get to Staten Island at 7AM and stand around for three hours in 40 degree weather freezing my ass off as I watch the whitest group of 38,000 people you can imagine stretch, talk politics and drink cappuccinos. I'm not sure what the racial breakdown of this thing is but if isn't 98% white people I'd be floored. Shit take out the top 20 men and the total percentage is gonna be about 99.9%

Get on the course and first of all I get stuck in the group that has to run on the lower part of the Verrazano Bridge which means that not only do I not get any nice views but all the slobs who pee over the side of the bridge from the top level are basically peeing on me as the wind kicks everything around. Then add to the fact that the lower level is a wind-tunnel and at 40 degrees outside the wind-chill must have dropped it 10 degrees for those first two miles.

Rest of the marathon goes pretty well till I cramp up in my upper thigh which basically knots up and I'm long striding through it to end the excruciating pain. It reminded me of when I was a kid and sometimes I use to wake up in the middle of the night with a cramp in my calf. But not only was this cramping worse, unlike it happening when you are laying in bed, this time I have to run 7 more miles. Rest of the run is completely miserable and then it goes from shitty to bloody shitty when I hit the pisser at mile 23 I'm back to pissing Merlot and everything in my urethra hurts. Not sure if I passed the stone or if I was just bleeding from the bladder but either way..my Life is very very bad.

Drag my sorry ass across the finish line in 4:09 which is respectable but still 10 minutes off my goal and now I'm back to a regular Joe. No more adoring fans screaming my name, no more aluminum blankets, nobody handing me Gatorade my the gallon and no more reason to complain...

Thanks for everybody for the support along the way.