“5 to 15 years”

I got a call from Ali during the day Friday saying there was an “incident” at home.  Of course I knew this related to something more than likely Sadie related, I could only imagine what it was.  Evidently at some point Sadie decided that digging into the wall under the front window would be a good idea.  Ali and I theorized that she saw something outside and in her dog brain she was going to dig through the wall to get it.  Ali said she scolded Sadie strongly about it.  When I got home and saw the damage I wasn’t all that freaked out.  It was maybe the size of half a softball and nothing that couldn’t be patched and painted pretty easily.

Saturday during the day was quite busy.  Ali and I knocked out a bunch of our normal stuff.  In addition the grass was looking a bit unkempt so we mowed and weed whacked the property.  That wasn’t enough work so after lunch we pulled stuff out of the garage and cleaned it. (our scheduled February cleaning project)  There were tons of spiders, webs and dead frog and lizard carcasses to be sucked up.

We had to leave early for the race I was running that evening, the Festival of Lights.  The FOL is a HUGE parade in Fort Myers that typically has somewhere around 200,000 spectators.  Right before the parade they have a HUGE 5k run as well.  The race didn’t start until 5:45 but we left the house at 3pm due to issues with finding parking before they start shutting down streets. 

We piled the two dogs into the back of the Camry.  For the most part they shared the back seat.  However at some point Nicki decided she would have more room laying on the floor in the back.  This would be my third time running the race, the first time running by myself since Ali is not in running shape yet.  Hell I wasn’t in running shape either.  Since Thanksgiving this would be only my third time running since I had some knee flare ups after the Turkey Trot.

We got into Fort Myers a little after 4 and began looking for a suitable parking spot.  We knew we had to park far away if we wanted to be able to get out of town after the race.  Otherwise we would be pinned in until after the parade ends around 9 pm. So we found a lot that was posted as 7 bucks to park.  When I pulled in I told the guys that we needed to be able to get out after the run, we couldn’t be parked in.  He said it was no problem, if we parked in the front row we had direct access to a small street in front of the parking area that we could get out on. Ok, sounds good.  We paid our seven bucks and started the long walk.

The streets were already lined with chairs and in many cases people were already planted in those chairs even with the parade not scheduled to start for a good three hours.  Areas of the sidewalk that did not have chairs were covered in duct tape with people’s names written on them, I guess that equated to a reservation.  I find it hard to believe that some assholes didn’t just rip the tape up if they felt like it.

Sadie and Nicki got lots of “how cute” and “look at the doggies” as we carefully maneuvered our way through the people and seating arrangements.  Finally we got to the closed off areas of the street so we could walk out in the open.  As I went inside a big tent to check in I checked out the registration set up since we time races as well.  They had a good system going with plenty of people manning the registration area that knew exactly what they were supposed to do, something we are sometimes lacking.  I thought to myself if our club would be able to handle a race of this magnitude ourselves (over 1500 runners)  Not in our current state, it would take a lot of retooling of procedures, standards and thought processes.

Once I got my chip, shirt and packet we all just sort of hung out for awhile outside the registration tent.  Ali found a nice spot in the shade that worked out well for the dogs.  We just sort of hung out and took in the bee hive of activity.  Quite a few people came up to us and wanted to interact with the dogs.  With Sadie it is a totally different situation than Nicki. Nicki is automatically scared of new people and TERRIFIED of children.  Sadie loves anyone. Without fail she happily greeted anyone that came up to her including kids.  A couple of the youngsters were even greeted with licks to the face.

Race time was finally approaching.  Ali said she thought it would be best to just stay put with the dogs and I could easily find them after the race.  Controlling both dogs with one set of hands is a tough.  The start line was 3 blocks away so I made my way in that direction.  Along the way I made a port-a-potty stop.  I was hoping to avoid it after my “upper decker” experience at the YMCA run but I had to go.  Luckily there was no such intruder in the urinal this time.

