Life in the Cheese Drawer

and fall just keeps holding on. snow is drifting down outside right now, but the air is barely above freezing and it will turn to rain soon.

tomorrow it will be 50º here. but the nights are still cold and ice is forming on the lakes, starting on the edges and creeping along til it’s strong enough to hold. the first couple inches of the ground is hard, but it quickly gives way to loose soil, as i found out the other day pounding a stake into the dirt for lights. i dug up the last of my potatoes just 3 weeks ago.

minnesota’s coldest month is january, but december isn’t far behind, sneaking in before february. the solstice is a mere 21 days away and soon we’ll turn our axis toward the sun again. but the temperatures sure aren’t showing the time of year this year. and while i would love to get in more runs outdoors in the warm, the dark keeps me indoors after i get home, and the temps dip as soon as the sun dips.

the good news is that while fall is holding on, that means that much less of winter to manage. i sure wouldn’t mind a fresh coat of snow to freshen up the brown grey outdoors, but at the same time i’m ok with driving on dry, clear roads.

but we sure could use some moisture in the air. it is ridiculously dry lately. we are barely out of a drought that took hold over the summer, and if we get just another 10″ of snow this winter, we’ll be back in it for spring.

there’s the weather report for the day. it’s a good fallback when you don’t want to deal with everything else at the moment. what i really want to talk about is the great resignation but i don’t have the energy because my job is a timesuck. oh, the irony.

wow this year’s kablpomo has been a complete fail. well, not a complete fail since i’ve actually blogged this month, but as for every day? not getting it.

some things that have happened during november:

1. i was down at my parents’ to help out for a week after my mom’s knee surgery.
2. cleaned like a crazy person for thanksgiving guests jane, blues, and emily. that was the day after i got my covid booster, which knocked me sideways. i was struggling with any energy, but also needed to clean. managed to work through the blahs, cleaned the house, and am now more protected against covid!
3. also realized that i am like, the only person who wears a mask anywhere anymore. i was out this past weekend doing some shopping around, and no one is wearing a mask. there’s a new variant, and our hospitals are full, and everyone else is just like, meh. whatevs. i think it’s bizarre.
4. hosted thanksgiving after a year hiatus!!! that was fun. i made a pumpkin pie, then after i botched my second crust, i made a pumpkin custard? i put it in my springform pan like a cheesecake. (i imagine that cheesecake and pumpkin pie are more related than we think.) for those who enjoy the pumpkin filling and not the crust, that is the way to go. it baked at about the same time as the pie, and it was good! i also made a butterscotch tart (deeeelish) and jane brought a pecan pie. oh, and i was at the bakery that morning and picked up half a key lime cuz why not. had all the old standbys, and i think i may be done with turkey. next year i might just pick up a couple rotisserie chickens from costco instead. turkey is kind of boring!
5. i put half of each of the pumpkin desserts in the freezer because two days later i made a carrot cake for nate’s birthday (today!). he is now the big 44. oof.
6. my black and decker food processor that i bought 15 years ago finally bit the dust. the motor decided to just go crazy and make a ton of noise. instead of waiting for it to blow up, i bought a cuisinart processor with the black friday deals. i didn’t get the super awesome industrial one, but cuisinart is apparently the name in food processors, like kitchenaid is for mixers. anyway, i used that to grate the carrots for the cake, and it definitely is quieter than the BD one.
   
7. november was actually a pretty good running month. it hasn’t snowed yet and the temps arent’ outrageous yet, so i’ve gone out on the st john’s trails to get as much trail running in. besides, the trees buffer any wind, which is more than i can say when i run on the road with the wide open corn field there for the wind to whip up into a frenzy. so the treadmill is out for the season and weekday running (it’s dark) but on the weekends i do try to get out a little bit.
8. which is GOOD because i signed up for the 2022 EARTH DAY HALF MARATHON. yes, it’s finally back! i’ve gotten pretty decent at getting in 10 miles occasionally, but 13.1 will be a haul. training starts in 2 months? 3 months? well, i’ll just keep running like normal and see what happens.
9. i put away my fall decor today. i turned on my outdoor lights and have a poinsettia, but other than that, i’m gonna wait a couple weeks to put up any christmas decor. not ready for that. even while i was out black friday shopping, i was like, ehhhhh. i’ll wear my krampus shirt though. hopefully the christmas excitement shows up.

any ideas for blog posts the remaining two days in kablpomo?

today i headed to southeastern minnesota for the week, and snow was in the forecast. so i watched the band of weather on my weather app, pinching and zooming to see which way it was headed and at what speed, and figured i needed to head out around 12:30 to stay ahead of the snow on my drive. i finished packing, baked some sourdough bread, and put in three miles on the treadmill, after which i looked at my app, yelped, and jumped into the fastest shower i’ve taken in a while so i could get on the road. the snow was coming.

instead of I-94, which is nothing but a construction zone for the 60 miles from clearwater to maple grove, i headed a bit east and took hwy 10 down to the cities, where i would hook up with hwy 52. it’s not as quick, since you drive through some small towns and hit some stoplights, but it’s construction-free. there’s just something about zooming past cement pilons at 75 mph that puts my shoulders on edge.

