Status update

Sometimes it seems as though I have all the time in the world to plunk out a blog post, and then life just happens!

First, Thing 1 and his girlfriend went to prom.

They went with like a million other kids in one freakin’ large vehicle.

The advantages to living in a small town? Remembering what most of these kids looked like on the first day of Pre-K.

Saturday started off cloudy for my bike ride.  And we stopped a lot along the route–a garage sale, the farmer’s market and then coffee!  I was feeling a bit down before the bike ride as I had misstepped on a friend’s deck after the prom party and took a spill.  My left ankle was sore, and even sorer on Saturday morning.  ”Suck it up, buttercup,” I thought to myself.  ”Get your shorts on and GO!”  So GO! I did (albeit with all those stops).  It was the right thing to do for my ‘making a mountain out of an injury molehill’ inner voice, as I let two friends convince me to sign up for the Jersey Girl Tri on Aug. 4.  Yep. I’m in!  I have to say, I’m a bit excited.  Especially about the potential for new gear (tri suit anyone?)

I spent the rest of Saturday icing my ankle and trying to flex it.  It got more moveable as the day went on, so I committed myself to keeping up with my running plan–7 miles Sunday morning, which comes far too early after such an exciting episode of Orphan Black. Here’s a shameless, unsolicited plug for BBC America: best network out there.

Sunday I awoke to the pitter patter of rain on the roof.  It didn’t sound so loud, so I got dressed and headed out.  I was noticeably the only one on the street. But I kept plugging away.  The ankle felt great.  The right hammy, not so much.  But that’s typical.  At mile 6.5, my phone rang–it was the Mister.  ”Hey, you know we’ve got to leave in about 20 minutes for the city for brunch,” he said.

Oops. Totally forgot.  Sped (relative term here 6.5 miles into my longest run since coming back after my injury) home, showered, and changed.  Off we went to the city Brooklyn. Yes, Brooklyn is part of the city, but it’s also, although neighboring, LIGHT YEARS away in terms of traffic! Even more so on a rainy day!

We were meeting up with a friend of the Mister’s who’s an contemporary/pop artist–Tomokazu Matsuyama. First stop, his gallery.

A sight for color-deprived eyes:

I’m not an art historian, nor have I ever played one on TV, but let me tell you this: SO MUCH FUN! to visit an artist in his studio without gallery representatives, art historians, art collectors, etc.  For nearly 90 minutes, Matsuyama-san showed us different pieces he was working on, how he came up with his ideas, how he went about representing them, and then the nitty-gritty business behind the whole thing.

Here’s what I found so fascinating about his art: there are a couple of techniques prevalent in Japanese art (again, not an art historian, just shit stuff i know): asymmetry, that ‘flat, single dimensional’ perspective and use of pattern.  The piece above (which is HUGE–about 5 ft high x 15 ft long maybe) has the awesome white w/ red floral backdrop (sorta like the japonisme you see in the american impressionists like Mary Cassatt), and the work is a single dimension–no one color or shape takes the foreground or background.  You know what–each color on this piece was painted between 18-25 times to achieve that flatness. Symmetry? what’s that?  The piece is called Senbazuru (1000 Cranes), which is a traditional Japanese theme.  I didn’t have time to count.  Nor did I need to.  The Japanese are precise like that.

Especially pleasing on such a gray, gray, rainy day though were the paints

Matsuyama has staff.  As he paints, his staff record (by number) the different colors so that he can replicate additional prints.  Each of the big rubbermade tubs is sorted by specific color (say, red) and shade (say, 1-25).  As he creates his art, he takes laser prints of the pieces, and sorta like color-by-number, identifies each of the colors in the piece.  Then the laser print and self-made paint chips go into a binder for safe-keeping.  He has one piece with over 106 shades of purple.  I like knowing that about him–he’s taken a calculated approach to reproduction, but he’s also completely identifying his creative process.  I found it quite interesting.  Sorta right brain/left brain.

Also fascinating (at least for me) was that the minute I saw his color gradations, I thought of Noro, one of my most favorite fiber artists.  Noro spins and dyes his own yarns in these  phenomenal fiber combos, and then his colors?  Ah-mah-zing!

As I got my bearings in Matsuyama’s studio, I couldn’t help but notice how similarly he and Noro gradiate their colors.  Sorta cool.

