February Coffee Date

What a week!  We thought we were getting a hurricane, and ended up with tornadoes.  Because the hurricane itself didn’t hit us that badly, most people in our area had little to no damage- except for those in the path of the tornadoes, where there was utter destruction.  Luckily we were in the first category, but everyone is left with the feeling, “What just happened?”  But of course… there were still workouts.  Thanks as always to Kim and Deborah for hosting.  Here we go… Monday It was a rainy day.  In the morning I did Caroline Girvan’s deadbug workout, and saved my run for later in the day.  I thought I might go to the gym and run on the treadmill, but there was no thunder or lightning, so I ran 3 miles outside. Tuesday I started the day with this 30 Minute Pilates Core Workout..  OUCH.  It was hard!  Followed it up with hip stability exercises, and that was it for the morning.  Later in the day we got news that schools would be closed Wednesday-Thursday because of Milton. Wednesday Hmmm!  I had a 10 mile run planned.  But there’s a hurricane coming.  Should I run on the treadmill?  Milton is still out in the Gulf of Mexico and isn’t due to make landfall on the west coast of Florida till night.  The weather seemed fine, so I decided to run outside.  Instead of going to my nearby trail (which is on the edge of the Everglades) I decided to stick to streets closer to home.  I was thinking it would be safer, in case of lightning. Once again, I was a little dismayed how hard 10 miles felt.  I thought about cutting it short, but instead did my trick of running 30 seconds/walking 30 seconds until I felt better, and ended up doing the whole distance. I went inside, took a shower and when I got out we had a tornado warning.  WHAT?   We turned on the TV and saw that a tornado was passing just to the west of us (you know, like where my Everglades trail is!) It was moving north, so didn’t affect us directly.  But several tornadoes went through our county and wreaked havoc, as tornadoes do. Lesson learned- take the weather seriously.  The outer bands of Milton spawned around 20 tornadoes throughout the state that day. Thursday Milton moved through overnight, causing some gusty winds but not much else.  We awoke to a beautiful, breezy Thursday!  Since we all thought the weather was going to be terrible, work was canceled for the day and I slept in.  But later in the day I decided to go for a run.  I had new shoes! I just ran 2 miles, then did a MadFit standing core workout.  Then we got word that schools would be closed AGAIN on Friday.  So many people in our county lost power in the tornadoes, and they were still going through every school to make sure there was no damage. Friday Okay, I’m so confused.  What day is it, anyway?  My daughter was home, but I had work (side note- it’s SUCH A RELIEF when your kids are old enough to stay home alone.  When they’re little, these school closures are brutal.). I went to the gym for leg day! Saturday 4 mile run before work.  I don’t know what’s up with this hazy photo.  It was a beautiful day!  Milton blew in some cooler, dryer air.  Not actually cool or dry- but coolER and dryER.  The end is in sight. Sunday On tap- sleeping in and watching the Chicago Marathon!  Then in the afternoon I’m hoping to put up my outdoor Halloween decorations.  I’m cautiously optimistic that we will have no more storms, so it’s time for outdoor decs! These storms are always scary.  Luckily everyone in our Florida blogging community made it through unscathed.  Our real life friends are all fine, although my daughter’s band director had a tornado go through his neighborhood!  He had damage to his house, but it’s still standing and, most important, he and his family are all fine.  PHEW. Did you have a “normal” week?- I’m trying to remember what that feels like. Are you getting fall weather?

Hi there!  Usually I do a coffee date post on Fridays, but I’m all discombobulated this week.  It IS Friday, right?  We’ve had an eventful couple of days here… but we’re fine, our house is fine, and our friends are fine.  We’re VERY lucky. But, we had a tornado!  Actually a couple tornadoes went through our county.  We got a tornado warning, turned on the TV, and they were showing the tornado live, as it was caught on a traffic cam.  On the other side of the screen they showed a map of the county and where the tornado was going. It was scarily close to us, but we could see on the map that it would stay to the west and was moving north.  Remember- Florida houses have no basements!  Everyone in the path was urged to get into their bathtubs. Just about all our destruction from Milton came from these tornadoes.  Most of the county is fine, but the areas in the path of the tornado were obviously devastated.  The schools were closed Wednesday, Thursday, and they’re closed again today because so many people are without power, and they’re still making sure all the schools are structurally sound. Seeing the damage so close to home, and then all the flooding and wind damage on the west coast, makes me feel a little guilty- but we really had no issues from this storm (other than being temporarily scared by the tornado warning.) We had no damage and didn’t lose power.  I had a little unexpected vacation from work (we were closed for a couple days) and well…. I kind of …. cringe… (I’m very sorry!) enjoyed it. On Wednesday (when Milton was still out in the Gulf of Mexico) my daughter asked if her friend could sleep over.  Sure!  Because it’s always a good idea to be in charge of someone else’s kid in a natural disaster, right? I picked up her friend and we stopped at Target for last minute supplies.  Remember my storm snacks?  Well, the girls took a dim view of the Lesser Evil popcorn, keto plant-based cereal, and sugar-free chocolate chips.  They loaded up the cart with more “appropriate” supplies. I took the opportunity to get a couple more candles.  I figured, if we’re going to be stuck in the house, it might as well smell good, right?  I had such a good time smelling them all (I always think of the Girl Next Door Fall Extravaganza candle sniffing when I do this.) I love all the names… But this was my favorite: I ended up choosing these two: By the way, did you know that money spent during a storm doesn’t really count?  We were throwing things into the cart with reckless abandon.  My husband wasn’t too pleased (especially with the mocha marshmallow coffee.)  But we were ready to hunker down. The hunkering didn’t last long!  By Thursday morning the worst of the storm had passed, and we were left with a beautiful, breezy day.  We even opened our windows (for the first time since… March?) It wasn’t exactly COOL.  But it was less humid, and we enjoyed the windows open until 11 am, when I realized I was roasting and we had to turn the AC back on. Since I had a bonus day off of work, I decided to start working on my blog to fix the sidebar problem.  So if you never hear from me again, you’ll know what happened.  No, just kidding- I backed it up!  Hopefully I can fix the current issue and also clean up a few other things that have been bugging me. Now, back to regular life!  All our friends on the west coast evacuated.  Stephany went to Ocala; two more friends drove all the way to South Carolina, and others flew up to New Jersey.  We’ll be anxiously awaiting word from them on how their homes fared in the storm.  We’re so close to the end- PLEASE, no more hurricanes! Have you ever been through a tornado? Do you have a favorite fall candle scent? Top photo by Greg Johnson on Unsplash  

