There are those days that are so monotonous you wished you had never left your comfy pillow.  However, there are some days that are full to the brim with bizarre events.  Saturday just happened to be one of the latter.  I generally do not provide a detailed blog account of my day because, quite frankly, my days are probably not that interesting (why else would I spend my time amusing myself by watching others).  Since there were so many oddities I decided to break from tradition and try to run you through my interactions today.

• Eventually I shook off the sleep and checked out the weather.  Once again the Globull Warmers were eating crow as the temps were in the mid 30’s forcing me to choose the treadmill to get my 6 miles run in.  To keep the boredom to a minimum I decided to watch The Warrior’s Way thinking that sounded like an action packed movie that will keep my mind off the rubber belt under my feet.  That movie started out interesting and then went into a complete tailspin making my run feel like navigating through molasses.  If that wasn’t bad enough, about a third of the way through the run my heart took a jolt about throwing me into the wall behind the treadmill.  Some dumb*ss director decided the show wasn’t complete without a $#!#%@!$% clown.  A martial arts flick set in a Western setting must not of had the audience drawing power like a martial arts flick set in a Western setting with a clown!  I eventually got the heart beating normal again and closed out the rest of the mileage making a mental note never to watch anything from that director again.
• With the weather as it was, there was not much I could do on the lot so decided to run some errands with Linda.  First off was lunch and that ended up being Panda Express.  While Linda ordered her honey walnut shrimp, I checked out the entrees and decided on one that had just been filled from the kitchen.  As I walked back to the clerk she asked me if I was with Linda and then handed me a shrimp on a stick.  For some reason I assumed Linda had asked her to give me sample of her selection or maybe they had too many to fit on her plate so just gave me a bonus shrimp.  having deduced that, I gladly accepted the shrimp and put the whole thing in my mouth at once.  Guess what?  It was not what Linda ordered, but rather their new hot/spicy shrimp.  In case you don’t know me very well, my body is a finely tuned ecosystem that runs on a spice scale of ketchup to mild Taco Bell sauce.  Ten seconds later my mouth was on fire and unable to really answer any of the clerks food selection questions.  Linda saw me in distress and I explained the situation.  Her response was “Just because they hand it to you doesn’t mean you have to eat it”, causing the clerk to laugh.  I think there needs to be a ruling here – I claim that if you are going to give someone a piece of food to try, you should be obligated to tell that person the spice level before handing it to him.  Anybody with me on that?  What if I had my gall-bladder out or not been in such peak physical condition … for the record, Linda is on the suck it up side of this debate.
• With the fire in the mouth finally contained, we headed down to Running Central to pick up another pair of running shoes.  The weekly mileage is piling up as I set the groundwork for the half marathon later in the year (fingers crossed).  This is definitely the most miles I’ve logged this early in the season, but I am still 5 miles from where I need to be in September – but already at Bix distance and only 2 miles from the Steamboat run in June.  Two blocks from the store it literally starts to snow.  Last week I was running in 85 degree heat and this week I’m out in the snow.  Oddly, there was no place to park by the store so we headed around the block and parked in a community lot.  After a brisk walk to the store we opened the door to a totally PACKED store.  I’ve been going to this running store for years and it has never been this full of customers.  I took a glance out the window at the snow and then to Linda in hopes of an explanation.  My only guess is the local schools had track season starting and all the young kids in there were simply excited about getting their gear.  I think one of the female clerks recognized me and detoured over from her current customer and asked if she could help me.  As has been the case for the last 5 years my response was ” I need a size 10 Nimbus please”  Her response was “Wow, you’re easy I’ll go look for you”.  I mentioned her response to Linda as we headed to the car as a candid argument against her impression I’m full of strange quirks that puts me far from the easy category.  Funny enough, she didn’t even notice the lady ask me what I needed and didn’t understand why she was telling me they were out of what I wanted.  They offered to order a pair for me, but I always try them on since Asics has a tendency to tweak their Nimbus on every release and some of those are not for the better.  I was really happy with the service and that is definitely one of the reasons I take my business there.Hit the Jump to see the rest of the day with some fail pictures
  
• Next we went to Sam’s to pick up some needed items.  That place was equally packed with everyone clambering for free food samples.  For some reason, they did not seem to be sampling this particular food item.  Credit to Linda who pointed out this less than mouth watering product.  I need to know,  is there anyone out there that likes or even knows someone who is willing to try this particular snack?
  
  (note, I left the tag below it due to being equally disturbing.  A pound of beef jerky?  doesn’t that equate to like a 20 pound steak?)  Time to leave this aisle pronto.  We pushed our cart up to the door lady so she could verify that we were not stealing our humongous package of paper towels and got our purchases into the truck.  The lady literally said “You got your Bounty, you’re all set” giving me some humor fodder for the cold trek to the truck.  As we headed out of the parking lot, we notice this car drive by.
  
  Thry passed several people who tried to catch their attention but they were having none of it.  I about got out to see if I could help, but they were turning into traffic and I went for the camera instead.  We took a glance at them as we turned in an opposite direction and noticed they were an elderly couple both wearing the full coverage cataract sunglasses.  That put a shudder down our spine.
• Next up was the new mall where I spent a significant amount of time standing next to two old guys experiencing a significant amount of pain having to go shopping with their wives.  They were crashed out in some chairs where one had pretty much resorted to catching some zzzzz’s.  Eventually we made it down to Eddie Bauer’s where I stumbled on this FAIL
  
  You have got to be kidding me.  Apparently these are mitten scrapers with the one on the left being for SUVs.  Mind you this is a mitten and thus no real reason for the placement of the scraper beyond the personal satisfaction of telling the snow exactly what you think about it… and in the case with the left one, can even put an exclamation point on it.  I guess it would also be useful for the idiots that live in Illinois and can’t drive on the snow or ice.
• After spending no less than 15 minutes trying to get our purchases rung up at Dick’s Sporting Goods, we headed back for home.  Note, at least 10 minutes of that time was trying to get two Olympic style weights rung up weighing a whopping 2.5 pounds a piece ($2.48/ea equals some serious waste of time).  Before you start laughing at me, I needed a smaller increment to add to my leg press – 10 pounds was too much change between the cycles.

Sorry to bore you with a day in the life of a country boy, but everywhere I turned strange (at least to me) things kept cropping up.  Now the question is whether all that people watching/interaction was worth blowing the entire day!  Just in case Linda is reading this, that answer is a “no” in case she gets any crazy ideas about making this a routine.