The past two days were busy ones for the calendar of interesting events.
Yesterday (July 12) was the anniversary of Joseph Smith sanctioning polygamy as well as the anniversary of surgeon general reporting a direct link between lung cancer and smoking. Also, Geraldine Ferraro was announced as the first female VP candidate on July 12 (1984).
Today is embrace your geekness day. I'm pretty sure it's a made up day, but I'll embrace it anyway. I am pretty geeky. I prefer to classify myself as a nerd, though. Somehow, it seems a little nicer/more relatable than geek. Today is also the birth anniversary of Father Flanagan, who founded Boy's Town. That'd be important for a few Omaha folks, I guess. In 1917, a vision of the Virgin Mary appeared to the children of Fatima, Portugal. I have no additional information on that. Sounds weird, though. Why only the children? How many children? Where's Fatima? I'm going to have to do some google research...Also, on this day in 1985, the first LiveAid concert was kicked off by Prince Charles and Princess Diana. remember when they were an item? Life was so simple back then...
Today's spin class was a pace work workout. Generally, spin class does a lot of hill work (fitting for around here) or intervals (also good for training). But today? Pace. Find a pace that's faster than your comfortable riding pace and hold it. For an hour. While we make the resistance harder or easier. While we stand up or sit down. Active recovery involves keeping that faster than normal pace while easing up on the resistance. It was a nice switch from the norm, but I couldn't do it every day.
I'm getting my hair cut today. It's been 10 weeks. I'm ready, even though I'm not COMPLETELY sick of my hair, yet. It'll be nice to get it cleaned up a bit. Scooter's bed is gone!!! Crib gone, bed gone, Bubba LOVING the mattress on the floor thing. But it's a little wild, so we might be looking for beds before this weekend. We'll see how the next few nights go...
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
CSA is for me
Actually, I'm a novice. I constantly have to look up what CSA stands for (Commuity Support Agriculture). That doesn't mean I don't love it, though. Every week, fresh produce gets delivered to my work. When I remember, I pick it up and carry it with me on the train home. When I don't remember, I drive back into work to pick it up and drive back home before 7pm. Either way, my husband salivates as he looks up recipes to use for our bounty.
Cost-wise, it's about the same as what we would normally spend at the grocery. The benefit is organic produce, and a chance to try things that we would never buy on our own: hakurei turnips, chard, joi choi, and mizuna are a few of the things we've tried this year. So far, these new experiences have been overwhelmingly positive. Ben's been geeking out on veggies and their storage, prep, and final resting place (our plates).
Don't get me wrong, though. We have had our share of waste. For example, we didn't eat all of the radishes before they got soft and weird. It's a work in progress. But so far, we are proud CSA shareholders. We've kicked around the idea of doing the family share next year. We signed up for the "individual" share this year, which come each week in a 10 gallon rubbermaid. With the exception of the fresh herbs, which would be wonderful, the problem with the family share is the amount of food. We'd have to eat vegetarian meals for every dinner, and even if Scooter were around, there's no way we'd finish it all. Well...maybe we would. That girl can eat some veggies.
Cost-wise, it's about the same as what we would normally spend at the grocery. The benefit is organic produce, and a chance to try things that we would never buy on our own: hakurei turnips, chard, joi choi, and mizuna are a few of the things we've tried this year. So far, these new experiences have been overwhelmingly positive. Ben's been geeking out on veggies and their storage, prep, and final resting place (our plates).
Don't get me wrong, though. We have had our share of waste. For example, we didn't eat all of the radishes before they got soft and weird. It's a work in progress. But so far, we are proud CSA shareholders. We've kicked around the idea of doing the family share next year. We signed up for the "individual" share this year, which come each week in a 10 gallon rubbermaid. With the exception of the fresh herbs, which would be wonderful, the problem with the family share is the amount of food. We'd have to eat vegetarian meals for every dinner, and even if Scooter were around, there's no way we'd finish it all. Well...maybe we would. That girl can eat some veggies.
