It gives you a funny feeling to be running along and have them fly over you and spray you. But I kept on running. And after while I came upon the woman who was directing all this.

She had a balloon way up in the sky on the end of a rope, and was sitting in her car with a radio, talking in the sky with a helicopter. I noticed she had all her car windows rolled up, hot as it was.

She saw me coming and got out of her car as if something important was up. She met me in the road and I thought maybe she wanted directions to somewhere else in the neighborhood. Since I run these streets all the time, I could have helped her for sure.

But instead of that, she had serious advice. She said, “It’s not a good time to be out running, because we’re spraying.”

And I said, “Well, it’s not a good time to be out spraying, because I’m running.” Then I ran on.

We each did our own thing that afternoon, because they kept right on spraying and I kept right on running. And I’m alive to write about it now these many years later.

So I guess no harm was done to me, and certainly not to them.

People who try to tell you what to do may have a balloon and seem official, but think twice before you mind them. Afternoons were made for running.