Jogging Mystery Revisited

Welcome back. A very unusual incident occurred while I was jogging last week. Yes, I still venture out to jog between about 0330 and 0400 (a.k.a. 3:30 AM and 4:00 AM). As I yield to age and infirmity, however, my predawn jogging is increasingly predawn jogging-walking-jogging-walking-etc. Nevertheless, the very unusual incident occurred while I was indeed jogging.

Earlier Events
I don’t wish to mislead you. The incident wasn’t anything like that convergence of strange occurrences I described years ago (Predawn Jogging Mystery), when I lived and jogged on a suburban Northern Virginia neighborhood street--the powerful whoosh I heard behind me in the darkness; the helicopter flying patterns overhead, once with a downward pointing searchlight; the fire and rescue vehicles, staffed by men twice my EMT-wife’s size, who sounded a horn after I passed.

Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps the men in fire and rescue garb were not members of a special government organization. Perhaps I should not have cautioned my blog readers that those seemingly innocuous occurrences could be--I didn’t say were--the government’s attempts to conceal an invasion of extraterrestrial aliens. No doubt my warning would have been taken more seriously if our country was then being led by our current president.

Wisconsin Predawn Jogging
Living and jogging in rural Wisconsin, I find predawns are darker. There are only a handful of residences spaced over roughly a third of my route. The occupants have no idea of my predawn proclivities and thus no thought to brightening my path. The remainder of my route is along a country highway.

Instead of near-daily predawn encounters with the Virginia neighborhood’s deer, fox, skunk or rabbit (see Time to Exercise and Exercise Update), sightings here have been rare and often anonymous.

There was a week of chatting with a persistent raccoon that kept raiding my father-in-law’s stash of birdseed until stronger lid ties were in place.

How the large-cat-size, corn-eating
blobs appeared in predawn light.

And one morning, I had to stop suddenly to avoid a cluster of large-cat-size blobs in the darkness. Having noticed corn on the road during my previous afternoon’s walk, I assumed the blobs were feasting animals, probably groundhogs, too engrossed to notice my unstealthy approach.

One other morning, when jogging past the church, I spied something cat-size on the side of the road. The location was too dark for a true identity, but as I passed, the something rushed toward me as an attacking dog might with no growl or bark. I ran faster and didn’t look back, choosing to play it safe. No cat has ever approached me like that.

Daytime view of site of predawn
attack by unidentified something.

The Very Unusual Incident

Daytime view of site of very unusual
predawn jogging incident.

Getting back to the very unusual incident, I was jogging effortlessly on a down-sloping grade and had just passed the site of my earlier encounter with the corn-eating blobs. The unlit house ahead on my right was coming into view in what there was of moonlight, and the road was clear.

I lifted my right foot and something struck my heel!

The blow was hard enough for me to test how fast I could run. Knowing better than to look back while running forward, I was too far away to see more than a dark cat-size blob when I finally slowed down.

Wrap Up
Was it a cat? Was it the same something that attacked me by the church a half mile away? Were those corn-eating blobs really groundhogs? Was the very unusual incident an attempt to contact me? Has whatever I witnessed--well, never really witnessed--in Virginia reached Wisconsin? I’m listening for helicopters.

Am I the only one having such encounters? You’ll let me know, won’t you? Thanks for stopping by.