Oh no, it is too early for this shit

After three straight nights of holiday parties, a 7:30am race Saturday morning was not warmly welcomed. Speaking of warm, the race was held on the West Side Hwy Hudson river piers which offer zero coverage from the icy wind blowing in off the water. Oh and it was a balmy 20 degrees (without factoring the wind-chill). Since I am insane and typically run outdoors in the winter, I dress appropriately: one layer of fleece lined running tights under another layer of my skiing neoprene tights, four layer over the upper body (including under armor long underwear), two pairs of gloves, an ear warmer, a hat, and a neck/mouth warmer. Poor Evan and Michael showed up in just jeans and a winter coat. After standing out in the cold weather handing out goodie bags or certificates, the boys were uncontrollably shaking and their testicles had probably retreated into up into their esophagus.

I luckily did not have to stand still in the cold. I volunteer to be a “running buddy” which meant I was to run with a young girl and guide, instruct, and encourage her. Well the girl I had was SUPER COMPETITIVE! She took off from the start at a dead sprint. About 400m later, she was walking and panting (more like hyperventilating). Once girls started to catch up to her, she would take off sprinting again! We repeated this wind sprint / walk with panting (so bad that I started to think about the steps of CPR) throughout the entire 3-mile race! Yeah, even her coach eventually caught up to us and tried to get the girl to “pace herself” since she obviously was not listening to me. At one point, the coach grabbed the back of the girl’s shirt to force her to continue at a slower pace. Eventually the girl wrestled away from her grip and took off with me at her heels. I eventually realized the girl was so competitive that if I ran alongside her, she would speed up to beat me, then I would catch up and she would pass me again. I finally decided to just run behind her a couple of steps so that she would not have a heart attack racing me. Oh and don’t get me started on her parents. They were the total soccer mom little league dad type who push all their failed aspirations onto the child. Every time we would approach them, they would shout out “you are a winner, you are faster than all these girls, you can beat them, don’t start walking, winners run, etc”. I gave the coach the “are you kidding me, they are going to push this little girl into therapy” look.

Since Dana felt bad about having us volunteer for her charity race at 7:30am on a freezing Saturday morning, she took us all out to breakfast. Well that is after we carted all the leftover race supplies to her apartment (free labor, what can I say). While we were waiting on the street for the last few people to finish up in the apartment, we witnessed a delivery trunk trash a nice SUV! Yeah, the truck was trying to make a right turn and ended up scraping the entire side of the SUV and even bent off the front grill! It sounded like crunching metal which figures because the side was all scratched and bent in and basically fucked up! It was funny that the truck paused as to realize, wow that was waaaaay more than a tap, before driving off. A guy stepped out of the coffee shop across the street and threw his hands up to his head. He then headed back into the shop, and then reemerged on the street with the car’s owner (who then took off in the direction of the delivery truck). I am regretting that I didn’t snap a picture of the SUV, because it was seriously so messed up.

Dana took us to her favorite West Village breakfast joint, the Pink Teacup. It served soul food which is basically an excuse to plaster the place with Martin Luther King Jr. portraits. I swear, one entire wall was dedicated to the King. Sitting right next to us was an old guy eating his grits and eggs and reading the Saturday paper. I took a closer look at him and realized it was Michael Caine! Now I debated asking him for a picture (because I take my camera everywhere) but decided not to interrupt his breakfast. I mean, he IS a person too. Well our table of six was talking about one thing or another, when the conversation turned to movies. I kept waiting for someone to bring up one of his movies (like the notoriously horrid Miss Congeniality), but no go. I did steal a glance or two in his direction to see if he was curious or eavesdropping. While exiting his seat, he brushed his ass up against Nancy’s back (or at least I think her name is Nancy). She took no notice because hey it was a small place. Well once he left the restaurant, I ejaculated to the group “oh my God, that was Michael Caine (followed by some blank stares)….you know the original Alfie, oh alright Austin Power’s Dad”. I guess I was the only one to notice his presence. ‘Bought time anyway since I hardly have any celebrity sightings. Anyway, Nancy was like “oh wow, he rubbed his ass against my shoulder….I’m never washing it again!”

Since there were so many leftover bagels, Dana sent us home with bags. In the subway, Evan was carrying a half gallon of milk in one hand and an overstuffed bag of bagels in the other. He wanted to switch hands because it was hurting his frost bitten fingers. He tucked the milk under his arm (by the armpit, between his side and bicep) while he was transferring the bagels to the other hand. Well he squeezed too hard to keep the milk in place, that the cap shot off and milk gushed out like a champagne bottle. I look over and Evan and the surrounding blast area are all covered with milk. He panicked and was like “what do I do”. Well run silly! We ran up the stairs (beware the wrath of the MTA workers) and I had to hold my side from laughing so hard. He later said “man it looks like I was just molested by a cow”.