Category Archives: Blog

Musings, momentary insights and sometimes mundane details of life as a 50 something single female at the beginning of the 21st Century.

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Taking my breath away…the beauty of connections

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Last week I was plowing along at my usual break neck speed wondering why I just couldn’t seem to find the motivation to train, write, pretty much do ANYTHING besides the most basic housecleaning and my nursing shifts but still not taking the hint and slowing down enough to pay attention, when BANG! life literally took my breath away.

I awoke the first time a little after 9 PM, because I was cold and went to check the thermostat; but it was running fine, said 82 degrees so figured I was running a small fever and took some Tylenol, put a cover over me and went back to bed.  Some back story here might be appropriate. I  have chronic episodes of pain and low-grade fever that are related either to some genetic predisposition to autoimmune anomalies or as a long term side effect of the treatments that kept me alive. I am not sure which, the doctors are not sure which, and I am as I was told actually “an incredibly healthy obese woman for a patient with my history”, and finding the cause is not nearly as important to me as having a happy, functional life.  Anyway feeling run down, minor aches and pains or an elevated temperature are not things that send me anywhere normally except my medicine chest and back to bed, after which I wake up, take my veggie smoothie and go train.

This was not one of those times. I had fever dreams all night about fires and suffocating and woke to find I really couldn’t breathe. Dressing myself winded me and just taking a normal breath hurt, let alone laughing or yawning. I wasn’t coughing, nor did I have any upper respiratory things going on more than the normal Arizona summer allergies.  The symptoms didn’t add up to me but I knew I needed to finally give in and see a doctor so I headed to Williamsfield clinic, who triaged me and sent to the emergency room.

I won’t go into how long my day was at the emergency room, available beds, staffing and the incredible load any VA hospital contends with means I was there most of the day. So long story short, my X-ray showed pneumonia. Admission was the first option, but I hate hospitals and they were (are always) short beds and I begged to go home, I assured my doctor I had the friend support to be safely supervised and I would return immediately if I worsened.  The ED got me my meds, some high tech antibiotics, breathing support, and pain killers and I went home.

My friend who was with me that day was a saint and support and kept making me laugh (maybe just to get back at me, cuz it sure hurt when I laughed). Both our electronics ran out of juice, and there wasn’t much in the way of healthy food choices, but the day could have been worse, after all I got to go home. Once home, my friends and family rallied and I was better taken care of than any hospital could have done. I was/am thankful all the amazing love, support, soup and time.

Which is about where my gratitude stopped. See, I wasn’t going to be released to work for a week, and well I am barely self-supporting, and I like to think of myself as indispensable, and I would be missing 3 days of work.  Actually, the truth is, it is hard to find a subsititute nurse if I am not there, and the family truly needs full-time nursing, that’s why they have us.  I also care about my patients and like the family I serve, and I have a strong sense of responsibility. If I say I will be somewhere, I expect myself to be there.

Then there was that whole thing of my  human “doing”ness  rather than my human “being”ness. I was actually too sick to do anything. So I got a little whiny on FaceBook, and more than a little “why”ney during my morning meditation/chat with my Higher Power. I had just gotten the best ever medical news so why this, why me, why now, why can’t I ever just get ahead a little before my finances wobble again….bleah, bleah, bleah. I really went on and on about money, and my kids (who are grown and awesome but can always use your prayers too) and just when I was about to work myself into a full blown pity party I read this blog http://razzzberries.blogspot.com. Yeah. HUMBLED!

And my self-pity is silenced as I stop thinking about myself and start praying for some one else.

Big ol’ reminder of how incredibly lucky I am, and if the radiation damage to my lungs means I am more susceptible to this pneumonia kind of thing, then I am putting on my big girl panties and being more cautious, but also realizing stuff happens. Good stuff and bad stuff, and it really isn’t about me.

I am blessed. I healed quickly, I usually do. I know a small part of this is my cumulative life changes from all the good advice over the years. I eat healthy (primarily organic vegan), I exercise, I am less obese than this time last year; another part is all the threads of love that hold and balance me like a kite in flight; but there is another part of my incredible resilience that I just call “Miracle” . That part is the result of all the prayers, spells, meditations, candles and energy work sent on my behalf over the last couple decades from multiple people of multiple faith paths, and for them I am grateful.

