Mom, butt plugs, and the Autobahn

This vending machine was spotted while using a restroom off the Autobahn. Oddly enough, it reminded me of my mother.

Some quick background: My mother was a true specimen of eccentricity. She also got a bit batty in her old age. She never had a functional transmission between the brain and tongue at any age.

Moving forward: My parents are over at my brother's house. (Both of them are in their 80's at this point.) Mom starts leafing through the Austin Chronicle that was lying around and discovers the, ahem, interesting ads in the back. The Chronicle is the local free rag, complete with offbeat local news, personals, ads for escorts, and ads for sex toys. The purveyors of sex toys apparently have a generous ad budget, and spend it on large ads replete with photos. My poor brother walks into the room, and Mom greets him with, "What's a butt stopper?" After recovering from the initial shock and confusion, he figured out what she was asking and says some vague things about different strokes for different folks, then suggests that she call the advertiser and ask, as he has no personal experience.

And she does.

None of us were privy to that conversation, but she reported that the man who answered the phone was very polite and explained fully how a butt plug was used. This seemed to mollify her. To my knowledge, she never asked my brother about any sex toys again. It is entirely possible this wasn't her last conversation with the advertiser, though. We will never know.

Mixed bag

Seeing as how we don't expect to be working in the office any time soon, my employer is encouraging us to go in and pick up any personal items that we may want/need at home. As a safety precaution, we have to schedule our visit. Mine was today.

I don't know which emotion was prevalent; there were several all jumbled up together in a mildly unsettling stew. The parking lot was virtually empty. The only cars parked around my building were those belonging to the landscapers. Guess I may as well park in the convenient Handicapped spot, since no one is here! Grabbed a box from the pile that was thoughtfully placed outside our department's door, and went in. Lights were off, as expected, no weirdness yet. That changed as soon as the lights came on.

Seeing everyone's work area, with everyone's personal touches, immediately made me homesick. I work with a great group of people, we enjoy each other's company, and work very well together. I miss our face-to-face conversations, brainstorming a work issue, comparing notes from the weekend, laughing about something silly. It's going to be a long time before we enjoy each other in person again. Damn.

Birthday streamers still hang from the ceiling, pens and papers are still scattered on people's desks, pictures are still tacked up, the group jigsaw puzzle is still on a desk in an unclaimed cube, the dishtowel is still draped over the counter like someone just finished up their lunch dishes. Is this the zombie apocalypse? The little things are now intimate glimpses of absent humanity. Disconcerting.

Of course, my work area was still a pigsty. I cleared out my food supply (oops! guess the crows will enjoy all these stale snacks!) and threw away some stuff. The oranges on my desk continue to dehydrate nicely, and quite impressively.

It hit me when I found the mummified teabag in my coffee cup. The memory of my last day working there was as fresh as ever.

I remember flying out of there, stress levels through the roof, terrified by the events of that day. That morning, March 3, Paula's sister had awakened with a fever, struggling to breathe. By the time I left, around 2pm, Marianne had been ventilated, isolated, and heavily sedated. The day had been a flurry of constant text message updates, each one worse than the previous. The COVID storm was in its early stages, steadily brewing, but wasn't completely taking over our lives just yet. Here in Seattle, there was obvious concern over the outbreak at a nursing home in Kirkland, but none of us work in healthcare, and none of us are in a nursing home, so no need to worry, right?

That Tuesday, the brewing uneasiness became a full-on body-slam of concern, dread, fear, and apprehension of possible impending loss. As Marianne's story continued to parallel the COVID story, we all realized that we needed to take ourselves out of circulation and quarantine until we got her test results. Friday afternoon we were notified she was negative. Saturday she passed a little before 4pm, and a splendid rainbow appeared just out her hospital window. (Looking back, we are all highly suspicious of her test results. Many false negatives were occurring then, and her trajectory was a classic case. Thankfully, none of us got sick. Who knows.)

