Reading Lately

It took me three months to read the first three books in this post and three days to read the fourth book.

What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty
I picked this book up from the "take a book, leave a book" shelves at work. In Chapter 1, Alice is newly-married, fabulously in love with her husband and expecting her first baby. In Chapter 2, Alice awakens on the floor of the gym, having fallen off the bike in spin class. She is ten years older, has three children and is in the process of a nasty divorce.  Alice spends the next several months acclimating and trying to remember this new life. In her mind, it is ten years ago. 

In Chapter 1, they nickname the little baby-to-be the Sultana. The setting is Australia, so I had no idea what a Sultana was until I was watching "The Great British Baking Show" and found out a Sultana is a type of raisin. Who knew! With interesting subplots about Alice's family, this is a light fun read. 


Free book from the shelves at work. It fell apart after I read it!

The House of Eyes by Kate Ellis
Another book I picked up at work. This is one in a series of Wesley Peterson detective novels. Eyecliffe Castle and the surrounding town of Devon are the setting. At first Wesley is not too concerned when Leanne Hatman is reported missing by her father Darren.  Then Darren turns up dead at the site of a barn he is renovating on Castle property. 

The book goes back and forth between the present and an 1800's diary written by a member of the D'Arles family that used to live in the castle. Nefarious happenings were going on back then as well. There are also various archeological digs going on, and then it turns out two girls went missing in the 1960's.

Aside from having to keep track of three time periods, and way too many murders to be believable, this was still a quick read.  It all comes together, again, not too believably, in the end.

Kindred by Octavia Butler
I checked this out of the library upon reading about it on Modern Mrs Darcy.com. It was one of her top reads of 2019, but it was written in 1979. I was intrigued because there is time travel in this book, and I love me some good time travel!

Dana is a young black woman living in California who somehow is repeatedly transported back to a pre-Civil War plantation in Maryland. Each time she has to save slave-owning Rufus's life, and ensure that he ends up with Alice, a slave, because they are Dana's ancestors. On one trip, Dana's husband Kevin, who is white, is transported back with her.

This book is basically a slavery narrative from a 20th century point of view - what Dana has to endure to survive and to return to her own time. I liked that it was a Jeopardy question one night when I was reading it.😉

The River by Peter Heller
As noted above, I read this book in three days. This is the story of two college friends, Jack and Wynn, on a wilderness canoe trip in Canada. They are very experienced outdoorsmen, but chose to forego bringing a satellite phone. Ugh, if only they had that phone.
While canoeing through dense fog, the boys hear a couple arguing on an island. When they smell the smoke of an encroaching forest fire, they decide to turn back and warn the couple. At that point, almost everything that could possibly go wrong, does.

The descriptions of the landscapes are vivid - made me want to be outdoors (but not in a situation like this). It is not a happy book, but it is a gripping page turner.

Thanks for reading!

2019 Amazon purchases

Personal finance blogger Joe at Retire By 40  recently posted a list / review of all his Amazon purchases for 2019. I thought it would be fun to do the same thing here.

I broke my Amazon purchases into categories:

Christmas Presents
1. Men's Compression Socks 2 pairs at $11.99 each
These were Christmas presents for my two sons.  Each of my three children got one big gift also known as the "anchor gift" and three small gifts. Socks are small gifts. I know they liked them because Son 1 requested them and Son 2 kept them. That is why I had to buy a second pair the day after Christmas.

2. Herschel Travel Bag $29.99
This was a Christmas present for my husband.  Usually we give each other "ideas", but I came up with this one myself. His old toiletry travel bag was decades old and had seen better days. Husband liked it.

3. Creatine Pills $27.83
Another small present for one of my sons.

4. Adjustable Height Standing Desk $119.99
Anchor present for my older son.  He will use this when he works from home.

Household
1. Driftaway Julia Floral Lined Valances 2 valances at $17.99 each
We are redoing our living room. These look fresh and bright compared to the old 1990's brocade valances we had before. I am going to do a whole post on the living room remodel once it's done.

New valance - photo courtesy of Amazon website

Clothing
1. Vince Camuto Black Ponte Leggings $49.00
I used Swagbucks to buy these so they were actually free. Yes, I am still doing Swagbucks! And these leggings are great.

2. Mizuno Wave Rider 22 Running Shoes $119.95 Returned
I wrote about my search for running shoes in this blog post . This was one unsuccessful attempt. They were terrible and the only Amazon item that I returned.