I got to the starting line with 5 minutes or so to spare.  There was the usual HUGE mass of runners all chomping at the bit to go.  Like last year there was a single wheelchair participant whom they left go a few minutes early.  There were so many people that I couldn’t even hear the starter on the PA system.  All we got was the gun and the mass of humanity slowly starting to move forward. 

The first quarter to half mile or so of this run is a major pain in the ass.  You have too many people jammed into too small of an area.  Being inches from hundreds of moving body parts is tough to navigate.  It also can dramatically slow down your official race time if you start in the back half of the pack as I did.  You are just trying to not fall down.

So finally we get out onto a wide street and things spread out a bit.  The temps were good for running, in the low 70’s. The first mile or so is normally the toughest until I get loose.  Well the whole race was tough.  I never felt all that comfortable and I was struggling to maintain an 8 minute mile pace.  I picked out some visual targets during the race that I HAD to pass like the chubby woman with two knee braces or the lady that looked old enough to be my mother.  The race route was lined with thousands of cheering spectators.  However I wasn’t really able to enjoy any of their cheers, I was looking straight ahead, focused on just getting through it.  It sucks, I would like to be able to catch some looks to the crowd now and then.

So the final turn into a looong straightaway finally arrives.  I picked up my pace the best I could and “sprinted” towards the finish.  My official race time was 26:09.  My GPS time which accounted for the delay at the start was 25:45.  It was close to an eight minute mile pace which was ok considering the circumstances.  My time stuck just on of the north side of the middle of my age group.  I was 34th out of 69 men in the 40-44 bracket, yahoo.

Ali decided to come up to the finish line to cheer me on.  She said she was yelling for me but between my tunnel vision at the moment and the loud crowd noise I couldn’t hear or see her.  They had no water right by the finish line.  Luckily Ali saved a bottle for me. I needed it.  The dogs and her were very happy to see me.  After stretching a bit I made my way into the same tent we went in for registration, this time for refreshments.  As I went in they handed me 3 tickets. Each ticket was good for either a soda, a beer or a slice of pizza.  You entered this huge tent on the left.  The line went down the left, around the back and up to the right where the pizza, beer and soda awaited, a pain in the ass.  Things really got annoying when after waiting in line for awhile I finally got to the right side.  They make an announcement that the pizza was not here yet!  WTF???  They had the EXACT same issue last year!  Hundreds of people waiting for pizza  that was promised post-race!! Jesus Christ.  Well I stayed in the line thinking I would at least get a soda after waiting for so long.  I was about to bail out of waiting completely as my patience was expiring when guys started coming into the tent with garbage bags full of pizza boxes.  Yay, I used two tickets and got two slices, one for Ali and one for me.

After eating we didn’t stick around and started the long trek back to the car.  The trip back was tougher because the sidewalks were now packed in some cases 10 deep with people waiting for the parade.  Trying to navigate that with two dogs in tow was not fun.  Finally we decided to just walk out in the street, the parade had not actually started yet so it was the fastest way to go.  I heard dozens of dog admiring comments along the way.

Finally we got up to the cross street we had to head down to get to our parked car. Just then the fireworks signifying the start of the parade started.  Regular blog readers will remember what happened at the Pottstown Rumble when Nicki was first exposed to fireworks, she is TERRIFIED by them.  I quickly knelt down and grabbed her.  As soon as the noise started she was frantically trying to run.  I was strong enough to hold her in place but she was freaking out.  We were right in front of parade watchers as this spectacle was taking place.  We had to get her out of there but she was too scared to be able to go about it without running over people.  I scooped her up like a big 65 pound furry baby and carried her.  Being held by me seemed to calm her down somewhat.  Once we got out of sight of the explosions I put her down.  She made a beeline towards the car.

