It’s Been a Week…
Oof. It’s been a busy, busy week. All good things… like: The kitchen backsplash is done! I love it! But this meant having a stranger in the house, almost the entire day of my day off. Don’t get me wrong- I’m incredibly grateful to him. He did a great job- but still. It was stressful. Then, for two nights in a row I had to be at my daughter’s school. One for the “open house” where we meet their teachers, and the next night for a band parent meeting. I love all my daughter’s teachers! And the band meeting was about the upcoming trip to Rome. Yes, you read that right- my daughter is going to ROME in January. The band has a big trip once every four years, and it happens to fall on her freshman year. I know what you’re thinking. “Jenny, what exactly are you complaining about? That you got a new kitchen? That your daughter has incredible teachers? That she’s going on an amazing trip to Rome?” These are all great things! But I’m really scattered. At the risk of sounding incredibly neurotic, I don’t like being out at night. Once I’m home from work and dinner is done, I want to on the couch doing this: So, I’m ready for some serious quiet time… except that tomorrow night is the first home football game, GAAAAAH! Now, I don’t HAVE to go. A lot of parents don’t, but I know if I miss it, I’ll regret it. For various reasons I missed all but one of the football games my son’s junior year (he was in the marching band, like my daughter is now.) I vowed I would go to every game his senior year- and then everything was canceled because of Covid. I learned my lesson! I’ll be at the game tomorrow night. Wish me luck! And by the way, the kitchen saga is not over yet. We now have the issue of What To Do About The Floor. You’ll hear all about that next week! Do you consider yourself a homebody? – Ha, I do! I always have to gear myself up to go out, especially at night. Photo by Marissa Grootes on Unsplash
Reading and Eating, Pumpkin-Style
The first weekend of Pumpkin Palooza has come and gone! I think of Labor Day weekend as kind of the “Opening Ceremony” of Pumpkin Palooza, so I like to go all out. But first! I finished two great books: The Mimicking of Known Successes is a sci-fi mystery, which I first heard about from ccr in MA. The story is set on the planet Jupiter, which humans have colonized after destroying Earth. To be honest, the storyline was interesting but not amazing, but I LOVED the setting. The description of life on Jupiter was fascinating and so well done. I had an odd experience though- I didn’t read the description of this book at all, but dove right in without knowing much. About halfway through I realized I didn’t know if the narrator was male or female. For some reason I had vaguely been thinking male (their name is “Pleiti” which I would contend is gender-neutral) but when I realized I wasn’t sure, I flipped back to the beginning for clues- and I couldn’t find any. There was no mention of appearance or clothes- other than special scarves that shielded them from the harsh atmosphere- nothing that specified a gender. Finally I took a glance at the description on the inside jacket which describes it as “a cozy gaslamp mystery and sapphic romance.” Oh! I guess Pleiti is a woman. In a way I was disappointed that I found out- I was kind of enjoying reading the story and not knowing. It reminds me of a conversation I had with my son several years ago. We were at a store together and after we left I asked him “Do you think our cashier was a man or a woman? I couldn’t tell.” His response was, “Why does it matter?” Yes- why DOES it matter? On the subject of gender, Adichie’s Feminist Manifesto is so good. I think I’ve done a pretty good job with my daughter- never called her princess, or talked about her being “pretty”, and avoided any talk of “girls do this; boys do that.” But the other day she was telling me about a friend who liked a boy but didn’t want to tell him, because she didn’t want to be the one to initiate anything. I said “Yes, that’s a good idea. Let him initiate it.” WAIT. Why did I say that? It just goes to show- I need a check-in now and then. This book is FULL of wisdom, and it’s a very quick read. Now for the food! First breakfast of Pumpkin Palooza: pumpkin pancakes. I used this recipe from Running on Real Food. They’re made with chickpea flour! So they were a little odd, ha ha. But still delicious! I used my usual trick for pumpkin baked goods- take the amount of pumpkin spice the recipe calls for and double it, and add a pinch of cloves. The only thing I would say about this recipe is, there’s too much salt. Next time I would cut back a little, but I enjoyed these. For dinner I made this recipe for Pumpkin Pasta Bake from Nora Cooks. She uses an almond ricotta, but I made a tofu ricotta instead. And I topped it with Miyoko’s liquid plant-based mozzarella. We’ve been getting a lot of use from that cheese! This dish was good! The sauce has coconut milk (but it doesn’t taste like coconut) and pumpkin. We enjoyed this for THREE dinners- I love leftovers. Last year I ate so much pumpkin in early September that I got sick of it (ack!) In order to prevent that tragedy again, I’ll be taking a short break from pumpkin (after I eat my pumpkin oatmeal for breakfast today, heh heh!) Have you read either of these books? Do you think it’s obvious from the picture on the front that Mimicking is about two women? Do you like pumpkin baked goods?
