Clumbsy

I’ve not written a lot about this recently, but the cruise is just days away.  I’m in full planning mode and am busy making lists upon list of things that will need to get done, things to do, people to see, things to buy etc.  I’m a planner. I can’t just casually go on vacation.

Thankfully, I’m a planner. Then when things like dropping your favorite camera lens while doing a test pack allows for time to get a new camera lens.  

I was standing at my kitchen counter pulling the lenses and camera out of my big camera bag to test that it will fit in a new smaller camera bag that has a ton of pockets (one of my major requirements for camera bags).  I pulled the lens out of it’s container and it slipped out of my hand. I was, thankfully, standing over the counter so it shouldn’t have fallen too far.

You know when you try to save something from falling, and your attempt to save said something usually makes the fall worse? Yah, that's exactly what happened. In my attempt to catch the lens before it hit the counter, I flipped it and it landed on the tile floor. No es bueno.

I can’t type the four letter words that came out of my mouth because the MomUnit reads this. Suffice it to say I would have made a seasoned sailor blush. 

Picking up the lens and flipping it over I discovered the glass in the front was completely cracked. In my moment of denial I thought, “It can’t be that bad.” I put it on the camera to see how “bad” it was. The lens wouldn’t focus, or turn and oh yah, I couldn’t see clearly through the massive crack in the glass. Ugh. 

I hadn’t planned on spending some of my vacation savings on a new lens, but I knew myself well enough to know that without a lens that could capture everything I wanted, I’d whine and complain the entire trip. So, in order to save my traveling companions, I bought a new lens. 

The lens I had dropped was a Sigma 18mm – 200mm lens. To me it’s the overall lens to have. It covers my wide angle shots as well as my zoom shots. It was a great lens for the price I paid for it.  I’ve always been a bit too cheap when it comes to my lens purchases and well, it greatly affects your photos. 

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com

So this time I opted to spend a bit more and get myself a Canon lens.  I tested it out around the house last night and while it’s heavier than the Sigma lens, I felt like the photos seemed mo’ better.  It could be because I’m convinced that a Canon lens will naturally take a better photo, which means it’s 100% mental. 

Anyhow, the camera bag is packed and ready to go.

Now on to packing everything else. 

It shouldn’t surprise you all that I have a packing check list.  It dawned on me a couple of years ago that before every big, or little trip, I take I write out a list. Every….single….time. So why not just have a list made up. It’s perfect for me and not too surprisingly it gets updated just about every trip. Something new comes up that makes me at least add it to the list. 

This year the new item is my FitBit and Charger. 

Yes, I caved. I bought a FitBit.



Photo courtesy of guest photographer on Amazon, Amer.

I’ve worn it for a week now and think I love it. Remember back a couple of days / weeks ago I wrote about loving my gold stars? Well, with the FitBit I can earn BADGES.  I’ve earned my 5,000 steps and yesterday I earned my 10,000 steps.  

 

It also synchronizes with MyFitnessPal so my food intake gets accounted for and it tells me how many calories I’ve consumed, as well as the calories burned. It’s just a fantastic piece of technology.

One other thing it does, that I’ve not figured out if it’ll help me or not is it irons. 

 

Okay, it doesn’t, but I had to make sure you were paying attention. 

 

Seriously though, if worn while you sleep it also tells you about how good of a sleep you got. Interesting? Maybe. Useful? Maybe.  The jury’s still out on this.

 

Also, quick update on the Couch 2 5 K adventure. Turns out training really does make a difference.  As I mentioned we are doing each week for about 2 weeks.  This week we started Week 2 which increased my jogging time from 1 minute to 1.5 minutes.  It doesn't seem like a lot, true, but when you've not jogged, or ran or anything like that, and you're carrying extra weight on you - it matters. 

 

I can say with confidence that it has gotten easier.  I don't breath as heavily as I was - okay maybe not breathing, but panting and gasping for air.  I can now finish the minute and a half and not feel like I want to pass out due to lack of oxygen.

 

I plan on continuing to jog on the trip - we'll see how easy it is to jog on a moving ship.  Our next jump up is significant. It's jogging for 3 minutes straight intervals.  Oy Vey. I'm petrified of this next level.  I'll keep you posted if I still type after losing so much oxygen.

Karma

The thing of it is, I do believe in karma.  I have witnessed "what goes around comes around" activity so many times in my life that it's hard not to believe in karma.

When I was in like 4th grade, I found a $20 bill lying in the street outside our house.  I kept it.  I, of course, shared with the MomUnit I found it and she said, "Its yours." I'm not sure if my little innocent mind was thinking I should put up "Found" signs or not for this $20 but I do remember thinking that someone was missing it.

