I’ve recently discovered that running can be fun. I’ve hated running all my life, because it makes my lungs burn and my mouth gets all clogged up with dried saliva. It’s the worst. I don’t mind running while playing sports, because I want to win, and you generally can’t win if you’re not moving very fast.

So today, I went for an unprecedented, purely recreational run because my legs were on fire from sitting in a chair and hacking for the past 30 hours. And it was great! After I was done I thought, what the heck?

It turns out, the secret (for me) to make running fun is to want to run to something. If you see a sale for cool new trainers, with a free keychain upon purchase, do you saunter on over? No! You close the distance like a rabid lion seconds from devouring a thick jackalope. Same principle with running. I really wanted to check out these trees in the forest, so I ran to them. Then I ran to check out a stream and leapt over it like a graceful squirrel.

I think that’s why tracks and treadmills have never appealed to me. Who wants to run to see the other side of the track? Woohoo. And treadmills — they’re possibly the most counter-productive invention of all time. You’re literally running nowhere. You get to do the activity with no forward progress; that’s like washing clothes with dirt.