Laurie will be there now each morning, along with you, if I know your name when I talk to the Universe; there with my sons and their triumphs and times of poor judgement; there with my daily stranger and those who I struggle to forgive or be forgiven by; there with me and my gratitude and resolves.  I hope you all continue the favor for me because whether you believe in the divine or just in the physics of energy, your words of encouragement and healing have changed my life, allowed my life; but just this month if you don’t have time for an addition, let Laurie take my place in your prayers, because I would really like her to have as much magic as I have had.

 

P.S. For those with questions about pneumonia click here

http://www.medicinenet.com/pneumonia/article.htm

P.P.S.

Here is Laurie’s blog  link again.

http://razzzberries.blogspot.com

Blog, Licking Your LIterary Labito

Space Pirates start your engines; A bit longer review of Alexander Outland: Space Pirate by G.J. Koch

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So a few further musings about Captain Alexander Napolean Outland.  I really didn’t like him at first, but then I must explain that roguish womanizers are not on my list of favorite people in real life or on the printed page. In fact, Mr. Outland made me muse that maybe the author Ms. Koch has been to one too many geek conventions with her Alien series, hopelessly warping her perception of men into caricatures of male post-adolescent horn-dogs.  I still can’t say I really like Alexander, but his misadventures were like a big old, bag of salty Lays potato chips, I just couldn’t stop reading, and I bet neither will you.

Also, don’t be surprised if the voice you hear narrating this Outlandish adventure is a cross between the original honorable outlaw Humphrey Bogart and either Harrison Ford or Nathan Fillion.  Just as many of the great sci-fi movie icons owe their character traits to earlier hard-boiled detective novels and gritty western television heroes, recognizable bits of Hans Solo, Captain Kirk, and Captain Fancy Pants surface in this honorable space rapscallion.  The female characters in the book are predictable Gini with a tiny twist in the mechanics of the co-starring she-male but both are built to keep men thinking with their tiny brains but capable of using their own; sort of brilliant Bond girls with secrets. As in any respectable anime, dungeon crawl or comic book team we round out the main characters with a sidekick and a more-than-he-seems old man

This is not a science fiction story that wants to change anything about how the reader sees the world or treats his/her fellow life forms.  Talking at all about the actual plot in this review could detract from the rumpusy ride.  Other than the nourishment all actual reading brings to the brain by its very process, there is  absolutely nothing even remotely nutritious about this literary dish.  This latest and greatest Koch novel is all spicy snack food that is consumed quickly and leaves the reader licking the salt off their metaphorical fingers and looking for more!

http://ginikoch.com/

Blog, Licking Your LIterary Labito

Take Me to Your Reader, some musing on books and snail mail

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Words are a powerful thing. The right word at the right time can change things. Two of my top ten things in the whole wide world involve words, books and snail mail. First lets talk about a couple new books.

Yesterday two potential bestsellers broke shelf, “Red Shirts” by John Scalzi and “Alexander Outland” by G.J. Koch http://ginikoch.com/ both are funny and infinitely readable, chock full of  geek insider humor that will still be funny even if you don’t get the pop culture reference.  Scalzi has arrived already with “Fuzzy Nation”  (his last book for those who don’t follow his daily penning at http://whatever.scalzi.com/) hitting the NYT Hardcover list in its first week of sales. I don’t feel the need to tell you much about him or his book as so many others have said it more eloquently than I could. Let me promise you that if you can find a copy of this book, and buy it, you will need to make space to read it through to the end; because it’s that good.

Ms. Koch on the other hand is still on her way, struggling out of the cocoon of genre publishing that has nurtured and hampered many the nascent author. Her series, that began with “Touched by an Alien,” is a remarkable example of a developing voice, easily relegated by booksellers who haven’t read it to “disposable genre fiction,” the language and character development is always a little more, and each one improves a bit on the last. Her Alien series are respectable “on base”  swings of her mighty pen, but Alexander Outland is her first “out of the park” hit. Here is hoping readers take notice.

However neither of these books was the most important printed words I read yesterday, nor was it beginning my next book “Praying for Strangers,” or the brief reread of favorite passages in “Tutu: Authorized” before I had to return it to my library.  The most important thing I read yesterday came in a small envelope from Bremerton, Washington. It was simply a snail mail from my neice.

