Keep My Head High

I really wasn't planning a blog hiatus, but the past couple of weeks have been crazy busy.  Most of the crazy had to do with our rental house.  I'll go into details about the rental house later.  Right now I just need to catch up.

I'm still dealing with shin splints, however the soreness isn't as bad as it was just a couple of weeks ago.  I've only run once in the past two weeks, twice if we count the Run Fit class at RU last night, but that was not continuous running -- We did circuit training.  I've also  made a discovery that the custom orthotic for my left shoe is most likely a contributor to making my shins splints worse than they needed to be.  I took the orthotic out of my left shoe and replaced it with the original insole that the shoe came with.  Guess what?  I had little to no discomfort in my shin.   At the Run Fit class I was able to SPRINT for the first time since about August, and there's no next day overwhelming soreness or pain. *WHEW* I must add that I still can't do a lot of side to side movements, but when I run it's not side to side -- it's forward.  I like moving forward, and not just with running.

My dad left for for a Mediterranean cruise last week.  I'm not sure of all the ports, but Morocco and the Egyptian Pyramids are on the itinerary.  It's the perfect trip for him.  He's traveling with a group from his church.

The same day my dad left for his cruise was the same day my cousin came up from Ensenada, Baja California - Mexico.  The plan was for her to stay at my dad's house while he was away, but he forgot to leave the keys with us.  My cousin had a lot of business to take care of while she was here and she ended up staying with us until we could have a set of keys sent down from Fremont, CA where my brother lives. It was great catching up with my cousin, but she needed a lot of assistance with looking for particular businesses and agencies.  It's a long story, but her purse was stolen with all of her identifications in it, including her Military ID, California Driver's License, her Mexican residence ID, and so on.  She was planning to stay with us only one or two days until the keys arrived, but it turned into four since a couple of agencies required long waits in line, such as the DMV.  The advantage to my cousin's stay with us is that we were able to catch up on all of the relatives happenings and  incidental gossip in addition to a lot of thought provoking conversations about spirituality.

My cousin is a veterinarian.  It was funny that my cats and dog seemed to know she was an animal person.  My cat, Lumpy, would not leave hear alone at all. 

Computer companion

Since just before the end of September we were dealing with our rental house.  A friend of ours had lived there for over three years, but work was about an hour drive one way.  He decided to move closer to work.  He kept telling us that he was working on cleaning the house and getting it ready for the next renter.  Hubs and I figured all we needed to do was  paint and shampoo the carpets, plus some small repairs and a little yard work.  We were wrong.  So many things were broken or dirty beyond cleaning.  We were shocked.  Our friend hired a cleaning company to help him out, but it was so dirty that even the cleaning company charged him extra... and it was still not up to par when the cleaning company left.  Trash and rotten food were left behind in the driveway.  Some personal items were left behind, even though our friend said he took everything and that other stuff was ours.  In all fairness, we did keep a few things in the garage, but mostly Hubs' drafting equipment, a desk, a dresser, rolled up blueprints, and a few toys from when the kids were little, but that's all. These items were all off to the side and out of the way.   Our friend's kid's photo album, some of his furniture, bird care supplies and clothing items were definitely not ours.  We have a long list of things that were broken and needed to be replaced such as entire closet doors.  We really did not expect this since he rented another house from Hubs folks a few years back and everything was fine.  Our friend was expecting his security deposit back, but the cost of getting everything fixed and cleaned exceeded that dollar amount.  Needless to say, our friend is a bit miffed with us, but mostly with Hubs since they handled the agreement together. I'm not sure what will happen with this relationship, and I hope we can get past this mess.    

Hubs and my son worked at the house every singe day for the past two weeks painting and doing repairs.  My cousin even helped us a few hours hauling trash and cleaning cupboards.  I sanded and varnished the kitchen floor and part of the living room floor.  I also spent time scrubbing various things like greasy drawer pulls in the kitchen, the mold off of the ice and water dispenser on the refrigerator door, and the fireplace that was left full of soot, ashes, and wood.*  Since we didn't rent a dumpster, we put trash in receptacles where ever we could, which meant hauling bags of garbage to our house, my inlaw's house,  my sister-in-law's house, a neighbors house (she offered) and  my dad's house.  New carpet has been installed and everything is beyond ready for the renter, who should have moved in when our friend moved out.

