kate – Page 59 – Life in the Cheese Drawer

like the deserts miss the rain*

June 5, 2016 kate Comments 0 Comment

i have a deck. vegetables are in. sunflowers to come (charlie…). next weekend, i’m hoping to relax.
tonight i came back up to central via mankato, which means i dipped into west central mn before getting into true central mn. i headed up the minnesota river valley for bit and then hit lake country. i visited two biomes on my way up here. and vastly different parts of mn.
for the record, there is something weirdly different about west central mn versus southeastern mn. i’m not sure what it is – perhaps the farms are farther apart and seem a little more industrial; maybe it makes no assumptions about what it could be, what it really isn’t (southeastern mn does that a little bit): it knows it’s farmland and it will always be prairie. it’s a little more desolate. a little more hick. a little less “our poo don’t stink.”
i need some blogging ideas. what do you all want to read about?
*the title needs a little explanation. remember that 90s song – “and i miss you; like the deserts miss the rain…and i miss you…. like the deserts miss the rain.” etc etc. it’s a song called “missing” by the band everything but the girl. i actually didn’t know the name of the song until i just now looked it up, because my HS friends and i called the “the biome song.” weird? yes. we had just learned about biomes when the song came out, and my friend chandra said that since it mentioned deserts, it would be the biome song.
and minnesota has four biomes in it – tallgrass aspen parkland, prairie, deciduous forest, and coniferous forest. i drove through two, as i mentioned above. this explanation took up more space than the blog post itself did. wow.

driving

June 2, 2016 kate Comments 0 Comment

one of the more annoying things about this commuting thing is that i drive home and think “man! this is great running weather!” and by the time i get home, it’s too dark to do anything. bah.
speaking of driving….
compared to the last time i did this stint, i am saving a crapton of gas money. i still need to drive to and back from st cloud every week, but the distance to work from where i’m staying is actually less than my commute was down here to roch. so that’s a plus. last time i was doing this, i was driving 90 miles a day to get from austin to rochester for work. on top of the 175 each way back home. instead of filling up twice a week, i can get up there, go to work four days, and get back home on one tank of gas. huzzah!
ALSO. gas is not $3.95 a gallon like it was four years ago. (knock on wood.) that was heavy. so not only was i filling up twice a week, but it was at $70 a pop (i have an 18-gallon tank).
to compare: $600/month last time (just for commuting – not any driving i did on the weekends). $160/month this go round for commuting. i was spending half that on just to and from rochester every month from st charles. that is fantastic. plus, i have been getting some killer gas mileage lately. 35 mpg this last tank, and that was mostly 70mph+ freeway driving.
all this to say, i hope i can go for a decent run tomorrow.

the game's afoot

June 1, 2016 kate Comments 0 Comment

my blog game, that is.
let’s just say it’s limping along. barely. i gotta step it up.
know what else is limping along? my running. ugh! after my rest time post-half-marathon, this cold i have has been taking over my life. i’m working on week three, and running feels like torture. i haven’t run any farther than 3 miles, and that was with a break in the middle of it. hey hey – ho ho – this stupid cold has got to go. maybe this is the last week of the nasty thing and then i can resume life as normal (well, as normal as possible).

begin summer

May 31, 2016 kate Comments 2 comments

and so i enter my 38th summer. what are my summer vacation plans?

despite the upheaval, i want to be able to relax. i feel like i’ve been running around to no real end for the past month, and i’d like to have a moment to just be a normal weekend person for a bit. (my weeks will pretty much be upheaval; i realize that much). after my deck is finished, i’m hoping that this will be able just be a thing. i want a little peace.
despite the upheaval, i want my garden to be a thing. so far, so good. my tomatoes are in, the peppers are in, cucumbers, dill, basil, and cilantro planted. this weekend i’m renting a tiller, and charlie and i are finishing up the back forty with sunflowers, and i’ve got to get the green beans in the ground. then some zinnias here and there. i still want to see things grow.
despite the upheaval, i am going to my family reunion! i’m not going to let this be the summer that i don’t go (i have a 100% attendance record to maintain, after all). BIG LAKE. SUN. RELAXATION STATION. << especially that, haha
despite the upheaval, i still love summer. i will take advantage of the warmth and the daylight and the greenery and the flowers and the growth and the frogs croaking and the birds chirping away. not the junebugs though. those things can die in a fire.
despite the upheaval, i want MORE upheaval and someone to buy my house down south so i can commence the living like normal up northerly. it will be work, but it will be worth it.

let’s go, summer!

two of everything!

