new nose hoop

sooo....yesterday i did what i have been wanting to do for a while: got a hoop for my nose.

about 30 minutes, some "holy mother!", and a pain-induced running nose later, I'm officially sporting it:
and i'm laughing at myself-life is so much fun sometimes.

new best time biking

16.1 mph average

YEAH.

i think my goal by the end of the season is 20. since i started around 12 or 13 i am about halfway there!

beautiful things on a smokin day

spontaneous DD run with matt. small iced coffee, extra cream, extra sugar. driving with the sun roof open, wind flowing, music swinging. conversations and questions about what's next in life.

the bike ride from hell

So yesterday we had this brilliant idea to bike my bike in to the bike shop. When we bought the bike two months ago, it came with a free 60 day tune up, so we wanted to take advantage of it.

I had told Matt no way. Then I started getting sucked in and said I would only if it was 20 miles or less each way. He mapped it at something like 19.87 mi each way.

No getting out of that one.

So we hopped on the bikes and biked this:


The upper right corner of the route is where the bike shop is. We were going to just reverse the way we came, but decided to try another way that would be more scenic. Note to self: when the guy giving us the directions said "once you go over that mountain" I should have realized that was going to be a problem.

About mile 24.5, as we were "going over that mountain" I emotionally/physically hit a wall, pulled over and flat out started crying. Maybe this is part of being a girl (not the wussy part, just the crying because I was pushed so hard part! :) But I eventually got back on and kept going.

At mile 35.5 I hit another wall as my legs inexplicable started aching really bad. Deep down, from my hips all the way to my shins. And it only got worse when I would stop. Matt asked me if I wanted him to go ahead and come back with the car to pick me up. Thank goodness I'm stubborn and don't like giving up because I just kept pedaling...and crying for a few miles.

Eventually the aching almost went away--maybe my body finally metabolized some of the ice cream cone, banana, and half of a snickers ice cream bar I had eaten when we stopped at mile 32 for a break and a flat tire change--and we pulled back in our house still having somehow averaged a 13.1 for the whopping 45.59mi ride.

I still feel slightly wussy that I struggled so much. There's people who bike half centuries and centuries frequently (50 & 100 mile rides). But I made it, and I did my best. I guess that's all that matters.

Hanging out

Last night several of us ended up hanging out as a house (Matt & I and Kate, one of our housemates). It was some great spontaneous fun: grilling out, playing games on the porch with the neighbor, and re-watching Juno.

The game we played was "Incan Gold" -- it's a chance game where you basically get to be like Indiana Jones exploring an ancient Incan Temple looking for treasure. Kudos to our gaming friend Josiah (and thanks for being willing to loan it to us - I don't think we've lost any pieces yet :)

More about the gardens...

This is a bit belated, but about a week and a half ago, I thinned my spinach. I'm not very good at growing things from seed, but somehow these came up and needed to be spaced out a bit. I felt like I was harvesting my first crop, like it was very organic and healthful, and I munched a few :)

Last year I tried some veggies for the first time, but I think I only ended up growing some zuchinni. This year I'm venturing on and trying several fruits & veggies:

Strawberries (too bad you have to wait until yr 2 to eat them!), blueberries, blackberries, and rasberries. Spinach, zuchinni,
green peppers, bush tomatoes (can anyone say SALSA?), and pole green beans. I even planted an herb pot (oregano, parsley, chives, & rosemary) and a few things for tea (peppermint & chammomile).

Who says you can't garden in the city?

Our biking commute: Day 60

So we usually do our biking commute in two day segments: home from work the 1st day, then to work the 2nd day, leaving our car at work overnight. We've been trying to do 1 or two of these blocks a week (2-4 trips).

After filling up our car the other day, and seeing it cost $54, we decided we're going to shoot for closer to 6 trips/wk on the bike, and to commute w/ some co-workers who live down the street more often days we do drive.

That's exciting. :) We save about $2 every time we bike one way, plus we get a great 45 min workout :)

I told Matt though, that I don't want to bike that often unless I get faster (he can average 16-18mph, so he usually is waiting for me :). I just have a hard time spending 45-50 min of my day each way we bike.

But yesterday and today I averaged my fastest times yet! Usually on day 1 of a block I average about 14mph, and day two I average about 12mph; but yesterday I averaged 14.7, and this morn I averaged 14.1 (that was even w/ taking the scenic route home yesterday - 16 miles through manheim & down fruitville pike instead of our usual 11.5 down harrisburg pike!) I'm proud of myself :)

p.s. Josh, we've lasted longer than the 2 wks you predicted! Maybe we should have bet some Starbucks on it or something :)