I May Be Falling In Love With the 5K

Guess What?

Early start means you get to see the beautiful sunrise.

On Sunday I ran a 5K PR for my 40s (actually faster than any 5K I'd raced since 2013)!  Average pace of 9:32, beating my previous average 40s PR pace of 9:35, and good enough for 51.49% on the age graded performance scale.  And, there were some non-trivial hills and forced walking on the narrow turns since I started too far in the back of the pack (as in, I could have probably run faster!).  My garmin recorded 3.05 miles, but given the hairpin turns, I think it probably was the full distance.

I have so much love for all of these ladies!

It feels so good to be getting back into faster running shape for the first time in several years.  I may try to get a nice flat 5K into the schedule just for the fun of dropping the current PR a little further.  Also, I love it when I get to run with my local running friends!

If we're being honest, I'm fairly certain I *could* have run much faster than Sunday's time in 2014 and 2015, as I was regularly doing halfs and fulls at decent paces that I probably couldn't do right now during those years, but I didn't really race any 5Ks, so I'll just claim the 5 year PR.

Garden eggplant parmesan with squash is apparently great pre-race fuel!

In a fit of inspiration, I signed up for a Thanksgiving Half Marathon for my first half marathon in over 2.5 years.  I've been regretting this decision as I've failed to properly execute on several of my planned long runs and my sense of dread has been increasing.  But, hope springs eternal...especially after a fun, fast (for me) race.

Last week was a decent week of running, if not spectacular:

M: 5.18 easy with a friend, chatting @ 12:02/mile, 1.9 walking in the city

T: 2.44 biking to and from the trail; 3.01 tempo with F, slowing her down to 10:39/mile; 0.38 jog back to the bike.

W: REST

Th: 1.37 jog/walk; 2 hours gardening

F: 6.01 @ 12:34; 1.53 walk w/8X30s strides and walking recovery in the mid 9s/mile

Sa: 0.87 jog to track; 5 minutes of drills; Cooper test (12 minutes running as far as possible) but targeting a pace I thought I could sustain for Sunday's 5K: 1.27 miles @ 9:27 -- best cooper test I'd done in a few years.  I already felt like this week was a win.  Even if I had a bad race, I had something to smile about. 0.5 jog + 0.17 walk c/d.

Su: 0.83 jog pre-race to and from the car to drop stuff when they announced a delayed start of 7:45 instead of the 7:30 that was advertised.  We cut it very close for 7:30, but we had plenty of time to get our bibs, run our stuff back to the car, and use the porta potties with the 15 minute delay. 5K race; 0.75 miles walk to the car and brunch and back.

The rc.oktober run was small, but well run, early, but with post-race breakfast options in walking range, and the sunrise was beautiful.  E, who is *not* an early morning person, said he would do it again.  Which probably means that I will too.  

  

Summer Friends and Family Fun

The last two weeks have been focused on family and friends and garden and work.  Last in the priority scheme has been working out.  We visited my hometown, celebrated all the family summer birthdays, and then my niece came for a 5 days visit full of bay area fun.

Yet another outdoor summer dinner:

Deviled eggs and quinoa bacon tomato salad

Workouts have still been happening, but only between the other stuff, in a functional, maintain basic fitness, kind-of way.

One of my favorite Mission Murals we saw on the 

niece's chosen site-seeing trip in SF

I did 25 miles over 2 weeks (so half my normal mileage) including 4.5 miles of run-walking with a bestie in Norcal in the heat and under the smoke that was just short of dangerous, 2 small but not lame track workouts (7X400 @ sub 9/mile pace in one and 5X0.25 at 8:41 and 0.5% treadmill incline in the other). My niece was nice enough to join me on a Sunday AM 75 minute hot yoga class that *KICKED* *MY* ASS*.

The beautiful beaches of Half Moon Bay.

The longest continuous effort I made was 7 miles run (11:46/mile) before packing up my bags to go to Philadelphia for a wedding where I hid from the humidity and walked about 3 miles total over 3 days, including a quick indoor gym workout where I did random core interspersed with TM speedwork.

Tomatoes, cheese & bread.  Heavenly.

The wedding was for a close friend of our family with whom we'd lost most contact in the last few years.  It was awesome to be there and reconnect with the groom, meet the bride, and see the extended family.  We're so glad we went and are hopeful this will lead to a sustained reconnection.

The harvest we came home to!