As we approached the car a new problem was staring us in the face.  Remember that front row spot that was supposed to allow us to get out when we needed to?  Well it would work as long as someone else didn’t park in front of you.  After the drama of the fireworks neither Ali or I had any patience for this situation.  If we didn’t get that car moved we would be stuck at the parade until the owner decided to come back.  I marched right over to the guys that were running the lot.  I reminded them I was the guy that needed to get out.  I pointed to how we were now parked in.  The guy looked and came over.  “No one was supposed to park there” he said.  “well, I guess nobody told this guy..” I remarked as we walked over.  The attendant surveyed the situation.  There was no way to squeeze past.  As we walked around the car we noticed that the passenger side window was wide open.  Ali mentioned that maybe we could throw it in neutral and push it out of the way.

I told her that I didn’t think you could put it in neutral without the key.  Furthermore the steering column would lock in place once you started to turn the wheel. The attendant agreed but said maybe we would get lucky.  So I reach in the open window, pop the lock and open the door. The alarm starts blaring, lights start flashing and all hell breaks loose.  As soon as the alarm starts going the attendant heads towards the parade saying he was going to try to find the owner, I have no idea how he planned to do that. 

Well 50 yards down the little street there is a cop that has traffic blocked off.  He’s a younger guy, probably not much past 30.  “You guys aren’t trying to steal that car are you?” he says.  We laugh and say no of course not, we explained we were supposed to be able to get out of the parking lot but got parked in.   We hoped we could get the vehicle in neutral to move it out of the way.  Well initially the cop seemed to be good natured about it but then he starts in a more serious tone.  “You know what you did could technically be a felony.  You can get 5-15 years for it.”  My pissed off meter immediately jumped off the charts.  This guy was going to try to throw his authority around.  “So you are saying they would convict us of a felony for trying to move a car that parked us in”, I say in the best controlled tone I could muster. I was REALLY pissed and felt like calling the cop a f’ing asshole for even throwing that bullshit out there. “Well you wouldn’t want someone opening your door would you?” the cop says.  “If I parked someone in I would understand, yes….”  It was right on the verge of getting real ugly.

I backed up and explained what happened in depth.  I said we ran in the race and made sure to get parking arrangements that would allow us to get out after the race.  We were just freaking out a bit.  After that the cops attitude dissipated a bit.  Amazingly the parking lot guy just then was walking back towards us with the car owners in tow.  I have no idea how he found him but didn’t care.  The car owner was very nice and apologized for parking us in, he wasn’t aware he was blocking us in.  He moved the car and we were on our way. What a night.

My Sunday was laid back again.  I knocked out what needed to be knocked out in a couple hours.  After that the rest of my Sunday was much like the prior Sunday, I caught up on Heroes and Battlestar Galactica, played with the dogs and played WoW.  It was nice.

During the weekend I had to break up a big dogfight.  Sadie has this thing where she can’t stand if Nicki has a toy or anything else in her mouth, she tries to steal it.  Most of the time Nicki will just let her take whatever Sadie wants to take.  Well when I was outside with them I threw a part of a palm tree to Nicki and she was chewing on it.  Sadie comes over and tried to grab it.  Instead of letting Sadie have her way Nicki clenched down tight on the wood and pulled.  She outweighs Sadie by 20 pounds so she is definitely stronger. 

Well when Sadie refused to back down Nicki lost her patience and turned into the Tasmanian devil and went after Sadie with intent to maim.  Sadie returned the favor and had her teeth fully exposed.  They were trying to hurt each other at that point.  I yelled at both of them and pinned them both down.  As soon as I did they both fell right into line and calmed down. After all I am THE leader of the pack when push comes to shove.  After the incident they acted like it never happened.

It’s very funny watching Nicki chase Sadie around the yard.  Sadie is extremely fast and extremely elusive.  In a straight line Nicki can accelerate pretty well and almost keep up with Sadie.  But Sadie can change directions on a dime and when she does big, burly Nicki goes shooting right by her.  I think Nicki enjoys having someone to burn off energy with.  We just need to tweak their interactions a bit more.

So far knock on wood both of my knees don’t feel bad at all after running the race.  I am cautiously optimistic because I felt pretty much felt the same way initially after running the Gobble Gobble.  I am not running this week as a precaution.