but to get to hwy 10, i needed to drive cross country a bit on my usual route i take to work, which winds through some farmland that is buffeted by trees and hills, small ponds and farm houses. i was driving up a small incline, and on the left came into view a field of swans taking a pause in the migration. they were sitting, pecking, taking a small walk, otherwise nonplussed with their rest stop during the flight plan.

it’s surprising the amount of waterfowl i have seen taking a break in the fields. i understand why – there is food there, and they are loading up to continue their flight. but in the past few years, i have seen this more and more often than i have my entire life. and it’s not for lack of driving past open fields. i have seen several cranes, swans, geese (no surprise), eagles (not waterfowl but still a big bird), and more.

it makes me wonder if my current home is in the middle of a migratory pattern from one location to another in a way that my other homes have not.

so i found a map that shows some swan tracking! a lo and behold, one of the swans that has a tracking collar on it definitely took a path that coincides with where i found them.

anyway, i am happy that i see all this wildlife. it’s just surprising and i hope to see more of it!

welp, i tried out 108 sun salutations last night. today, my hamstrings are a bit tight and my deltoids aren’t too happy, but overall, i don’t feel bad. doing 108 was an undertaking, though, and sun salutations are no joke. it took me about 50 minutes to get them all done. i don’t feel like it was any sort of relaxing or meditative like other yoga i do, but there is something about repetitive motion.

here are 30, sped up!

i had to take a break at about 75 because i was starting to get nauseous from all the head movement. i took a motion sickness pill and then finished up. toward the end, it was getting rough. but i persevered!

would i do it again? maybe. but i would rather do a full ashtanga sequence 30 days in a row than 108 sun salutations 30 days in a row. the ashtanga has a bit more variation.

i give 108 sun salutations 3/5 stars.

sometimes youtube recommendations are horrible, and other times they catch my eye and i have to take a look.

so when i saw a video about a woman who did 108 sun salutations a day for 30 days, i had to take a look. i can’t imagine doing that many in a row! she said it took her between 45-90 minutes to complete them all on a daily basis, and i believe it. i also imagine her arm muscles got really tired over the course of her 108 repetitions.

why 108? it’s a number of the wholeness of existence in hinduism and yoga and connects the sun, moon, and earth. the average distance of the sun and the moon to earth is 108 times their diameters.

you know me – i’m always up for a challenge. so tonight i’m going to try doing as many sun salutations as i can up to 108. we’ll see what the results are; if it’s relatively ok, i might try it for a few days instead of my usual yoga fare.

chaturangas – only good on the way down.

 

my outdoor running for the year may be coming to a close.

i was down in st charles the past couple days, and yesterday i went for a run through town. i used to run up and down all the streets in st charles when i still lived there and was training for my first half marathon.

i forgot how enjoyable it is to run through residential neighborhoods! i like looking at the houses, the lawns, the gardens. it’s just a pleasant thing, especially on more quiet streets.

anyway, it’s supposed to snow this weekend, and the forecast looks pretty grim. the treadmill is looking more and more like an all-the-time thing now, at least for the next 3 months or so. yuck.

*****

as promised, a pie update. the crust was pretty good. i think next time i’ll add a bit more sugar. also put a cool filling in the crust.

the filling could have used some more sweetness. but it was nothing some ice cream couldn’t fix.

****

and a review for tuesday. i saw bob’s red mill came out with oat crackers, which i felt had to be the bees’ knees. or bee’s knees. whatever.

so i ordered 5 boxes because it was a cheap way of doing it. but i wish i had read the ingredients beforehand! it included rosemary, so instead of tasting like a wheat thing, which i had hoped they would, they tasted more like those crackers you buy when you accidentally grab the wrong box off the shelf.

i do like rosemary – that’s not it. it’s just that i was hoping for something without hint of herb.

anyway.

that’s all i’ve got for now. (oh wait – i did pick up my thanksgiving turkey. that’ll be here before we know it.)

no lie on the title.

the dirty carpet had been just too much. and nate had a week off. so on sunday, we moved everything out of the weird middle room/dining room/office and rug doctored the entire carpet.

after 5 years of cat filth and not cleaning it before we moved in, let me tell you, watching the grime come up out of the rug was REALLY satisfying.

the next time the rug is just too dirty to deal with, though, i think we’re just going to replace it with hardwood/laminate. it’s almost 25 years old at this point and it’s not very cushy. plus, there are parts of it that are starting to unravel, and then stan decides that it’s his new toy and so it becomes even more unraveled.

moving the stuff out of the room and then moving it back was a lot of work. i actually was thinking “ugh, let’s just tear up the carpet and replace it now.” (we did not.)

so, my weekend was eventful in that nate and i got a lot of stuff done. carpet on sunday, and on saturday i put all my summer outdoor stuff away 🙁 while nate raked leaves so he had a better time snowblowing this year. (if there’s snow to snowblow.) i also finally dug up the rest of my potatoes!

it’s supposed to snow next weekend. farewell fall 🙁 can’t wait til spring.