The garden has actually been taking quite a bit of time between trimming, harvesting, watering, weeding, and preserving/gifting food -- it's not really a work-out, but it is one of my favorite hobbies (plus it pays food-related dividends), so I'm happy to trade time spent running for time spent with the plants.

Pimientos de padron y tomates! Sabroso!

The only "race-like" effort I put in over the last 2 weeks was a late-for-the-plane sprint through the airport for a few minutes.  I felt fast and strong (if a bit ridiculous), despite the huge purse and backpack I had to manage.  I arrived at the gate to E (who'd gone ahead while I checked the bag) motioning that I could stop and I kind of wanted to keep going.  But, I was also happy to see how quickly my breathing recovered -- yay interval training!

I love dahlias and it was peak season at the Golden Gate Park

Dahlia Garden during our site-seeing tour.

The next 3 weeks have me homebound, gardening, working, and hopefully getting in some good workouts, with a 5K on labor day weekend and a 10K the weekend after that.

You Might Think I'd Get Tired of Tomatoes

It's peak harvest time for our garden right now.

My weeks involve hours of harvesting and trimming back the plants to keep them healthy.

And, since 80% of our garden is tomato plants right now, that means lots of tomato-based meals, as well as canning and roasting and gifting.

This tomato (an heirloom varietal called Coustralee) probably weighed over 3 pounds.

Even with the efforts at tomato management, sometimes we just get to enjoy ridiculousness.

This is that Coustralee tomato, sliced.

One of my favorite meals in the world is sliced high-acid garden tomatoes with fleur de sel and a robust extra virgin olive oil. 

Wok-fried padrones, eggplant (with cheese & chili flakes) & garden tomato salad -- Californian Summer Dinner at its finest.

 I probably have it about 2 out of every 3 days when we're at home during peak tomato season.  And it never gets old.

Gazpacho (Californian-style instead of Adalusian-style) & Padrones 

-- another perfect Californian garden dinner

Essentially, I'm barely keeping my EVERYONE-IS-TRAVELING-IN-AUGUST travel envy at bay with the garden and delicious meals I can make from it (hence all the photos).  

In running news, I'm taking a couple of easier running weeks due to social obligations.  Last week was 19+ miles, most of it running, all of the running in the 11 min/mile or faster range, which was nice to see.  The goal for this summer has been to drop my paces, and Parkrun 5k PR failure notwithstanding, it appears to be working, generally, in my training log.  Here's to hoping the 3ish easier down weeks will just be good recovery/maintenance and if I can fit in a couple of solid workouts each day ideally it will set me up nicely for my September 5K and 10K.

Enjoy your August! 

Happy Californian Summer Week

We're having a mild Summer.

Look at all that green fruit!  

Typically, at this point in the Summer, at least 1/3 of it would be ripe (red, yellow, purple/brown, orange, etc.).

While the cool temps have slowed down the tomato development, it is wonderful for my running.  Most days, after I have my coffee and clear my email, it's only in the low 70s when I head out the door.  If I really wanted to optimize, I could get out in the mid to high 60s early in the morning, but because I am heat sensitive, I do like to train in some heat during the Summer so that I can enjoy the performance boost I get from the cooler temperatures of Fall races.

It was an A- workout week, which was wonderful: 1 day off, 2 track days of 3400 total speed each (including a 9:04 mile -- so close to the sub 9 goal, but not quite there), 1 easy 6 miler, my 36 minute jump-rope calisthenics insanity, a bike/yoga day, and one workout of 5 minutes jog; 20 X 1 min hard/1 min walk; 5 minutes jog.  There were also several hours of gardening, yardwork, and late night resistance tube/stretching work -- I'm quite glad that these things are making it back into my routine, and hopeful that they will contribute to me avoiding re-aggravating my picky left leg.

Red lentil soup, garden zucchini tzatziki salad and rosé -- Summer heaven.

Tonight's dinner is gazpacho, with 80% garden ingredients, which is likely to go into the weekly rotation for the forseeable future.

Garden gazpacho!

In other news, one of the many guest room visitors we regularly entertain took us out to dinner at a local ramen joint.  The portions were huge, so I took home 2/3 of my noodles/veggies/meat as well as my dipping sauce.  Last night, I made zoodles, tossed 'em in with the leftovers, added the dipping sauce and some water, brought it to a boil and then had the genius idea to portion the boiling soup into our bowls, and crack an egg in each, cover with a lid, and let the egg poach.

HAHAHAHAHAHA! That was not the expected outcome!  Thankfully, the broth was hot enough to cook the eggs once we broke them up.