Monday, July 11, 2011
that lovin' feeling
I haven't lost it. In fact, I've got it. I've got it bad.
With the exception of the "missing" member of the family, life is about as good as it gets out here. Ben and I were just talking the other day about how content we are. Finally. We're finally in a happy place. Was it a new mattress, coming in to solve all of our problems? Maybe. That new mattress is pretty awesome. In fact, I've been sleeping so soundly, I often wake up wondering what happened to the night.
I'm pretty sure that this contented, happy feeling is a result of moving out here, though. Let me give you a small list of reasons why my life in Oregon is better than my life in Nebraska:
1. No airconditioning. On first glance, this might be met with horror. Until you realize that if you open the windows in Oregon, the humidity in the house actually drops. Amazing. Wonderful.
2. No road rage. I walk/ride the train for my daily commute. This takes about the same amount of time as my Omaha commute. It just costs 1/3 as much (maybe 1/4 as much with high gas prices), and affords me an extra 2 miles of "exercise" daily. Pretty sweet.
3. BJJ 5 times a week. This is not so much a plus for me as it is for Ben. But it IS kind of a plus for me because in Omaha, if Ben were to do 5 hours of bjj weekly, we wouldn't see him for 10+ hours during the week. Here...he can do 5 sessions of bjj and only miss about 3 hours of family time.
4. Farmers markets. Ok, there was a pretty good farmers market in Omaha. The difference here is that there are 3 within walking distance of either our house or my work throughout the week. And we belong to a CSA that delivers to my work. The one in Omaha was a 20-30 minute drive on Saturday morning, only.
It's not all happy contentedness, however. We miss our moms. We miss our Scooter (for the summer, at least). We miss our Omaha friends. We're still getting settled into the new apartment. But you know what? Neither Ben nor I have taken any allergy medication this year. Unheard of in Omaha. I ride my bike to the gym. Not unheard of, but definitely dangerous and/or time consuming. All in all, I'm probably the happiest I've been since Scooter was born. And I'm alright with that.
With the exception of the "missing" member of the family, life is about as good as it gets out here. Ben and I were just talking the other day about how content we are. Finally. We're finally in a happy place. Was it a new mattress, coming in to solve all of our problems? Maybe. That new mattress is pretty awesome. In fact, I've been sleeping so soundly, I often wake up wondering what happened to the night.
I'm pretty sure that this contented, happy feeling is a result of moving out here, though. Let me give you a small list of reasons why my life in Oregon is better than my life in Nebraska:
1. No airconditioning. On first glance, this might be met with horror. Until you realize that if you open the windows in Oregon, the humidity in the house actually drops. Amazing. Wonderful.
2. No road rage. I walk/ride the train for my daily commute. This takes about the same amount of time as my Omaha commute. It just costs 1/3 as much (maybe 1/4 as much with high gas prices), and affords me an extra 2 miles of "exercise" daily. Pretty sweet.
3. BJJ 5 times a week. This is not so much a plus for me as it is for Ben. But it IS kind of a plus for me because in Omaha, if Ben were to do 5 hours of bjj weekly, we wouldn't see him for 10+ hours during the week. Here...he can do 5 sessions of bjj and only miss about 3 hours of family time.
4. Farmers markets. Ok, there was a pretty good farmers market in Omaha. The difference here is that there are 3 within walking distance of either our house or my work throughout the week. And we belong to a CSA that delivers to my work. The one in Omaha was a 20-30 minute drive on Saturday morning, only.
It's not all happy contentedness, however. We miss our moms. We miss our Scooter (for the summer, at least). We miss our Omaha friends. We're still getting settled into the new apartment. But you know what? Neither Ben nor I have taken any allergy medication this year. Unheard of in Omaha. I ride my bike to the gym. Not unheard of, but definitely dangerous and/or time consuming. All in all, I'm probably the happiest I've been since Scooter was born. And I'm alright with that.