Fast forward several years, and an instructor at TASIS said in one of my classes that if you find money in the street or in your path, you can bet that eventually you will lose that amount of money. That thought blew my mind.  I remembered that $20 I found and then remembered the money I had lost through the years.

Whether the instructor was a wise old man, or just spouting off life lessons, I will never know. What I do know is that I blamed karma on losing my camera card at the 3day.

I figured I had done some inexplicable wrong and this was payment for that wrong.  I couldn't pin point what I had done that was so bad to warrant losing ALL my 3day photos.  Surely a punishment so severe would help with the recall of such a horrible act.  Maybe it was a build up of acts. That didn't seem fair.

Then the call came in. The call from Carl at the Seattle Memorial Stadium.  I had called the stadium the Monday following the 3day to ask about a lost and found. You return calls made me feel as if there was no chance. I was 100% sure I had lost the card in the stadium. 

Carl's voice sounded fun and a bit eccentric on the phone when he told me he found the card.

He....found...the.... card....!!!

Wait, what?

That doesn't happen. I had already prepared myself to forget all the fun, fabulous, award winning photos I had taken.

I had already made plans to fix my karmic balance, or imbalance. 

He found the card!

I immediately went into overdrive and peppered poor Carl with questions about how I can get the card? When was he in his office? Where was his office? And could I come immediately?

I managed to contain myself long enough to wait until after work and then shot across the lake to get to Carl. My hero.

Carl, it turns out, has worked at the stadium for 20+ years.  He's one of those folks where his voice doesn't match his look. His voice was strong, deep and a bit of an accent.  He is 5 ft ... maybe.  Appeared from his office with long-ish greying hair, a cowboy hat, a leather vest, flannel shirt, black jeans and cowboy boots.  Now the accent made sense.

Carl was glad to have been able to return my card to me.  He invited me back to his office to look through the lost and found box just in case I had lost something else.  I declined.  Cowboy Carl was sketchy as it was, I wasn't about to go into a dark, off the beaten path office with him. 

When I thanked Carl, for the hundredth time, he said it was part of his job and that he and his side kick Bobby LOVED returning things to people. In fact, he said, he had the pleasure of returning a 4 carat diamond earring to a gal. 

So I have my camera card back. Yay. On it was 623 photos.  That plus the hundred I took on the other card meant I had a LOT of photos to review. And I loved reviewing them all. 

While I may not have taken an award winning photo this year, I still got some that made me smile. Photos I'll review for years to come and remember the fun 3days of cheering on the walkers, pretending to fly, singing, and laughing and a little bit of crying.

Here are some of my favorites.

Princess Lori pushing Blueberry into the sweep van.

Lady TaTa was awesome. She'd do just about anything I'd ask her to do. This request was that she jump off the ledge and pretend to be flying.

Day 2 Last Walker.  The last walker into camp always gets me.  The entire camp of tired, blister covered feet gets up and cheers them in. Its a beautiful thing.

Blueberry with us Super Walker Stalkers.

Lady TaTa has the flying down to an art.

Captain Double D (me) not so much. It's way harder than it looks.

My 3Day Family: Princess Carla, BigBro, MammoGirl (aka The Niece), Lady TaTa, Seattle SIL, me and Princess Lori.

P-Dot only made on appearance this 3Day.  She had the flu and didn't feel much like coming out to be in the photos (either that or I completely forgot 99% of the time). The firemen/women are a huge deal for the 3Day. They walk full gear, all 60miles - or as many miles as they can. The female fireman/woman was pregnant this year.  Crazy all the way around.

Such sparkle...and one not so sparkly.

Captain Double D and MammoGirl present and accounted for.

This lovely puppy was a Great Dane - she was very interested in Lady TaTa and Sparky.  The Great Dane's head could easily sit on the door of Sparky.

Three of my most favorite 3day peeps.

A sea of pink coming across the I90 floating bridge. Ignore all the traffic, that's typical for Seattle these days.  But do marvel and exclaim over all the walkers coming across. Yay Pink!

Me and my BigBro cheering on the walkers on Day 3.  BigBro inherited that hat from another guy last year or the year before.  He wore it with pride this year.

Be afraid cancer.  We're coming to get ya!

Synchronized flying. Don't try this at home.

Woah – oh-oh-oh It’s Always a Good Time

Oh Hi! Remember me? Yah sorry about that little break in blogging. I ah got captured by Pink People and held until I danced and cheered until I couldn’t dance and cheer no more.