Tomatoes: The Work Pays Off

The garden is out of control this time of year!

My first "real" tomato harvest of the season was this weekend, and it was almost entirely cherries (with one blossom end-rot thessoloniki).

Oh, happy day!

I sliced those cherries and we enjoyed caprese for dinner -- the first one of tomato season, but definitely not the last.

Isn't this just such a gorgeous sight?

I had purchased soft mozzarella to keep in the fridge so we could be sure to enjoy caprese the day of the first harvest big enough to feed us both.  It was wonderful, although now that the waterfall of ripening has started, I can switch to buying fresh mozzarella in water (and, I really should calendar a date to make it from scratch before the end of tomato season).

First tomato harvest caprese -- Sunday night dinner.

Today, a little more than 24 hours after the first harvest, I harvested again.

First ripe plum tomatoes and full-size medium thessoloniki.

From here on out, every few days, I'm going to be going out and pruning like crazy and harvesting.  This will likely be the last week where we only have enough for us.  Starting next week (or the week after that), I'll begin gifting tomatoes (and cukes and all sorts of squash), and probably, the first weekend in August, I will get to spend a long weekend day canning (and saving seeds for my seed bank).

Have I mentioned this is my favorite time of year?

I save the seeds in the Summer and then freeze them.  I start the seedlings in January or February.  I water them and put them under grow lights and hit them with a fan in the garage (still planning to build a hothouse...) until late spring when I can bring them outside.  I transfer them in and out of the sun until it is warm enough to leave them outside overnight.  I plant them in late spring once the danger of frost has passed.  And then I water and prune and put the cages out and weed until now, when they finally bear fruit.  Tomato harvest season is a reward for 6 months of effort and I enjoy it so very much!

Running is similar in ways.  It often takes months of sacrifice and effort before you see the benefits.  There are things out of your control (weather, pests, birds, squirrels, viruses), but you just do your best to control the controllables.

Right now, I'm in a dedicated running effort period that's a new one for me.  I'm focused much more on getting in a few fast hard workouts or races a week and letting the rest of the workouts just balance with my life as makes sense.  If I get in 2 hard running workouts in a week, I call it a success.  This is partially because  I'm starting to focus more on total body fitness as opposed to just running fitness, and this means that my running mileage has taken a hit in favor of more total body workouts.

I finally made it back to the yoga studio for the first time since December last Friday.  I'm hopeful I can get back into a once a week yoga-studio pattern again, as once I'm in the habit, it's much easier to keep it up.  I've also been pretty good about keeping up a once a week jumprope/calisthenics workout.  I'd love to bump this one up to twice per week, but realistically speaking, once is great and I want to reward myself for the good stuff I'm doing rather than set goals that are unrealistic and be bummed when I don't hit them.  So, an A+ week for me these days would be 1 yoga class, 1 jumprope/calisthenics session, 2 hard running workouts, and 3 easy runs with relatively healthy food.  I get an A- if it's just 2 easy runs, which, since I took a rest day today, is the best I can do this week -- wish me luck.

Peachtree week's mileage was 20 including twice around the 3.4 loop in the North Georgia mountains with 500+ feet of climb post race.  I consider that workout a success if I average sub 15 minutes per mile, and I did on both, so yay!

Last week's mileage was 25 including 3.5 miles of hills in the Atlanta heat, 4X800 at the track, a good run/walk workout of 0.5 w/u; 10 X 1min hard, 1 min walk; 0.5 c/d and quite a bit of walking during the week to round it out.

My left leg is still a bit spotty, but I've been trying to stretch and strengthen -- I've taken to doing shoulder rehab exercises as well as stretching and strength at night while I watch my latest obsession: Bosch.

And there you have it.  Tomatoes are coming in.  Running is coming along nicely.  Summer is here.  All is well.

Peachtree Week -2.5

The garden is in great shape and I'm excited for the first ripe tomatoes, which I assume will arrive in a couple of weeks.

I'd been going with a week-based countdown for Peachtree.  But, July 4 is on a Wednesday.  Which means, my Monday start of the week leaves me with less than half a week for the final one.  So, I'll call this check-in Week -2.5.

Also, it just feels like we're getting closer to the 4th of July at a faster rate than I can describe and I think that's because the seasonal change makes everything Summer feel much more imminent.