My neice is all and all a pretty remarkable woman. She thinks for herself, makes primarily good decisions, and more importantly always seems to learn from her other kind so rarely makes the the same mistake twice. I don’t actually talk to her much but I hear about her adventures, accomplishments and challenges from her mother, my sister.  I am proud to call her family. Yesterday she made me feel like she was proud to call me family as well.

Even though compassion is my highest ideal, there are only a few things I can say I truly love as evidenced by my daily choices, those are  books, family, friends, music, cooking, spirituality and snail mail, ordered by how much time I spend for each. (I am learning to love exercise, gardening, ecology and financial responsibility but those are a whole other blog topic each.) I love books. I love getting books (hence the jackpot feel of the Mother’s day Kindle Fire  and all the classics now available at my fingertips for free). I especially love to give books to people I  love, and I spend serious time selecting the books I give. I have to like the book itself, have to believe the book and message will amuse, entertain and enlighten the recipient a bit.  Years ago I made such a choice and gave my niece “The Paper Bag Princess” by Robert Munsch. I also love to write letters and send cards.

Lately I have been feeling a bit like maybe I shouldn’t give books anymore, and this week for the first time in years I didn’t spend Monday morning filling out cards and notes to pop in the outgoing mail. The world it seemed to me had moved on, and I was a bit of a relic to still want to give books, write letters and send cards all the time. Worse than seeming like no one cared, it seemed that I was being a bother or perhaps insensitive, that my penchant for sharing words, mine or others, was more about meeting my own needs than attending to someone else’s.

Yesterday a thank-you note came with a letter inside, I hope she won’t mind me including a brief quote since I am not using her name here, “I will always be grateful for you giving me the book The Paper Bag Princess. Your timing was spectacular and I needed the message at the time. I still LOVE that book. I still pull it out from time to time and read it. The message in that book (and the fact that someone gave it to me, which made it feel even more special), it helped me not only accept myself but be okay with enjoying who I was too.”

I started to cry when I got to that part, because those few words were exactly what I needed to hear, too. There was more to it as well. I give her credit for what beautiful waves of personal growth she made from tiny ripples my words and a gift of words started. She made her own ripple yesterday, her note helped me accept and enjoy who I am too.

I don’t make my living with words anymore, I don’t regret when I did, but I quit writing professionally because the difference I was making then was not the kind of difference I wanted to make. Words are powerful.  My business card says “Wordsmith” because Probably words are the most powerful tool in my life. I still write daily; blogs, charts, cards, letters, poems, recipes, journal entries, goals, shopping lists, etc. Sometimes I even write professionally. I read incessantly. I don’t make my living with words, but words make up my life.

Thanks to a few well placed words from my niece I will continue my snail mails and book giving. I might have anyway without her, but the fact her letter arrived on the same day I was journaling about whether I should or not, seems more than coincidental.

Words are powerful, today I choose to use mine for good.

 

 

Blog, Suburban Homesteading by a member of the Hopelessly Citified Brown-thumb League

How Green is my Valley, or is that just the reflection off my face.

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Ok, not actually a valley,  more like a 10 ft by 2 ft stretch of dirt and a few odd containers. And, yes, I am very nauseated this morning, been happenning too often of late. If there was a womb at the Inn, I would think I was pregnant. But I am not, so lets talk about my garden instead.

At the beginning of the season I started seeds for Daikon,  Red Winter Kale, Broccoli, Brussel Sprouts, Swiss Chard, Summer Squash, Winter Squash (Spaghetti Squash) , Cantaloupe, Yellow Dandelion,  Cucumbers, Basil, Mint, and Arugula. (I also planted a bunch of sunflower seeds directly in the left side of my garden and wild flower mix on the right from which one one sunflower actually grew and is now thriving.LOL)

I mixed 1/3 compost with 2/3 organic potting soil and carefully placed one to two seeds in each little starter pot, watered every third day and waited and watched them sprout. Then I watched my mint get invaded by spider mites and die, and my Dandelion just never really take off and grow, but all the rest got pretty and green and ready for a real garden.

When it came time to  plant them in my purchased community garden, my plot was already planted with someone else’s plants, I could get no answer form the garden custodian, so I took them back home and I decided to try them (again) in the raised dirt garden section at the back of my yard. I had tried my first gardening experiment there last year. The dirt was so dead there weren’t even any bugs and I bought some organic fertilizer but my brown thumb and the dead dirt won out and everything died within a week of transplant.

Well, almost everything, my aloe although not thriving did come back and one plant actually bloomed this year.

