Go, you chicken fat, go away!

I just wanted to do a small run today because of how my foot felt after Saturday's run.  Seemed ok today, so I'll go further tomorrow.  I ran past Gordon today.  His owner saw me coming and made sure to put him on his leash real quick.  I don't think he needed to do that for me.  He probably didn't realize it was me at the time.  Anyway, I got to Brown and started heading back south on the RWCD road when I heard him hollering for Gordon.  Apparently Gordon had bolted for the street.  But he came back.  I continued south and saw two coyotes up ahead.  When I got closer the saw me coming so they went over to the bushes.  I took some pictures of them.  One of them squatted down and took a poo.  Honestly.  Coyotes have no sense of shame.  I tried to get close to them, but they ran away.  I looked around to see if Gordon was coming back, but they must've turned east on Brown.  I watched them for a while until I saw another runner coming.  When they got there I pointed them out to him.  Then I ran home.

Finally I get to put these shoes to rest.  I should've stopped wearing them 300 miles ago.  Little old lady.  I ran two loops this morning in the dark.  I was running south down the RWCD road and I heard some music behind me.  I glanced back and saw someone.  But it was dark, so I couldn't tell if it was one person, two persons, a person on their bike, or what.  Whoever it was, it seemed like they would pass me soon.  After running a little bit without being passed, I looked back again.  Now I could make out that it was one person and a dog.  I kept running and they finally passed me.  The man said, "Good morning, Burt."  It was Jesse Lee.  I said good morning back and later sent him and his wife a text message that he was a creeper for running in the dark without a light.  I'm trying to recruit them to join my Ragnar team.  What better way than by calling them creepers?  I kept running and Jesse put some some distance between us.  Then I could see another form up ahead.  Had Jesse reached the fence and turned around?  Nope, it's a man on a bike.  And he's headed right towards me.  I was pretty much hugging the edge of the Canal, and he wouldn't move over.  So I completely stopped and practically tippytoed the top of the canal bank so he could ride past.  Douche.  I kept going and I could see another shadowy figure.  Without arms.  It was a guy walking with his hands in his pocket.  I got to Adobe and could see Jesse running down to his neighborhood.  He lives on the other side of the Canal from me.  They are the soc's and we are the greasers.  I ran the next loop without seeing any more figures.  Other than Jeff snoozing away.

I'm feeling pretty good.  I wanted to do a long run, but I didn't get outside until late.  It actually wasn't that late, but I thought it was because I'd been up for over an hour.  So I did 3 loops.  It was just starting to get light out, but still dark when I started.  I came into the Floodway and a dog barked at me.  The owner said, "He won't bite.  He sees you running and wants to run with you."  I've seen this lady and her dog before.  I believe that's the exact same thing she said to me last time.  I got to Brown and went over to the RWCD road to head south.  Somewhere between Brown and Adobe I came across another runner whom I'd never seen before.  I ran down to Main Street, went back over to the Floodway path and headed back north.  My pace was pretty good.  Well, pretty good for me lately.  When I crossed University, I saw Gordon and I patted his head.  Then I saw Jeff snoozing with his jacket over his head.  The End.

2 climbs up Hilltop again.  My wife is part of a bunko group of 12 ladies.  So once a year bunko is held at my house.  Last night was that once a year.  I ended up eating my dinner in my room.  Naturally I fell asleep early.  My 4 year old grandson was also in bed with me with a fever.  Around 1:45am I woke up.  I couldn't get back to sleep for another two, two and a half hours.  I finally got out of bed around 7:45am which is the time we wake Emily up.  So, no running before getting her on the bus.  My wife and I left at 9am and it was a little warm.  I think I could have done more than just 2 climbs if we'd gone earlier and it was still cool out.

There were a lot of people there as usual.  Vickie didn't want to climb up because she is still not feeling well.  I haven't been able to run all the way up without stopping to catch my breath yet.  Maybe next week.  On the way down after the first climb almost at the bottom I saw this girl on the road ahead of me taking selfies.  I passed her up and stopped at the gate to catch my breath again.  She asked me how many times I was going to go up.  I said, "I think just twice."  She said, "Don't say 'just' twice.  That's great.  Keep up the hard work."  She smelled just like my wife's best friend, but I thought it would be inappropriate to tell her that.

I sent the text message out yesterday to see who was coming.  Mike said he couldn't come.  His dog died this week.  I don't know if that's why he didn't come or not.  Maybe.  Glen said he would need to be back by 7am, and it would be cutting it a little close, so he would let us know.  I said we could start at 4:30am if he wanted.  Maggie finally responded around 6:30am and said she would as long as my wife was coming.  I told her that my wife was feeling better and would be.  She was worried about the pizza she was going to eat and how it might make her feel sick.  I told her we were having Taco Bell for dinner, so we'd all suffer together.  Glen texted back after I had gone to bed to say he wouldn't make it.  So it was just me and the ladies.

The last three nights I've woken up real early.  I woke up around 3am this morning.  But that turned out to be a good thing because it gave me plenty of porcelain time, and I needed it after Taco Bell.  We told Maggie we would pick her up at 4:45am, but we got there 5 minutes late.  We drove out to Usery and I was trying to figure out how many miles I could get in because Maggie also needed to be back by 7am.  I figured 6 miles would be about right.

Maggie and Vickie got the head start today.  I was having trouble getting my LED blinky light to turn on.  I had almost given up, but then it came on.  I caught up to them shortly after the stop sign.  There was a whole slew of cyclists that were coming down right when I passed them and some cars.  It was like a traffic jam.  Luckily there's an extra patch of asphalt right there.  I was feeling rather good this morning despite the Taco Bell.  It was for the first time in a long time a bit cold.  I warmed up pretty quick, so it didn't bother me, but my wife complained that she was freezing the whole time.  She and Maggie stayed together and just walked today.  Maggie is going through a hard financial crunch right now, and she was unloading on Vickie.  I know it's got to be hard for her.

It was dark and hard to see my regular landmarks, but I was pretty sure I knew exactly where I was.  But I questioned myself because I was running faster.  I was like, "Am I really at 1.7 miles?"  I pulled out my Strava and it said 1.7 miles.  I think working out my climbing muscles doing Hilltop is really helping.  I felt strong all the way up.  I knew 3 miles would be shortly after Bulldog so I pulled Strava out and saw that I was at 3.0 miles.  I ran a little bit further just in case I stopped before reaching our Jeep or something.  Then I crossed the street, texted Vickie to let her know that I was turning around, and took a drink.  My water bottle was still over half way frozen.  Usually it thaws faster, but with the cooler temps it didn't.  It's still not melted all the way and it's 9:30am right now.  I headed back down and it felt like I was moving faster than my usual Saturday morning runs.  I was in fact.  My pace was 26 seconds faster per mile than last week.  It wasn't too long and I could see a couple of shadowy figures ahead of me.  I knew it must be Vickie and Maggie.  I hoped I could sneak up on them without them hearing me.  I caught up to them at 4.4 miles, but they heard me right before I got to them.  I still yelled "boo!" and good gamed my wife.  I was going to keep running, but she reminded me that she had the keys.  So I grabbed them from her and headed down for the final 1.7 miles.  There were other runners out today.  I think I saw 5 others.  Which is a lot.  I got down to the Jeep and was disappointed that I didn't see any wild horses today.  But I did see a coyote in the parking lot.  I did my best to call it over to me, but it wouldn't come.  Then I drove up the hill and picked up Vickie and Maggie.  We got her home by 6:55am.