I had a great week.  23.87 miles of walking/hiking/running with 67% running including a nice solid 9 miler at 11:56, some speedwork in the 8s & 9s, and 2 strength mile intervals between biking to the trail and back with E in the mid 10s.  The hiking was unplanned, but a friend texted me the night before and asked if I wanted to go hike the Stanford Dish the next morning while she was unexpectedly in town.   YES!  I love combining my workouts with catching up with friends.

Cross-training is an area of improvement -- I'm making the time and effort to do some stretching and rolling to try to avoid returning to my left leg hamstring/glute insertion issue.  I also ramped up to a very hardcore (for me) 30 minutes of 1:30/1:30 jumprope with calisthenics (pushups, scissor kicks/crunches, side lunges, knee thrust planks, dips, front & back lunge leg extensions, side plank leglifts, deep squats/cross knee to elbow, jab-jab-cross; pelvic bridge) -- my goodness does this workout kill me.  Plus, I fit in a bonus 12 miles of random biking (I owe E for this one, he prefers to bike as his transit and so I opted in a few times when we were going somewhere together).

On the food side of things, last week was the second week in a row where we slept at home all week.  This means I can cook dinner every night and do bulk food prep for freezing, which is something I love to do.  I absolutely love having frozen pinto beans, hummus, and other healthy home-made treats available for defrosted use.

Yellow squash noodles

Saturday night, we had a typical "let's eat the random stuff left in the fridge" before we go to the Farmer's market meal.  The ingredient that needed to be used before it went bad?  Yellow summer squash.  Examining our other ingredients, I decided to go with a carbonara-inspired dish that wasn't really carbonara at all.

Yellow squash noodles with a carbonara-inspired preparation 

of ground turkey, garlic, eggs, milk, and pepperjack cheese 

topped with fresh-grated SarVecchio (parmigiana-style hard cheese from Wisconsin) 

Like many of my food experiments, it was... good.  Not great.  Definitely not carbonara.  But a good meal that used up the ingredients we had lying around in a warm and yummy way.  It had been a while since I'd cooked with squash noodles and I'd forgotten that even if you salt them and let them drain, they do continue to give off more water when heated.  Perhaps next time I'll bake them before tossing them in the saucepan.

Summer is Almost Here (Peachtree Week -5)

E and I visited my hometown last weekend and built rockets with the kids at my mom's party. The next day, we set them off.

The kids are almost out of school.

BBQ season has started.

The tomatoes are growing like crazy and have officially overtaken the kale as the tallest plants in the garden.

My todo list for this week includes planting cucumbers, squash, eggplants & peppers.

I am happy, happy, happy.  I love everything about Summer *except* running in the heat.

And, running is definitely getting harder for this high-heat-generating human as the bay area temperatures start to rise.  Being near Sacramento just made it even more difficult.

Last week's hardest effort by far was 2 miles @ 10:52/mile pace, uphill back home from the rocket launch with my (much) younger sister in the 90F heat of my hometown.

Weekly mileage was less than 20, but I fit in a 7 miler followed by some decent strides as well as 2 other easy runs at paces that used to be a little harder, so I'm feeling pretty good.

I'm very much enjoying the scheduled workouts for the 10Ks.  They are easier to fit in, and I'm focused more on improving my speed than I have been in several years, which is a nice change.  Fitness comes in many forms, but being able to hold faster paces is a type of fitness I'd let go over the last few years.  My mantra had become "just get the miles done" because I found that if I had the added stress of a distance and a pace, if I didn't hit both I didn't get the feeling of satisfaction that I craved from my running hobby.

Being able to focus on racing 6.2 miles means more speed and strength work, and all of the results that come from that.  I'd been struggling with whether I was better off registering for the half or the 10K for RNR San Jose, but when I started plotting what the training cycle would look like I did not like the idea of double digit long runs in August or September, so I'll be doing the 10K and decided to pick one or more half-marathons later in the fall.

Just Trying to be My Healthy Self (Peachtree Week -8)

I'm doing all (or most of) the right stuff, running-wise.  This feels great.  Good food.  Lots of sleep.  Reasonable increase in workouts.  Very slow decrease in body mass without too much hunger, but generally trending in the right direction.

It's also slow but steady progress on the fitness increase, which is the higher order goal.  I'm pushing myself pretty hard on pacing on the shorter stuff and I'm seeing some improvement.  But this leaves me wanting more!  This week's mileage was 26.08, with notable workouts including 1.75 miles w/E @ 9:50 pace; 6 medium effort with Jen on Saturday @ 11:27 (including 30 second walk breaks every mile); and 8X400 with 90s rest with the track group, all sub 9 min/mile except 1 @ 9:02 pace, which caused me to take a longer break so I could do the last 3 in the high 8s (last one was 8:29).  I also joined a friend at Cyclebar for a 60 minute ride one day, which was a fascinating experience -- first time I've ever worked out with earplugs.

