Go, you chicken fat, go away!

Even though Ragnar is over, Mike still wants to run on Saturday mornings.  Fine by me.  But this was my first run since Ragnar.  Mike picked me up at 5:30am.  I was able to get my business done beforehand, for once.  But he asked to use my bathroom.  I made him use the one that only gives you one ply at a time and you have to hold the handle down until all the water empties out. 

It was foggy out.  That means humidity.  That means sweat.  Mike got out in front of me like he always does.  The nice thing was that I could still see his LED light briefly right at mile 2.  Traffic wasn't too bad today and the drivers seemed courteous.  Right after mile 3 I heard the horses on the other side of the road.  Of course I had to cross to go see them.  This is where this entry is no longer family friendly.  One of the horses was trying to mount the other.  She wasn't having it, so she started bucking and she kicked the "happy" horse right in the chest with both back legs.  I took a couple of pictures and then my glasses started to fog up. 

I had made up my mind that I would turn around when I saw Mike coming back.  Because I had stopped, he was a little more ahead of me than what he usually is.  So it was right at 4 miles when I turned around.  He caught up to me and I asked him if he had seen the horses.  He said no, and I told him that they were about a half mile down.  I kept my eyes open, but as I was going down, a cyclist was coming up and he spotted them and pointed them out to me.  I'm sure I would have seen them anyway, but appreciated it.  I stopped again and took more pictures as it was a little more light out.  Now Mike was way ahead of me again and I never saw him for the rest of the run.  About three quarters of a mile before the bottom there were two girls running up.  They said good morning and then the one closest to me looked down right as I put my hand up for a high five.  Desperately I yelled, "High five!"  She felt bad for missing it.  Oh well.  Then about a quarter mile from the bottom I saw pieces of shredded tire all over the road.  The largest piece was right in the middle of the bike lane.  I kicked off to the side without losing my stride.  A cyclist was zooming down and I heard him yell, "Thank you."  Turns out he was coming straight back up once he got to the stop sign, so he made sure to thank me again as we passed the second time.  It was a nice run, but I need to get out more next week. 

Oh, and this next weekend is the Phoenix marathon, half and 10k.  Sasha and two of his boys will be staying the night at my house.