After 90 minutes in the studio, I was about to drink the paint (no time for refueling before we left NJ), so when we got to the brunch locale, Parish Hall, I helped myself to Deviled Eggs, french toast, two eggs over easy and two sausages.  Plus an IPA.  And then a coffee.  I could have gone on, but I tried to show restraint. It was delish.

All this activity made Monday almost relaxing.

Decisions, decisions

Slowly but surely I’m making progress on my Sencha.  I have to say that while I do love sewing because the project results in something wearable relatively quickly (as compared to knitting), it is a huge PITA to drag the sewing machine, ironing board, iron, and all the other tools out for only a few hours.  I totally understand the need for a sewing room!

Sencha has required quite a few decisions, first being, what color Converse should I get?

Friday, my coworker and I headed over to the LCS (local Converse store?) where I had my choice of two: gun metal gray (with the dark grommets) or low profile charcoal (with the silver grommets). While my coworker thought the low profile charcoal pair matched better, I liked the gun metal gray pair better (as evidenced by my pointing finger) because of its slightly off-white toe and narrower tongue.   We texted yet another coworker for her opinion.  She agreed with my assessment.

I am a Converse fanatic.  They are my sneaker of choice.  I wanted a pair to match Sencha for an outfit I have planned in my head that also involves sunshine yellow linen sailor pants.  I have my 25th college reunion coming up in June–I will wear this outfit to our class dinner. Yes, I do plan my outfits weeks in advance. Doesn’t everyone?

The decisions didn’t end with the converse.  Onto the buttons:

I’ve got two different buttons here, right side and wrong side.  Yeah, sometimes I use the wrong side of the buttons–it’s allowed, you know, because when you buy buttons, you do buy both sides, the front and the back.  The top two are a bright mother of pearl.  The bottom two are less shiny.  The 4th button is the right side of the 3rd button.  I think I’m going to go with the third button–it’s a good match of the yellow, without being too bright.  I’m not so worried about not using the brighter buttons.  I’ll find a project for them.

Although I have the right buttons, I’ve decided to not make button holes, and instead use snaps as the closure, and add buttons just for decoration.  I can’t believe that I’m ad-libbing so wildly on my 4th project.  But I am.

Project 5 will not be clothing; instead a wallet.  But that also involves some decisions, as in which fabric for the outside, which for the inside:

 

I’m leaning towards the darker steel gray for the outside (it will show less grime) and the yellow on the inside.

Here’s the wallet:

 

I’ll start this next week.  Because I already put away the machine.  Project 6?  That will be my sewing room.

 

 

Ugh!

There is this horrid photo of me from my race on Sunday on Facebook!  I’m grimacing and it looks like I’m barely moving.  I wanted to think it was because I was at mile 5.5 out of 6.2. But no, I think it was more like mile 4.   The even sadder thing is that I saw this photographer from far away, and worked really hard to smile.  Apparently,  I need to try harder.

I know I shouldn’t get wrapped up in race photos–but this one is so BAD! And I have no idea why the photographer decided specifically to post it on my running club’s FB page for the world to see.  Oh well, a dash of humility never did any harm.  But it still sucks.

So I needed a little pick-me-up to counteract the horrid photography.  Lucky for me, a package came in todays mail!

 

my new sASSy running skirt!  Granted, I’m not moving in it, but it did me a world of good.

My evening only got better–when I went to our club run at my LRS, there was a surprise awaiting:

 

No, the ladies are not the surprise.  The surprise is: my bras had arrived!  A few weeks ago, I attended a “Diva Night” at my LRS, and wouldn’t  you know it, I won the raffle–a free Moving Comfort sports bra!  Yes, I am now thinking I need to play the lottery–a gift card and now a sports bra!

For the raffle prize, I got the bra on the left (rebound racer), and then picked up an extra (the one on the right), just in case.  This was a good thing–you see, I had misplaced my running bra sometime in early March, and it hasn’t turned up yet.  Now that I’ve actually dropped some coin on a new one, I know the old one will reappear.  Because that’s how my life works.

So, here’s to hoping that in my next race, the sports bra and sASSy skirt will lead to better photos!