This is what happens when tatsoi and mustard greens go to seed.

In terms of races -- I've now got 3 on the calendar.  Crissy Field parkrun May 26.  Peachtree Road Race July 4 in ATL in the heat and humidity (much more of a comparison against previous performances than a PR effort).  Pacing a friend at the Giant Race 10K in San Francisco on September 9.  So this leaves me with a choice.  Pick a Fall half and have just that as my one hard effort on the books, or try to find something shorter somewhere in there where I can do a strong effort... suggestions welcome!

Meanwhile, life is proceeding apace, as it does.  Guita keeps growing (she's getting huge!).  The tomatoes in the ground are thriving and the winter garden has completely bolted at this point (except the oh so lovely speckled romaine).  The tomato seedlings are so big that I need to transplant them so they can continue to thrive if I plan on delivering them through early June (which I do).

I am in love with the speckled romaine!  Delicious.  Beautiful.  Continually productive. Heat tolerant (hasn't bolted yet!)

In other news, one of the interesting side effects of quitting Facebook is that I'm reaching out and interacting via text, meals, IRL meetups, runs, etc. with more people than I used to do.  The human need to connect is still there, and I can't satisfy it with an easy FB answer now.  I think, overall, this is definitely one of the biggest improvements in my life since quitting FB.  I've been having text conversations, phone calls, and IRL interactions with folks I care about on a much higher frequency than I did before I opted out.  Of course, I've lost the light interactions with a larger group in exchange and I do miss that sense of knowing what's going on, but I think the decreased processing of those folks and their life is a net positive, even when weighed against the loss of knowledge of what they're up to.

Actually Back to Training (Peachtree week -9)

Friends with chickens are the BEST!

I finally hit a 25 mile week for the first time since January.  Even being at home, cooking good meals, and not being too busy with work, it's still been very difficult to safely get the mileage up to a respectable number without injuring myself (which I'm obviously very cautious about given the left leg issues in late '17 and early '18 and right shoulder dislocation in March).  But I finally did it!  And, as always, once you start to get into better shape, being in better shape and working hard felt great.

2 hours to make deviled eggs from scratch

(including homemade aioli)

15 minutes for them to be devoured at a party

Monday and Tuesday I had a visitor in town from New York (one of the string of many who grace our guest room and make us less sad about all the folks who've left the bay area).  She's a faster runner than me, but graciously slowed down and joined me for 2 miles in the mid 11s as her cooldown one day and 3 miles at 11:03 as an easy run for her and an almost medium effort run for me.

Wednesday, I headed out to meet my local running club on the trail.  They've moved things around and the long run is now on Wednesday AM, which is difficult for me, work-wise, driving 20 minutes to do a long run and then driving 20 minutes back afterwards makes the long run *much* longer than doing something on my own.  So, I decided I'd just drive to the closest entrance to the trail they run and jump in when they get there, around mile 2 for them.  My plan was to join the first runner and try to hang on as long as I can, then drop back and hang for at least 1.5 miles, before finally running back to the entrance on the trail solo.  It worked wonderfully.  I did drills and calisthenics 'til the first runner arrived and then I hung on for dear life for a mile in the low-mid 8 minutes/mile.  Yeah, I haven't done that in a while!  I slowed for a recovery mile and then did 10 X 1 min hard/1 min jog for a total workout of 3.27 miles plus 6 targeted calisthenics exercises.

Only about 30 garden beets left to harvest and eat or gift!

They are delicious.

Wednesday PM, Jen was in my neck of the woods for work and I convinced her to come visit instead of sitting in traffic during rush hour.  We headed back out to the trail and did a nice easy chatty 3 miles @ 11:31/mile (much like A, the previous visitor, she also slowed down for me, and I appreciated it).  Another milestone!  I don't think I've done a double workout in any form in years, and *certainly* I haven't done a double day of runs in at least 5 years.

Friday night dinner: camembert risotto and leftover beets and beetgreens.

