On the bright side, I haven't had any real problems lately with my hamstring. I'm trying to pick up the mileage and have been making very slow progress. I've increased mileage up to 7-mile runs, then backslid, then increased distance again, then backslid. It's been little things, like banged up toes or travel (several days at altitude in Denver, CO for a family function put me out for a week! Apparently my body doesn't handle altitude very well). I'm also still having trouble with motivation. I know I will stay in better shape if I can run at least 3 times a week, but that is easier said than done. I'm back up to 5 miles for distance and hopefully I'll keep moving in the right direction for the rest of the summer.
I'm still thinking about running a marathon sometime in the next year or so. I had talked to my older son back in June about running the Portland Marathon this coming October, but after much consideration and hemming and hawing, decided that it just didn't give me enough time, given the general age and condition of my poor legs, to adequately prepare without injury. I'm thinking October 2016.
On the knitting front, I haven't really gotten anywhere. I finally finished up my daughter's socks. When I had woven in all the ends and laid them side by side to admire them, I discovered that the sock tops don't match, size-wise. With the same needles and same stitch count, the second sock came out narrower and shorter. I must have been really stressed knitting the top of that second sock to have tightened up my stitches that much. Sheesh! I thought about trying to stretch it out to match the first sock, but realistically, that won't work. I really don't want to reknit the whole second sock though. I've already had to pull out part of the foot and reknit so the second sock would match the first. (Seems I couldn't read my own notes on what I did on the first sock.) So, rather than reknit the entire sock, I think I'll reknit just the top and kitchener the new top to the original foot, which is the correct size. And I'll think really relaxing thoughts as I knit. Whenever I get around to knitting again.
Which brings me to my next tale of woe. My tennis elbow, which has been plaguing me for over a year now, is STILL not better. After a third round of physical therapy, I've been sent back to the orthopedist to see what he's got up his sleeve. I now have an MRI scheduled, which will hopefully tell us something helpful so I can finally get some relief. I am so frustrated with this injury. In some ways, it's not as bad as a foot or leg problem since it doesn't keep me from getting around. In other ways, though, it affects just about everything I do every day.
As I have been so neglectful of the blog this year, I thought I'd offer a brief recap of my spring.
In March, hubby and I took a trip to New Orleans. I'd never been there and we thought it would be fun. We stayed at one edge of the French Quarter and could walk just about anywhere we wanted to go. The weather in early March was changeable, and we got some rain and storms, but we got some beautiful sunny days too. We took walks every day - there was a great path along the river, which was only a few blocks from our hotel. One morning the fog was so thick we couldn't actually see the water from the riverside path we were on, all of 10 feet away.
We walked down Bourbon Street:
We took a cooking class at the cooking school next door. This is cajun style jambalaya (on the right) and gumbo (in the bowl). It was a very fun afternoon; we did all the cooking ourselves, with help and advice from the teacher, and the dinner we had at the end of it was delicious! The gumbo we ate was not the gumbo we made that day. According to our teacher, gumbo needs to sit overnight so all the flavors will combine and soak into the meat. So we ate gumbo that had been made a day earlier, and our gumbo was put into a big gallon ziplock bag and frozen solid. They assured us that there would be no problem taking the frozen gumbo home on the plane. We were skeptical, but really, what did we have to lose? Wouldn't you know, I carried it on with me in a grocery bag and it made it through the security x-ray machine, and stayed frozen solid all the way home.
The other high point of our New Orleans trip was getting to see NPR's "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me" live. Yes, I know it's a radio show, so what is there really to see, but it was a lot of fun to be there for the taping. It was pure serendipity that the show was traveling to New Orleans the very week that we had planned our vacation there. And the theatre was only a few blocks up the street from our hotel! The Saenger theater in New Orleans was historic and absolutely gorgeous. The show was hilarious. I laughed so hard my cheeks hurt! It took over 2 hours to tape the 45-minute radio show, so we got to be there for the bloopers, the digressions, and a lot of extras from Paula Poundstone.
