Stage one knee injury

An easy 5 miles with Daisy this morning along Buffalo Bayou.  My left knee is at 'stage one' in the predictable running injury arc:

Stage 1:  Some soreness at the injury site but not serious, it goes away quickly after you've warmed up.  A couple of miles into a run and you're feeling 100%.  Nothing to worry about, right? 
Stage 2:  The pain doesn't go away as readily (as in Stage 1) during a run, sometimes it even becomes worse.  However you manage - perhaps with the aid of a knee brace - to carry on regardless.
Stage 3:  The injury becomes worse when running and you are unable to run as far or as fast as usual. You may be forced to abandon a run halfway through and hobble back.
Stage 4:  You can't run at all.  You consider going to see someone about it.
Stage 5:  Just walking is uncomfortable.  You finally abdicate to common sense and go and see someone.  He or she tells you to cut down on your running (duh); to wear a brace (which they have handy for sale) and they prescribe some physical therapy.  The therapy consists of stretches and other exercises with which you are very familiar and should probably do on a regular basis. However if you did that it would cut down too much on your running time.

I will try not to go beyond Stage 1 by re-starting the physical therapy (I still have the file with all the exercises) today and will continue to wear the brace.  What was that?  Stop running?  No way.

Dinner last night was chipotle painted baked tofu and potato and white bean salad with roasted red pepper, both from 1000 Vegan Recipes.  We also had some fresh green beans.  Good ones have been hard to find lately - the not-so-close HEB on the corner of Memorial and Dairy Ashford had these organic ones from Mexico.

Kathleen and I also went to the official inauguration of the new athletics track at Rice University stadium: here is a pic of the inaugural run with Sammy the Owl being beaten by a girl. In case you missed it, the new track is blue.