Weekly Rundown- Not Bad, Just Different
Well, this was an interesting week! I wish I could say there was a ton of running, but I can’t. There were cardio alternatives though, and I switched up some things strength-wise. Thanks as always to Kim and Deborah for hosting the Weekly Rundown! Let’s just see what happened in this odd week. Sunday Leg day at the gym! The most notable thing about this workout is that I put ten pound plates on the bar for my squats, for the first time. I didn’t quite get down low enough though, as you can see by this photo: I always get scared doing squats- scared of what, I couldn’t tell you. Scared that it will be hard? Or that I can’t do it? I vowed to try it again next time and get down lower. Monday Okay, sigh. My shin was acting up again so I got in the pool. Just to clarify, this is a recurring issue that pops up every time I try to run a little faster. It’s not that I can’t run; I’m just trying to prevent it from getting to that point. 45 minute pool run. Tuesday Inspired by Wendy’s post last week, I got out my old arch-nemesis, the pull up bar. I was able to do a hard at-home upper body strength workout with the 10 and 15 pound dumbbells I have- lateral raises, overhead shoulder press, and negatives on the pull up bar. The way I do them is, I put my knee in the band and pull myself up (with the band to assist me.) Then I slip my leg out of the band and sloooowly lower myself down with full body weight. It’s crazy how hard this is! I also did planks and side planks. Wednesday Instead of doing a long trail run, I decided to do a “long cardio” at the gym. I did the first 30 minutes on the stair climber (ugh) and then got on the treadmill for an hour. Again- ugh. I felt my shin when I first started running, but as long as I kept the treadmill at an incline, it was fine. Treadmill runs are so boring- I adjusted the incline and pace frequently just to break it up. Yes, I would rather have been out on the trail for 90 minutes! But this was a good substitute. Thursday Another 45 minute pool run. This time it was still dark, so I got to “run” with the full moon! (I thought of Kim.) But the biggest thing about this workout is that I listened to this episode of the Human Performance Outliers podcast, with Ben Patrick, the “Knees Over Toes” guy, talking about his top six strength moves. I’ve heard of him many times, but something just clicked this time. Once I was out of the pool, I looked up his moves on Youtube and decided to add them into my routine. Friday Leg day! Part 1 was at home. I did Knees Over Toes tibialis raises (these should help my shin!), goblet squats, and Nordic hamstring curls. or I should say, I attempted the Nordics but couldn’t quite do them- they are REALLY hard. Then, the gym where I pushed and pulled the sled! This is another Knees Over Toes move- he says it helps with achilles issues and plantar fasciitis. Your heels never touch the floor- you can see how this would strengthen the feet and calves. Then, back to the squat bar- I got down lower! After deadlifts and abs, I did hamstring curls- obviously my hamstrings are very weak, and I have to work up to doing the Nordic curls. Saturday Hmmm, my legs were sore today! That’s okay though. I got in a good 5 mile run before work. The humidity was 95% for this run, but it was early enough (just after sunrise) that it felt okay. I felt my shin before and after the run but not during, so… I guess it’s fine for now. The tibialis raises and sled pushes/pulls should fix everything! Sunday OFF! Sleeping late! Pumpkin pancakes! Reading and watching football! It’s going to be a nice, relaxing day off. I like my workouts, but I definitely know how to relax when the time comes. What do you like to do on your days off? Or do you not take days off? Have you heard of the Knees Over Toes workouts?
September Coffee Date- It’s Time!
Get out the pumpkin mugs! Pumpkin Palooza has begun! I’m joining Coco and Deborah for the Ultimate Coffee Date. Grab a (pumpkin) mug of your favorite hot beverage- earl grey tea for me- and let’s get started. If we were sitting down together for coffee (tea), the first thing I would share is that I usually get out all my fall decorations on September 1st. Yes, it’s 95 degrees outside. Yes, fall doesn’t officially start until September 23rd. But I’m always so excited I can’t wait. THIS year, though, I’ve decided to start off gradually with a football theme. The first Baylor game is tomorrow night, and I’m so excited. I love college football and I LOVE our Baylor Bears! The beers are chilling in the fridge, we’ve paid the big bucks to stream the games, and I have all the ingredients for Ultimate Vegan Nachos! I always especially enjoy the very beginning of things, like the first day of Christmas vacation or the first football game of the season. I love it when things have barely begun, and all the rest is stretching out ahead. So you can imagine my happiness at pulling out my Crazy Pumpkin Lady mug for the first time this year, and decorating the house for the beginning of football. Now, let’s talk about that backsplash. In my last post I didn’t mean to imply that I would be revealing the finished product today. Ahem, not quite yet! The tiles have been ordered, and the tile guy is coming to install it next Wednesday. But since we’ve been waiting so long, here’s the tile we chose: Meanwhile, Wednesday is also the day the dishwasher repairman is coming, because our dishwasher has stopped working. This isn’t as big a tragedy as you might think- after living for over a week with no kitchen sink at all, not having a dishwasher is a minor inconvenience. I’m not exactly sure how one guy is going to repair the dishwasher while another guy is tiling our backsplash at the same time, but Wednesday is my day off, so that’s the day everyone is coming! Somehow we’ll work it out. Lastly, I would tell you that we saw Barbie- great movie! My daughter and I saw it with my friend and her two girls; our daughters have been friends since preschool. The only way we could convince the girls to go with us was to go to a theater in the next town over, so they wouldn’t run the risk of seeing anyone they knew while they were out with their moms. Sigh. We all wore pink! Here’s another “amazing” selfie. In the only shot where I don’t look like I have narcolepsy, I cut my daughter practically out of the picture. But you can see her pink top, barely. Funny side note: my daughter DID see someone she knew. Her assigned “study buddy” from biology, a nerdy (and I use that term lovingly- I like nerds) boy who walked up to her in the lobby of the theater and said “I finished the biology notes!” We all got a chuckle out of that (afterwards- not in front of him!) That’s about it for this first day of September! Are you excited about the new month? Anything you’re especially looking forward to in September?