One of my favorite running events in the Roanoke Valley is the Jingle Bell Run for Arthritis... I have helped emcee it for the past 8 or 9 years… at least as far back as I can remember (I’ve been at WSLS for more than 11 years) - I was looking over my calendar today and realized the first planning meeting is Monday… so many people come together to work so hard on different community events - and those plans take time to carry out…
Well…I couldn’t help but think of my most embarrassing Jingle Bell Run memories… I think it was my first year… it was cold… someone gave me the starter gun and I was supposed to wait for Barry Brewer with the Star City Striders to tell me when to start the race… there I was looking at hundreds of serious hard core runners in the front of the pack… (I wasn’t at all familiar with running or races)... some of them started getting a little restless and a few of them shouted let’s start this thing already… that made me a little nervous and so I yelled okay… 1-2-3 and started the race… then when Barry found me and explained that the clock needed to be ready to start so they could time everyone… I felt a wave of panic wash over me… fortunately the runner who finished first had started his watch so they could get the clock set to time everyone correctly… it was a near miss and I thought they probably wouldn’t ask me to help out ever again… but they did and it has been my pleasure to be a part of the event ever since… I hope I don’t make Barry nervous anymore…
Posted by Karen McNew at 10:02 PM. Filed under: mcnews blog •
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