Lesson #6: Don’t fight with someone until you verify with your wife that his wife isn’t a professor in her department.

I am emergently typing this blog, because my wife is telling her side of the story on her blog, and I’m sure there are some problems with her version.  So here’s the true version of a very unfortunate situation Friday night last. 

I am a runner.  I bike because it is 1/3 of a triathlon.  That is the only reason.  So for the last 10 years, I have run around Lake Phalen 6-7 days a week.  It takes me 35-36min depending on the day.  It is 4.37 miles.  I can run around it with a blindfold on.  There are two giant hills on the route.  Both of which I avoid by moving over to the biking path which takes the low road.  I hate hills.  Never, in 10 years, over 3,000 trips around the lake with my running shoes, has anyone pissed me off.  That is, until last Friday when I was running with Jessie around the lake.

18min into the run, Jessie and I approach hill #1 and move onto the biking path.  A couple comes up behind us and says “Passing on your left x 2,” and we move over.  They fly by.  Somewhat of an unusual sight around Lake Phalen, I must say.  The paths are usually full of little chubby kids on Big Wheels, a grown man carrying a monkey in a twins uniform on his shoulder, lots of runners, lots of Hmong families walking 4 abreast, but rarely a professional biker.  

24min into the run, hill #2 arrives, and we move to the biking trail with the other 50 people walking on the biking trail.  In my rear-view ear, I hear “On your lefffffffffffft.”  No need to move over, as we are already single file on the right side of the biking path that is 8 ft. wide.  The bikers who passed us on hill #1 passed again, but this time there was an added “This is a bike trail!”  I was not in the best mood, and said, “Hey, if it is such a problem, get on the street where you have a private bike lane painted.”  At the end of the hill, the guy parked his bike in the middle of the path, and clipped out.  Stood there waiting for me to arrive.  Jessie said, “Oh shit” and moved over to the running path.  I continued on the bike path to see what this professional biker wanted to tell me.  He started yelling at me. I yelled back at him and told him to go a lot of different places. I explained to him that there are 2 spots we jump onto the bike path with the other 400 people not on bikes walking around Phalen.  I also told him that the only law on the bike paths is a bike speed limit of 10 mph, which he and his wife were well over.  He asked me a strange question, “Are you a bike?”  I said, “Yes,” and this made him confused I think.  He was in my face, but I didn’t punch him.  Jessie was getting worried across on the walking path and started yelling, “Stop it you guys, lets go.”  I turned and started to walk away with a few more words for the professional biker, and he decided that he was going to pull a move off of page #5 from the 6th graders handbook for girl fights.  He tried to trip me with his bike shoe as I walked away.  Yes, the trip move.  Unsuccessful.  But this really pissed Jessie off, who all of a sudden comes running over and starts calling the guy an as**ol! for “getting physical” as she called it.  He asked her if she could read.  Jessie didn’t reply. 

Then he started to walk towards me again.  His wife, who was standing off her bike up ahead yelled at him to stop.  At that moment, Jessie looked at his wife and realized that it was a professor in her department at the U of M.  Awesome.  We very quickly all realized that this needed to stop, and they rode away and we ran on the running path again.  I think he realized that his question about whether Jessie could read was not appropriate for someone finishing their PhD in literacy education in his wife’s department.  Area of altercation with blood red star in map below.

30min into the run, we see them waiting on the path ahead with their helmets off standing next to their bikes.  They had checkered flags waving as we ran towards them.  We were either going to fight, old-school, or they were apologizing.  I was secretly hoping for the former.  They apologized, made small talk, shook my hand, etc.  I was not impressed, but can be very collegial if I need to be.  And I really needed to be for Jessie’s sake.  All I was thinking the whole time was that it was a good thing he hadn’t successfully tripped me because I would have given Jessie’s professor’s husband a broken nose back there. 

It was their first time riding around Lake Phalen.  I think they realized that it isn’t a spot to go on a Friday night for a smooth bike ride on the path if you want to go fast like real professionals do.  Maybe this will be their last trip around Lake Phalen.  He told me he didn’t want to be one of those guys that “gives bikers a bad name.”  It was the first time they had been bike riding as they got their bikes the day before from the store.  I’d say that’s a bad way to start out your professional bike-riding career if you don’t want to be “one of those bikers.” 

My lesson…Never get into a fight with someone until you verify with your wife that the guy is not the husband of one of her professors.  Sub lesson: this guy is a major as**ol!  Sub-sub lesson: I have good restraint because every person I’ve told this story to would have punched the guy after the 6th grader trip move.  Last lesson: don’t fight while exercising, it is stupid and throws off your pace.