 

 

Dodged a bullet

good thing Mother’s Day was yesterday, because if it were tomorrow, I certainly would have earned a “fail.”

Tonight the Mister had a work obligation.  When the Mister has work obligations that means I’m free to be creative with dinner.  Most of the time, I’ll serve things the Mister doesn’t like, like macaroni and cheese or breakfast for dinner.  That’s when the Mister’s Japanese heritage shines: doing a mash-up of meals and their appropriates times for eating is just. not. his. thing.

The Things were clamoring for mac & cheese.  And I do admit, I make a mean mac & cheese.  I buy spendy cheddar and mix in some others fancy ones that may be lying around.  I make my own roux.  I top it with a proprietary mixture of panko and parmesan (proprietary=a lot of both) and bake it in the oven.

I got home from work, started the water boiling for the macaroni, shredded the cheese and started the roux with the butter and flour.  The water was at a boil, and I looked in the pantry for the macaroni, and voila! There was NONE! And no back-up either: no rigatoni, no shells, no ziti (yes, that is a sin, to be living in NJ and to not have ziti in my pantry).  The only pasta chez Sato? Linguine.  Oh well, let’s just break it into tiny pieces.

Onto the roux.  The butter and flour were thickening, and I went to add the milk.  Voila! Again there was none! Yep, mac & cheese night is usually Tuesday night and the milkman (again, another throw-back NJ phenomena–I have a milkman) makes his delivery Tuesday morning.  So Monday means no milk.  BUT, I do have heavy cream.  That will work.

As I was putting together this monstrosity, Thing 2 happened into the kitchen.  She saw all the ad libbing that was going on, and mentioned “you should really test this first, you know.”

Yes, I do know.  But I won’t.  Let’s get Mikey.

So mac & cheese turned into “linguine and really really thick and creamy and fattening cheese.” I steamed a few twigs of broccoli to ease my consciousness, and stuck a fork in this nightmare otherwise known as dinner.

All three Things pronounced the Franken-dinner “really good” and each took seconds, but I’m still a little skeptical. Good thing this happened on Day 1 of a new Mother’s Day year. Hopefully it will be forgotten by this time next year.

We are not big celebrators of hallmark holidays.  Mother’s Day, Father’s Day?  Really, we should all be respectful of and thankful for all family members everyday.  That being said, I did use the day as an excuse to lie in bed until 9am. I was not asleep however.  Thing 3 decided 6:30am was an appropriate time for gifts.  (In case you were wondering, 6:30am IS NOT an appropriate time for gifts. Just sayin’)

Thing 3 wrote me a lovely poem and presented me with a bottle filled with colored sand. I’m glad she’s 9.  I’m hoping guessing this will be the last bottle of colored sand I get ever. Thing 2 brought me my coffee. Made to my liking.  Thing 1 actually went shopping with his girlfriend, and knowing my penchant for playing around with my family’s initials, got me these:

 

Little glass balls with our initials.  I’ll find a better way to display these, but I LOVE them.  They sorta match our family mugs:

yep.  our initials spell “strep.”  I lobbied (for a NY minute) for a 4th child that we could name either Oliver or Olivia so that we could be “PRESTO” but the Mister overruled that.

Maybe that’s why he disappears on “linguine and really really thick and creamy and highly fattening cheese” night.  Too much temptation.

 

i can’t think of a clever title…

drat!

Maybe because my brain is fried.

This morning I ran the Newport 10,000m race in Jersey City (NJ).  I had a 6 mile run on my training docket, but when an ERC club member mentioned they needed a 4th runner for the women’s open team (for our USATF team), I figured why not?

Why not?  Maybe the pouring rain (drops so big you could even see them)? Actually the rain was only present from about 20 minutes before the start through the first 1.5 miles.  Then it stopped (but the humidity picked up–overall a perfect race day!).  Actually, my goal for the event was to see if I could hold myself in check–I’ve got my 10M at the end of the month, and I’m determined to really treat that as a social run, but I tend to get caught up in the excitement of the event and go off too fast.

So my goal was to run about an 11 min/mile.  At mile 3 though, the clock showed 30:12, so I dialed it down a notch, and finished at 1:03 and change (chip time), 1:04:22 (clock time).  I walked two water stops and a bit along the boardwalk, mostly because the boards were slick from the rain and I didn’t want to lose my footing. But honestly, I don’t think I could have gone much faster–my endurance is still a long, long, long way from where it was this winter.