So, back to this year. I reviewed my desert gardening book, the stuff I’d learned in class and I carefully spaced and transplanted everything into the left side of the garden.  I planted on the left because over the course of the fall and winter I had been cutting in my compost as it ripened and I knew it was working, life was returning to this dead, dead soil because I would see the occasional worm when I played in the dirt.  I was really proud of all my work and the plants that survived the transplant looked pretty good. (Um, Citified Brown Thumb struck here as well, my broccoli and brussel sprouts just withered up and died.)

Then a roadrunner AND a local feral kitty (both of whom have not been back for three weeks, hopefully due to heat not predators) both decided it was their duty to tease my dogs.

First came the cat, strutting back and forth along the back wall just out of dog reach. I am sure he was taunting them in a voice only dogs can hear, or maybe it was hte message of his staccato tail swish. The dogs could not resist and gave chase, back and forth, both 110 lb dogs. They had made  two complete trips through the middle of the muddy plants (of course I had just watered) before I could get them out of the garden and back on the lawn. I tried to set things up and hoped for the best. Some of the plants were gonna make it when the road runner stopped by.

My garden was destroyed. Every plant was broken and dug up. Partly the devastation was my fault because the whole coyote, roadrunner skit happening in my back yard had me rolling on the ground laughing too hard to sound to serious about the dogs stopping. And believe me, that bird was never in any danger.

I accepted my gardening defeat at this point, leveled the soil again and consoled myself with harvesting my first real crop ever from my Arugula which I container garden, so was unaffected.

The once upon a time garden continued to be watered because I use an old fashioned circular style sprinkler which waters some places by accident as well as the intended target, plus it was still spring and raining occasionally.

Well, what do you know right after one of the good storms I noticed things started to grow. Maybe they were seeds that didn’t germinate, or maybe they were the old root systems just hanging in and re-establishing growth. Funny thing was, now I didn’t know what any of the plants were, because my Lab and Retriever had truly rearranged all the dirt and plants. I pulled the ones I knew were weeds and waited to see what would happen.

Funny it is that my accidental garden seems to be my most successful to date. When the serious heat hit, my friend Regina helped me lay down a small drip circuit and currently at least one cantaloupe, a half dozen summer squash, and a winter squash or two are growing and ripening in my little garden. A million little bugs and I are sorting out which ones help and which one hurt, the ground squirrels have feasted regularly on all but the squash leaves but I have still harvested Chard, Collard, Arugula and radish twice. I have even shared a salad of the Arugula and a harvest of greens.

The chard and collards are done for the season I think, but what do I know.

Nothing when it comes to gardening, obviously. Like most things in my life, the best stuff happens when I show up, follow directions and release the result.

My arugula was just thinned and sprayed for the spider mite/flies that love my inside plants and I am starting my pumpkins inside now for transplant in a month so they are nice and ready in Oct, November.

I keep taking pictures of my melon, knowing a lot can happen between now and the table but enjoying the process.

And learning, ever so slowly by failing forward to become a successful suburban Homesteader.

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I’m Holding out for a Hero…..

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“Where have all the good men gone

And where are all the Gods?

Where is the street-wise Hercules to fight the rising odds?”

Well this week-end a whole lot of them are in Downtown Phoenix filling up the convention center and spilling out into the Hyatt and Rennaissance hotels, as well as littering the streets with costumes ranging from Spielberg set-ready Mandalorian Mercenaries to not even wearable in schloch sea monsters with a lot of Goth, Steampunk, anime and even Disney princesses dotting the scene.

Inside at long rows of piled and pillage-worthy tables media heroes will sign autographs and get pictures taken with you.  Amazing and well known authors like Peter S. Beagle, James A. Owen, and Michael Stackpole (who still doesn’t recognize me, LOL, but I am over it, my ego at least is healthier, and he certainly seems friendly and less full of himself as well, and he has some talent) meet, greet and autograph for fans wonderful novels on real paper. Artists and costume designers and movie weapons handlers and other names found in press packets and magazines and online blogs sign every imaginable kind of geektastic souvenir. All these people that make the magic of imagination happen for me and hundrerds of others are my heroes. They made my life bearable when reality was tough, and added the frosting when my life was a piece of cake.

And well, there are so many comics and characters walking around and available in purchasable formats there I could go broke just buying a smidgen of the cheapest things.

