Every Wish That We Put Into Motion.... (comments welcome!)

[DopeyBadger]

Not a female. I can't speak to the intent of your neighbors and that comment about noticing your routine, but I've had many neighbors in my area that I don't know outside of me running by their homes that have commented similar things to me. "Didn't see you yesterday.", "Noticed you only take Mondays off, why is that?", "Ahh, so this is where you live, I see you run by my house all the time.", "Maybe I'll join you one day, you always run past at about 5:45pm." "You're still going, I saw you X minutes ago on such and such street." Things of that nature. To be fair, on a single run I might run by some houses 5-10 times. But I also wouldn't dismiss your experience and say it would also make me more aware if I were in your shoes because it can be off putting.

 

[Herding_Cats]

I’m with your DH on this one. If I found out someone I didn’t know had taken enough notice of my routine to realize when I deviate from it, I’d avoid that person/area whenever possible. Maybe they’re harmless, but maybe they’re not, and once you find out which it is, it might be too late.

Right. This is where DH is landing on things (although he is significantly more conservative about me being out and about running on my own. Heck he was even making sure he knew who I was running with for the marathon in Jan. since @The Expert sat things out. But I literally cannot avoid this spot unless I drive somewhere to run, or run down the big hill and then along the highway (NOT happening) instead.

Being in a rural area and knowing my neighbors, my gut says it's probably no big deal. This time of year, a lot of them sit out on their deck, in their yard or even the garage in the evenings because it's nice out and they can chat with the dog walkers, families on bike rides, etc.

That said, sadly, there is far too much craziness out there to dismiss it. If you can vary your route or schedule and be less predictable, I'd do it. And keep training that dog!

Right. This is where I landed on things. Sketchy neighbors yell out potentially questionable things, but not necessarily inappropriate things. And I don't want to make the big jump that one person said something and now I cannot run there because that's a big leap.

Not a female. I can't speak to the intent of your neighbors and that comment about noticing your routine, but I've had many neighbors in my area that I don't know outside of me running by their homes that have commented similar things to me. "Didn't see you yesterday.", "Noticed you only take Mondays off, why is that?", "Ahh, so this is where you live, I see you run by my house all the time.", "Maybe I'll join you one day, you always run past at about 5:45pm." "You're still going, I saw you X minutes ago on such and such street." Things of that nature. To be fair, on a single run I might run by some houses 5-10 times. But I also wouldn't dismiss your experience and say it would also make me more aware if I were in your shoes because it can be off putting.

See, I totally get that. And I even wondered about asking because it was a sort-of innocuous comment if it wasn't made to a woman running alone. Men wouldn't think anything of this sort of thing. My running route is a T shape, where I start at the bottom of the T and then either turn left or right depending on the mileage I pass around 15 houses that I can see from the road on direction, and 9 houses if I run the other direction. And if I put it all together that's a 6 mile stretch across the top from end to end. So I run past these houses a LOT. If they're home, they see me often. I know who has dogs. I know who has kids. I know who has a Tesla (because I can barely hear it and they always seem to be coming or going when I'm near their driveway.) I know where the poison ivy is on the shoulder.

 

[superchime]

See, I totally get that. And I even wondered about asking because it was a sort-of innocuous comment if it wasn't made to a woman running alone. Men wouldn't think anything of this sort of thing.

Since a guy made the comment it's possible he didn't even realize how saying something like that might be inappropriate/scary for a woman. A lot of men still don't realize the safety issues women have to think about on a daily basis.

So I think I'm leaning towards it probably being nothing, but maybe you could put some extra safety measures in place if you don't have them already (like the apps that track you and alert someone if you stop moving or seem to have been thrown in a car or whatever). And I know it's probably not possible since you have a lot going on, but if you could be a little less predictable with when you run that might help too. Definitely keep training the dog! But I think if someone had bad intentions they probably wouldn't announce that they were watching you. It's a tough call these days, though, and a comment like that would definitely freak me out.

 

[accm]

My original suggestion was going to be to change your route, because that would've totally made me feel uncomfortable. But reading your previous response that you don't really have another route, I would make a point of only going when it's light out, and have Garmin live track setup so your husband knows where you are. If you can change up the times of your runs without it being a huge pain, I would also do that.
I'm a sketch bag when I run. I refuse to run in the dark. I run mostly in a suburban area, but there are a few spots where there are no houses around, and I tend to run those sections faster unintentionally.

 

[Cabius]

Since a guy made the comment it's possible he didn't even realize how saying something like that might be inappropriate/scary for a woman. A lot of men still don't realize the safety issues women have to think about on a daily basis.