** EDITS** Zippers
**I added a link to my 2007 race results because I had erroneously stated previously that I had finished in just over 3 hours. It was actually just over 2. I guess it just felt like 3...
I get an email at work every month laying out notable tidbits about each day. The first Quaker immigrants landed in Massachusetts today, for example. They were later deported. Also, Dr. H. Harlan Stone used zippers rather than stitches on 28 patients today, thinking that would be better in case there were complications from the original operations - just unzip and go to work, right?! Hm...sounds like a pretty horrific idea if you ask me. And it kind of was. They don't do that, anymore.
I signed up for an offroad triathlon today. Mark your calendars, folks. July 30th, I'll be swimming, biking and running my way to exhaustion. I'll be 1/2 way there on the drive down, I'm sure. It's in Newport, so I'm fairly certain we'll have to go down the night before. Either that, or get up super early for the 9am start. I'm sure there'll be a pre-race briefing I'll have to go to as well. It's been a while since my last tri. I'm kind of excited. I'm also kind of scared and wondering why I signed up. The last one of these I did was a little longer (1000m swim, 20k bike, 5k run), and it took me 2 hours (I know, I know...). This one is 800m swim, 12k bike and 5k run. Last year's slowest person finished in 2:30. Yipes. You might be reading a blog post from the 2011 slowest racer from the Olalla Lake off-road tri. Congratulations! I'll keep you updated.
In prep, I've hopped back into the spin class routine. Today was my first day in over a month. I did a mini-backward-tri yesterday (run, bike, swim), and after spin this morning, my thighs were so tired/sore that my knees ache. Ugh. That's not a good feeling. I biked to the gym this morning. We only moved about 2 blocks away from our first apartment here, but for some reason, it has added about 9 minutes to the walk to the gym. Biking eliminates that. Next step is to figure out how to bike to work.
And last but not least, 10 weeks after getting my hair cut short, I'm going in for a trim up on Wednesday. So excited. Mostly b/c this haircut has lasted so long. I'm generally dissatisfied by week 4, and getting it cut by week 6. I just this weekend decided that I'm sick of my hair and ready for a trim. It's time to grow it out, so we'll see how creative my new hair guy can be...
I get an email at work every month laying out notable tidbits about each day. The first Quaker immigrants landed in Massachusetts today, for example. They were later deported. Also, Dr. H. Harlan Stone used zippers rather than stitches on 28 patients today, thinking that would be better in case there were complications from the original operations - just unzip and go to work, right?! Hm...sounds like a pretty horrific idea if you ask me. And it kind of was. They don't do that, anymore.
I signed up for an offroad triathlon today. Mark your calendars, folks. July 30th, I'll be swimming, biking and running my way to exhaustion. I'll be 1/2 way there on the drive down, I'm sure. It's in Newport, so I'm fairly certain we'll have to go down the night before. Either that, or get up super early for the 9am start. I'm sure there'll be a pre-race briefing I'll have to go to as well. It's been a while since my last tri. I'm kind of excited. I'm also kind of scared and wondering why I signed up. The last one of these I did was a little longer (1000m swim, 20k bike, 5k run), and it took me 2 hours (I know, I know...). This one is 800m swim, 12k bike and 5k run. Last year's slowest person finished in 2:30. Yipes. You might be reading a blog post from the 2011 slowest racer from the Olalla Lake off-road tri. Congratulations! I'll keep you updated.
In prep, I've hopped back into the spin class routine. Today was my first day in over a month. I did a mini-backward-tri yesterday (run, bike, swim), and after spin this morning, my thighs were so tired/sore that my knees ache. Ugh. That's not a good feeling. I biked to the gym this morning. We only moved about 2 blocks away from our first apartment here, but for some reason, it has added about 9 minutes to the walk to the gym. Biking eliminates that. Next step is to figure out how to bike to work.
