All before 9 am....

So this morning, Natalie arrived at my house at about 6:30 am. She's crazy, but that is a different story. Today was the day of our 5K, the Cosely Zoo Run for the Animals. So we left the house at about 6:50 with the intent of parking a bit far from the race, walking to the start, stretching and then leisurely running our race. Well, things just don't seem to always go as planned.

When we get to the end of my street with see a Boston terrier running around, crossing streets, no leash or owner! We also noticed his that he was carrying his back leg, poor guy. So, we pull the car over and twice try to coax him in the car...it worked the second time. Cute little guy jumped right in and was so sweet! I got his collar off and of course there was no ID tag but he did have his rabies tag on. I called Animal Control, no answer, so then I dialed 911. I explained to the dispatcher that it wasn't an emergency but also that we didn't know what to do with this dog. As we are talking we continued to drive to Animal control. The police officer said that someone would meet us there so we park the car and this sweet dog so running all over the car - so funny!

So....we are waiting..... and waiting....and waiting...and it's after 7:00....and finally someone from the animal control walks up. We ask if he works there, "Yes", so we explain the situation and he takes the tag. When he returns, he tells us that he called the owner and they are on their way. OK, great! Now take this dog...I have a race to run. Nope....he tells us just to wait here for the owner! AHHHHH!!!! It's 7:25....did I mention the race is at 7:30?

While we are waiting for this lady to come, the police call us back and tell us it is going to be a while before an officer can get there because they are really busy. Umm....yes...I know they are busy. There is a run blocking off the entire town of Wheaton that I AM SUPPOSED TO BE RUNNING IN!!! The lady finally pulls up and she is almost in shock. So cute! She even brought her other dog to come and get..."Gus". She told us that he has recently figured out how to get out of their back gate and she tells us she feels terrible about the race because she sees our numbers.

We leave animal control, fly into Wheaton, only to discover the place is a and house and there is not much parking. We park way far away form the race start, Natalie runs into caribou Coffee because she is ready to pee herself....by the way you need a key for their restroom, back out to borrow a key, OK done. So now, to get to the race. Seriously, I felt like we were in a movie. We run, not walk, to the starting line to discover that the race is started, there is not a runner in site and they are packing up the pad that you have to run across to get timed. So the guy tells us to go, we run across it the starting line already out of breathe and find that we are the absolute last people in the pack even behind the walkers! So funny! The good news is, he told us how far behind we were and after crossing the finish line I realized that I met the two goals I had set for myself.

1. To not walk any part of the race...check!

2. To finish in under 30 minutes...check!!!!!

Below is a picture of the very technologically advanced timer thingy on my shoe that allowed me to get such an awesome time...AKA, it's the thing that times you when you run across the starting and finishing pad. HAHA! I thought it was really cool!

After the race, we walked around and got some good laughs about our eventful morning. We met two very nice ladies in Starbucks who were willing to listen to our story and took our picture!

Insert photo here when Natalie sends it to me :-)

Nat - I love ya! What a great morning!!!

UPDATE: I just checked the website...I got an official time!!!! I didn't think it was going to register since they were packing up the start...I did so much better than last year; my official time was 29:47.6 and I came in 24/99 in my age division. OK, not much under 30, but under nonetheless. YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!