May 23, 2016 kate Comments 0 Comment

one downside of living like a nomad is i end up needing two of a lot of things. two bottles of soaps, two deodorants, two sets of cold medicines (ugh, i know; right?), etc., because i’m sure if i try to pack up every three days, i’ll forget something.
which means i spend a lot of time at target.
which means i spend a lot of money at target.
fortunately, i got a nice 10% off coupon (essentially 15% with my red card) from target in the mail, but of course i used it on my least expensive trip. *sigh*
other than that, life’s been going. so far this week has been going immensely better than last week, in that i didn’t have to drive to cannon falls after work to get my ss card.
in good news, my deck should, in theory, be done this weekend. it’ll be nice to enjoy it for a little bit!

where am i? what am i doing?

May 21, 2016 kate Comments 0 Comment

what is especially weird about this job/moving transition i’m doing is that at any given moment, i have to do a double-take: where do i live again?
when i was up in st cloud for my grandma’s funeral, i had a weird moment like that. nate and i were turning into the hotel, and i was thinking, hmmm, i wonder how long it’s been since liz has been to st cloud? probably a while – i wonder why she doesn’t visit me more often? then i shook my head: i don’t live in st cloud. why would liz be visiting me here?
it’s only gotten worse. it doesn’t help that half my FB friends live in st cloud and post about things in st cloud. one of them posted she went to joan jett at grand casino. i had heard that my supervisor at st cloud tech was going to see joan jett this weekend too. in my head, i’m thinking, whoa, that’s a long drive to go see joan jett from rochester. wait a minute…this is my supervisor in st cloud.
oh man.
i didn’t have this difficulty coming down here; rochester was so unfamiliar to me that there was no question as to which was which town. but now that i’m familiar with roch, and the place i’m moving to is very familiar to me as well, this is bound to get really confusing.
so, if i’m looking off in space wondering where i’m supposed to be in the next few months, that’s the reason why.

so it begins

May 15, 2016 kate Comments 2 comments

for some reason, this commuting thing is already worse, and it’s only been six hours. it could be because i have a nasty sore throat that’s really dragging me down, but i miss my kitties and i miss my hubby already!! 🙁
so tomorrow i start my new job. i’m hoping i feel better than i do now. i remember being really anxious before i started at roch comm & tech , but i am not feeling anxious at all for this job. maybe tomorrow morning, but i feel like i’m just heading to another branch of mnscu, so it’s really similar. i hope i find coworkers as awesome as mine at roch comm & tech 🙁 wah i already miss my department.
BUT.
this is what i want. this is good. i just have to do this weird commuting thing for six months at most, and things will settle down again. rinse, repeat.
maybe i’ll be able to blog a little more! now that i’m not cleaning 24/7 and running around like a chicken with my head cut off. watch for details!
on the plus side, i’m going shopping after work tomorrow (if i feel up to it), which should remind me how much i hate st cloud traffic. exciting!