But my real heroes at this convention are the “invisibles” there. The young men and women, or sometimes not so young, who have ventured to their first event ; the ones who come year after year just to listen and learn and dream of the day they will be signing autographs;  and especially the handlers and table setters and all those with Tardis badges who actually make the event happen. You are all my heroes. Although both are needed to make sense of that old timey wimey, I have always been more fascinated with the cogs inside than the hands on the clock.

After about 7 hours at the opening I was exhausted, but I really I sort of wish I could be there again today. Still, I have a different kind of hero to serve today so I will go don my nursing scrubs and go be Robin to the Mom’s Batman, truly wish there was a female superhero/sidekick relationship I could use for this metaphor….hmmm. Maybe someone needs to write one, or maybe its already out there, in the aisles of Phoenix Comicon waiting for me to discover it on Sunday.

If you aren’t doing anything yet this week-end, go buy a day pass and bring some cash. Buy a couple comics, go to the Hyatt and try some new games, get your picture taken with the Mandalorian Mercs or R2D2.

But whatever you do this week-end, be a hero.

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Choosing as an integral part of success or Green Warrior needs food

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Math and music are as magical to me as poetry, elves and unicorns.  As a youth this meant conversation about my future included these three things, a statement that I was gifted in all areas so could easily achieve academically anything I wanted, a question about what I wanted to do or be, and then a frowning reference to being practical since I was, after all, a girl and poor so wanting to be a Doctor or Nurse should have a better back up plan.

With that option gone, I could never decide “what I wanted most” and so slid from one  opportunity to another, mostly in the fields of arts and communications, with a side trip into the military and hard science, and raised my sons holding multiple jobs at a time, being who each job wanted, writing, dressing, etc. for the part; not so much choosing as becoming what was chosen for me. Mind you I am not complaining, I have had incredible opportunites and expereinces.

At the turn of the century, after some years of therapy and a few Oprah inspired journaling experiements, I started making choices based on what I liked and who I wanted to be and I became a Nurse.  I love it.

But now I have decided with my new lease on life to finally go back to college, be enrolled by 2013 and get my BS (Okay, to all you seniors out there who applied for and got into college, you rock, this process is tougher than I thought!) and I am trying to choose my major. I have committed to myself that whatever I choose, I will finish.  I have narrowed it down to three possible degrees.

I will never get a BS, if I don’t have a concrete goal and stick with it, but I really don’t like choosing. There are so many classes I want to take, so many areas I am interested in and enjoy learning about, I want to take them all. Unfortunately that has been my approach to college which is why I have so many credit hours and no degree. Not making that mistake again. I will pick a major, plan my classes and stick to the plan. Trying to grab everything offered, leaves me in the end with nothing.

Remember the Aesop Fable about the dog and the bone? So I am choosing, and applying, first at ASU, then if rejected there, I will try other options, I will keep you posted on the progress. Anyway, I find myself resenting the need to choose.

I like it even less in my daily life when I must choose where to spend energy, money, time.  My favorite game of imagination is “If I had all the money and time I needed…” If something comes up repeatedly in this dreaming exercise I add it to my bucket list and find ways to make it happen.  How to make it happen is to accumulate appropriate choices.

Yup, just like in a video game, the outcome is dependent on my choices. How I approach each encounter determines what weapons I arrive with at the Big Boss of my dream.  Utilizing John Scalzi’s recent incredibly humorous (and accurate) metaphor http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/ , I get to play on a fairly low difficulty setting since I am an American born white female. Although I do know I do not play at the easy setting since I am now past 50, not attractive, not married, and still female,  the setting was certainly much higher while still a single mom with kids at home.

Ways to gear up for this quest I am attempting includes maximizing my physical well-being with continued exercise and weight loss, managing my chronic pain without pharmaceuticals, making financial and professional decisions with the long range goals in mind, and finally sometimes saying no to things I really, really want to do that are side quests or repeats or just beyond the energy levels of my current character.

I am having to face one of those decisions today. I had two graduations and attendance at a music performance planned for today, but life had different plans in mind. So I won’t be leaving my house after all today. I will instead stay home and regenerate so I can do Bootcamp in the morning, visit with old friends at Phoenix Comicon this week-end, all while still fulfilling the most important quest this week-end that is my job as a nurse.

I am choosing success, but I don’t actually have to like it at the moment.