And last but not least, 10 weeks after getting my hair cut short, I'm going in for a trim up on Wednesday. So excited. Mostly b/c this haircut has lasted so long. I'm generally dissatisfied by week 4, and getting it cut by week 6. I just this weekend decided that I'm sick of my hair and ready for a trim. It's time to grow it out, so we'll see how creative my new hair guy can be...
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Flakes
Well...we're all moved into our new apartment. Kind of. We call it home, and Bubba corrects us that it's not home; it's our new apartment. There's still boxes everywhere and junk piled up on every surface, but it's not from lack of trying. We've been slowly (but surely) emptying our 10x10x10 storage unit into our living room (and bedrooms and office and...). We're almost there.
We've decided to sell (or donate) all of our garage-type stuff that would have to be stored in a storage unit. We priced out those things, and at $65 a month (minimum - for the smallest one), we could replace all of the stuff IN the unit w/in a year for the cost of storing it. Bummer. After this move, though, I'm not in any hurry to do it again next May. We should probably go ahead and sign on for another year now, before they jack up rent on us.
We've also put up half of our belongings on craigs list. Actually, just the big items that we want to get rid of: Scooter's bed, Bubba's crib, etc. We've had 4 or 5 people "extremely interested" in the crib, arranged times for them to look at it, only to have them completely not show up. But I'm hopeful that the crib and the bed will be gone by Monday.
We've been busy unpacking boxes and hanging up pictures. It's almost like a real home, now. All that's left (besides about 15 more boxes and a TON of organizing) is Scooter. Once she's back here (in 7 more weeks), this really will feel like home.
We've decided to sell (or donate) all of our garage-type stuff that would have to be stored in a storage unit. We priced out those things, and at $65 a month (minimum - for the smallest one), we could replace all of the stuff IN the unit w/in a year for the cost of storing it. Bummer. After this move, though, I'm not in any hurry to do it again next May. We should probably go ahead and sign on for another year now, before they jack up rent on us.
We've also put up half of our belongings on craigs list. Actually, just the big items that we want to get rid of: Scooter's bed, Bubba's crib, etc. We've had 4 or 5 people "extremely interested" in the crib, arranged times for them to look at it, only to have them completely not show up. But I'm hopeful that the crib and the bed will be gone by Monday.
We've been busy unpacking boxes and hanging up pictures. It's almost like a real home, now. All that's left (besides about 15 more boxes and a TON of organizing) is Scooter. Once she's back here (in 7 more weeks), this really will feel like home.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Do you ever get that feeling...
I wrote this in June (June 13th, I think)...I'll post it today, but it's all out of date. Hopefully, I'll have more later today or this weekend. I need to get back into the writing of things.
I'm pretty accustomed to juggling several balls at once. I used to be a single mom. Sure, I'm a little out of practice, now that I have an incredibly helpful husband who also works, but somehow finds time to take the kids to the park every day, the library once a week, and swim lessons twice a week. But for some reason, I'm completely overwhelmed right now.
I'm overwhelmed to the point of inactivity. I have so much to do that I can't do one thing. I know it's not just me. I have a co-worker that was discussing this same phenomenon with me last week. At work, we're both so swamped that we've kind of just shut down. It has now crossed over into my "home" life, as well. At work (if you care), I've got 3 "high" priority priorities in addition to 4 "high" priorities that I've kind of put off. The 3 super-high (I'll call them) priorities are due by the end of June, except I'm going to be gone next week, so I basically need to have them done this week by Thursday. The other 4 are probably expected to be done by the end of June, too, but they're not going to be complete. At home, we're moving, getting ready for vacation, and trying to juggle after school activities (including homework) and playdates.
