We turned right at the light and went through some shady neighborhoods before running through Silver Lake and then into Hollywood. Man, nobody outside of the LA area ever knows how dirty Hollywood really and truly is. The sign is about the only clean thing about this town.
Having weaved through the denizens and tourists of Hollywood, we continued through West Hollywood and down Sunset Blvd towards Beverly Hills. When we hit the intersection of Sunset and La Cienega, the Heavens opened up and within 2 minutes, our comfortable run through LA became a rain soaked trudge through shallow rivers flowing down sidewalks. Every intersection became a challenge of jumping over fast flowing streams of runoff, while avoiding cars that wouldn't dream of anyone being a pedestrian in rain suited for Noah's Ark. For about 5 of the 22 miles, we ran in this rain. The rest of the run was uncomfortable. We ran down Rodeo Drive to Wilshire Blvd, hit the Wilshire/Santa Monica intersection and turned around. What a run! I'll be ready to smash my original marathon time of 4:08 I logged in the Palos Verdes marathon in 2009. I'm shooting for 3 1/2 hours. Wish me luck.
