So happy May or Happy Health Awareness month, depending on which side of the Jane Fonda fence you're on. Part of the festivities here in the office today was to 'dress the part', so there are many people dressed in sweats and workout attire. A couple of my favorites are Tara (One of our wonderful content managers here at Zappos) and Nick (another Content Team stud-muffin) They're totally decked out with some pimpin 80's workout gear. Very nice, Tara and NIck! The real reason I'm writing though is because I'm sitting here at my desk feeling really weird wearing my running shorts at work. Besides how white my thighs are and how scrawny I look in white, I have a draft 'down there' - Never had THAT happen at work.

I just whistled at Nick, 'Nice Addictions' - Now I feel naked AND dirty.

Today was a busy day! We woke early to get to the start line – which was only a half-mile away (Between Centennial Park and Vanderbilt University). I looked out the window at 5am and it was raining cattle out....goodness it was coming down – NOT a good start to a marathon, but the rain settled down just in time for the start of the race. It actually turned out to be remarkable weather for a marathon!!! We had just enough time to run out two miles on the course and back. The way back was definitely tougher as we had to weave our way through the oncoming marathon runners. We cut our way back through a side street and suddenly found ourselves running on the race route between miles 8 and 9, well ahead of the elites in the race – Yikes!!!!

All the volunteers thought we were the leads in the race!!!! What a completely weird feeling! We ditched the thought of running this route VERY quickly. Soon we found ourselves weaving thru bystanders (We kindly didn’t get in the way of the runners - promise!), looking for wide sections of the street to get back to the hotel for the shuttle ride to the finish line. It what pretty funny the amount of stares we received from people thinking that we were completely insane, not too mention the MANY comments we got, ‘You’re running the wrong way!!!!’ We were laughing the entire way - A COMPLETE blast. We made it back to the hotel and caught a ride over to the finish with plenty of time to watch the elites cross the finish line.

Is it me or there a lot of dead pigeons around here lately? It's gross to think about, but in the last month or so I've seen a dead cat and like four dead pigeons...perhaps it was the same pigeon and someone moved it three times...I don't know, it's weird (in nothing but very best old school John Travolta voice).

The Coin Count

ALAS! One Penny!

Running Total: 43 cents

Top weird thing on my run today:

I ran thru a Vegas community called Cactus Flower. Not only was there no Cactus, there were no flowers either.

There are so many things I see on my runs that I want to write about when I get home, but like those dreams one can't remember the day after, my memory seizes and all I could think about when I hit the computer is food. Today was special. I actually have a story for you. I'm sure you're thrilled.

As soon as I started my run I noticed a ball that was ‘lost' - hanging out in the gutter, no home, no owner, no great prospects, and no dreams. Ahhhhh...Poor little ball. I kicked it into the yard that was directly behind it and pursued my aspirations to get in at least seven miles. I turned the first corner down the first major road I normally run down and what do I find in the gutter? Another ball! This road, like many major roads in residential areas in Las Vegas, is bordered up and down with cinderblock walls. I threw the ball over the wall and proceeded. So now my feeble mind can't help to think of anything but those two balls and what a weird thing it is to find these toys on the street...now we have something! My voyage for the rest of this run was to find as many things that make sense to throw back into a yard as possible...You with me? So seriously, here's what I found:

Four balls total

One Frisbee

One little black rubbery and stretchy action figure

What looks like a base to a balloon launcher?

Some cartoon-face thingy that had the same consistency as a stress relief ball

I threw all these over a wall or back into a yard - Hopefully all you kids that lost these toys now have them back, safe and warm. If they're not yours, enjoy your new toys kiddies!

The Coin Count

Nada today, but look at all the other things I found! YAY!

