It was a marathon weekend in every sense of the word. A record 10,000 runners, some costumed as bovines and felines, poured into Memorial Stadium Sunday morning, galloping, trotting or wincing their way to the finish line. Watching from a bench in the south end zone, two thoughts jogged along my mental tracks: a) I have a severe case of runner’s envy and b) where does this most recent weekend rank in terms of tests of endurance?

Let’s find out. The starter’s gun fires at 8 p.m. on Friday night.  That’s when I walk onto the Vine Street tennis courts to pulverize Penn and whip Wilson from side to side. A south Florida-like humidity saturates every skin pore. An hour of hitting and you are both soaked and drained, like toweling off after a round of butterflies and dog paddles. Dao is uninterested in continuing, ditto here.

Shower. Change. Downtown. An old friend’s mom celebrates her 50^th birthday. I swing open the door to Marz and breathe in the galactic eroticism.  People look good here without trying too hard, a rare “O” Street quality. John, the first Martian (Marzian?) I recognize, greets me with a big grin. It’s been several months since I’ve seen him, but much longer for Ryan, whose mother commemorates a half-century tonight.  I find him at the back of the bar. He’s Larry the Cable Guy with charm. He and his brother work in Longmont, Colorado for the world’s biggest auction company. We catch up over tangy Coronas. In between swigs, shared memories spout: lighting his sister’s Barbies on fire, battling for customer service awards—or lack thereof—at OfficeMax. I walk home around 1 a.m., my stomach proportionately full of spirit and spirits.

It’s too muggy to sleep past 8:15 a.m. on Saturday. I putter for a pair of hours and then go to the grocery store. Back home I form a supply chain that would make Dell proud. Green peppers + tomatoes + Angus + cucumber + skewer = end user satisfaction. I drive to Walgreen’s to buy a football. It’s like going to Dollar Tree to buy silverware. It exists, but only to be bought in the direst of circumstances. With my glow in the dark football (see what I mean?), I make my way to Holmes Lake and find a shaded picnic area. Dao, Quan and Joe quickly arrive. Everybody brings something to the proverbial table. Hoanh his charcoal; Hiep his grilling prowess; Ha his Brett Favre impersonation; Cheiu his buoyancy; Huyen brings her daughter, An; An her pacifier; Huong her Angry Birds t-shirt; Giang her technology smarts; Hanh and Huong their youthful exuberance. We eat for hours, tight spirals and sun rays  are our blotation device. That’s something used to fight bloating—not to encourage it. We pack up around 6 p.m.

Early May signals the beginning of yet another marathon: the NBA playoffs. A load of laundry in the hopper, I turn on the idiot box to cheer for my Dallas Mavericks. They don’t stand a chance against Oklahoma City. Playing at home and down 0-3, they blow a 13-point lead and get swept like dust under a rug. By the way, is James Harden not the best 6^th man in recent memory? Anyhow, the sun is down and it’s Cinco de Mayo, so Dao and I decide to go downtown and survey Lincoln’s Mexican pride. It seems most of that pride is spent on cheap sombreros and José Cuervo shots. A tenuous way to pay homage to an improbable Mexican victory over French military forces 150 years ago—but we also enjoy listening to a groundhog ruminate on the arrival of spring, so está todo bien. I come home at 11 p.m., listo para dormir.

Sunday morning is cooler and clouds swirl overhead. The starter gun for the real marathon fires at 7 a.m. I leave my apartment at 9 a.m. to watch the procession. There are fluorescent signs and cups of Gatorade and lawn chairs lining 10^th Street. Several thousand gather inside the stadium. Hackneyed as it is, it does feel like everybody is a winner. Runners throw up their arms as their likeness appears on the Jumbotron. Pockets of onlookers roar in approval. I can’t stay for long as my marathon weekend has yet to reach the finish line.

Across town, Dao and I meet Julie. She’s our real estate agent. She is real, knows her stuff and is appropriately aggressive in showing homes to us. We see a few, both from the late 1930s, and both with attractive yet distinct attributes. The second has a master bedroom/loft with a wood-burning fireplace, skylight, walk-in closet and full bathroom. It’s so nice the Rip van Winkle in me worries I’d never leave. No Rip routines today, however. That’s because Luisa, our college friend and polyglot extraordinaire, is celebrating her newly-minted master’s degree from UNL.

We get to the grad party around 2:15 p.m.  There’s a global cocktail around the snack table. I see friends from Ukraine, Moldova, Argentina and Uganda. And I also spot Gary, who, four years ago, first introduced me to Partners of the Americas. As Luisa’s host father, he’s flown all the way from Hawaii to help her celebrate. Most everybody here has a dog-eared passport and a scroll of frequent flyer miles. A Japanese Chin eats, spits and dances around Begonias in the backyard. We have our very own version of Chinsanity. Sadly, we couldn’t stay long because the marathon weekend wouldn’t let us. Dao was off to Omaha for the Bo Pelini Foundation dinner (Yes, he has a foundation) and I had a tennis match to start.

I get to the east campus courts at 4 p.m. sharp, running on beef taquitos and Empyrean Ales Chaco Canyon. My foil, Doug, is friendly but businesslike. I let him serve first—a psychological gambit to apply pressure from the start. I play in the middle division of the Ace Bandage Tennis League, so aces are as rare as double rainbows. The first set is over in 20 minutes when I fist pump at 6-1. Doug asks to change courts and we do. The sky turns a dark, elephant-colored gray. As this happens above us, Doug finds his ground game. He moves me around and at 3-5 I tell myself to reverse the trend. I do this through solid serving and tapping the reserves in my Glycogen well. We shake hands after 7-5 and I race home to shower.

Another graduation party begins at 6 p.m. I’m a little late after a pit stop in the Hallmark aisle of Walgreen’s. Kyle is taking a summer internship in Seattle after graduating from the UNL College of Journalism. He’s amazing with a camera in his hands. His party has in local attitude what Luisa’s had in global latitude. Just the visages of old high school friends—Zach, Melissa, Andy—restore film in the dusty canisters of Lincoln escapades. I can’t believe what a good time I’m having and it’s 8 p.m. before I, or anybody else, realize it. I wish Kyle good luck and walk out the door. The sky can no longer stop from crying, tears of rain trickle down my windshield.

I drive back to my dad’s empty house. Click. The Lakers play Denver. I kick off my shoes and put my head against a pillow. I think of all the mile markers from the weekend: late-night tennis, a 50^th birthday, Longmont, Colorado, kebabs, laundry loads, Cinco de Mayo, the actual marathon, Luisa’s hard-earned graduation, a straight set victory and Kyle’s new chapter in Seattle. Even though I won’t go to bed for a few hours, I’ve crossed the finish line, running more for virtue than for victory.