Grocery
1. Kind Bars $12.72
I bought these when I was figuring out how to redeem Swagbucks

2. Lara Bars $15.29
More testing out how to redeem Swagbucks

3. Ubr Breakfast Rounds 2 boxes at $19.99 each
I wrote about these yummy bars in one of my Acadia National Park posts. My husband fell in love with them at the breakfast buffet. I actually used a $25 gift card from Christmas 2018 towards this purchase.


Well that sums up my Amazon spending for 2019. I don't have Amazon Prime, but did take advantage of a 30-day free trial for Amazon prime / free shipping.  I did spend $2.15 for one week of Amazon Prime at Christmas. Excluding my returns, Swagbucks, and gift cards I spent around $255 on Amazon last year.


Do you spend a lot on Amazon?  Thanks for reading!

New Year Update

Happy New Year.  This is going to be a quick post about how we spent our New Year's Day. My husband and I started off 2020 with a race. I ran the Bill Hogan 3.5 mile which is held in conjunction with the Hangover Half.  My husband did his own thing and ran about a 10K.  I finished in 45:38 which is about a minute slower than I did this race last year.

Afterwards, we hurried home to shower and get ourselves over to the Troy Music Hall. Our friends had tickets to the Berkshire Bach (orchestra) playing all six of Bach's Brandenburg Concerti.  We were in the sixth row and it was amazing. I am not a philistine! 😉 Of course not! That is a reference to one of my favorite movies "The Squid and the Whale" which I watched on Netflix over the weekend for the umpteenth time.

I watched a lot of Netflix over the past weekend, while recovering from a cold. The rewatch of "The Squid and the Whale" was prompted from viewing "Marriage Story", also by Noah Baumbach and also about divorce.  In addition, I watched "Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things" (so true) and "The Magic Pill", which touts the benefit of a ketogenic diet.

My husband and I have also started watching "Schitt's Creek" which is a Canadian sitcom by Eugene Levy and Dan Levy. It is about a wealthy couple who find themselves broke and end up in the small town they own with their two spoiled adult kids. 

It was a great way to kick off the new decade!

Last Run Recap

On Saturday we ran the Last Run Holiday Lights Through the Park 5K.  That was my 13th and final race of 2019.  For some reason I was dreading it ahead of time, you know that negative thinking "Why am I doing this? It's going to be cold! I don't want to run!"

In retrospect, that is probably because it is the only race of the year that starts at 5:00 p.m. in the evening.  Normally, we are out the door early in the morning, coffee in hand, with no time to think about NOT going.

However, when I was standing watching the pre-race fireworks, bopping to the music on the speakers and feeling toasty warm from all the holiday-bedecked runners packed in around me, I was really glad I was there.

Photo courtesy of Albany Events/Andrzej Pilarczyk

I found some hand warmers at home and I used those to keep my hands toasty with my little red gloves. The red ones matched my holiday attire which is part of the fun.

The first mile was incredibly slow as the roads were narrower than usual due to the big snowstorm we had five days earlier. That created somewhat of a logjam for those of us in the back.  Once we got past that, it was free and clear going. The holiday lights were fun too look at.

Photo courtesy of Albany Events/Andrzej Pilarczyk

All in all, my time was 40:17 (12:58 pace). I came in number 1,120 out of 1,513 total runners.

A lot of our running friends were there which made it even better.  We went out afterwards; our friend wanted to use up two $25 gift certificates that he had won in a raffle a few weeks earlier.  We had no idea what the place would be like. Fortunately, it was a little pizza joint so we looked perfectly appropriate in our crazy holiday running getups. It was less than $25 for four of us, so our friend will have to go back!

Thanks for reading!

Turkey Trot Recap

On Thanksgiving morning, my husband and I ran in the Cohoes Turkey Trot.  There was easily a turkey trot to choose from within 20 miles in any given direction.  We chose Cohoes because it was free with a canned good donation. It is nice when you can get the occasional free race, and it helps stock their food pantry.

The Turkey trot in my own town cost $30 per person plus a processing fee and is not even chip timed.  Seriously, why pay that much and not even get a time?

It was ironic that there were only two port-a-potties for about 500 runners! Fortunately, I got in line with time to spare. There was a lady in the back telling people to hurry up. I think everyone got to “go” by start time.

They had water bottles instead of cups at the water station.  More poor planning because who wants to run a race holding a water bottle? And then no water bottles at the finish. They did have coffee, which worked for me, however most runners want water.

They say you get what you pay for.  Or should I say you don't get port-a-potties and water bottles at the finish when you don't pay!

This was a 3.5 mile race and I finished in 43:59 (12:34 pace).  I was number 353 out of 489 runners. The day was blustery but fortunately the air temperature was warm, so you were good with a warm hat. I had new earbuds so I had my music as well.

