Go, you chicken fat, go away!

My wife, bless her heart, has been trying to do everything this Christmas season.  She hardly sleeps.  Well, it all caught up with her as she's now a little under the weather.  I woke up early and knowing she wouldn't be going on her walk, decided to do my run while it was still dark out.  It was only 6:30am, so there were people out.  But I haven't run in the dark for a while, so I brought my headlamp.  Not that it did me any good to be able to see better, but at least it would let people see me coming.  My Runkeeper goes off every 5 minutes.  It tells me the distance I've gone and my overall pace.  Right before the first 5 minute alert I could see that I was coming up on an old man with a rather large dog.  The alert went off and I thought he heard it because the dog started walking next to him making me think he'd pulled it in with the leash.  However, the dog was not on a leash and I'm pretty sure I spooked the guy as I said good morning.  The dog started running toward me and even ran next to me for a little bit.  I told it to stay. 
Coming back down the Canal Road I saw a zanjero truck pull up to the radial gate on Adobe.  There's a gage they have to check several times a day to make sure the canal levels are on point.  Then he crossed Adobe and parked in front of the well.  It was still darkish, so I hollered at him and asked if he was Mosiah.  He said his name was Jared.  Just then another runner approached me and asked me what the name of the road was.  I said it was Adobe.  He said, "Adobe?"  I said, "Yes."  He asked, "So that up there is Brown Road?"  "Yes, it is."  "And Lindsay is that way?"  I said, "Yes, it's two and a half miles that way."  He said, "I should have gone to the other canal."  I laughed, "Yes, you should have," as if I have any idea what was going through his mind.
 

Woke up this morning to an email that said, "Do you have that job done yet?"  I realized it wasn't even on my schedule.  But I missed my run yesterday and I didn't want to miss it today.  I started  out with the idea of running three loops.  On my first loop I passed this old lady that was all bundled up for winter.  She looked at me in my shorts and T-shirt and said, "You're making me cold!"  (That's usually what old ladies say to me.  I've never had one say - you're making me hot.)  I told her I have an extra layer of insulation as I patted my fat tummy.  She laughed and said, "Good attitude."  As I was making my way back down the Canal, I decided to call it quits so that I can rush this job.  Better call it quits for today on the blog, too.

I got another early run in before sun up.  It was 6:30am again.  But there was nobody else out!  It was eerily creepy.  Last time there were tons of people out.  I literally didn't see anyone until 2.5 miles when there was finally an old man walking his dog.  A quarter mile later I saw another lady across the Floodway.  Then I finally started seeing a lot of people right before I made it to Adobe as there were kids and parents walking to school.  I guess it's getting too cold for everyone.

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.