Thursday afternoon, after a non-stop stressful day of work, I jogged to my new local track and busted out 5X800 with 3 minutes walking recovery (paces: 9:00; 9:12; 9:10; 9:28; 9:18).  I had such mixed feelings about this one.  It was so hard.  And the paces were so slow compared to my historical pacing.  But it felt so good.  It felt fast (because I haven't run fast in so long).  Did I mention it was hard?  Also, the training plan called for 6, but after the 5th interval, I decided I'd pushed myself harder than I had in a long time and I really didn't want to re-injure myself.  Coupled with Wednesday's double, I decided to take it easy.  So I jogged home and logged a total of 4.33 miles.

Good call, too, because my left knee was all twingy that evening while I just walked around the kitchen and cooked.  Clearly, I'd pushed it right to the edge.  I took Friday off completely.

Saturday, I'd hoped to run 9.  My last long run of 7 had been a decent effort in the low 12:00s about 10 days prior and I figured I should be able to do 9 without too much trouble.  Ummm... no.  My left knee was better, but still a little twingy, and, uh, running by effort meant that easy was 13:07/mile average pace.  So, yeah, I modified the plan, did a loop of 3 super slow miles and pushed the long run to Sunday.

And then, today, what do you think happened?  I headed out, feeling pretty good, but a little apprehensive about the knee.  I hit mile 2 at a sub 13/mile pace and started to think seriously about how I was feeling and whether I wanted to be out for that long.  I did a quick mental mileage total and realized I'd be jumping from two weeks of sub 20 to 29+ miles if I executed on my plan.  Also, it was sunny and, per the norm, we've got another guest at the house that I was neglecting.

So, I settled for 3.12 easy @ 12:12, followed by 10 X 30s hard/60s walk; and then a jogging cooldown for a total of 4.81 miles for the day and 25.57 miles for the week.

If I can keep this level of effort up for the full 9 weeks between now and Peachtree, I'll be thrilled.  I don't expect my pacing to improve egregiously, given that it's just going to keep getting hotter.  But, I do hope that if I put in a good late Spring and Summer block, I'll be in decent shape to race a half in the Fall once it cools off, which would be wonderful.

Fancy New Track

Look what my city installed 0.5 miles from my front door!

Just as I'm slowly getting back into running, I got the best gift from my city: a brand new track.

I pulled off a pretty good week.  Lots of home-cooked deliciousness.  Several days of shoulder weights -- every day that it gets stronger and feels more stable I feel more comfortable running.  This week included 5 days of running totaling 21.8 miles including a short solo effort at the new track to break it in.

Sunday AM, I jogged over to the new track where I did some drills and then busted out a 9:10 mile followed by 7X100 (26, 25, 24, 24, 24, 24, 24). 

The 9:10 mile was the reality check I needed.  Close to my sub 9 goal in the heat, but making it super obvious that my fitness still needs lots of work if I'm going to hit my 2018 running goal of Very Good on the Cooper Test. 

But those 24 second 100s (several actually in the 23s, just rounded up)? 

Oh, those were the positive inspiration my Des-winning-Boston-is-the-best-thing soul desired -- they signal my future fitness if I stay on the right track.  I haven't run that fast in a long time, and certainly haven't felt safe running that hard with my shoulder until very recently.  I floated on my cooldown and enjoyed the rest of the day with hopes of improved fitness.  The only race goal I currently have is the Peachtree Road Race, which is unfortunate in its heat and hills and humidity, but a good goal to train for, nonetheless, as finishing requires fitness that will translate well into a good fall effort when I can benefit from cooler temperatures.

It's time to start removing the winter greens and make room for the tomatoes. 

There are approximately 30 beets and at least 3 afternoons of blanching and freezing greens in my future.

In other news, Spring is officially on the hot slide into Summer and the winter greens are bolting.  I froze quite a bit this weekend and will likely put the tomatoes in the ground sometime this week.

I've never seen a cilantro bush before...

Fairbanks, revisited

The winter garden has been amazing this year. I haven't had to buy lettuce, chives, or dark leafy greens in months.

The week was mellow with an easy workload on the client side, so I gardened, cooked in, did laundry and got ready to head to Alaska. Friday, the night before we flew out, I realized we had gift guanciale (GIFT GUANCIALE, people -- you know you've made good life decisions when you have someone in your life who gifts you home-cured guanciale just because they love you):

Guanciale sautéed with garlic and onions.

