Bought an MP3 Player

Chris Wilson called me the other day to tell me about an article he had read in a magazine. The article reported on a study of runners who run while listening to music. Apparently, some music makes runners run faster. He is suppose to loan me the magazine and I will do a story on it in my Running Shorts column in the local newspaper. I have been running and racing for nearly 30 years and I have never worn headphones. I know that there are a lot of devices out there and many runners who run with headphones. However, I have seen runners wearing headphones in situations where they should not be and I think they can be outright dangerous. I remember going to the track at 11:30 at night to run and seeing a girl walking on the track all by herself wearing headphones. Or, people running with traffic on the streets. Mariah Reynolds and I were running trails last week and she told me everything I needed to know about what is available. I bought an MP3 player today. I surprized non-technical self and was able to load some music on it. Now, when do I use it? When I'm running trails, I like to know what is going on around me. Also, I fall once in a while and I would surely break it. When running a marathon with a lot of runners, I like to interact with others and sometimes watch for traffic. Then, I think about the upcoming Marathon 2 Marathon on October 16. We will be running along Highway 90 from Alpine to Marathon, Texas. This is a remote area of southwest Texas and from what I can see on Google Earth, there are no buildings or intersections for the entire 26.2 miles. Also, it is a small race and I can see myself out there by alone for a long time; it may get a little boring. Surely, I will wearing the MP3 player for that race. Maybe for the Surfside Beach Marathon in February, also.
In the meantime, I ran 3 miles on the roads in town this evening. With so much traffic now that school is back in session, I certainly did not use it today.