A dollar donation or not?

Surely I am not the only person who gets annoyed when I am solicited for donations - usually towards a very deserving cause - at the grocery store check-out counter.  This usually happens at my local Randall's, which is owned by Safeway.  Same story last week:  "Do you want to donate one dollar for birth-date cancer?" Birth-date cancer?  Never heard of that one before, must be something you get when you turn 90 or a 100, after many many birth dates have gone by... Of course I had mis-heard.  The checkout person was actually soliciting for 'pros-tate' cancer, a much more familiar version of the dread disease.  Birth-date, prostate, it makes no difference.  The answer is still - no.  Not because of what, but because of where and when.

There's a time and a place for everything, and I very much object to being asked to donate anything to whatever cause, while I am shopping.   It is a bit embarrassing to say 'no thank you, not today', or to make some other miserable excuse, not to give a measly one dollar to a very good cause, whether it is cancer, juvenile diabetes, MS or whatever.  After all, you are in line with people you may know - from your neighborhood - and you've just spent nearly $20 on a bottle of wine,  almost $5 for a small bottle of herbs (which is criminal!) and the equivalent of what you used to pay for meat, for some organic veggies.  And that is exactly why I find gratuitous solicitations like these to be most unwelcome.  I am not at Randall's to make donations.  I am there to shop.  Don't abuse my patronage just because I present a nice captive audience.  Remember I can always decide to go to HEB or to Rice Epicurean or Kroger or even Whole Foods. Hmmm.  Scratch the last one - I was solicited for some green cause in the checkout line at WF not too long ago...

As for running, nothing happening on that front as I am still injured from the overly vigorous Crossfit session of last Wednesday.  Should be ok to do a short run this afternoon, definitely tomorrow.  Kathleen did very well this morning at the Heights 5K Fun Run, placing 2nd in her age group, with her second sub-24 minute effort!  I was very much looking forward to running on fresh legs but alas it was not to be.   I was happy to finally meet a fellow blogger - Nuke Runner - who had a superb run, finishing well under 19 minutes and placing in his age group.  Congratulations!