By the next week, businesses were shutting down. Offices like ours are now full of abandoned detritus, the silly stuff we all cart in to make the place a bit more comfortable and personal. I left some things, brought some things home, threw away some things. The orange mummification project? Stayed at work. The medals from all the races I had completed since starting that job? Those came home.

I look forward to starting a new collection of medals and dried produce. Meanwhile, I'm gonna find out if crows like stale wasabi peas.

Hood to Coast: A Story

File under "Strange things that happen during relays":

Despite everyone's best efforts, it is darned near impossible to stay organized with 6 severely sleep-deprived humans trapped in a van for upwards of 30 hours. Everyone is juggling a bag of items for use during the event (multiple pairs of running shoes, dry clothes to wear in between runs, personal food, safety vests/headlamp/blinkers for the night runs, toothbrush, baby wipes, etc.), and a bag for after the event (clean street clothes, mainly), and a sleeping bag. Throw in a couple of coolers, mass quantities of water, and any shared food, and the vehicle gets pretty busy.

I have a decent system of what needs to stay with me and what can float around in the back. My during-race backpack has three compartments, but is about ready for the fabric recyclers. The compartments exist, but the interior has shredded enough that stuff mingles together at the bottom. It still functions, though, and is just the right size, so I keep insisting on trying to use it.

It is now time to retire that backpack.

Every time I started rooting around in there for something I had put into a particular compartment, I came up with the lone pair of emergency clean underwear. Given that I lived in a pair of compression running shorts for the event, the message from The Universe was somewhat obvious. But The Universe wanted to make sure I got the hint.

During my last run (a wonderfully easy 4.2-miler), I'm trotting along, enjoying the scenery and the cool misting rain, and I spot something in the grass next to the road. Could it be? Noooo. But yes, it is.

A clean-looking pair of errant women's bikini underwear.

Then, when the woman who ran after me finished her segment, she told me that SHE had seen a pair of seemingly-clean ladies briefs in the grass.

Message received and acted upon.

Ragnar Northwest Passage: 200 miles of silliness

It takes a particular kind of crazy to enjoy a relay. You are signing up to spend ~30+ hours with 5 other people that you may or may not know, go without sleep or decent food, and run a total of anywhere between 15-18 miles. Throw in the added joy of living in a van that comes to resemble the aftermath of a small child eating breakfast, climbing all over each other's sweaty stuff, and it's a heck of a fun way to get to make new friends.

For the uninitiated, here's how a relay works:

• They're usually around 200 miles total, divided into 36 segments.
• Teams consist of 12 runners, 6 to a van.
• Each runner runs three times, for a total of anywhere from 13-18 miles.
• Runners go sequentially, and pass a wristband "baton" at defined exchanges, and cycle through the team. For example, I was runner #9, so ran leg #9 (6.8 miles), #21 (2.2 miles), and #33 (6.8 miles).
• Every 6th runner passes the wristband to the first runner in the next van, so each van drives to the next major exchange, and uses the waiting time to eat and rest.
• There is no stopping until the finish, so yes, you run through the night.

A big part of the fun is coming up with silly (often crude) team names, decorating the vans, and sometimes even wearing some sort of costume. Many teams create magnets with their names and "tag" other vans at the exchanges. "Chafing the Dream" was one of my favorites. "12 Hotties and a Squatty Potty" definitely had the best costumes.

This relay started at the Peace Arch up by the Canadian border, wound down along the coast, through Anacortes, across Deception Pass, and down Whidbey Island to end at Langley, WA. It was a beautiful course, hilly with lovely views, and a delight to run. In van 2, I barely knew one runner, and had never met the other four. We were four women and two men, early 40s to 57 (me). All of us were experienced runners; our paces ranged from 9:30 to 11:00 miles. We were not a fast group. The race starts Friday morning (start time depends on your projected paces), and you have until 9pm Saturday to finish. Our first runner started at 6:45am Friday, and we were projected to finish around 7:30pm Saturday.