I traveled to the event with 3 running club friends, one of whom (Michael) convinced us to stay for the awards ceremony by claiming we’d have a chance at winning some of the random prizes at the end.  I’m going to go on the record here and state that in my 46 years of life, the number of times I’ve won something through a drawing or lottery could be counted on one hand.  I’m not lucky in that way.  Except for today!

 

I won a $25 gift card to a local Mexican place!  Woo-hoo!

And even luckier?  As we were making our way back to our car, I was approached by another runner, who asked “Are you Paige?”  I acknowledged that I was, and he introduced himself as Neil from RunningInNJ.  We read each others’ blog!  How ’bout that.  I always marvel when I read other bloggers’ accounts of running into fellow bloggers, and now that’s happened to me!

Of course, I took a selfie of Neil and me!

 

After returning home, parenting duties called (even though I really wanted a nap). Today was the student art festival in my town, and all three Things were represented.  I really like this art festival, mostly because it gives my kids the non-athletic kids a chance to shine.  Having attended an elementary school and high school where art and music programs were cut across the board, I’m more than a little jealous that my kids get such a comprehensive art program.  And of course I’m biased, but I think they’re rather talented, too.

 

Here’s Thing 3 with her watercolor.  She says she hates watercolor.  I can understand that. It’s hard to control watercolor.  And she’s all about perfect execution of her own ideas.

 

These are Thing 1′s.  He was fulfilling some volunteer duties, so he wasn’t around to explain the assignment.  I really like the one on the left.

 

Here are Thing 2′s.  Let’s just say that ceramics is not her forte.  Her pencil drawing of the  teapot is really 1930′s/art deco-ish.  I love the heaviness it portrays. And I love the faceless girl.  She’s really good at body shapes.  I thought her landscape could be a cute storybook illustration.

The day ended as it started–a huge rain storm swept through town (luckily after the art show, which is en pleine air).  Now, it’s time for a nap!

 

Nearly perfect

Yep, today was nearly perfect.

I’m not going to say it was perfect because that’s the point of perfect–it’s impossible to attain. I learned that lesson (the hard way) in college when a professor (after handing back our papers was questioned by a student re: the average grades–Bs and Cs) asked “there were no perfect papers.  A means perfect.”

My nearly perfect day started with a nice 3 mile run with the Mister.  Although I’m still rebounding, for some reason, I had ample energy this morning, and my pace picked up a little. Ok, for those speed demons out there, it still barely qualifies as “running,” but for me, it was faster than my (recently) typical 11+m/m, so I’ll take it.  I think this pace surprised the Mister though, because at one point, I looked to my side, and he wasn’t there.  I turned around, and he was way behind me.

I put on the brakes.  But he waved me on.

It’s nice to run and feel healthy.  It’s also nice to run with the Mister and not be competitive.  He’s a much better runner than I am, but on the rare occasion when we do run together, we’re actually only together for maybe the first 1/2 mile.  Then we split off.  I think it’s an adult version of “parallel play” (when kids too young to play together are put together and each plays his/her own thing, independently, yet together in space and time).

I finished up my 3 miles with a core strengthening workout supplied by my coach.  It was tough.  I’m slim, so sometimes I fool myself into thinking I’ve got a strong core.  That’s not necessarily true, and today’s short core workout proved that point.  I liked this workout because it gave me both the basic exercise, and then as I get stronger there were add-ons to make it more difficult.

As the day progressed, it just kept getting better.  Work today was amazing.  I launched a pattern contest for a new hat for my Christmas at Sea program, and all submissions were due by 4/30.  I was hoping for 7-10 submissions (the time frame was short), and in total, I received 12.  Today, the two other judges (co-worker Jenn and designer Kirsten) came to the port, with a professional photographer, and we narrowed down our choices to 5, then we took those five hats onboard a vessel to solicit opinions from the seafarers that would actually wear the hats.