 

 

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The Red Shoes

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The best year EVAR (not a misspelling but a Geektastic superlative) continues with todays shopping trip to GoodWill with my DIL.  I brought home very lightly used awesomeness. First are some new shoes (Red Maryjane Skims, retail stores have them currently on sale for 50$, regular price 99$), a pair of straight leg jeans (Macy’s carries this jean for 60$, same pair on sale for 39.99$) and four tops rock. The Ann Taylor is  only available at AnnTaylor.com in other colors but retails there for 48$ and the silk kimono style from Lane Bryant is exquisite although not currently available so have to estimate by other similar tops on sale that it started at 99$ and clearance between 49$ to 69$. Then there is a comfortable cotton striped boat neck tee and a teal flowered tee that both are originally form Kohls so could have found them as low as 20$ each.

And what did I pay in total for this exciting wardrobe makeover? $35! And that even included a small donation>

Yep. I will try to add pictures later.

Oh and my hair was styled today by the Hair Ninja.

So I should be rockin’ it pretty this week-end at Phoenix Comicon.  At least the Thursday and Sunday portions (I work the other two days.)

As I said, best year EVAR continues!

 

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Post time: and the horses are in the gates…

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Not only do seasons change but how we measure them alters as time progresses. I realized this morning that Mother’s Day, my best ever I might add, had come and gone and I didn’t even know who won the Kentucky Derby.  There was a time, back when I still had a Mother, that May was as much about that race as it was about flower baskets and hand drawn cards with couplet sentiments.

I was often at risk for getting knocked about a bit this time of year for leaving evidence that I had perused the sports pages before my father, he slept in on Sunday, only arising in time to drag us all to whatever church of god or academia he was worshipping at that week. Horse racing was at its peak in spring, and baseball had just begun. These were the only two sports I cared to read about so fall and winter I was safe since then it was only the funny papers and the World News that interested me, and those could wait until the afternoon when they were tossed to us children strewn about the living room floor. But this time of year all the bits of really important details missed by not being allowed to actually glue my transistor radio to my ear were available in the big, beautiful Sunday paper’s sports section, and so the day I am remembering I was up before any of them.

I sat reading in the big red overstuffed chair waiting for the  auspicious “thump” of arrival and then quietly opened the front door. Funny thing about parental hearing, it has a superhuman acuteness for those actions progeny wish to conceal; so like Elmer Fudd, I was vewy, vewy quiet. We had a working television that day, a sometimes thing, I turned on the morning cartoons to lay sound cover. They always started Sunday morning with these Christian dramas, then maybe there was Gumby or Felix the Cat, or maybe Mighty Mouse. I don’t remember anything after the drama as I was thoroughly buried in newsprint Nirvana until others began stirring  and The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show started.

By than I had already devoured every tasty detail offered on everything from the situation in Panama to the stealing of  “The Little Mermaid” statue in Copenhagen (if I found out when that happened I could place today’s root memory, I also remember that whatever year I am channeling was the year I met my first mention of Mandela) and then with religious reverence opened the sports page. That year I remember “Northern Dancer” won and I didn’t get to watch it. (Ha! Thanks to Google I realize I am thinking of 1964). The next year it was “Lucky Debonair” and by then I had read every Marguerite Henry in the library. I don’t remember any winner’s names after that although I still followed the Triple Crown until my adolescents and Secretariat, but everyone knows him because he was the horse that didn’t quit even when all the odds were against him.

I watched the race Secretariat won but by then my time measuring the year by the races had passed.  My plastic horses were no longer daily fed grass in shoe box stables. Time had marched on and I was immersed in Lothlorien, Burrough’s many “found” manuscripts or toiling and cavorting in Dicken’s  England, and longing for life to hurry up and arrive.  Not realizing it had, every morning, every minute because everything changes, not just seasons, and time passes quickly, even when it seems to us it is holding still.

The Kentucky Derby is called the most exciting two minutes in sports.  I Googled the replay this morning and this years race lives up to the hype, http://www.kentuckyderby.com/news/videos/kentucky-derby-2012-replay, I’ll Have Another finds his stride in the final stretch and comes from behind to take the race by a nose. My life this Mother’s Day kind of feels like that. A lifetime of running hard and always holding the ignominious position of seventh to ninth, not last, not losing, but not in the running for the roses. Somehow this year I have found my stride and have come from behind to win by a nose.  I am grateful for today, but trying just as hard to not label this consolation “good” as I strove to not label the challenges, the desolations, “bad” (yes, I am reading St. Ignatious brought on by rewatching “Joan of Arcadia”.)