Yesterday, Ben's aunt and uncle and 2 of his cousins were kind enough to come up and help us move. Their help was MUCH appreciated (and needed). We're basically out of the old place, but now we've got to clean it. Ugh. And the new place is a total pit. I think it'll all fit, eventually, but it'll be pretty disorganized and awful until after we get back from vacation. We worked all day yesterday (with a couple of hours break for a playdate with one of Scooter's friends from school). By bedtime, I was walking in circles trying to decide what to tackle next. I did manage to get some shirts in a drawer, but that's about it. The story of my life, lately.
My sister nearly cut her thumb off last week. Surgery is today. I'm going to call her later, to see how it went. Her husband is out of the country, and apparently, a volcanic eruption has grounded his flight back. Additionally, my mother in law is having retina problems. Luckily, she's clear to fly to our vacation destination. The downside is that she can't carry anything (including her grandson). Hopefully, we can place him in her lap w/o too much stress on her.
Unfortunately, Scooter will not be coming back to Portland from our trip: she'll spend the rest of the summer at her dad's. It has kind of put a damper on the whole vacation for me. I'm really looking forward to some quality time with her before she goes, though. I'm glad we'll have next week w/o work OR home to distract us.
I'm pretty accustomed to juggling several balls at once. I used to be a single mom. Sure, I'm a little out of practice, now that I have an incredibly helpful husband who also works, but somehow finds time to take the kids to the park every day, the library once a week, and swim lessons twice a week. But for some reason, I'm completely overwhelmed right now.
I'm overwhelmed to the point of inactivity. I have so much to do that I can't do one thing. I know it's not just me. I have a co-worker that was discussing this same phenomenon with me last week. At work, we're both so swamped that we've kind of just shut down. It has now crossed over into my "home" life, as well. At work (if you care), I've got 3 "high" priority priorities in addition to 4 "high" priorities that I've kind of put off. The 3 super-high (I'll call them) priorities are due by the end of June, except I'm going to be gone next week, so I basically need to have them done this week by Thursday. The other 4 are probably expected to be done by the end of June, too, but they're not going to be complete. At home, we're moving, getting ready for vacation, and trying to juggle after school activities (including homework) and playdates.
Yesterday, Ben's aunt and uncle and 2 of his cousins were kind enough to come up and help us move. Their help was MUCH appreciated (and needed). We're basically out of the old place, but now we've got to clean it. Ugh. And the new place is a total pit. I think it'll all fit, eventually, but it'll be pretty disorganized and awful until after we get back from vacation. We worked all day yesterday (with a couple of hours break for a playdate with one of Scooter's friends from school). By bedtime, I was walking in circles trying to decide what to tackle next. I did manage to get some shirts in a drawer, but that's about it. The story of my life, lately.
My sister nearly cut her thumb off last week. Surgery is today. I'm going to call her later, to see how it went. Her husband is out of the country, and apparently, a volcanic eruption has grounded his flight back. Additionally, my mother in law is having retina problems. Luckily, she's clear to fly to our vacation destination. The downside is that she can't carry anything (including her grandson). Hopefully, we can place him in her lap w/o too much stress on her.
Unfortunately, Scooter will not be coming back to Portland from our trip: she'll spend the rest of the summer at her dad's. It has kind of put a damper on the whole vacation for me. I'm really looking forward to some quality time with her before she goes, though. I'm glad we'll have next week w/o work OR home to distract us.
Friday, June 3, 2011
Full steam ahead!
So...as you may have guessed, I'm hardly "in Hell" anymore. As such, it's no longer a huge effort to keep going. In fact, things are going so fast, I can't keep up.
1. Scooter's here!!! She's in school. She thinks it's harder than her school in Omaha was, but she loves it. Her new favorite (which is weird, since it was her least favorite in Omaha) is gym class. They have a great teacher who does really creative and fun things. She has, at a minimum, 20 minutes of homework each night. Usually, it's closer to an hour. 20 minutes reading, always, and most days math and some sort of language arts work as well. It's tough.