*SIGH* 

 If that weren't enough, someone rear ended the back bumper of Hubs' car while he was idling at a stoplight after a trip to Home Depot, buying items to finish fixing up the rental.  No one was hurt, just the bumper.  Hubs had to laugh because it has been a draining past couple of weeks -- then the car gets bumped.  At some point you just have to laugh because it's so ridiculous.

If there's an upside, sanding and varnishing floors is a really good workout.

Now that we have some momentum going, we need to get back to caring for the house we live in.  I need to sand and refinish parts of the dining room floor where the dog likes to hang out.

My boss turned 60 last week.  She looks amazing for 60.  If you met her you would never guess that she's even close to 60.  There's something to be said about healthy living. Her family arranged a surprise party and had a small gathering.  I was quite touched to be included since I haven't been summoned to the office in several months due to a very stable staff. One of my former co-workers flew in from Texas to be here for the occasion.  It was so good to see her again.  This birthday event was somewhat like a family reunion, even though it was people I have worked with.  I guess it's a good thing when you can consider people you work with as family.   I thought Hubs brought a camera, but he didn't use it.  My boss was given a toga, crown and gold tone asps to wear at her party.  It was great.  I must explain that my boss is notorious for pranks, and you know what they say about payback.  It was awesome.

Good news.  My daughter finally got into San Diego State University.  SDSU was being a bit stingy with admissions, but recently let more students in. SDSU is only a 15 minute drive down the interstate, but it will take much longer just to find parking.

Saturday, October 16, is my daughter's 27th birthday.  Since she has a gig working behind the scenes at a college play on Saturday evening, we'll be taking her out for lunch.  She has plans to spend next  weekend  in Las Vegas to celebrate.
 

1983

2010

There's plenty of blog fodder ruminating in my head, but there's so much that it would quality as the longest blog post ever if I were to write it all down.  Two extremely busy and emotional weeks will fill a head.  I'll spare you all.  Besides, there's too much fodder to even process.  I'm exhausted.

Song from 9/29/2010:
It Happens - Sugarland

PEACE


*My cousin kept calling me "Cinderella."

Symphony No. 6 in F Major, Op 86 "Pastoral"

Lately, I sit at the computer thinking I should blog about something, but it's just not happening. It's the same old thing. I have plenty on my mind, but the words aren't formulating. It's sort of like I'm stuck. I'm sure this has to do with not being able to run, and my mind really hasn't shifted gears. No running = no blogging.

Since I'm busy not running, I've been taking a lot more pictures, gardening, and have been taking pictures of gardening. Honestly, I'd rather be running, but I can get really aggressive when it comes to digging and pick axing the huge plot of soil that occupies a good portion of our backyard. I've also become acquainted with a family of Blue Jays that have declared our backyard their territory. My dog isn't too thrilled about this occupation.

"She's up there. Maybe if I bark long enough they'll all go away?"

They're not going anywhere. This one is quite good at taunting the dog.

As part of a homework project and in leu of Earth Day, I've spent some time with the kid showing him how to seed some plants:

K-Cups, not just for coffee. He's carefully peeling the foil from a used cup.

Adding the used coffee grounds to the soil.

Scraping out more coffee grounds.

Adding the soil to the K-Cup.

See?

Sweet Peas are a good choice.

Just add water.

We don't want to forget what we're growing!

Now we wait.
To be continued...

Wednesday's Song:
In Bloom - Nirvana

PEACE

Bonus points to whomever guesses the song.

Life is Beautiful

Since I'm busy not running, I've been doing a lot of gardening. I did manage to start some vegetable seeds, plant some flowers, pull TONS of weeds, and turn over the soil. It's the turning over the soil part that's giving me the best workout, but it's a lot of work. I just strap on the "Frankenstein" boot** and go. I have a huge backyard and I feel like I've barely put a dent in things. Gardening is not a weekend project in my yard. It's probably about a 4 month project, especially since things went by the wayside. I've also become acquainted with a few bugs I've never seen before, like this one:

Potato Bug or Jerusalem Cricket

I've lived in Southern California forever and haven't seen these bugs until recently. I shot that picture and posted it on Facebook just to find out what it was. I tried looking for it on the internet, but there are only a zillion bugs in the world, maybe more. My FB friends gave me the info.*

Last Saturday, Evan came up with this outfit, and I felt it was worth a picture, but he would only have his picture taken if he could show off the marble he found in his room:

Yes, he has a unique sense of fashion...

Here's the marble, which is now lost inside his Great Grandma's piano.