This was my 12th race of the year.  I met my 2019 race goal of running in 12 races, and I still have one more race coming up.

Since I don't have any amazing race pictures, here is a picture of the salad I made on Thanksgiving.  It is a blue cheese and pear salad; the recipe came from Food network.com. My only tweak was adding the craisins. Yummy.

Dressing was added later

Thanks for reading!

I Get The News I Need On The Weather Report

That song came on my iPod when I was running one day last week. That song is in one of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies.  If you don't get the reference, google “Garden State” - Infinite Abyss. And yes, right then, I did feel like the only living girl in New York.

In addition to my family and friends, the main thing I am thankful for on this day before Thanksgiving is the feeling of being able to run outside in the sunshine.  That sums it all up for me - good health, the outdoors, the glorious sun on your face.  As Dr. Cohen says in another scene from Garden State: "Yeah, you're alright. You're alive!"

This time of year, I really do get the news I need on the weather report. If it is sunny you will find me running outdoors, walking the dog, and occasionally helping my husband with the endless leaf blowing and raking.

My husband, daughter and Summer on the rail trail on a perfect November afternoon

My older son got me a groupon for a dip in a sensory deprivation tank as a birthday present last month. I scheduled it for the day after Stockade-athon to rejuvenate any sore muscles.

That was a new experience for me. You get naked, shower, put in earplugs, and climb into 11 inches of salt and hydrogen peroxide-infused water. The salt concentration keeps you afloat, just like in the Dead Sea. You switch off the light and just float for one hour. It was relaxing and maybe I would do it again. I definitely wondered about the cleanliness of soaking in water that others soaked in. As it turns out, nothing (bacteria!) can survive in that mixture. Plus, it’s been well over two weeks and I didn’t catch anything.

Yes, I went into that abyss 

Speaking of Stockade-athon I was in the newspaper. Yes, that's me in the pink.  Bethany from my running club is to my left in purple.

Photo courtesy of Schenectady Gazette

Thanks for reading! Happy Thanksgiving!

Stockade-athon 2019

On Sunday I ran the Stockade-athon which is a 15K run. Yes, that is 9.3 miles. Or three consecutive 5K's is another way of looking at it. It is my longest run of the year and this was my second year running it. 

The day was overcast, but definitely felt warmer than last year, probably due to it not being windy. Plus, you can stay indoors at Proctors Theater or the YMCA until the race starts which is very nice.

Despite the sign behind us, we were not actually frozen

Running 9.3 miles does push me to my limits, but in a good way. I was totally prepared for this race, having followed Hal Higdon's 15K training plan for a solid three months.

The first two miles went by quickly as I was trying to finagle with my iPod.  It turns out the wire to the earbuds had broken so the one negative was that I had no music for this run.


At the start - colorful runners on a gray day

The middle miles are just a matter of one step in front of the other. My legs were just on autopilot and I felt happy to see each mile marker. The last third goes through beautiful Central Park which is very pretty and scenic. It was an overall good run.

Here is a screenshot of my time.  I came in 1347 out of 1409 runners. Hey, I am only in competition with myself. And guess what? I beat last year's time by over 1 minute so I have a new PR in the 15K.  

Thanks for reading!










Clocks Back

I have been neglectful of ye olde blog here. I am also in a reading slump.  The last book I started was the weekend of October 19th.  We went to Massachusetts to watch my niece cheer at her college football game (Endicott College) and thence to Newburyport. On October 20th, my husband ran the Newburyport Half Marathon with an old friend who lives there. 

Sunset in Newburyport Massachusetts

I passed on that run and started reading Stay Hungry by comedian Sebastian Maniscalco while sitting in the car waiting for it to warm up a bit.  Not a book that I would have ordinarily chosen, but my coworker lent it to me after she heard that I have tickets to see him next April.

I made it through Chapter 3 and have not read anything since. That happens sometimes. If it can happen with reading, it can happen with writing. Instead I have been crazy into doing crossword puzzles.

Besides running and volunteering at Squirrely Six last weekend, I participated in a Crossword Puzzle Tournament on October 26th. I may need to devote a post to that.  In case I don't, I finished 16th place out of about 70 participants. It was a blast! Oh, and it was also my birthday. 🙂

Every day after work last week there was something to do: Monday - got my nails done, Tuesday - ran treadmill at the gym, Wednesday - saw Zombieland: Double Tap.  I loved it.  Gosh, that needs a blog post of its own as well.  Thursday - Halloween! We always get a lot of trick or treaters; the rainy weather did not keep them away. Friday - met a group of my husband's old high school friends for dinner. 