Things went well through the first several sets of exchanges. My first run was mostly downhill, through some beautiful forest, on a 2-lane state road. Though hot, the 6.8 miles went by quite nicely. We cycled through the first 12 legs, and arrived in Burlington some time in the early evening. We used the time to get some pizza, then went to the van exchange for showers and rest. I was so tired I didn't care about the showers. (Why bother? Just gonna stink again in a few hours anyway!) Threw a bag on the ground and dozed for about 1.5 hours, but the noise level was far from sleep-inducing. We were on our way again around midnight. My second leg started at 1:45am and was short and flat, in downtown Anacortes. Two down, one to go!

At 5:40 am, we handed off the wristband to van 1. By this time, we were sharing fantasies about finding breakfast and passing out, in that order. Our swearing had begun to significantly increase, as we got slaphappy and more comfortable with each other. Despite vastly different backgrounds, we had begun bonding quite well. Nic is a seriously badass obstacle course racer, and Ryan and Severin aren't far behind. Ryan and Severin know each other from work, and have raced with Nic before. They were also our fastest runners. Donna is from New Jersey, so we had some good laughs about being East Coast assholes (she knew all about driving in Boston and being a Masshole driver). Marilou is a small package stuffed with a huge amount of honey badger, doing obstacle racing as well as a lot of endurance running events.

So, we're all dying to find real food and sleep, and figuring we have about 4.5 hours. It's 5:40 in the morning, most of us got zero sleep at the last van exchange, and last night's pizza had long worn off. That's when the shenanigans started up.

Runner #1 departed, and someone from van 1 makes an announcement: "We did the math, and it's going to take you guys 7.5 hours to do your last set of runs. We don't want to wait that long for you to finish (at the finish line). We're going to skip one run and leapfrog some others, so that we don't take much time. You guys need to find a way to shorten the time. Come up with a plan and tell us what it is when we get back with our last runner. See ya!"

Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot. Seriously? Wrong on so many levels. To enumerate the level of effed-up-ness:

1. You just robbed us of our food and sleep break. You're going to be back in 2.5 hours, so there's no time to go find food. Nothing nearby is open. You also just shorted us on sleep time. Awesome.
2. The entire point of doing a relay is to tough it out and complete the challenge, not short-circuit it because you "don't want to wait". Go sign up for a 5k if you don't want to wait. Waiting is part of the deal.
3. Unless someone is injured or sick, there is no excuse for skipping a leg. Even someone IS injured or sick, it's up to the other team members to figure out who is going to cover for them and do their runs.
4. You just blew any possibility of having a legitimate time and ranking with other teams. No, we weren't going to win anything, but I'd still like to have an accurate time and see how we stack up against other teams.

My vote was to just run our legs and make them wait 7.5 hours. After venting a bit, we did all agree that we wanted to run our legs, but were willing to try to compromise somehow. Marilou and I both checked out of that conversation and threw a bag on the ground and promptly fell asleep for 1.5 hours, while the others stayed up and hashed out possibilities. They came up with a plan to leapfrog some legs, so that two runners were going at the same time. Our "official" time was already blown to hell, so why not. Apparently Ragnar is ok with leapfrogging. I rather doubt they're cool with simply skipping legs, but as long as I run my legs and get my swag, I'll deal.

At 8:30 we were ready to, waiting for runner #6 to arrive. That's when we got the text announcing that they were going to get some coffee before dropping off runner 6 to start her hour-long run. Are. You. Kidding. Me. So now we have to sit around for ANOTHER hour, when we could have been sleeping. Unbelievable. How about bringing US some coffee too, while you're at it? And food. You didn't happen to see any food while you were chillaxing, did you?