I didn't post earlier because herding_cats asked for female input, but in case my perspective is relevant here: as a guy, I would definitely say something like that out of friendliness if I weren't aware (from these forums) that it would come across as threatening.

When I run, I see some of the same folks regularly, and it's nice to see a familiar face. I notice when the handful of regular folks are gone, and am glad when I see them again. I would totally say something like, "hey glad to see you again!" or whatever.

Doesn't necessarily mean this guy isn't menacing in some way, but I do think that most men (including me!) aren't really attuned enough to the way that sort of thing can sound menacing to near-strangers.

 

[Herding_Cats]

I didn't post earlier because herding_cats asked for female input, but in case my perspective is relevant here: as a guy, I would definitely say something like that out of friendliness if I weren't aware (from these forums) that it would come across as threatening.

When I run, I see some of the same folks regularly, and it's nice to see a familiar face. I notice when the handful of regular folks are gone, and am glad when I see them again. I would totally say something like, "hey glad to see you again!" or whatever.

Doesn't necessarily mean this guy isn't menacing in some way, but I do think that most men (including me!) aren't really attuned enough to the way that sort of thing can sound menacing to near-strangers.

Yeah. And I complete see this perspective. They’re just the slightly creepy/weird neighbors that I would in general not interact with.

(Not to be confused with some other prior neighbors who used to sell drugs out of the house at the end of our driveway. We were happy when the bank foreclosed and evicted them.)

 

[Herding_Cats]

OK. Time for a weekly wrap-up. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with myself this week since the Olympics are now over, and I'm not waking up and immediately opening Peacock and "rewinding" the live coverage to see what I missed from the morning sessions. My routine of coffee & olympics, 2 hour break for lunch and productivity, and then 3 more hours of Olympics was pretty great. Was it great for my running consistency? Not overly. Last week I ran 4 days in a row, and my body let me hear it. And since I'm just getting started back up, I was trying to be a bit more circumspect about things.

My weekly goal is 4-5 days of running with an emphasis on very easy pace.

Monday: 45min. No dog (my back needed a break)and an avg pace of 14:03. I did a couple of very short downhill strides just because it sounded like a nice way to break things up. 15/30 intervals.

Wednesday: 45min. With dog. Creepy neighbor interaction. Avg pace of around 13:48. 15/30 intervals, and I think that if I maybe switch to 30/30 that my back, and the pup, will be a little bit happier since I won't need to "brake" to a walk as often. Something to investigate on another day.

Friday: I had intended to run, but then got a text from my pie-job pleading for me to come in for a few hours on Saturday because they had so many orders and had sold almost all of the pies on Friday. That meant moving grocery shopping and a few other projects that had been planned for Saturday to Friday. And then we found the pumpkin beer I really like, and then I wasn't really feeling like running post-pumpkin-beer.

Saturday: (6 hours and about 280 pies in the morning) 57min. With dog. I swapped out the 15/30 intervals for 30/30 and discovered that maybe running with the pup at 4:30 on a Saturday afternoon isn't the best choice. He really wants to chase cars, and there were a lot more than usual. There were also a lot more dogs out in yards than usual, and of course he also wanted to go check all of those out. *sigh* What we also learned is that he definitely has a limit and it seems like it's about 45min/3mi. I noticed after we turned around at the 2mi mark that he was pulling a lot less than usual, and by the time we hit the 3mi mark he was mostly just trotting beside me. But if we had to pause for anything (moving over for a car, etc) he was wanting to lay down in the grass. All signs of a tired pup who is ready to be done. So out of respect for his age and conditioning, we walked the last mile home. I'm pretty proud of myself for getting this run in since my body is definitely not used to standing on concrete for 6 hours straight, my forearms were shot, and I'd been up since 6am (because I work up early enough to watch most of the men's marathon replay before work.)

Sunday: When 2 of the boys ran a 5k last month, we won a prize. The race itself is a big fundraiser for a women's group that provides (among many things) scholarships for a nearby school. The race itself is only about $25 (no medals or shirts) but they get a LOT of local businesses to provide things for raffle prizes. Everyone who runs the 5k gets a ticket, and they draw out all of the tickets during the race and post the numbers on a big marker board. If you match a number, you get to draw a paper out of a big fishbowl that has a prize written on it. This year we matched a ticket and DS3 drew out a half-day pontoon boat rental! This was the *only* weekend this month we don't have something going on with our schedules, so we packed up all our fishing stuff and motored around the lake trying to find some yellow perch for 4 hours. It was cooler and windier than usual, but it was a nice day. Why am I included this day though? Well I finally convinced DS2 to take the puppy for a short run in the evening. I think they only did 1mi, but he really needed it after being kenneled up all morning.