The 3Day was this past weekend. And what an odd 3Day it was this year. While I LOVED the 3Day and all that comes with the 3Day, I need to have a serious talk with Team Wraspir about getting back together and walking together. Stalking was difficult this year.

Here’s the skinny.

Our beautiful Survivor, Blueberry, walked with Flamingo Road this year. And while I’m thrilled she picked a Flamingo Team – and a team she loves – she needs to walk with the others.

Bueberry somewhere on the route, I think Day 2.

Blueberry and Capt Double D

Blueberry with her awesom Super Stalkers: Captain Double D (Me), Blueberry, Lady TaTa, and MammoGirl

Seattle SIL decided to be a volunteer crew member this year and found herself on a sweep van (basically the vans that drive up and down the route picking up tired and hurt walkers). Its great she volunteered, and she rocked it, but she needs to walk with the team.

And lastly, BigBro. He walked – ish. He didn’t train like he should so walking this year was a challenge. Still he got out there and did a damn fine job of walking. But he needs to walk with team.

That's MammoGirl walking with BigBro (aka her dad)

BigBro with his favorite Super Walker Stalkers

I missed stalking the three of them together.  I am hatching a plan already for next year. I’ll keep you posted.

Team Wraspir: Captain Double D, MammoGirl, Lady TaTa, Seattle SIL, BigBro and Blueberry after closing ceremonies.

As for me, I had the time of my life…again.  I had TWO co-pilot stalkers this year. And if I do say so myself we were SUPER WALKER STALKERS!!! The Niece, aka MammoGirl and her girlfriend, Lady TaTa joined me on the route.

Ole! Lady TaTa

Super Walker Stalkers at work. It was exhausting.

Super Walker Stalker stance! Grrr!

Super Walker Stalker Stance on I90 Bridge.

Take that cancer.

One tired MammoGirl. But so darn cute.

I believe I can fly!

Super hero Walker Stalkers at opening ceremonies.

Sparky was ALL Decked out and enjoyed every single bit of attention she got. And she got a lot of it this year.

Yep. Those are speakers on top of the light bar!

What? This old thing.  Why I just threw it on this morning.

Team Ford "had" to get their photo with the rock star Sparky.

We were so awesome it almost hurt!

Between us being Superheros, Sparky being the DJ and Super Pink, and our sign, we were popular this year. I wonder how many people have us in their photos.

If we had received a donation for every person who wanted a photo of our sign, we could walk in a couple 3Day's ... easily.

Speaking of photos, biggest bummer ever. On day 3 at closing I lost my FULL camera card. 500+ photos of all three days.  Gone! I broke my own photo rule by not taking them off every night. I’m so sad at the loss of all those photos.  I just know I had some award winning photos in there this year. I’m sure of it.

I suppose on the bright side it’ll be the quickest 3day scrapbook ever. I’ve been stalking FB for photos, and thankfully Blueberry had taken photos. As has so many other friends. I did a few with my iPhone too, so I have some. But not all.

Closing ceremonies.

This is what courage, strength and $3.4million looks like.

We will never give up!

In other non 3-day news, I’m still jogging.  I think I mentioned we’re doing each Couch 2 5K week twice. This week is the second week of week 1. Yesterday we did day 1 of week 1. I hadn’t jogged for 4 days. I was concerned.  But I kicked major jogging arse yesterday. I did the entire 8 minutes without huffing and puffing to the point of losing oxygen in my brain. In fact, I was awesome.  It felt SOOOO good.  And a little painful.  Turns out I have shin splints. Not too surprising, but damn they hurt. I think I’m ready to move on to Week 2 next week.

Attitude is Everything

Today I completed day 3 of week 1 of the Couch 2 5K (C25K).  I must admit, jogging is getting easier.  The Skinny Butt Brigade and I took off at lunch today to do day 3. I was a bit anxious prior to leaving because I play unhelpful mind games with myself that just about sabotages my efforts.

Still, TOJ (The other Jenn) and Hot Lava (We created this nickname for her today while running) and I set out. Our route would take us 2.25 miles and 30 minutes.

I managed to run all 8 minute intervals...eventually. I had to stop for one of the intervals and stretch out a shin muscle that was complaining.  But I made that 20 seconds up before our cool down started.

It is getting easier. 

Getting motivated isn't my problem. I'm all 50 shades of motivated.  It's the patience I lack. I want to be a runner now! And I realize that my overweight frame, while jogging is helping to get rid of the overweight frame, is still learning to be active and healthy. I must be patient.  And I must not jog/walk every day. TOJ has already reprimanded me for doing so.  The last thing I want is to get injured so I can't jog.

