Go, you chicken fat, go away!

I wanted to run Usery today, but it's too close to Christmas and I'm sure there's 1000 things to do.  So I just ran up the Canal to Junior.  There is a pump in the RWCD canal just downstream of the Main Pumping Plant that feeds lateral one half.  It is affectionately named Junior.  I saw a man in a long sleeve white shirt not quite a quarter mile ahead of me.  I could tell he was running so I didn't think I'd be able to catch him.  When I got to the one mile mark I saw another man with fluorescent yellow shirt.  He turned onto the Canal road.  He looked like he was running pretty good so I knew I wouldn't catch him.  I also noticed long sleeve white shirt man was running with a dog and I had made some ground on him.  At Greenfield Road he had crossed over to the other side of the Canal.  After a while of watching fluorescent yellow pull away I noticed long sleeved white was gone.  I turned my head and saw that he had ducked into an orange grove presumably to take a pee pee.  As I watched fluorescent yellow cross McKellips I saw a zanjero truck pull up.  It was Jeff.  Jeff had just started working at RWCD a few months before I left.  We talked for a little bit.  By the time we were done I think fluorescent yellow was at least a half mile ahead of me.  I could still see him when I crossed McDowell Road.  I thought maybe he'd turn around soon since the Canal starts about a quarter mile north of Junior which is a half mile north of McDowell.  But he never came back so I figured he'd gone out to Val Vista.  I turned around at Junior, but did not touch the fence for fear of being electrocuted.  About a quarter mile before McDowell I ran into long sleeved white shirt and his dog.  Ginger had about a three mile threshold when I used to run with her.  But they were taking it pretty easy so I'm sure they were all right.  One nice thing about this run was that I started off a little fast, but I started to slow down.  Usually when that happens I get progressively slower and slower and slower.  But I reached a pace where I evened out and maintained it for the whole way back.  Have a Merry Christmas everyone.