how to run a half marathon

May 9, 2016 kate Comments 1 comment

*runrunrunrunrunrunrunrurn*
after three months of training, the day for the half marathon was upon us last weekend. well, i trained for three months. i can’t speak for liz.
i’d run 10 miles at the most. that 10 miles was… not bad…but not awesome. i knew i could do it. i was relatively unscathed afterward. and they say that you can run 1/3-1/2 more of the distance than what you’d trained for. so i was (supposedly) good.
the day before, i ate. a lot.
the morning of, i ate. a muffin. and used the bathroom. (no runner’s trots for me.)
Screen Shot 2016-05-09 at 11.15.43 PM the time came. we started our half marathon. 13.1 miles.
we decided the best way to accomplish this was to walk a little bit each mile, so we ranranranranwalksranranranranwalked. liz took a picture at each mile marker.
so things were going pretty well. it takes a couple miles to warm up, and after three miles it just becomes a blur, but then after about 7 (for me, anyway), things start to get hurty. after 9 miles they get really hurty, especially below the waist. after 10, the bra starts chafing, and i have to make an effort to hold my arms away from my sides as i run to let the cool air flow over my chafed arms. at 11 miles, we stopped to stretch out the calves – OMG.
at this point, all those runners who’d been running fast then walking then running fast then walking were running really slowly. so liz’s and my “slow and steady wins the race” attitude passed all those losers. (said she who came in 112th out of 137.)
and then…the wall. the last mile was just torture. my hamstring quit on me. i took a minute at a street sign to stretch it out, and i barely got my leg 8 inches off the ground before it screamed at me to send it to guantanamo because that would’ve been less torturous than what i was putting it through now. after a couple kicks, it barely loosened up, but mind over matter, right?
right.
we walked a little bit, then decided it was time to run; it was mostly downhill at this point anyway, and the end was near.

OH HAPPY DAY! MILE 13!!
liz decided she needed to sprint the last stretch, so she finished 10 seconds ahead of me, but i said screw it; as long as i finish running, i’ll be good.
and finish we did.
so why did we do it? like i’ve said before, because, well, we can!

then after that? i ate a lot.
the day after? i ate a lot.
today? i ran again.

helloooo

May 9, 2016 kate Comments 0 Comment

well hello blogosphere. i have not forgotten about you. it’s just that there’s a lot going on. and somehow i’ve relegated blogging to the back of my list. bottom. finito. 🙁
it’s my last week at rctc. i’m both sad and excited – i’ve never before taken a job, really, as part of professional/personal development. it’s always been about the moola. this is the first time in my life where i’ve sat and thought, ok, do i REALLY want to leave this job? i like my job. i like my coworkers. i like my boss. i like the atmosphere. but, personal development really won out in the end. sure, it helps that i’m making more money, but given the opportunity with the same money? i’d definitely have to think about it.
anyway, tomorrow’s just one long party all day for me. time to get out my party dress and go to bed to get my beauty sleep.

planting

April 26, 2016 kate Comments 1 comment

my grandma died early monday morning, and after i got home from work that afternoon, i hauled out my planters. the weekend before, i’d gone to the amish greenhouse down the road and gotten some flowers to plant for curb appeal, and they had been sitting in their pots waiting for an opportune moment. what better opportunity than to celebrate the life of a woman who kept more flowers than i could even imagine.
my grandma’s house in st cloud had tulips lining the house, so every spring when the snow melted, the season was greeted with red and yellow tulips. her moss roses spread all over the yard, and her rhubarb was getting to the point of unwieldy. The front door’s walk was small, but my uncles had spent some time to dig it up and create more garden space for more flowers.
she was the plant whisperer. inside her house, there were african violets in pots all over the surfaces next to windows, and big planters with large ferns, lilies, and other greenery lined her living room. and in the pots were little ceramic animals or a small bird or last easter’s palms or maybe a bird’s nest with some eggs in it. a large philodendron sat on top of her hutch, with its green leaves hanging over the edges. she almost always had starter spider plants in glasses on the windowsill in her kitchen, waiting for homes. her thumb wasn’t just green – it was the vibrant green of springtime and tree buds.
i dragged out my planters, some of which i’d gotten from her, and filled a bucket with dirt from my vegetable beds to set my flowers in their home. my tulips i’d planted last fall were up and blooming, heralding springtime, and i had moss roses waiting to plant down by my mailbox. of the many traits that my grandma passed to her off-off-spring, including a baking itch and the ability to enjoy shopping, i think the need for dirt under the fingernails in the appropriate months is my favorite. seeing opportunity in a seed, hope in a bulb.