No telling how tomorrow’s race will go, no need to know, in this moment. This now, I am grateful to be still running. And just like the horse “I”ll Have Another”, I may be the focus of the spotlight, but the moment itself was the cumulative result of a multitude of efforts. I cannot take credit for my win but I am certainly enjoying the moment, before it passes.

Today I measure the seasons by the weather. I am learning to grow green things and so I am more aware of the intensity of sun and the scarcity of moisture; and I am caring for a home and a car owner so I measure the passage of time by how long it is till I need to change my oil, my A/C filters, or add power to the meter. I no longer have plastic horses, I get my news paper on line and my mother and my father remain only as memories and character quirks in my siblings, myself and our children.  Much has changed, but I am still here, and my day has begun.

It’s Post time.

And the horses are in the gates…..how will I run today’s race…

Blog, Suburban Homesteading by a member of the Hopelessly Citified Brown-thumb League, The Annals and Recipes of Sally Frye, Triathlon Training

Delicious and Nutritious breakfast porridge recipe and my protein powder preference quandry

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A healthy day begins with a healthy breakfast. I know this not only from the plethora of pointed press I have been force fed or voluntarily consumed about nutrition, but also from personal experience. In fact, this is perhaps the only nutrition fact that has remained consistent in my 50+ years of trying to eat right and eat well.

In my life of battling unwanted weight gain and episodes of malaise, general joint pain and depression, as well as acknowledged opportunities to find healthy options during life altering illness, I have seen the rise and fall and rise again of low carb, low fat, low sugar, liquid food substitutes, calorie counting, and cabbage (or other single healthy food) heavy diets. I have been taught four food groups, food pyramids, glycemic index, inflammation ratings (IF), and ONQI ratings, and the latest (and I think at this time greatest) ANDI score; and through them all the need for a good breakfast was always clearly stated regardless of how that “good” was defined.

Personal experience also reinforces the belief that breakfast makes everything better. I am more energetic, able to cope with pain, frustration and the good things in daily life with a nutritious breakfast. So what does a good breakfast look like for me?

I  find myself less likely to make poor food choices later in the day if I start my day with at least 14 grams of protien, a bit of fiber, and coffee. (Getting enough carbs is never an issue for me.)Ok, maybe the coffee just wakes me up enough to make my breakfast, but I can’t imagine breakfast without it.  Since I am training to compete again in a triathlon, weight loss is a priority for me as well and I restrict my daily calories to 1800. (If I ever doubt the benefit of 1800 calories a day, I just carry my dogs 35 pound bag of food around for a few minutes and I am again convinced that the best thing I can do for my knees, hips, feet and race times is shave another 35 pound off the old body. My doctors are in complete agreement on this fact as well. At 5’5″ I am currently weighing in at 218 lbs, definitely obese by medical standards.)

A side note here for those who privately express horror at my telling my actual honest weight, I think lying about it is even funnier. I mean look at me, this is obviously my weight. Yes my weight makes me uncomfortable, therefore I am doing something about it. Lying about my weight would change nothing. However, telling the truth motivates me to face and change that which makes me uncomfortable.

Anyway  porridge and smoothies are my two favorite breakfasts.  One fast, one more preparation intense, they both include the protien I need and the flavor I crave as well as other important nutrients.

Quinoa Porridge, 30 minute prep/cook time. 3 servings

2 cups filtered water, or 1 cup filtered water and 1 cup organic apple cider

1 cup quinoa (I like Trader Joe’s Red)

2/3 cup dried fruit (I like it with dried cranberries, dried cherries, dried blueberries, or chopped prunes)

2 tsp fresh grated ginger

healthy dash of nutmeg, or cinnamon or cardamom (only use one and experiment with fruit and spice combinations. I like cardamom with cranberries, nutmeg with prunes and cinnamon with cherries and for cranberries and tart cherries I use apple juice)

1/2 cup soy, rice or almond milk

Place everything but the fruit and milk in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Lower to slow simmer and cook for 12 minutes. Stir in dried fruit and milk choice and recover and cook for 5 minutes more. Turn off heat and leave for 10 minutes to finish absorbing fluids.

