Uh, What Was I Gonna Title This?

January 9, 2013

Aurora De Lucia giving a very sleepy face in her Disney Hotel room before the Goofy ChallengeWho remembers?

(That’s a rhetorical question, the point being I don’t remember.)

I’m sure it was going to be some clever thing about traveling from L.A. to Orlando, or more likely a simple “Traveling From L.A. to Orlando.”

The point is,  I’m delirious. I was awake during the daytime(!) today – when the sun is up. For the past month or more, I’ve been sleeping during the days and I’ve been awake at night. (That is my pretty normal sleep schedule.)

This morning, instead of going to bed at 7, I stayed up, finished packing, and went to the airport.

(Side note: When I went to buy band-aids at Ralph’s for my trip, “Man in the Mirror” was playing over the sound system. I thought that was a perfect theme song for the last tiny shopping trip before the Goofy Challenge.)

I told the nice man on my flight to Houston to please make sure I actually woke up in Houston. (One time, I did not wake up at a layover until they’d almost finished boarding the new passengers joining the plane, continuing on to who know’s where. I awoke and ran off the plane in time to catch my next flight.)

Not only did the man make sure I woke up, he let me know I was going to gate 41. Full service stranger! Our flight was delayed, so I sprinted to gate 41, and barely made it on board. (Yay!)

During the second flight, I stayed up. I didn’t want to get too much sleep during the day, so hopefully I could try to sleep tonight – during the night.

Aurora De Lucia leaning her head back with her hat covering it in her Disney Hotel room before the Goofy Challenge
I wasn’t sure which sleepy picture you’d like more. So I gave you choices. You’re welcome. 😉

I sat between two Romney supporters. Surprisingly, we actually didn’t fight, fight. We had some pretty civil discourse. And then we talked a lot about planes, ’cause one guy was a pilot.

As if the universe was asking for me to get in a fight, I walked to the Magical Express (the Disney bus you take from the airport) with this couple. The guy said, “I hope we don’t run into any jerk runners this weekend.”

Now, marathoners sometimes get a bad rap, though almost every marathoner I’ve met has been a lovely, kind, supportive runner – not a malicious braggart or anything like that, as they are sometimes labeled.

But, I understand that marathoners have a reputation that precedes them in some people’s eyes. I said something along the lines of “I’m sure they’ll be plenty of great people there. But when you get tens of thousands of any kinds of people together, there are bound to be some jerks.”

And he proceeded to say something along the lines of, “Hopefully they won’t be like the jerk runners from the New York City marathon.”

Excuse me, what?

Now, I know that Cory Booker has tweeted out advice that “we don’t have to attend every argument we’re invited to.” And he’s so right, right? I know he is!

And the ING NYC Marathon is so over at this point. Why would anyone still be talking about it? Why, oh why? Well, somehow we were.

Mickey shaped towels waiting in the room.
Mickey shaped towel waiting in the room.

So many people have made it clear that they think the runners have no business being upset. This guy made arguments such as, “If people knew what was going on in New York, why would they even go?”

‘Cause Michael Bloomberg told them to! (For the record, even though that was a bad public slip up, I still very much respect and support Mayor Bloomberg. I think he does a lot of great stuff and is a smart man.)

Anyway, we don’t need to drag this out forever on this blog. (I’m sure I could rant about it for at least two entire blog posts, but that’s unnecessary.)

I felt bad ’cause I’m sure some people around us on the bus heard us talking about it and thought, “It’s January 2013! Please, oh please, quit talking about this!”

I know the skin on my forehead was begging me to stop! It doesn’t like feeling any stress, ’cause that just makes it all the more stressed about wrinkles. That reminds me, I should slather on a whole bunch of moisturizer before bed. I’m sorry, forehead. I’m sorry Dr. Brandt (who is not my dermatologist, but someday maybe will be).

(And of course, sorry, people on the bus.)

Aaaaannnnyway, I made it to the hotel successfully. I am in Orlando.

[*Head falls to the computer keyboard. Over-dramatic snoring starts.*]

6 thoughts on “Uh, What Was I Gonna Title This?”

  1. Welcome to Orlando! 🙂 I’ll be volunteering at both the Half and the Full…and the Expo on Friday. Are you going to be wearing your signature hat during the races? I’ll try to keep an eye out for you!

  2. How wonderful to meet you on the bus back to CBR from the expo today (we were the cool people you were drawn to!). You have such an amazing story and I cannot wait to read more. Looks like we have been at a few of the same races this year, too bad we didn’t meet sooner in your journey! Wishing you the best of luck at all of your races this weekend and hoping we run into you again!

    1. Nikki, so amazing meeting you and your group today!

      And all of that back at you 🙂 – the good luck to you as well. I also hope to run into you again! And, I just started looking at your blog. What a story you have too. I also can’t wait to read more!

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