Floridiots on the run

Anyone who's run road races on a regular basis and seen the same names weekend after weekend knows the running community is very small indeed.

Tonight, I was struck by just what a small world it is while running with a few new friends at Pacers.

Steve and I headed out in our own pace group (regular blog readers will know that this might be for the best), but ended up running with a nice dude named Pete who claimed to be just as bad at pacing as we are and a girl who wore headphones. I chatted with Pete for a while before realizing we'd both recently moved back to the area. He'd spent time in Colorado (so did we!), and in Florida (no ... freaking ... way!), so we spent a good portion of the run touting the benefits of living in a cultural mecca that has seasons after a few years in the tropics. We talked about how nice it is to be living in what feels like the center of the world these days, and about how crappy it is readjusting to winter weather (though it was a downright balmy 40-odd degrees today ... how quickly we Floridiots forget what real winter weather is like!).

Our headphoned friend got into the conversation near the end of the run. She was relatively new to Pacers, she said, and just moved back to the area.

"Where from?" Pete asked.

"Fort Myers," she said. "How about you?"

A small world indeed.