Well, it was my first post- Century Trilogy week of reading, so it was bound to feel a little blah.  But I’m happy to report that I finished this book, and can weigh in with my opinion: I liked it!  But I didn’t LOVE it.  The characters were interesting and I was curious to see where the story was going to go.  It’s a mystery, and I always love a mystery.  The thing I didn’t love was, the story was told from multiple timelines.  I think that could be super confusing if you listened to the audio version of this book (anyone who listened want to let me know?) Overall the ending was satisfying- but I wish the same story could have been told without the confusing time period switching back and forth.  But that’s my personal preference- I’m just not a fan of that style. Next up: I’m only about 1/4 of the way into this, but I’m liking it so far.  The premise is, a mysterious woman gets up on an airplane and walks down the aisle, telling each passenger when and how they’re going to die.  The passengers react with confusion, outrage, amusement… but six of them are given especially early death dates, and I’m just getting to the part of the book where we’ll see if the first prediction comes true. I’m not far enough into the book to say if I’m going to love it, or just like it.  But I’m enjoying it so far. On to the eats!  This week I made Suzanne’s Chickpea and Sweet Potato Stew.  It was so good! I also decided to splurge on the weekend, and made lasagna (I always use the recipe from Isa Chandra Moscowitz’s Veganomicon.) And, storm snacks!  We were hoping that Milton would nudge a little bit north, but it’s actually tracking further SOUTH now.  The counties to the north of us now have a hurricane warning.  It looks like we’ll have a tropical storm, but if it tracks further south we’ll put up our shutters tomorrow (we have accordion shutters which are attached to the house- all we have to do is pull them closed and lock them.) Either way, I stopped at the store for snacks! WHY do we feel like we need and deserve junk food when there’s a storm coming???  The cashier actually asked the woman in front of me, “Are you having a party?” The woman said “No, I just want to make sure I’m stocked up in case I can’t leave the house.”  Hee hee. Wish us luck!  I’ll be here eating my popcorn, and anxiously watching to see how our friends on the west coast are faring. What are you reading now? What are your favorite storm snacks? Top photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

You know that question, if you could have a superpower, what would it be?  After contemplating many possibilities (flying, being invisible) I’ve decided that I definitely want my superpower to be the ability to control the weather. We have another hurricane heading to Florida.  It’s forecast to hit the Tampa area, which is terrible (if you haven’t already read it, here’s Stephany’s post– her car was totaled in the flooding from Helene, and now she has to evacuate.)  After it hits the west coast, Milton will continue across the state- hopefully staying just to the north of us. But we have a tropical storm warning, so school has been canceled for Wednesday and Thursday, and all after school activities are canceled for this week.  For my daughter this includes a rehearsal, a concert, an audition for an all-county band, a football game and a band picnic.  WHAT are the odds that this storm would hit us in this week of all weeks, where so many things were scheduled???  I’m really cranky about this, because we were supposed to bring soda to the picnic, and now I have about 50 cans of Coke in my fridge.  Grr. (Yes, I know- people died from Helene, and I’m complaining about having too much Coke.  Yes, I feel like a bad person.) I hate not knowing what’s going to happen.  Did they cancel school for nothing?  Should we be putting up our hurricane shutters?  At least, it seems smart to prepare for a power outage.  Let’s see- do we have our battery powered fans?  Check.  Lamps?  Check.  Beer?  Check.  (WAIT.  How did that get on the list?)  Food?  Che-eck… a trip to the store is probably in order.  Water?  Nope.  I’ll start filling bottles with our purified tap water (or, if we have a boil water order, we can just start drinking Coke, heh heh.) I don’t mean to make light of the situation.  There’s no great outcome here.  If I say I hope the storm doesn’t hit Tampa, then I’m wishing it on someone else.  But since I can’t control the weather (darn!) I have an alternative superpower. From this article, “40 Simple Rules for Life”, #37: Separate almost everything into two: things you can control and those you can’t. Don’t waste time and energy on what you can’t influence. Yes, that’s a superpower right there.  I’ll prepare, hope for the best, and deal with whatever happens.  Sending love to all our fellow Floridians on the west coast!  Hope everyone is safe. Top photo by Mélody P on Unsplash