In addition to the gift guanciale, I realized I had all the other ingredients for a perfect black lentil salad (fresh greens, garlic, onions, capers, tomatoes, kalamata olives, dijon mustard, lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, & black lentils) and I was so excited because normally I would have to put this on the meal plan and shop for at least one of the ingredients in order to enjoy it.  It was a thing of beauty:

We headed to Alaska for the first time in 2.5 years so I could lecture at the University, and so we could visit Arvay and D who live in a dry cabin.  In fairness, it's no longer fully dry, they have  a pump that can push purchased water to the sink, but it's limited with respect to pressure, and the only running water in the cabin goes to the sink, so there's an outhouse and showering and laundry have to be done in town (see the comments to this post for more info).  We stayed in a hotel in town, so we didn't get the full rural dry cabin experience except when we were dinner guests.

One of many perfect views from our snow hikes.

Visiting Fairbanks is always a great way to get a new perspective.  Weather (snow and ice in April!) and permafrost and lack of first world infrastructure make for a very different and much more planned and thoughtful way of day-to-day life.

Virtually untouched trails after a couple of inches of snow.

We spent Easter and the day after snow hiking on the trail system that is adjacent to their property.  And while they may not have all of the modern creature comforts, they do have an abundance of natural riches next door whenever they want to access it.

Does it get any more Alaskan than this?

One day we went to the local feed store just to check out the baby fuzzy ducklings, chickens, and turkeys.  OH! MY! GOODNESS!  I want baby fuzzies!

Beh-Beh Duckies!!!

I've been very fortunate on the book side of things lately, which means Arvay got a good pile from my luggage (we normally ship books back and forth). 

Arvay got a good book score!

I'll compose a full books post soon, but if any of these have been on your maybe list, all of them were great and I recommend them.

Soup #3, and Still Healing

Soup #3 is one of my default go-to options:  Lentil Soup.
 

Yellow Lentil Soup

Course 2: The last cherry tomatoes & sauteed shishitos from the garden.

Lentil Soup Recipe:

1 cup chopped onions (I used red 'cause I had one half cut, but ordinarily, I'd use yellow)
4 cloves garlic
1 chile
1/4 cup olive oil

1 cup yellow lentils
6 cups water/broth

(1 Cup leftover roasted carrot soup)

cumin (2 T?)
turmeric (1 T?)
lemon juice (1/4 C?)
white vinegar (splash)


1. Sautee first group of ingredients 'til onions are translucent, stirring constantly.

2. Add 2nd group of ingredients, stir, bring to a boil, reduce to a low simmer, cover with a lid, and set kitchen timer for 35 minutes.

3. At 35 minutes, taste.  If more cooking time could be used, add time and continue to simmer, otherwise, move to step 4 after turning off the heat.

4. Blend all ingredients with a stick blender until smooth.  Taste.  Add leftover soup if you are planning to add it and re-puree.  Taste.

5. Based on taste test from #4, add ingredients from last group to taste.

6. Let soup cool for 10-15 minutes. Serve warm.  Enjoy!


On the workout front, the ankle is slowly but surely healing.  Last week the mileage totaled 16.76 including a very exciting 3.06 miles of jog/walking with my sister-in-law.  I can jog.  My ankle can handle the load.  I can't jump without extreme pain (thanks to tabatas, I know this), and I'm apprehensive on uneven terrain -- so we'll see where I end up with the planned 8 mile trail run with the bay area running folks this weekend...

Today, starting a new week where I  have 75% mobility, I did 3 tabata workouts, with the jumping modified (because my ankle still can't jump).  I also did 15 minutes on the elliptical on level 9 (1.06 miles) and 15 minutes on the treadmill including 2 X 0.25 @ 10 min/mile 2% incline with incline walking heartrate recovery.  Overall, the workout felt like a good effort, and I feel comfortable that I'm headed in the right direction.  The next big test will be yoga... Wish me luck.

Soup #2, and healing

Soup #2 turned out pretty darn well, despite the fact that I actually burnt some of it and still need to scrub like crazy on my pot to get it back into a functional state.

Carrot leek garlic onion soup leftovers, just as good the next day.

1 leek, sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
3 T olive oil
1 bunch green onions, chopped (I had 'em lying around, I figured why not)
1 shallot, chopped
3 garden chiles, minced


1 bag baby carrots
6 cups water
3 cubes boullion

1/2 cup white vinegar
2-3 T lemon juice
garlic salt
turmeric
cumin
black pepper

1. Sautee first group of ingredients until the onions, leeks, and shallots are translucent
2. Add carrots, quickly sautee and then add water and boullion, bring to a boil, lower to a simmer, simmer for 45 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes or so and adding water (don't get on a conference call and forget to add water for 15+ minutes or you will burn the bottom layer of the soup).
3. Turn off the heat when the carrots are tender enough to easily break with a spoon.  Puree with a stick blender.  Taste.  Add spices from the last group of ingredients to taste.