(Why can my dog get better action pics than me????)


Also, I massively rolled my ankle in the garden on Sunday. Like, lay in dirt and breathe kind of rolling the ankle. Fortunately for me, my ankles are loose and sloppy anyway, so I don't really have any bruising or swelling today, but it's a little achy, so we will see how it feels as the day progresses and decide if it's a walk day or a run day.

 

[Herding_Cats]

Also, a vent about trip-planning with BIL/SIL

Spoiler: Feel free to skip this, or read and shake your head with me.

BIL and SIL are coming on part of our MW trip, and SIL is running the half with me. She's a teacher, and they have a few other things going on during next school year, so she's trying to use as few of her PTO days as possible for this trip. I totally get it. They are planning to fly down Thursday evening (after she gets done with school that day) so she can pick up her bib/shirt on Friday, and then fly home on Sunday afternoon. I have the most free time out of the 4 of us, so I usually do a lot of the trip planning when we vacation together (flights, hotels/rentals, dining reservations, park planning, etc) and just let them know when a really good price pops up for stuff. But I've planned 3 other MW trips now. I've stalked the flights. I know what the prices usually do. And they are not listening to me.

In order for them to leave after SIL gets out of work, they have to have a 5:30 or later flight. Our closer, smaller, regional airport has no flights in the timeframe that don't include a 9hr overnight layover somewhere. And 5:30 is cutting it close for the larger regional airport that's a 90min drive from them, assuming we don't have bad roads from winter weather. There are about 6 options from that airport, and a few more out of Detroit, but that's a 3hr drive for them, and the prices aren't really any better than the 90min-drive one, and there aren't that many more options for flights. So it's extra driving for almost no reason.

In the end of May I found flights that fit their time-needs perfectly for $105/person to Orlando. (Where we live, $250/person round trip is about a good a price as you can get without risking Frontier and their one flight every 2 or so days and cancellation possibilities, so getting a flight down there for about $100 is a good price.) It usually works better to piece the trip together with 2 one-way flights, since they also have the possibility of having a family member drop them off at one airport and pick them up at a different one when they come back. The response? Nothing. Crickets.

Last week I found another flight that again, matched their time needs for $86/person to Orlando. It's not going to get cheaper than that, even if they got a $19 fare from Frontier by the time they add a bag of any type. I forget to tell them the carrier, so the next day I was like, "Oh by the way, it was on American" to which they responded, "Oh, hahaha, we hadn't even looked yet!" And the day after that the flight went up to $204/person.

Sure. It's their money, but my main annoyance is that BIL will use the cost of the airfare to complain about the price of the trip. And I will chew him out if he complains about the cost of stuff in front of me in January. We borrowed a whole year's worth of DVC points to have a 2br while they are there with us so that everyone can have their own bedroom and not have to wake everyone up to get ready on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday morning. And if they change their days and come down on Friday, that's a bunch of points I could free up for a weekend trip some other time. I essentially guaranteed that I will not be doing any races in 2026 by putting this trip together this way.

So I'm frustrated. I'm so, so frustrated.

 

[The Expert]

How completely inconsiderate!

 

[accm]

That's really frustrating @Herding_Cats. You would think that if they have such a strict timeline, they'd jump on booking flights that cheap. I'm not sure what/if you're charging them for upgrading your room to a 2 bedroom, but I'd loose it if someone complained about the cost of the trip after I borrowed all my DVC points, and sent them multiple flight options to make the trip more affordable.

 

[Herding_Cats]

BIL is notorious for waiting until the last second (basically 1 month before) to book flights for stuff. DUDE. It never pays off. They just get more expensive.

Meanwhile, I'm over here looking to see how cheaply we can move our flights to an earlier day (DH is a solid "probably" for Monday instead of Tuesday at this point, but I'm seeing what Sunday night looks like now. )

 

[Herding_Cats]

That's really frustrating @Herding_Cats. You would think that if they have such a strict timeline, they'd jump on booking flights that cheap. I'm not sure what/if you're charging them for upgrading your room to a 2 bedroom, but I'd loose it if someone complained about the cost of the trip after I borrowed all my DVC points, and sent them multiple flight options to make the trip more affordable.

we aren't charging them anything. their only costs for this trip are airfare and whatever they decide to do once they get there.

 

[Naomeri]

Also, a vent about trip-planning with BIL/SIL

Spoiler: Feel free to skip this, or read and shake your head with me.