I've also been faithfully tracking calories, which is helping to prevent weight gain. This week I'm working on getting in more protein, which is tough since I had relied on ready to drink protein shakes. I didn't have to think about it, they were ready to go, no blenders or mess. The last one I used was Muscle Milk, which is lactose free, but for some weird reason my system no longer likes it. I'm itchy right after drinking a serving. I'll probably go back to soy protein, but it would be even better if I could find a decent one that tastes good, is an RTD, and cheap. I'm trying to keep foods as natural as possible, but sometimes an RTD is good to have on hand in a pinch. Suggestions are welcome!

Friday's Song:
Life in Technicolor - Coldplay

PEACE

** AKA: The ginormous overkill boot they gave me in orthopedics. I might as well use it for something!
*Justifying that Facebook is not a total time suck.

Doctor! Doctor!

Yesterday

Activity: Run
Date: 09/24/07 11:03 AM
Distance: 10.09 miles
Time: 1:46:54
Speed: 5.7 mph
Pace: 10' 36 min/mile
Calories: 964

I had a pretty decent run yesterday. I borrowed DH's dinky Ipod Shuffle clip, you know, the one the size of a media card, and went. It did help to have some tunes to run with for a change. I usually don't run with tunes when I run outdoors. It was not as busy on the bay path as it normally is, so I didn't have to worry about listening for bicycle riders and large groups, but I did have the volume low enough so I could hear other sounds around me. I did much better on my run than I had anticipated.

Today
No workout today, doctors orders!!!!

I went in to to a primary physician today. They actually assigned me to someone with a good personality, who knew about working out, running, etc. He went over a list of things I could be suffering from:

1) Lack of or little sleep

2) Thyroid issues

3) Deficiencies in my diet

4) Stress

5) Not enough exercise or athletic burn out

6) Depression

Based on our conversation, he didn't seem to think depression was a factor. He discussed that a lot of athletes do suffer from burn out at some point, and maybe this is my body telling me to slow down for a bit. He asked about my workout and running schedule. He did want me to take 2 off days between running and/or working out, and really rest. My blood pressure and heart rate were in the fabulous range. He wanted me to up my protein ratio, just to make sure I am rebuiding muscle properly. Then I was sent to the lab for blood work. Now it's just a matter of waiting. Oh, and weight on the scale there was 126... No change...

One more thing to ponder:

Why is it that the minute you are finished either super vacuuming, or have mopped the floor so clean you can eat off of it, that the dog decides to dig up her "treasures" (bones, toys, sticks, etc.) and bring them in all dirty and dusty, then plop them on the clean floor????

Peace

Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap

Today was the first Friday in three weeks that I haven't had to work. I spent my entire morning with my grandson. I thought it would be a good idea to get him outside for some gardening. He wasn't too excited with the idea of gardening at first so he went around the yard playing with his Hotwheels. I decided that he needed to get dirty, so I supplied him with a small hand shovel and a plastic flower pot. Needless to say, my grandson had a blast. before I knew it, he was lying in the dirt making dirt angels... It was great. It didn't occure to me to get pictures later on in the dirt discovery morning, but he was pretty well covered and quite happy with himself.






The best part about spening time with a 3 1/2 year old is that they look at things just a little bit differently. We're slowly working on getting the house in shape. Remember that the house is circa 1947ish and had nothing done to it 20 years prior to us moving in last year. The interiors are just about finished, for now, but the outside needs a decent paint job. My grandson pointed out this rust stain, just outside the sunroom door. He said "Mimi, he's sad. He's crying." I told him that we'll paint it soon and make it happy again.



While the little guy was enjoying the dirt, I was pulling some major weeds and overgrowth. The hot July 2006 temperatures and the freezing weather we had later on in December pretty much thrashed most of our plants, so we did almost nothing to keep anything going, so we're just like stating over. Amongst the weeds were signs of spring. The poppies that I had planted last year are coming back.



Today was some serious yard work. It was like doing several sets of squats, deadlifts, upright rows and tricep exercises. It's back to the "Yard-work Workout." I don't mess around. If I'm going to be digging in the dirt, it's going to be heavy duty. None of this picking little weeds with tweezers and my pinky finger extended business... I've got tools and I'm not afraid to use them.

Tomorrow I run. It's going to be in the 5 to 6 mile range, perhaps a little more. I'm in the zig-zagging phase right now, where one week I put in the longer mileage,and the next week I back off. Next week should be a 16 miler. The interesting part will be fitting in two 20 mile runs (in May) instead of just one.

Peace