In other news, I worked in the garden today to start taking down plants (since it's California, they are still green, just greedily sucking nutrients from the soil even though they are no longer producing much fruit due to short days and cold).

Lo, the final harvest of the year:

In running news, I can walk without pain.  I did end up with some purple bruising below the outside of my ankle, but with the daily icing and elevation it's been getting better.  I've been adding a mile a day and drawing the alphabet with my toes (still sore, but not terribly so).  Today, I've got one more walking mile to hit 4+ and tomorrow, for thanksgiving, I'm going to try some jog/walking.  Wish me luck. 

Baby Steps (and Soup #1)

It's soup season and leftovers mean tomorrow night's dinner is done!

Last week's mileage?  20.02.  Woo Hoo.  Back Over 20.

Portion ran (no matter how slowly)?  46%

Portion sub 9 min/mile?  9%

Other fitness efforts?  I made it back to the yoga studio after 13 weeks away.

IT HURT.

Not so much *during* class, but afterwards, I was sore in places I'd forgotten I have muscles for at least 3 days.

So, the hope is to average one visit to the studio a week for the next 5 weeks since I've got very little travel lined up.  Wish me luck.

In running goals, I've got a trail run coming up in 2 weeks with some local running ladies.  The stated goal is 8 miles, but frankly, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to pull that off.  I'll just rebuild fitness as best I can and go join to enjoy the activity as much as possible.  In terms of actual race events, I've got a few potential trail runs on the calendar in 2015, but the only thing I'm registered for is the SF Chocolate 15K in January.  Most likely, I'll use that as a springboard to prep for Kaiser, and then Oakland. 

Other random fitness goal?  Soup. One of my favorite things about fall is soup.

So, I'd like to make a healthy soup from scratch at least once per week for the next 5 weeks.  The first offering?  Tofu, Bok Choy, Mushroom soup.

It was good, if a bit spicier than expected due to some extra-hot peppers from the garden.

2 T cooking oil (I used saffola)
1 medium white onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon ginger powder (didn't have any root in the fridge)
2 insanely hot garden chiles  (next time, I'll likely taste each chile)
1 cup carrot match-sticks

soy sauce 1-2 T
mirin 1 T
rice wine vinegar 1-2 T
sesame oil 2 T
4-6 cups water

1 bunch bok choy (adult), chopped
1-2 cup(s) sliced mushrooms
1 package firm tofu, cubed

salt

1. Sautee first group of ingredients together until the onions are translucent.
2. Add second group of ingredients to the sauteed veggies and bring to a boil.
3. Add third group of ingredients, stir, lower to a simmer, add a pinch of salt.  Come back in 5 minutes and taste broth, add more salt if appropriate. 
4. Turn off heat after the tofu, bok choy, and mushrooms have been simmering for 10 minutes.

(Serves 4 -- or dinner for 2 nights for 2)

Enjoy!  (And if you have a favorite soup, please recommend it!)

The first week

I had a birthday last week.  It was a fairly important one.

It put me in a pensive mode.

I've been thinking about aging, and life, and my goals, and whether I'm happy with where I am.  The first week of a new year in my life.  Firmly in or on the cusp of what they call "middle age."  In general, I've decided I'm actually quite happy.  Happier than I have any right to be.  When I think about the millions of potential lives I could have been born into and lived, I feel very, very grateful for this one.

E made dinner for my birthday -- Caprese from our garden with truffle oil and caviar.

My Junior Attorney took me out for Persian food lunch.  So delicious!

The almost blue moon view from our Thursday night gathering of friends who come to us and BBQ was gorgeous.

A college girlfriend invited myself and another college girlfriend over for deviled eggs and farm fun.  It had been 17 years since the three of us had last seen each other.

The host has gorgeous chickens.

Her egg storage had over 300 eggs.  We barely made a dent.

Baby Goats are the cutest things!

In my pensive state, I didn't do much high effort running last week.  Total mileage for the week was 26.38, most of it walking, although I did fit in a 2 mile run with E, which is always a bit more high effort than I expect since his legs are so much longer than mine.  I did a bit of gardening and quite a bit of enjoying healthy food at home.  The lack of running effort is about to change, as my spreadsheet informs me that it's now 7 weeks to my target 10K -- so, there will be *some* quality workouts in the coming weeks, if only out of necessity.

And with that, 1 week of a new year of my life is done.  Voila.