After New Orleans, we had kids come home for spring break. Youngest son was home for a week and briefly overlapped with the girls, our daughter and our host-daughter from Japan, who flew out to visit before her school year started. I took advantage of having girls here and we took the train down to NYC and saw a Broadway show!
I'm still thinking about running a marathon sometime in the next year or so. I had talked to my older son back in June about running the Portland Marathon this coming October, but after much consideration and hemming and hawing, decided that it just didn't give me enough time, given the general age and condition of my poor legs, to adequately prepare without injury. I'm thinking October 2016.
On the knitting front, I haven't really gotten anywhere. I finally finished up my daughter's socks. When I had woven in all the ends and laid them side by side to admire them, I discovered that the sock tops don't match, size-wise. With the same needles and same stitch count, the second sock came out narrower and shorter. I must have been really stressed knitting the top of that second sock to have tightened up my stitches that much. Sheesh! I thought about trying to stretch it out to match the first sock, but realistically, that won't work. I really don't want to reknit the whole second sock though. I've already had to pull out part of the foot and reknit so the second sock would match the first. (Seems I couldn't read my own notes on what I did on the first sock.) So, rather than reknit the entire sock, I think I'll reknit just the top and kitchener the new top to the original foot, which is the correct size. And I'll think really relaxing thoughts as I knit. Whenever I get around to knitting again.
Which brings me to my next tale of woe. My tennis elbow, which has been plaguing me for over a year now, is STILL not better. After a third round of physical therapy, I've been sent back to the orthopedist to see what he's got up his sleeve. I now have an MRI scheduled, which will hopefully tell us something helpful so I can finally get some relief. I am so frustrated with this injury. In some ways, it's not as bad as a foot or leg problem since it doesn't keep me from getting around. In other ways, though, it affects just about everything I do every day.
As I have been so neglectful of the blog this year, I thought I'd offer a brief recap of my spring.
In March, hubby and I took a trip to New Orleans. I'd never been there and we thought it would be fun. We stayed at one edge of the French Quarter and could walk just about anywhere we wanted to go. The weather in early March was changeable, and we got some rain and storms, but we got some beautiful sunny days too. We took walks every day - there was a great path along the river, which was only a few blocks from our hotel. One morning the fog was so thick we couldn't actually see the water from the riverside path we were on, all of 10 feet away.
We walked down Bourbon Street:
The other high point of our New Orleans trip was getting to see NPR's "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me" live. Yes, I know it's a radio show, so what is there really to see, but it was a lot of fun to be there for the taping. It was pure serendipity that the show was traveling to New Orleans the very week that we had planned our vacation there. And the theatre was only a few blocks up the street from our hotel! The Saenger theater in New Orleans was historic and absolutely gorgeous. The show was hilarious. I laughed so hard my cheeks hurt! It took over 2 hours to tape the 45-minute radio show, so we got to be there for the bloopers, the digressions, and a lot of extras from Paula Poundstone.
After New Orleans, we had kids come home for spring break. Youngest son was home for a week and briefly overlapped with the girls, our daughter and our host-daughter from Japan, who flew out to visit before her school year started. I took advantage of having girls here and we took the train down to NYC and saw a Broadway show!
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| girls in Grand Central Station |
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| three girls taking in a show |
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| tired out, going home on the train |
After we took our host-daughter to the airport to fly home, and our daughter back to school to finish up her school year, Beatrice the cat passed away. She had been failing and we knew the end was coming. I'm really glad both girls got to spend time with her.
Sadly, Beatrice passed away in the night just after taking our daughter back to school. The cat is very important to her, so I drove up to Wellesley that day, brought her home so we could bury Beatrice, then drove her back up to school so she wouldn't miss any classes.
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| we buried her in the back yard |
We fit in a family wedding in Philadelphia in June, followed by a wedding celebration (yes, for the same wedding) in Denver in July. Daughter is in Japan for a summer internship and younger son is home working. That's everything in a nutshell. I'm hoping for more positive things to say about my arm progress in the next blog post, which will in turn increase my knitting output and my sanity level. Stay cool!
Shelley in CT
Shelley in CT
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