another day in the park

So I figured out what it was about GuyInThePark that bothered me so much. Dotted all along the path that runs around the park are park benches, nothing strange there… and some of them are covered. They’re like little garages for people (I assume a necessity due to the frequent rain here). A few times, while running, I’ve noticed a homeless man holed up in one of the covered benches. He’s all bundled up in his coat with his bags of things under the bench and he just stands there, looking out onto the football fields and playground, watching people from his semi-covered hiding spot. That IS kindof creepy.Anyhow, today was the third day in a row that I’ve seen GuyInThePark and I realized that he had reminded me of that creepy homeless man at first. After a second (and third) look, I’ve realized that’s not the case. The day after my initial run in, I recruited Katharina to go jogging with me… half a block out of the house on the way to the park, I discovered how GuyInThePark knew what road I live on… he lives there too, just a few houses down. We saw him going into his house, and he stopped, smiled, and said hi to me again. As soon as I saw him I realized how differently he looked outside of the ‘potential creepy homeless man in the park’ situation and, to rub it in, Katharine told me I was ridiculous in my earlier description and he seemed like a genuinely nice guy.Yeah yeah, I know.Fast forward… day 3, on the way to the park, I walk past him again… him (presumably) on his way home and me on the way to the park. He stops again, say hi again, and asks me to dinner. I politely and firmly declined and he smiled and told me to think about it. I have a feeling he’s going to ask again the next time he sees me. Either way, he’s not nearly the intimidating figure I had him made out to be in my imagination that first day… I’m still not interested… and definitely going to be careful… but I feel a little silly for my overreaction.
That’s that.

Speaking of today at the park… I went for another mile-jog with Dex. I’ve shaved a couple seconds off everyday, and am feeling quite good about it (although my knee is acting up again). The weather here has been holding out beautifully… I couldn’t ask for better (especially not this time of year). It still rains a little almost every day, but mostly during the day when I’m at work or at night while I’m asleep, and not enough to really make a mess of the roads and fields. I mostly keep Dexter off the grass when the fields are muddy… he’s a blonde so every speck of dirt shows… but today we ran into a guy with a 7 month old Beagle, so I let Dexter romp around with him for a while. This is the aftermath.

I suppose you can’t see it THAT well, but he is good and muddy. Especially considering it actually DIDN'T rain today, so the mud was not as plentiful or fresh as usual. I should have taken a better picture of my shoes too, because the tread on those bad boys were oozing with mud. The thick clay-like stuff too… not the stuff you can stomp out. Dexter got a thorough hose-down after this run, and he was none too pleased about the cold water. He's still good in the bath, but he's getting bigger every day and it'll be an odd feeling when I can no longer pick him up with one hand by the scruff of his neck.