Running Total: 42 cents

This should probably go under the “top weird things on my run today” Blog, but nah!!! This stuff is just too weird NOT to tell the complete story, so here it is. The top weird thing started off with two brand spankin’ new firefighter license plates just lying in the middle of the street. I was gonna pick ‘em up and try to drop them off at a firehouse, but I decided not to – thinking about the days that my mother told me if I ever get lost - Stay in one place...So perhaps the owner would retrace his/her steps and find them – Right? Not so weird, but check this out…About a half mile down the road I noticed a fire station that wasn’t there about five months prior (I hadn’t run this route in about that long)…Man, they build things quick here in Vegas! I ran back to where the plates were, scooped them up, then ran them back to the fire station and left them at the front doors. Cool! My good deed for the day I continued my run. About a mile away from my house was a fire truck with its lights swirling around. I’m like, “Weird! Huge firefighter theme today! What’s going on?!?!?” As I passed the truck there were four firefighters standing against their truck watching a hydrant blast out water. I mean, there was some serious water was gushing out of that hydrant! I had no clue what they were draining the hydrant for. Oh well, weird
stuff!

Sometimes I talk myself into running on a night that I don't completely feel like running and on other nights, I can talk myself out of running all together. Sometimes the hardest part about running is getting out the door. Sometimes the hardest part about running is getting out the door and having to deal with people that don't care much about other human beings. Today I went for a short run and got pegged in the back of the head with an open bottle of milk. Some guy just decided that he was gonna yell obscenities from the passenger side of this passing car and throw a half-full plastic bottle of milk at me. I'm okay. I've been thru worse. It hurt at first, but it was definitely more of a surprise than anything. The smell of milk is something I've never disliked, but it was rather unpleasant today - especially since it was soaked into my running cap and the top of my jacket. I've had people throw stuff at me out of passing cars before, but the items thrown never struck. This guy had extraordinary aim - lucky me. I guess in conclusion, watch out for careless jerks that scream and throw 'stuff' at you from passing cars. Mean people suck.

Top weird thing on my run today:
-An empty plastic milk bottle on the ground.

So Mother Nature has been trying to storm in Vegas for the last few weeks. We haven’t had a decent storm in Las Vegas it seems for three years. It HAS been windy though – Really windy. Does anyone really like running in the wind? Seriously. The only good thing at least is when you have a headwind you get a tailwind in return, that is until the time you turn the corner and you have to deal with the headwind all over again. Today, I was nearly blown right into a wall when I turned that corner. This was scary for two reasons:

1)Holy Cow! It is THAT windy outside right now

2)Holy Cow! Am I really THAT light?!?!?

Top weird thing on my run today:

• A dried up pile of vomit. Yucky.

I run at night and when I say ?night?, I mean some time between 9:30 and midnight usually - Most of my life I have. It works pretty well for me and my schedule. Running this late seems to help me clear all my thoughts and questions from the day...Hey, it's better than laying in bed for an hour or two wondering about every little thing. It also allows me to work a little bit more when I get back and it really does help me sleep better. Besides, I can't get my butt up in the morning any way! Yeah, you're right...It probably IS because of the late night running. What ever. I like it. For some reason I was up early this morning so thought I would go for my first morning run since the Zappos.com Las Vegas Marathon back in early December. So out I went, 6am and feeling like the morning sun was going to melt me like a gremlin. Along my route I instantly realized the huge difference in my surroundings between a morning and night run. Yeah, there were the obvious things: More people out and about and more school buses than I could count on both hands, etc...But there were also a few things that surprised me - The actuality that people never really looked at me with my oh so pale legs in shorts a little longer than I care to admit was much more believable to me at night and that house with grey curtains that I pass all the time was actually a house with a very obnoxious shade of pink curtains. Whoa! Nothing was more shocking though than the line that was formed inside, and well outside, of a Dunkin' Donuts I passed. WOW! I didn't even realize they had a Drive-Thru! THAT was packed solid as well! I'm not sure if this was a usual occurrence and now I wonder if it does happen every day - Guess I'll have to have run more in the morning to find out. One thing for certain, it put me in the mood for a tasty Dunkin' Donut this morning.

• A graveyard of rolled up sod - unfortunately all being torn up and not put down - poor grass.

Valentine's Day Candy. So much for the nice thoughts for V-Day.

Baby bottle nipple! Those over-sized cheap ones you get from the hospital when your kid is born.

Bottle of Coke with a substituted liquid of the complete opposite color. Eww....Gross.