Let me wax poetic about seafarers for a sec.  I LOVE these guys.  They have incredibly hard jobs and basically get zero recognition, mostly because they’re sort of a hidden workforce.  Regular people just don’t experience ports like we used to, when they were such a major factor in cities.  Over 90% of the products we use in our daily lives come to us via transoceanic cargo vessels, and seafarers are responsible for that safe passage.  Those incredibly HUGE cargo ships (today’s vessel was considered mid-sized at 280m long) have crews of about 20!  They are responsible for maintaining the ship, checking on the cargo (walking the decks to make sure those containers stay coupled, etc).  They are away from home from 9-18 months per contract.  And depending on their routes, they experience awful weather (every time a weatherman says “hey folks, we’re in luck, the storm went out to sea!” I cringe!), and sometimes are even held hostage by pirates.

(done waxing)

Anyways, we climbed an incredibly steep gangway (this is the most terrifying part of ship-visiting for me) with our hats and photographer, and even though this crew was in the middle of off-loading (they berthed at 5am and were scheduled to leave port at 7pm), about a dozen of them took the time to try on all the hats, pose for photos, and give us their opinions.

Upon returning to our office, we selected the finalists and chose the winner.  And then had ourselves a delicious lunch.  I’ll be announcing the contest winner soon (need to wait for the photos), which I’m super excited about.

And we just topped off our day with pork sliders for dinner.  nom nom nom!

Flowers flowers

everywhere!

There’s a lot (a LOT!) to criticize New Jersey about, but one thing is for sure, New Jersey certainly knows how to put on a SPRING!  Maybe it was the unending winter, maybe it’s still the coolness in the air (and that we haven’t jumped to 80F yet), but this year’s spring is DELIGHTFUL.

Here’re some shots from this morning’s run:

 

Yep, I’m back to regular running.  This morning was my “long” run of 4 miles.  I’m only going out every other day until I get some of my endurance back, but today’s 4 miles felt pretty good (although at a silly-slow pace).  Anyways, everywhere I looked, there were amazing colors–the pinks from the late blooming cherries, the purples from god only knows what that tree is, the white dogwoods, the red maples, the red azaleas…  Pretty-freakin’-fantastic.

Those florals totally outshine these man-made ones:

 

The dark mushroom with white & yellow flowers will become Sencha. I think.  Not sure yet.  The brighter floral will either be Scout or another Sorbetto.  Again, not sure yet.  I’ve got to decide something by Tuesday–that’s when I’m taking a sewing tutorial at my LSS (local sewing store).

I’m looking forward to this week.  I’ve already made another set of mason jar salads (a few different varieties for this week).  I’ve got my sewing class, and I’m starting up again with my running coach–it was a drag to miss Bruges, and my Soldier Field 10M has morphed from a flat-out race to a more social training run.  But that’s ok.  Because I’ve got this on my docket now!

And I will be ready!

 

All the ligaments in my head

Today was a day of forgetfulness.  Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with trying to remember everything.  Compounding the issue is the fact that when I plug my phone in to my laptop (both apple products, but the macbook uses outlook and my phone, ical), all my appointments on my phone’s calendar change to 4:00pm.  I can’t even begin to fathom how or why this is happening.

Thing 3 is doing a project on Charles M. Schulz (the creator of Peanuts) for school.  She LOVES this comic strip, although she has actually never seen the strip itself in a newspaper.  Instead she has compilations of the strip in book format. She was fascinated to hear that when I was a kid, everyday I read Peanuts in the newspaper, and then at school we talked about how funny it was.  (Yes, I know this makes me sound as though I was born in the 1950s, but no, I just actually grew up in an area with pre-cable lousy TV reception.)  She remarked: “sorta like commenting on someone’s status update, right?”

Anyway, she’s gotten all her facts down for her timeline, and decided to watch a Peanuts video on the computer.

And I just heard Peppermint Patty exclaim: Why am I so bad in school?  Why can’t I get better grades?  Why are all the ligaments in my head bad?

That is a great question.  Why ARE all the ligaments in my head bad?

I’m going to chalk it up to lack of newspaper comic strips, too many status updates and better TV reception.

A Review

unlike no others.

So many in the running blogger community somehow get nice presents (shoes!) in the mail, and they promptly review them.  This is not one of those reviews.  (and not just because I don’t get free shoes in the mail.)

Knitters less frequently get free yarn in the mail (must be something to do with the size of the market: running shoe market=HUGE; lace weight yarn market=not so much), but are still verbal about their opinions of various types of yarn.