We signed up for a 5K in October.  In no way, shape or form am I going to be ready to run a 5K on Oct 5th. BUT, I can, and will, give it a try. The Shrinking Butt Brigade plans to walk as much as I need, but we figured it's for the Day of Giving at Hotel Californiasoft, so might as well do it. Besides we get t-shirts AND drinks after. I'm all in.

The most difficult part of running for me is the breathing. I really need to learn how to breath correctly so as to not pant.  I was telling another friend this the other day and her response was, "don't run."

The 3Day is just two days away. I think Sparky is all set. I think I'm all set, and I think the co-pilots are all set.  I'm sure I'll be posting photos soon.

I Don't Care if Monday's Blue...

The title is a song stuck in my head thanks to a FB post from Patron Saint of the Smart Mouths.

Moving on.

When last we spoke I was dying. Not literally, but it felt like every muscle and every ounce of my being was sore. My eye lashes even hurt! Scouts honor! They did.

I was questioning with every painful step on Thursday what the heck I was thinking and how on earth was I going to every jog again.

Friday came and the sun rose high in the sky bringing with it HOT temperatures for the Seattle area in September.  Yet, the Shrinking Butt Brigade did not shrink from jogging in the 91 degree temperature on Friday.  TOJ (The Other Jenn) was saying that she heard that when you run on the road in hot weather you should add another 20 degrees to the temperature, that would be about what it felt like. 111 degree weather we were "jogging" in.

And I say "jogging" because I didn't do so well on Friday. It was hot for me.  I only did one full minute of jogging and it was towards the end. The other 5 I managed 40 seconds and had to stop. I really need to get my breathing under control.  TOJ was trying to tell me to breath deep in through my nose and out through my mouth...slowly. But when one is panting, one cannot breath slowly.

The amazing part of jogging on Friday, I wasn't sore after. And Saturday I was up early and out the door without being sore!  Me thinks there's something to this.

Saturday was the Street Team Day for the 3day. Basically teams walking parts of the route putting up flyers saying we would be in their neighborhood.  Princess Lori and I decided this would be a GREAT opportunity to try out our costumes. And boy am I glad we did.

Sparky looks pretty cool I think.   The cape off the back however, had issues.  The air passes over the car by the sides, and then swoops around the back end and comes forward.  That pushed the cape forward and into the back seat.  We couldn't have that. So Princess Lori and I fixed it. She sewed shoe laces into the fabric about 5 inches up from the ends, and I'll tie those around the spoiler in the back. Voila!

As for the costumes.... mine didn't have any problems. Well, besides that it's crazy.

 So a couple of minor wardrobe fixes for me and I should be all set for the 3day this coming weekend.  The Niece and her friend is coming to be my co-pilots for stalking. It'll be an odd year of stalking. BigBro is walking solo cuz SSIL is a Sweep Van volunteer this year (basically the vans that drive up and down the route picking up tired, broken walkers).  And Blueberry will be walking with Flamingo Road. So whereas last year we could find all three of them walking pretty easily, this year is any body's guess.

And lastly this past Sunday was Sunday dinner. It snuck up on me this month. The second Sunday came up quicker than it seemed to in other months. Still I managed.  The best part of Sunday dinner...besides the craze-EEEs that join me....

Left to Right: BigBro, me, Newcome SM, Blueberry, Mrs. Atlanta (and her puppy Zoey), Seattle SIL, Mr. Atlanta, Princess Lori, The Yank and PhotoGirl. Oh and P-Dot resting on Princess Lori's pink sneaker!

Are these...

Chocolate

Covered

Smores

 

OMG these were good.  I put peanut butter in a couple of them too and word around the house was the PB with the marshmallow and chocolate was to die for.  I may have to make these again and experiment with fillings. Nutella was brought up as a potential good feeling...that sounds delicious to me.

Also on the menu was citrus grilled chicken (made by your's truly), grilled veggies and grilled watermelon (thanks Mr. and Mrs. Atlanta), some tasty salads (thanks PhotoGirl and the Yank and newcomer SM), and fruit (Thanks BigBro and SSIL) and lastly, some wedged regular watermelon (thanks Princess Lori).

 

For the appetizer, I made the 7-layer Salad dip again.  This time it was even better than last time. I used almost all low-cal ingredients - the one exception being the bacon.  But it ended up with only about a half of cup left when all was said and done last night.

Yum!

And in case you haven't been keeping track, there's only 30 more days until the cruise!!!