We sent Ryan off at 9:30, for his long 10.5 mile run. After a few minutes, we left to drop Severin off to start her long 9.5 mile run. When we passed Ryan, we got the wristband from him and gave it to Severin. We dropped her at the beginning of her leg (end of Ryan's), then waited for Ryan to arrive. He got done, and we went to fetch Severin and start runner 9, myself, and 10, Donna. I finished and we drove to Donna's finish. She was late because she was so sleep-deprived and hungry that she was quite addled, and missed a turn somewhere, turning her 5-mile run into a 7-mile run. She got back on track and came in strong. We sent Marilou off on her 3-miler, then Nic got started on his (and ours) last run of the event, 6 miles and change. Almost done!

We went to the finish, and waited for Nic so that we could run the last tenth of a mile in with him. At last he came chugging around the corner, refusing to slow down or take a walk break. He led us to the finish, and we all celebrated being done! Collected our medals, picked up some food, then headed for the car to share in the caramel apple pie they had picked up during my run. YUM. Nothing was better than sharing that pie around the hood of the van. It was a delicious end to two long days and cemented our bond. Van 2 rocks!

Finally got home to a lovely shower around 8:30pm Saturday. Paula made me a gigantic gin and tonic to enjoy while showering, and it was as heavenly as the soap.

I already have the team name for next time: All Lubed Up and Ready to Go. (It's not what you think: Google "runners, chafing, bodyglide".)

Zelda the Christmas cabbage: A story of rebirth

It was 2014, nearing Christmas in Indiana. Snow was a regular occurrence, and the Polar Vortex was a miserable, wretched presence. I was waiting out my last holiday season in the Midwest, busily packing boxes and (somewhat unsuccessfully) trying to purge stuff. The apartment was in total chaos, and decorating for Christmas was not high on the list of priorities.

Then I cleaned the fridge.

I found Zelda tucked into a far corner, forgotten and abandoned, quietly awaiting rescue. Some weeks previous, I had purchased a head of purple cabbage with the intention of actually eating it. Apparently I had cut it in half and shoved one half back into the fridge, where it was promptly forgotten. December 4, I found a remarkably well preserved half-head of cabbage nesting back behind the beer and other essentials. Zelda was placed in a plastic pan of things-to-be-thrown-into-the-woods-to-compost next to the sink, along with some soggy cat kibble, coffee grounds, and other unfortunate produce.

The next night, I noticed something quite odd. There was a not-unattractive growth from her center! She was beginning to sprout, or bolt. Is this temporary? What happens if I just let her go? Will she keep growing? Why isn't this thing rotting?

By day 4, Zelda had been moved to her own container, along with the kibble. I watered her, and the cabbage runoff fostered a festive relationship with the kibble. The resulting mold resembled a snow-covered cobblestone walkway. Her stalk continued to gain height, and by day 10, she exploded with green buds. The cats finally noticed her, and tried their best to ignore this strange new plant. It was clear that some small Christmas decorations were in order. I found some tiny ornaments and sparkly garland. Begrudgingly, Paula agreed to let me move her to Seattle, if she was still around by moving day in a month.

By day 19, the green buds had bloomed into a riot of yellow flowers. She was definitely more holiday-like, with her purples and yellows and ornaments and garland, but something was missing. She needed lights.

I found some cheapo lights and cut a string down to Zelda length. The first attempt promptly blew the entire string, but the second attempt worked beautifully. By now, both cats were throwing her lots of side-eye and giving her a wide berth. They were spooked. Remarkably, her scent hadn't reached human-detectable levels, but it was obvious that her developing aroma did not appeal to felines.

Zelda's beauty peaked on Christmas eve. She was now sporting a spectacular Gene Simmons tree topper, and was in her glory. However, it was clear that her base was beginning to break down. Her perfume was mildly pungent, now noticeable by humans. Paula enthusiastically rescinded her permission to move Zelda with us. The cats were nervous around her. The end was near.

Christmas day, Zelda was relegated to the deck. I apologized as I carried her out. Paula showed the proper amount of grief. The cats were relieved. The cursed Polar Vortex returned, and Zelda was frozen by nightfall.

