You Give Us 22 Minutes and We’ll Give You a Trip to NYC (DAY 2)

The Race

We headed into Manhattan in the early morning to meet up with Elliot and run a 5 mile race in Central Park. Parking was fairly easy to come by (see next section) and we walked a few blocks over to the race area. Not only was I surprised to see that this was not a small race (over 5,000 participants) but once the starting gun went off it was the quietest race I'd ever taken part in. It was so quiet that not only could you hear yourself think but you could also hear what the guy next to you was thinking! Lucky for everybody out there, Mr. Entertainment (me) was there to talk the whole way through. In the post race interview with some girl who stuck a camera in my face I even managed to get in some of POTUS' talking points. When asked why I ran the race, Bloggerman said, "If we don't run, the terrorists win!"

Ticket
What the #*+@! Why is there a parking ticket on the windshield when we got back to the car? We specifically moved it from one side of the street to the other and pulled up to make sure we were not in the "No Standing" zone. Oh we can’t park here because numb nuts over at city hall decided the only other sign needed along the whole block would be 500 ft down the other side.
Nice... Thanks for fleecing the drivers so that the empty suit wearing panty-waits at ABC can park in front of their building. We wouldn't want them to have to walk like the rest of us. They might forget all those great reality shows they were thinking of on the commute in!

The Game
Well we finally made it to Shea and had sunny skies and 2 baseball games to take in (they were playing a true double header to make up for the rain out). Thanks to Josh for hooking us up on the seats. We could see everything. Unfortunately that also meant that we could spend 3.5 hours in the sun and see the Mets drop the first of two.

We hit the car after the end of the game because we knew that if we stayed for the second game we wouldn't get home until after midnight.

Friendly’s
For dinner we pulled off just north of Baltimore and thanks to Mrs. Bloggerman's expert navigation (and Google Maps) we found yet another reason to get off at Joppastowne (in addition to the cheap gas). Unfortunately our diets had already been blown for the day so we opted away
from the ice cream and Fribbles for two salads... although after the next marathon, we're going back for sliders, motz sticks, and bacon-cheese waffle fries all on one plate. Yummo!

The Pup-a-Lup
A special thanks to the Boig collective who were gracious enough to watch Mooks while we wenst away. They rock and when we got home she was sprawled out on the bed enjoying her freedom! Well not for long as we had a (near) midnight stroll around the neighborhood and managed to come back with "more" in our bag then when we left.

Once Twice Three Times a NO and 4-way Stops!

Ahhhhhh!!!! The numbers wont’ leave me alone. They always are there…oh wait that’s Hurley. Fhewwww….I feel much better now.

But seriously numbers are haunting me again. This time the numbers 2, 3, and 4 are bugging me and here’s why.

2 and 3 go together, as in November 2, 2008 and 3 consecutive times turned down from entry into the New York City Marathon (the former being the date of the race.) Come on people. Yes I know I didn’t have a good showing in 2005 but that was my first race after injuring my knee…I’m allowed one bad check every few years right (see the counterfeiting post from a while back)? Well I don’t know how they do this lottery but I was really looking forward to going up to NYC and running it this year. On the bright side, the other folks who I know who entered also didn’t get in so they have next year too. Speaking of next year…I guarantee my entry into the race.

Wha, wha, what??? How can you do that?

Simple. The New York Road Runner rule book says:

Those who have applied but been denied entry for the last three years in a row and who haven't secured entry through alternative methods are guaranteed race entry.

Lets see…that means 2006 (no), 2007 (no), and now 2008 (no)! YEAH! I’m in for 2009 and going to whoop the llama’s ass (or the emu’s donkey…whichever comes first)!

So Elliot, Eric, and any of you other yahoos that want to run this bad mutha with me…saddle up, 'cause we’re going to Disneyland….err…Central Park in November of 2009!

Wait….you forgot the number 4.

Oh yeah you’re right…thanks for reminding me. 4 is for 4-way stop, as in what you are supposed to do when driving your car and coming onto an intersection where the lights are down due to power outages. Didn’t they teach that on your driving test? Evidently most of the folks on Connecticut Ave and 355 couldn’t handle that master level driving technique yesterday afternoon. Yes, I understand that a strong storm(s) hit and knocked out the power, and yes, I understand that you were confused and a little scared, but the rains were gone and you could see clearly now…

Seriously, what the hell is wrong with you? The guy in the minivan next to me over by White Flint (on 355) was honking because the cars in front of us were stopping to be courteous. He was actually upset that he was being delayed. I tried to calm him but there was no sedating the man. Ah he’s a fat ass anyway who will probably have a heart attack behind the wheel and kill himself in a fiery late night wreck. As for me…I pulled off and got one of the Whoa! That’s Low! shakes. Yummo! (2 comes up again. As in 2 posts in a row I’ve used Yummo! Get Rachel Ray out of my head!!!)