Am I a Race T Shirt Bully?

The other night at church, my bride told me she saw several people wearing the 2012 St Jude Marathon race shirt while she was walking the halls. For some reason, I always think that there is some kindred bond that we have when I see someone wearing a shirt of a race that we ran together. A marathon shirt none the less is extra special, because I know the time, effort and pain that can go into a marathon.

So my question to my bride was "who was it? Did you know him?" She then proceeded to name a few guys I knew that ran the race, but then she said this, and I am going to paraphrase. There was one guy I asked about it and he said that he did not run the race, his dad works for the race and he got a lot of free shirts. Automatically, I immediately turn into these guys:



Yes, I turn into Cedric and Bob when I see some wearing a race shirt they did not run (unless it is a spouse, they put up with the other spouse training, so they get a pass) or if I see someone wearing the race shirt prior to finishing the race. Call me superstitious if you want, but you won't catch me in that position!

So, as we were leaving church the guy was walking out right in front of us. My bride nudged me and said "That's the guy, that's the guy who is wearing the shirt who did not run the race!" So I wanted to walk up to him and say in my best Hispanic accent:

 So, are you the guy who is wearing the shirt without running the race?  Are you going to run the race in order to wear the shirt? I wear the shirt and I ran the race. He ran the race and he is wearing the shirt, we are all wearing the shirts and we all ran the race, so why aren't you going to run the race? I guess we are just going to have to teach him to run the race if he wants to wear the shirt!

But, I didn't. I mean, Yeah, it does bug me to see people wearing race shirts they did not run, or to see people wearing the race shirt before they actually finish the race, but it is a personal hang up of mine. My bride gets on to me because I will not donate race shirts to the needy because they did not run the race and earn the shirts! Maybe this is something I will back off of one day, and maybe I am just kidding about all this!(Not really)  Honestly, I am getting so many that I try to give them to my wife to wear, because let's be real, after about 4-5 years of racing, most shirts do not mean as much to me, and I only wear certain ones. I do like to start up a conversation with people if I see they have the same shirt on though!

So, what is your stand on race shirts and people wearing them before a race or wearing them when they did not run the race? Are you a race t-shirt bully like me?

Let's define the term...

Tonight I am in Nashville, TN on a work trip. So yesterday I went to my local Enterprise Auto Rental shop to reserve a mid size car. My company prefers we do it this way because of the expense it saves. So I get there and reserve a mid size vehicle to be picked up on Tuesday between 8:30 and 9:00. Not a big deal right? (Oh one note to add, the guy wrote my reservation number on the back of his card and said I could use this number if I forgot my last name! Thanks but I know my name genius! Idiot!)

So I arrive around 9:00 to pick up my reservation, but they tell me they are out of cars and offer me a truck, which I politely declined. When I say politely, you do not know how hard it was, cause I knew they were going to do this because they always do this. I explain to them that I reserved a car yesterday and I have a card with that reservation number on the back in case I forgot my name! DUHHHHHH!

SO they get on the phones to hunt me down a car. Finally they find me one, at the oil changing place. So we get in the car and they drive me over to Firestone to pick up the car. While we drove over there, the Enterprise guy tells me their reservation system is not good. he says that all it does is pre-loads my information but does not assign me a car. I told him that this defeats the whole purpose of a reservation and he agrees with me. It so reminds me of that Seinfeld episode.

So we stand in from to of the garage as we do the walk-around and I sign the paperwork. I thought Enterprise would pick you up from the garage, not take you there to pick up your car. Needless to say, I am not happy with them. I wish there was another agency as close as them I could use.