Though Zelda's second life was brief, it was spectacular. She was an intriguing experiment in resurrecting produce. Subsequent attempts have failed: the banana found at the bottom of a backpack was impressively mummified but quite dead, and the orange in the back of the desk drawer is in month 6 of shriveling hardness, but shows no signs of afterlife.

Merry Christmas, Zelda!

Just a cat

Why does this hurt so much? You were just a kitty.


True, you were the most charming little creature ever, making up for your lack of smarts with a personality that was always open to love, both giving and receiving. You would purr madly if someone simply looked at you, and really turn up the volume when you were directly addressed by name. "Hello, Sally!" would launch you into a blissful fit of tail-twitching, purring, and loving, wide-eyed looks. You about exploded when you saw a brush, and would purr so hard you chirped. I will always miss hearing your fan belt slip.

And no, you never did figure out how to meow, though you could scream if put in the shower. You tried and tried, and never mastered the art of the meow. That mouth would open, a barely-audible grunt would come out, but no meow. Seeing that pink mouth silently open wide always made me laugh. Except when it made me cry, during your last ride to the vet.


You weren't the brightest kitty around. We would joke that it took you two days to notice when we were gone on trips. Yet you dictated the play rules of the house: when, where, with whom, and for how long. You gave Harry a slap-down after you had finally had enough of him trying to hump you (despite him being more than twice your size), and you controlled him ever after. Later, when the decrepit adoptee Pandora tried to push you around, you didn't give an inch. You did this with class, by simply holding your ground and refusing to budge. She misses you, you know. She is currently wandering the house, meowing for attention (completely unlike her).

When you fell in love with Meerkat Manor, I fell even more in love with you. Watching you watch the meerkats was supremely entertaining. Realizing that you didn't like to watch repeat episodes was a mind-blower.


No amount of change or chaos fazed you. You just went with the flow, never freaked out, and stuck close by. We thoroughly enjoyed taking you and Harry on our 2400-mile road trip. While Harry lived in one lap or another, you found the perfect spot between us to curl up and snooze, and accept offerings of love. We never had to worry about you bolting when we got in and out of the car. You trusted us to keep you safe.

I know we teased you about your girth, but you were the cutest road kill ever, and we loved rubbing your ample belly. When that belly evaporated, it broke our hearts, for that meant things were very, very wrong. I prefer to remember you in your tubby glory.



You have left a far bigger hole than I anticipated, my little Goober kitty. You were my Peanut, The Goob, my wide-eyed cat that always looked a bit surprised, and very kitten-like. I will miss sliding my legs under your slumbering (and heavy) body, while you slept so deeply you didn't budge. While losing you is horrible, I know you are far more comfortable now. I'm so glad that your ashes are joining Harry's over an apple orchard in Yakima. Run free and happy, and without pain, my precious little friend.

Half Marathon for Climate: Magnificent Fail

This blog post was originally going to be about running three half marathons in three weeks, but after Saturday's race, it's now much more interesting. The first two races, the Snoqualmie Valley Half (beautiful) and the Rock n Roll Seattle 5K and half (fun), were enjoyable and well-organized.

Half #3 of 3 was the Half Marathon for Climate. I chose this one because it was close to home, was a nice course, and the finish was a couple of blocks away from our favorite local brewery. This one was such a stunning implosion of failures that it's hard to know where to begin. The spectacular scale of the cluster-f**ked-upness makes this post run long. It might be faster to list what went right.

• Shirts were there.
• Food truck was there, and the food was free, as promised.

Here's the short version of what went wrong.

• No bibs. Didn't matter, there was no way to time anyone anyway.
• No information about anything.
• Four water stops, unmarked. The temperature was pushing 90 after a season of low 60's.
• No crossing guards or course monitors.
• No course markings.
• Where the hell is the finish? Not where advertised, and not marked.
• No promised free beer (or I couldn't find it).
• No medical staff.
• Website jacked up on Monday following the race.