BIL and SIL are coming on part of our MW trip, and SIL is running the half with me. She's a teacher, and they have a few other things going on during next school year, so she's trying to use as few of her PTO days as possible for this trip. I totally get it. They are planning to fly down Thursday evening (after she gets done with school that day) so she can pick up her bib/shirt on Friday, and then fly home on Sunday afternoon. I have the most free time out of the 4 of us, so I usually do a lot of the trip planning when we vacation together (flights, hotels/rentals, dining reservations, park planning, etc) and just let them know when a really good price pops up for stuff. But I've planned 3 other MW trips now. I've stalked the flights. I know what the prices usually do. And they are not listening to me.

In order for them to leave after SIL gets out of work, they have to have a 5:30 or later flight. Our closer, smaller, regional airport has no flights in the timeframe that don't include a 9hr overnight layover somewhere. And 5:30 is cutting it close for the larger regional airport that's a 90min drive from them, assuming we don't have bad roads from winter weather. There are about 6 options from that airport, and a few more out of Detroit, but that's a 3hr drive for them, and the prices aren't really any better than the 90min-drive one, and there aren't that many more options for flights. So it's extra driving for almost no reason.

In the end of May I found flights that fit their time-needs perfectly for $105/person to Orlando. (Where we live, $250/person round trip is about a good a price as you can get without risking Frontier and their one flight every 2 or so days and cancellation possibilities, so getting a flight down there for about $100 is a good price.) It usually works better to piece the trip together with 2 one-way flights, since they also have the possibility of having a family member drop them off at one airport and pick them up at a different one when they come back. The response? Nothing. Crickets.

Last week I found another flight that again, matched their time needs for $86/person to Orlando. It's not going to get cheaper than that, even if they got a $19 fare from Frontier by the time they add a bag of any type. I forget to tell them the carrier, so the next day I was like, "Oh by the way, it was on American" to which they responded, "Oh, hahaha, we hadn't even looked yet!" And the day after that the flight went up to $204/person.

Sure. It's their money, but my main annoyance is that BIL will use the cost of the airfare to complain about the price of the trip. And I will chew him out if he complains about the cost of stuff in front of me in January. We borrowed a whole year's worth of DVC points to have a 2br while they are there with us so that everyone can have their own bedroom and not have to wake everyone up to get ready on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday morning. And if they change their days and come down on Friday, that's a bunch of points I could free up for a weekend trip some other time. I essentially guaranteed that I will not be doing any races in 2026 by putting this trip together this way.

So I'm frustrated. I'm so, so frustrated.

I would be ECSTATIC is I could find flights that cheap, doubly so if someone else did the legwork and all I had to do was to go book them.

 

[accm]

BIL is notorious for waiting until the last second (basically 1 month before) to book flights for stuff. DUDE. It never pays off. They just get more expensive.

Meanwhile, I'm over here looking to see how cheaply we can move our flights to an earlier day (DH is a solid "probably" for Monday instead of Tuesday at this point, but I'm seeing what Sunday night looks like now. )

My dad is the same way, and it drives my mom crazy because he's adamant that "flights will be cheaper closer to the date". They're coming with us for Wine and Dine, and I just booked the flight for them with ours, because when we went to DC in April, they waited forever and ended up with crappy flights for more than we spent.
If you're going to go on Monday instead of Tuesday, you might as well go on Sunday!

we aren't charging them anything. their only costs for this trip are airfare and whatever they decide to do once they get there.

That's very generous of you, and I really hope they appreciate it.

 

[Herding_Cats]

If you're going to go on Monday instead of Tuesday, you might as well go on Sunday!

This is seriously how every single trip goes for us.

 

[jmasgat]

Here for you if you need someone to bang their heads against a wall....just sayin'

Also, given that airlines will let you change/bank $$ spent, there is no real reason to sit around and wait to book airfare anymore.

 

[accm]

This is seriously how every single trip goes for us.

Our flight home from Wine and Dine got modified to like 9:30pm, so obviously I just decided to spend one more night at Disney. Because it just makes sense.

 

[Herding_Cats]

Our flight home from Wine and Dine got modified to like 9:30pm, so obviously I just decided to spend one more night at Disney. Because it just makes sense.

in our case it turns into things like, "Well if MIL is coming over to take care of the kids on Sunday night because our flight is Monday morning, why not just leave Sunday night."

And there's a pretty decent flight on Sunday night that we could both fly down for 16k miles (total.) Soooooo yeah.

 

[Herding_Cats]

That moment when you're getting ready to buy new shoes (I have a fleet feet $15 reward that expires this month) and you're thinking through you MW costumes to decide on a color.

 

[The Expert]

That moment when you're getting ready to buy new shoes (I have a fleet feet $15 reward that expires this month) and you're thinking through you MW costumes to decide on a color.

It would be crazy NOT to!