Life in the Cheese Drawer

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.

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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.

well well, already i’ve fallen down on the “blog every day” train. blame my job. i come home from work and pass out for 3 hours until it’s time to go to bed.

today it was warm and tomorrow is slated to also be warm. it’ll probably be the last hurrah from the weather til march, so i took advantage of it and took off for a run this afternoon around 3:30. i was like, eh, let’s go for just 3, maybe 4 miles and call it good. except my legs were having a grand old time, so i ended up going for a 10 mile run! i’ll take that. no one is ever having a good enough leg day to run 10 miles on a treadmill.

when i came back, my christmas lights were on.

i had take down the halloween lights and plugged in the christmas lights but the timer was already set to go on at dusk.

anyway, turned those off right quick. it’s still fall! plus one more day of 60º!

daylight saving ends tonight, which means i will leave for work in the dark and come home in the dark now. that’s always fun. but soon enough it’ll be spring and time keeps on tickin.

tomorrow i make a pie. maybe i’ll try to get a pic or video. we’ll see how it goes!