Here's my theory. A group of 20-somethings (who are arrogant enough to think they already know everything, because the 20's are worse than puberty) are sitting around drinking and bitching about politics. Someone says, "Hey, why don't we put on a race to raise funds for an environmental cause?" OK, that's a laudable idea. Only problem is, no one in the group has ever run a race. No one in the group has any runner friends. No one in the group has seen a running magazine. No one in the group has ever even spectated at a race. No one in the group has the slightest clue. They throw together a decent, if information-lacking, website, set up a way to take people's money, find one (only one, of the many) available websites to advertise on, print shirts, and think they're done.

Seriously. That's what it felt like. I would put more thought into planning a block party.

I found this event on the biggest local running calendar, seattleruns. It looked reasonably legit, but I wasn't going to pay $75 for it. I contacted the organizer, and asked if she could use some pre-race help in exchange for a discount. Sure! Paypal $40. That's a little odd, but it's a donation, and I figured I'd register in the morning. (Usually they send you a promo code and you go register online using that code; other times you register with paper forms the day-of.) Just show up at 8:30 for a 10:00am start.

But.

I get dropped off, and there's one small canopy set up, some piles of shirts on the ground, and a totally-lost friend of hers who has zero idea about anything, but is friendly enough. I don't know if he was simply kept completely out of the loop or if he is extraordinarily inattentive, but whatever. After we stand around for ten minutes or so, the organizer comes screaming up with a tire that is hissing air and quickly going flat. Her passenger (who seems to have it together more than she), hops out and trots off with another volunteer to find water for the water coolers. What happened to the tire? Apparently she hit a curb on the way over. WTF. Ummm. Ok. She runs off to a mechanic to get the spare put on the car, but is gone forever, with less than an hour and a half before the start and nothing set up, and no one there that has any idea what's going on.

Meanwhile, there are no water sources to be found. We are at a city park, and the water spigots require some sort of key tool to open, and no employees are around. Friend-With-A-Clue and Volunteer load some of the coolers into Volunteer's car, and take off for friend's house (3 miles away) to fill the coolers. They also are gone forever.

By now it's approaching 9am, and people are starting to show up. Lost Friend then informs me that some email went out the night before about bibs not arriving in time. She had suggested to him that we randomly assign numbers to people, write it on their hand or something, and collect times that way. It's unclear to me what any of this was supposed to accomplish, as I see zero evidence of any timing mechanism. Sigh. I have already concluded that the day was going to be a massive cluster, and that the best I could do was calm folks down and have them join me in a no-pressure training run.

I spent my time informing people about the lack of bibs, and if they cared about their time, they should just keep track of it (most of us had phones or watches), and inform (whoever) at the (wherever) finish. Legitimate questions are being asked, and Lost Friend is deer-in-the-headlights. Is there a gear check? [What's that?] Are there timing mats? [Huh?] Is the finish marked? Is the course marked? [I don't know.] How many water stops are there? How are you getting people back to the start (it was a point-to-point)? [Blank stare.] Are.You.Shitting.Me?

After about a half hour of foolishness (and by now many more people are standing around confused and annoyed), I finally tell Lost Friend to call the organizer and find out some of these things. Her car has a flat, but her phone should be working. Sheesh. Answers are somewhat insufficient, but we get a little more information. Finally, the organizer shows up, all atwitter. She is just beginning to realize she has massively screwed up, but it's unclear to me that she fully understands the magnitude just yet.

In addition to all of this insanity, the weather was a major concern. It's been a cold year here in Seattle. Highs have been in the 60's. I can count on one hand how many days we've had over 70. Today it was supposed to get up to the 90's, and the run didn't begin until 10am. Not only hot, but also a lot of non-heat-conditioned runners. Between the 10K and the half, about 200 people had signed up. Water is a serious concern on a day like this. I was grateful that I had brought a (full) water bottle with me. Many people had done the same, but many had not, and it was a major issue. Four stops in 13 miles was nowhere near enough hydration for a day like today.