Here’s my (highly anticipated?) review of…wait for it…Mason Jar Salads!

Ingredients used: (combinations of) romaine, spinach, arugula, chick peas, apples, cheddar cheese in cubes, sweet corn, artichoke hearts, carrots, grape tomatoes, diced peppers of the red, orange and green variety and dressing.  (a viniagrette)

According to Thing 2:

• it’s good
• it doesn’t spill
• it looks cool (according to her posse)
• easy to eat with a fork without really tipping the jar over

According to the Mister:

• too much dressing
• easy to carry in his briefcase to work in the city
• noone at his work noticed how pretty it was

According to Thing 1:

• “are there apples in there?”
• “yes,” I respond.  
• “then I don’t want it.”

And me:

• easy to carry
• very filling.  I supplemented with some crackers and cheese and olives and a plum
• to get the dressing all over, I held the jar on its side and shook back and forth, then righted it and then shook up and down.  It worked.
• There’s a fine line between “full” and “stuffed.”  A full jar works.  An overly stuffed jar is almost too much salad.
• I ate my greens with chopsticks (easier than a fork), and the crunchy veggies with a fork.
• The Mister was right, I was a little generous with the dressing.

The verdict: PASS!  We will continue with mason jar salads.  Not everyday.  Some days are meant for the food truck (at least where I work).  But most days, this will fit the bill.  And I can see in the winter the mason jars will do a good job holding soup.

 

And I’m back!

So this week I started running again.  A little bit on the down-low.  I didn’t want to announce a comeback if all it did was send me back to my ortho.  And, honestly, after only 3 runs, I’m still not sure I should say anything, lest I jinx myself.

But Tuesday I ran 1 mile on the treadmill.  My intention was to walk, but after a really boring 3 minutes, I gave running a shot.  It was not painful, just a little uncomfortable, so I plugged along, telling myself, no more than a mile.  I followed that up with a 1.9 mile run on Friday.   And it felt slightly better during the run.  The best, though, is that after each run, there was no pain nor discomfort for the rest of the day.  I took this as a sign that I should keep going, but smartly.  So yesterday, instead of running, I met up with my cycle group for an easy 15 miles.  This morning I laced up for my typical 3 miles loop.  It was slow (10:40 min/mile), but it felt good.

I’m determined to stage in this comeback in an “every other day” sorta fashion, because, of course, even though I’ve been dormant for so long, today my right hip and glute decided to revolt a bit.  (leading me to think: WTF with all the stupid strengthening I’ve been religiously doing for so long?!)

But today was a prime example of why I missed running so much.  The ENERGY!  It’s only 3pm my time, and look what I’ve accomplished already:

1. Sorbetto.  This is a free pattern from Colette.  A simple tank with bias-tape trim.  I bought, washed and ironed the fabric yesterday and started sewing.  I had a few issues with my sewing machine, so decided to sleep on it, and this morning, after my run, I took apart the machine, and put it pack together, and voila, I had myself a cute little tank top.

2. after that, mason jar salads.  Yep,  these are done.  Thing 2 and I did some veggie shopping yesterday, and now 11 salads are hanging out in my fridge, awaiting their trips to either work or school.  They’re all slightly different, and as I was putting them together, I saw the need to better organize myself in terms of deciding beforehand what kinds of salads to make (chicken caesar, spinach, cobb, etc) before just adding ingredients willy-nilly. But that’s alright.  This week will be our test balloon week, to see how well salads last in these jars, how they taste on Friday, if the jars ever make it home from school (a big issue with Thing 2), if there’s enough dressing, etc.

Tonight we’re taking the fam to Mt. Fuji–a hibachi restaurant on the border of NY/NJ.  It’s for Thing 3 and a few of her friends to celebrate her birthday.  I’m not big on “invite the entire class” parties.  They’re spendy, they’re loud (!), at a place that’s really chaotic, etc.  Instead, I like to do ‘dinner and a movie’ or something a little more low-key with fewer friends (2-4).  Last year was Thing 3′s best party ever.  We went to a Japanese karaoke bar with two other friends, and sang our hearts out for 2 hours.  (Thing 3 and her two friends have a band. This party was a huge hit).

Time for a nap!