Social networking on the run: How I learned to untangle hair and what grape soda smells like

I've been a social networker (blog, Facebook, Twitter) for about a year now and like most people, my virtual "friends" have stayed just that: "virtual."

I know about your lives, and you know about my life, through words on a page, 140-character tweets, or updates on Facebook. Most of my virtual buddies live in states like New York and California, with a smattering in Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, the Carolinas, D.C., Oklahoma, Oregon, Canada and Texas. So, you never expect to come into contact with any of them.

But this week, I've had the pleasure in meeting/phone conversation with two of my blogging buddies .

First, on Monday, Rachel from Single Mom Seeking, and I finally connected over the phone. Rachel blogs about what its like to be a single mother and no topic _ mommyhood, dating, sex _ is off limits. Rachel is half Jewish, half Irish Catholic, which makes her daughter half black, half jewish, and half Irish Catholic. My kid is also interracial, so Rachel and I sometimes talk/blog about what we do with our kids' hair. (Those kids dont have a problem with hair. I'm the one who has a hair problem.)

Rachel is also an accomplished writer, having published a book that is the same title of her blog. And that's why we'd been exchanging voicemails. I'm thinking about writing a book and wanted to tell her what a nice book she'd written. Of all the blogs I read, Rachel probably as the biggest following. Makes me feel all important when she makes little notes in the comment section of my blog.

Somehow, in a post about vibrators and privacy settings on Facebook, Rachel worked in a line on her blog about how our phone conversation went.

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On Friday morning, I actually met up with a blogger friend in person (I guess if you meet someone, it is in person, right?) Anyway, I had blogged on Thursday about how often I get lost when I run the trails around Austin's Town Lake. Sadie, a 3:37 marathoner who lives in Austin, read my blog and fired off an email that began, "Ok...no more getting lost."

Turns out, Sadie was running a slow five miler Friday and volunteered to run with me and "show me around" the Lake. We met at 6 a.m. Friday morning, and though it was dark, I learned the tricks of the trail (there is a place in the run where it smells like Grape soda - that's what Sadie said and, yeah, I did smell some grapey-ness among the blossoms. Come to think of it, I now want to run back to that spot and order a nice bottle of wine) and I saw that there were some maps which showed you where the heck you were running. It was about 38 degrees and Sadie was even nice enough to loan me a pair of gloves.

Sadie is fast, I mean sick fast. She ran this most recent Austin Marathon and even though she treated it like a training run, she popped a 3:38. And the run culminated a week in which she would ran 70 miles. SHE DIDNT EVEN TAPER!!!!!! I've got a marathon a week from Saturday and I'm already shutting my legs down, hoping they do me right at the Cowtown Marathon. Sadie, you are strong!!

Sadie also blogged about our meeting.

Rachel and Sadie were not the first bloggers I've met/contacted. Susan, a cool runner-videographer; Ryan the crazy ultrarunner; Derek the crazy ultrarunner; Brian (sorry about the knee surgery, dude) and Richie have also had the (dis?)pleasure of meeting me.

Who's next?

What I missed about running

I got the okay from my doctor's nurse Tuesday to go ahead and run again. She told me to take it slow so I won't reinjure my right leg, but if you are a runner and you are reading this, you know that telling a runner to take it slow is like telling a TV weatherman to get it right. It's impossible.
I haven't run since March 8 and while out, I thought about a lot of things I miss not being able to run:
*Downloading my run from my Garmin 305 forerunner to Sport Tracks. I am a geek about the science of running, my heart rate, my pace, how long I spent in a certain zone. I've spent as many hours staring at my computer analyzing a run as I have spent stretching before a run.
*Eating what I want without guilt. No surprises here, though the desire to run faster makes me eat as nutritiously as possible.
*Soreness after a long run: My body talks to me when I know I've had a nice long run, or put together two or three good workouts in a row. My quads ache a little. My left knee gets a little stiff. The blister on my right big toe stings a little.
*The taste of my post-workout shake: Usually after a run lasting at least an hour, I drink a big bottle of Gatorade or Endurox. It's more sugar in one setting than I'll probably have at any other time during the day. But it's yummy, and, according to all of the sports scientists, well-needed.
*Getting my 2nd wind: It takes about 10 minutes for my lungs and the rest of my systems to get all warmed up during a run. But when I'm ready, some days I feel like I'm floating.
*Familiar faces: I do most of my runs around 7 am on the Trinity Trails in Fort Worth. I always see the same faces at the same point in my run. It's like clock-work.
The man on a bicycle.
The really old man _ gotta be at least in his 70s _ walking in the cold, wearing a suit coat to protect him from the elements, his face sun-burned, his gray hair covered by a worn wool hat.
The hispanic woman jogging. It always seems like when I'm done, she is just getting started.
The Tuesday morning running group from Luke's Locker led by Noreen.
*Saturday long runs: I missed these the most. Saturdays on the Trinity Trail is like, man, like a religion for me. I park my car. I stretch. And before my eyes is like this symphony of activity. The shuffling of feet. The vroom of cars going down Riverfront Drive. Runners in groups talking to each other. The crazy guy named Loy.
Even though I rarely speak to anyone, these people are like family, this atmosphere is like my own Norman Rockwell painting. You got elites and 12-minute milers sharing the crushed limestone and the paved sidewalks that make up the Trinity Trails. It's spiritual man. Just spiritual.

Client 9 once wore Bib No. X887

Late in 2006, before he was the New York Governor or the now infamous Client 9, Eliot Spitzer was the New York State Attorney General, and who would have thunk it: A runner.
The astute editors at Runner's World combed through their archives and found an interview they did with Spitzer in their monthly “I'm a Runner” feature.
In the interview, Spitzer said he runs two or three miles five times a week and listens to Springsteen or Dire Straits on his Ipod. In 2006, he was running for governor, which made for many long days. “My wife doesn't mind when I slip out at 5 a.m. She just asks that I don't turn on the lights,” Spitzer told Runner's World's Toby Tanser.
And get this, Spitzer ran a marathon, the New York City Marathon, in 1983. His time was 3:58:43. He wore Bib No. X887.
Here is the Runner's World interview with Spitzer, which was published in December 2006.
This picture of Spitzer is courtesy of Flickr. He is running the Utica Boilermaker 5K last July. He finished in 26:15, an 8:27 minute/mile pace.