Sunday, September 26, 2010

In Which I Run, Naked and Soaking Wet, Outside with a Lizard

Ah, that got your attention, didn't it?

Two days ago, I noticed a small lizard in my bathroom. I tried to catch him but he was a clever little reptile and wouldn't cooperate. I bid him farewell. After all, small, fast things do not do well in The Zoo. A certain cat, if she saw it, would pounce and pat and fling it around, torturing it to death--if it didn't die of a heart attack during that whole horror fest. A certain dog, if he saw it, would immediately swallow it, and it was so tiny he wouldn't even have noticed he had swallowed anything. Either way, a vain and nasty death.

Imagine my surprise when I saw a little blob on the floor of the tub while rinsing down the shower stall after my morning shower. Now, I don't shower with my contacts in, so I could be reasonably forgiven if I had shrieked and leapt five feet in the air. But I knew instantly it was my little friend, and that somehow he'd survived two or three days in my house with no food. So I knelt down, coaxed him onto my palm, made a fist, and then ran out the back door to let him free in my Texas ranger bush. Completely naked and soaking wet.

Luckily, I didn't scare any neighbors. Of course, I still couldn't see anything more than two feet away, so I can't swear I haven't permanently scarred someone's vision. I guess we'll know the next time I meet them on the street, if they avert their eyes and turn bright red, that the blob I thought was a bush was the neighbor on their patio, drinking coffee in the early morning calm.

Saturday, September 25, 2010

In Which Vegetables Continue to be Yummy, C graduates, and I Crochet

Zucchini pie.


C and her husband P.


Quadra by Norah Gaughan

...and knit. Diamond Brocade by Kristen Spurkland.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

In Which Vegetables Are Yummy

One of the things I miss most about living out here in The Desert are roadside farmer's stands. A couple of weeks ago, I drove 100 miles to a you-pick farm and came back with lots of veggie goodness. Most has been blanched and frozen for the upcoming winter, but here is what I made with some of it.

Zuchinni, squash, corgette--whatever you call them, they're yummy!

Shredded.

Sauteed.


Stuffed into an eggplant half and baked. Yummy in the tummy.  [Sorry for the blurry photo, but the eggplant/aubergine was not cooperating that night.] The leftover filling was used with eggs, in burritos, and as a side dish. One stop cooking.

Sunday, September 12, 2010

In Which We Think Pink!

A pink flower grows, while a pink sky glows....

...and some pink blankets cheer some blue hearts.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

In Which We Jog and Talk Foundation Garments

How's that for a teasing lead-in, eh?  LOL

The days are starting to get shorter now, here in the desert. The sun is rising just about 6 a.m., not 5 a.m. as it does over the summer. How do I know that? Well, certain very fluffy dogs and I must walk at 5 a.m. during our summer heat or certain fluffy dogs will fall over with heat exhaustion. And certain fluffy dogs that don't get their walk get grumpy and have tons of excess energy which gets funnelled into mischief making, so it's just better all around if we get up at a ridiculous hour and join the other heat haters/sensible folk in my neighborhood who are also out walking their dogs or running at the ridiculously early time of 5 a.m.

How's that related to my marathon? Well, to keep training on schedule, which at this point means walking 3-4 miles every Tuesday and Thursday until Marathon Day Dec. 12, I either have to walk in what will be ever increasing early morning grayness swiftly turning into inky blackness, not walk the dogs (but see above statement re: mischief making), or change my schedule somehow.  I opted for walking the dogs their 1 mile, then going back out for 2 or 3, and using interval training to get my miles completed in a (hopefully) shorter time span which will let me get to work on time.

So today I implemented more interval jogging. Don't be impressed--I just jog between the short ends of the blocks around my neighborhood, so maybe 200 ft/interval at the most. But I did that something like 8 times today, the most interval training I've ever done. No knee twinge. No sore ankles. Hooray!

And I am so glad I spent $36 on a new sports bra on Saturday. No bouncing (well, not that a flat-chested middle-aged woman can bounce much anyway). Those girls were firmly ensconced in a structural support matrix of epic proportions. I can barely get the thing off afterward it's so tight, as it's one of those over-the-head foundation garments. Yea, I guess my old sports bras were so stretched out that they should have been replaced a long time ago. I need to break down and replace things more frequently than once a decade...