2. My dad WAS here!! We took him to the coast for the weekend, where we tried to kill him. Just kidding (am I?). We took him on multiple short hikes and walks on beaches as well as a bike ride and a climb up a wobbly spiral staircase to the top of the Astoria Column. If the exertion didn't get him, the giant pot of clam chowder topped with a 1/4 cup of butter might have done the trick. It didn't. We were sad to see him go on Wednesday, off to Wisconsin and their cheese and beer. I hope he makes it back to Hawaii in one piece.
3. The sun is shining (at last), and the cherry trees that were in bloom along the streets near my work are now dropping cherries instead of flower petals on my head as I walk at lunch.
4. Pennies are still everywhere. Yesterday, though, I found a dollar bill while walking with my daughter. I found 2 pennies when we were downtown on Monday with Scooter and Dad. I'm beginning to think that Scooter is good luck. I'm also finding more and more articles of clothing laying around on my walks. Today, I found a sock, a jacket, a shirt, and maybe a pair of underpants. I'm wondering if I should start collecting clothes to wash and sell on craig's list or something. Maybe not the underpants...
5. Work is crushing me. There's just so much to do, and you wouldn't believe how much I've learned in even the last 4 months. But the volume and complexity of what we're working with here is amazing. Everytime I learn something new, I want to call up my old employer, and offer my services for re-doing all of their horrible reports. That, and apologize for writing all of those horrible reports...oops.
6. We're about to move into a larger apartment. That, and everything surrounding it, has also kept us busy. Hopefully, sometime in July, things will settle in again, as we wait for Scooter to return from Omaha. I've got a triathlon (sprint distance) scheduled for July 30th, so I'll need things to settle in order to focus more on my training. After that, it's a long, slow month until Scooter gets back, school starts up again, and we start this boat back up again.
1. Scooter's here!!! She's in school. She thinks it's harder than her school in Omaha was, but she loves it. Her new favorite (which is weird, since it was her least favorite in Omaha) is gym class. They have a great teacher who does really creative and fun things. She has, at a minimum, 20 minutes of homework each night. Usually, it's closer to an hour. 20 minutes reading, always, and most days math and some sort of language arts work as well. It's tough.
2. My dad WAS here!! We took him to the coast for the weekend, where we tried to kill him. Just kidding (am I?). We took him on multiple short hikes and walks on beaches as well as a bike ride and a climb up a wobbly spiral staircase to the top of the Astoria Column. If the exertion didn't get him, the giant pot of clam chowder topped with a 1/4 cup of butter might have done the trick. It didn't. We were sad to see him go on Wednesday, off to Wisconsin and their cheese and beer. I hope he makes it back to Hawaii in one piece.
3. The sun is shining (at last), and the cherry trees that were in bloom along the streets near my work are now dropping cherries instead of flower petals on my head as I walk at lunch.
4. Pennies are still everywhere. Yesterday, though, I found a dollar bill while walking with my daughter. I found 2 pennies when we were downtown on Monday with Scooter and Dad. I'm beginning to think that Scooter is good luck. I'm also finding more and more articles of clothing laying around on my walks. Today, I found a sock, a jacket, a shirt, and maybe a pair of underpants. I'm wondering if I should start collecting clothes to wash and sell on craig's list or something. Maybe not the underpants...
5. Work is crushing me. There's just so much to do, and you wouldn't believe how much I've learned in even the last 4 months. But the volume and complexity of what we're working with here is amazing. Everytime I learn something new, I want to call up my old employer, and offer my services for re-doing all of their horrible reports. That, and apologize for writing all of those horrible reports...oops.
6. We're about to move into a larger apartment. That, and everything surrounding it, has also kept us busy. Hopefully, sometime in July, things will settle in again, as we wait for Scooter to return from Omaha. I've got a triathlon (sprint distance) scheduled for July 30th, so I'll need things to settle in order to focus more on my training. After that, it's a long, slow month until Scooter gets back, school starts up again, and we start this boat back up again.
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