not going to du Worlds this year...

… not in short-course anyway. plans/hopes/pipedreams to rock the qualifier down in virginia beach this weekend passed away like so much diarrhea down the crapper when i came down with a stomach flu. i might have been okay to run 5k, ride 30k and run another 5, but there was no way the 5-hour trip down to VA was happening saturday morning.

so i spent the weekend curled on the sofa reading, switching off between sean o’casey’s autobiographical Drums under the Window and dan brown’s Deception Point. in my muddled state, a pretty interesting story emerged: something about the irish republican brotherhood planting a meteorite in the arctic ice shelf, and the head of NASA causing massive protests and rioting when he used the word “shift” in a public address. it made a lot of sense yesterday, anyway.

having done absolutely nothing but inhabit the couch since friday afternoon, i finally roused my lazy bones to attempt a trail run with the dog yesterday afternoon. people are beginning to emerge from their winter lairs and when we popped onto the park lot it was jammed with cars. i stopped to chat with teej, who’d just finished his run; and while we talked, i saw in my peripheral a child beginning to gravitate toward jack. any dog exerts some measure of gravitational pull over a child, and jack’s particularly cute, so i’m on constant alert for children and soft-hearted people in general.

and sure enough, now we’ve got an incoming. here we go.

child toddles closer; father strides forward protectively and establishes his ground, softly.

- what a cute dog. what do you think of the nice dog, jemmy?

jemmy better get the fuck away, is what the nice dog thinks.

both jemmy and his dad are still advancing. i pull jack closer to me, a movement registered by the dad, who for the first time looks at me.

- what a cute dog – he reiterates, then utters my favorite line: he doesn’t bite, does he?

- sometimes - i say cheerfully - and he’s not very good around small children. right on cue jack emits a guttural growl and curls his lips, freezing jemmy and his dad in their tracks. jemmy starts to cry and his dad glares as me, like i’ve just garroted the easter bunny in front of his kid. he grabs jemmy’s hand and jerks him toward the trail, looking back with one withering glance.

- i don’t get it – i said to teej – would they rather i lied, and let their kid get bitten? he shrugged and petted jack, who’d transformed back into dr. jekyll and was looking up with adoring eyes.

- he’s good protection – he said.

i like that reasoning. i feel tons more secure knowing that any would-be attackers under 3-feet will have a divil of a time getting past my dog.