I eat one serving right away and  place the other two servings in containers in the fridge. They are delicious reheated or cold with a bit of creamer over them like rice pudding.

As to my smoothie, my recipe is very usual and completely basic. I throw a cup of frozen organic berries in my blender, add 1/2 cup of filtered water, 1/2 cup organic vanilla soy milk and a scoop protein powder and blend. If I feel like mixing it up I will add 1/2 banana and 1 T of flax meal. Smoothies are easy and fast, but they are the source of my greatest diet dilemma at the moment.

I am in a complete quandry, my favorite protein powder is whey based. I love Aria’s vanilla protein powder; the cost, taste, texture, and what it puts into my diet (the hard-to-get-enough B-vitamins, calcium, and iron) and what it leaves out (artificial ingredients); but what I am struggling with is that protein powders have a large manufacturing, shipping and container carbon footprint and the basis for this powder is also whey, hence NOT vegan, hence even BIGGER carbon footprint.  I love Aria, but feel it doesn’t fit my big picture of ethical living .

I am slowly working my way through trying vegan alternatives, so far the “not gonna do it at all” contenders are Trader Joe’s Soy Protein powder, Alive and MRM’s vegan protein powder. Sadly, I had a vegan protein powder that I  really, really liked from Spouts (store brand) that was discontinued about 2 years ago. Right now Aria is on my shelf while I muster the courage to bring home a hemp one to try (courage is necessary because finances and personal philosophy require me to actually finish the can of protien even when its sand box grainy (TJ’s)or tastes waaaay to “healthy” (MRM) or weedlike (Alive).

It all comes back to the same question, the needs of the one over the needs of the many. Where do my needs for nutrition, convenience and enjoyment end and my need to leave my circle a little better tended for my having been here begin, or better yet how do I make the two mesh well? So that is my protein powder problem and my blog for today.

I am tagging it for Sally Frye folowers as this porridge recipe would be very apropos for the Rennaissance, although it would not be served for breakfast but be a supper or nursery dish. Also my quinoa use and my struggle with the politics of protein powder speak to the key elements of my training and my homesteading/living green goals so going to those readers also.  I hope all of you enjoy.

I can’t believe its almost May, 2012. I must be off the cyber verse now, because I have a Puppy Shower to prepare for and many errends to run.

Namaste, friends.

Jo Crowfae

 

Blog, Triathlon Training

Stroke, stroke, stroke, breathe

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Back in the water this morning, first time in 6 months, I went with the goal of at least putting my face in the water, and best case scenario completing a length or two without a kickboard.  I far exceeded my own expectations. The water was cold  on my feet and even colder on my shins and thighs but then the windy day made staying out of the water worse than diving in, so in I went.

I borrowed Dawn’s kickboard as mine is lost somewhere in the interim off training and I did my first length swimming head waaaay above water and psyching myself off for face in the water breathing on the back length.  Fear fought back and the excuse wheel spun but I learned last year that the best way to push past my “face in water” phobia is to just do it, so I did. I turned, kicked off and face went in the water, breathed out all that useful air and panicked. No breathing back in that time. Kick, kick, kick, face in again and this time turn my head and take a breath. So far, so good.

Three laps with kick-board done my DIL had to get out of the pool so I pushed forward and asked her to take my kick-board to the far end of the pool, which meant I had to swim for it.

I created the need to swim and so I did. One length without pausing was a good three weeks into last years training but I nailed it first time in the pool, then back with kick-board; one full lap with kick-board. Then Phil took it where I needed to “fetch” it, so I again swam to other end and kick-boarded it back.

Time to go for broke, I was going to swim there and back again; I caved 3/4 of the way on the back again and I touched my toes down at one point because the phobia just needed to make sure the bottom of the pool was still there, but only touched and finished swimming.

So now I am at five kick-board laps and two full swim laps. Two more kick-board laps, one more swim lap, one more kick-board lap, and a final full swim lap means I completed 8 laps with my kickboard and 4 swim laps, that’s 600 meters or .37 miles.

After which I walked almost three miles.

It was fun. I am sore tonight and fully aware of how de-conditioned I am cardio-vascularly speaking but I am proud of myself. I showed up, I did me best, and I amazed  myself!

And that is the beginning of this years “try”athlon training!

Now gentle readers, go out there and amaze yourselves as well.  There are so many little ways to exceed your own expectations of yourself today.

Namaste.