Finally we are rounded up into a gaggle, and told to start. Ummm. Ok. May as well be out for a solo run.

The course was wonderful, and could be a very nice event, if properly done. It was along a Rails-to-Trail path that runs along Lake Washington, and though it is urban, it's beautiful with plenty of trees and scenery. It's a shared path, with cyclists and pedestrians alike. At least it's hard to get lost…until the finish, or the split if you're running the 10K. I have no idea when the 10K course branched off. Shrug.

The day is heating up, so pacing is very important. I started out slow, and never sped up. Three miles go by. Where the hell is the water?? If I didn't have mine with me, I would be suffering by now.

Somewhere after 4.5 miles, I see the organizer and someone else standing by the path with some bottles of water and Gatorade. Of course, they're on the other side of the bike part of the path, so runners have to get in the way of cyclists if they want water. I'm not sure many people even saw her there. I still had plenty of water, so I kept going.

Just before mile 7, I spotted some random coolers stacked by the side of the road, with some paper cups. Of course there was no trash can, so people were trying to at least keep all of the empty cups in a pile. I drank up, filled up my bottle, shook my head at the incompetence, and got on my way.

I don't remember if there was another stop before mile 11, but by then it was really heating up. I had passed a beautiful public pool a few miles back and seriously considered trotting over there and jumping in, but had refrained. Now I was eyeballing the private boat launches into Lake Washington and considering a quick dip. Instead, I just reminded myself that I was only two miles out and slowed down more, still shaking my head.

I never did see any course monitors at any of the road crossings (required by law here in Washington state), or any course markings anywhere. There was no indication of where we were supposed to leave the path and head toward the still-mysterious finish. I guess it was asking too much to go get some chalk powder and draw some arrows or write "Climate runners this way" on the pavement. There was another runner standing around there, waiting for her son, and she told me to leave the path and turn right onto the street. (I really hope her son wasn't lying somewhere with heat stroke, but it wasn't out of the realm of possibility.) I exited the path, and headed towards the advertised finish, which was at the Community Center.

Got to the Community Center, and no one was there. Crickets. What in the holy f**k. Walked across the street to a local brewery, drank a large glass of cold water, and sat down in the shade, totally pissed off. Two other runner-looking types walked by, and said something that made it clear they had participated. They had somehow missed all of the water stops until mile 11 -- I honestly don't know how they finished. I commented that I couldn't find the bleeping finish, and they said, "Oh, it's right back there a block or two." Seriously? I walked right by it? Went back a couple of blocks and sure enough, there was a food truck parked in a business parking lot (NOT the Community Center), and a few stray runners standing around. Absolutely zero signage. Of course, there was NO medical staff anywhere at any point during the day. Didn't see the organizer, Lost Friend, Volunteer, or Friend-With-A-Clue either. I don't know where they were. Never did find the promised free beer, but as hot as it was, I didn't even care.

The so-called finish wasn't at the Community Center, but it WAS across the street from our favorite local brewery, so I grabbed my free food and shirt, and wandered over to the brewery to lay on their sofa before puking or passing out. By now my calves were completely seized up due to lack of electrolytes, and I really didn't want to pass out on the sidewalk. After laying there for a few minutes, I cooled down, the legs stopped seizing, and I felt pretty good after using their restroom to wash the crust of salt off my face.

I was extremely grateful that all I had to do was call my sis-in-law, who lives about 1.5 miles away. My car was parked at her house, so she came over, we enjoyed a beer, went and got some more food, then went home. The people who had parked at the start (13 miles away, remember) had to find the organizer (or someone, I have no idea how it worked), and call Lyft for a ride back to their car. Completely half-assed.

Oh, and I never registered, so haven't been on any of the follow-up mailing lists. Go figure.

Course: Outstanding.
Event: On a score of 1-5, zero.