By the time the next weekend rolled around, I really needed that extra hour we gained from turning the clocks back!

Trail Run Recap and Grand Prix

When it comes to running for me, sometimes it's just about finishing. But in the case of my trail runs, even just finishing has put me in third place for the Grand Prix. Let me start with a recap of the two October trail runs that I talked about in my running update post.

Way back on Columbus Day I ran the Fall Festival 5K Trail Run at Lawson Lake. It was a beautiful and warm sunny day, easily in the 70's by race time. My time was an incredibly slow 43:47 (14:06 pace). There are some parts that are very steep and required walking, or should I say climbing. I also was overdressed for the weather. I came in 37 out of 47 runners. That was Ok because 1) I finished and 2) I was not even close to last place. So I was satisfied.

Completely unrelated picture of mums near my office. 

Last Sunday I ran the 15th Annual Squirrely Six (miles) at Thacher Park. That is held in conjunction with the Hairy Gorilla Half (marathon) and is a fun Halloween-themed trail run. On Sunday, as forecast, it was pouring rain. My time was 1:26:57 (14:30 pace).  I came in 147 out of 165 runners.
It was not cold once we started moving; in fact it felt really good. Just like Lawson Lake, there were some steep uphills and downhills that I walked. That, and being super careful running in wet leaves and mud is what led to another slow paced run. Again, I was happy with my finish.

These two trail runs were my ninth and tenth races of 2019.

On Saturday afternoon I volunteered to set up and help decorate. Saturday was just gorgeous and the park was jam packed with people enjoying a great fall day.

Now about that Grand Prix....

My running club has something called the Grand Prix Trail Series. The Grand Prix encourages trail running and trail volunteerism.  You are in competition with others of your gender / age group.  That slow time at Lawson Lake still earned me 5 points in the Grand Prix Trail Series. Helping set up Saturday earned me a volunteer point and running on Sunday earned me 6 Grand Prix points as well.
I am solidly in third place in my gender / age and in the running to win something wonderful and exciting like a cap or a water bottle. Ha! 

So it's funny how I can finish near the back of the pack and still be in third place in Grand Prix.  And that matters to me!

Reading Lately

The Boston Girl by Anita Diamant
If you read the book The Red Tent that was all the rage a couple of decades ago, then you know what an amazing writer Anita Diamant is.  This book starts out in 1985 with Addie Baum telling her life story to her granddaughter.  It is a well written historical fiction novel.  If you can relate at all to Boston in the mid-1900's, Jewish immigrants, or young girls finding their voice, you will love this book. The girls would go to Rockport Lodge every summer and I was wondering if that was a real place.  It turns out that Rockport Lodge is totally real, and was the inspiration for the author to write this book. Anyway, Addie's parents were not the most nurturing people, but I found reading about their dysfunctional home life to be quite entertaining.  Eventually Addie finds mentors outside the home - and true love of course! The book was not as emotionally gripping as The Red Tent but I still recommend.

Well-worn library copy

The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper by Phaedra Patrick
My husband made me read - I mean strongly suggested I read - this book, which I did while we were in Clearwater last month.  At first I was cringing at this boring awful 69 year old widower who never left the house.  He wore the same old man sweater vest every day and didn't do anything. While finally cleaning out his late wife's closet, he finds a charm bracelet tucked away in the toe of her rain boot. Each charm has a clue about an aspect of his wife's life before they married. Mr. Pepper goes on both emotional trips and real life adventure trips to discover the story behind each charm. The book grew on me as Arthur Pepper blossomed.  He questioned his life with his wife, but the quest helps to bring out his good qualities and improves his relationships with his children and neighbors. I never quite understood why he loved those crazy clown pants though! All in all, it was a good read.

The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
I picked this book up because it is the fantasy type book I enjoy reading.  David is a 12 year old boy whose mother passed away.  His father remarries Rose who gives birth to his half brother Georgie.  Rose and his dad are wonderful, but David has a chip on his shoulder. The story takes place just outside of London during WW2. To escape the bombing, they move to Rose's family's estate where it turns out a great uncle and his adopted little sister disappeared as children 60 years ago. The books in David's room murmur and talk to him. They lead him to a passage in the garden where David is transported to another world.  But this is not a good world; there are the half man / half wolf Loups, for example. There are several charismatic good guys - all men. I disliked the intimation that Roland - one of these good guys - was homosexual.  It was completely unnecessary to the storyline.  I kept waiting for this so-called "book of lost things" to turn up, and some resolution to the mystery of the missing children.  It was a loooong wait, but my questions were answered.  The middle 100 pages of this book could have been omitted. Skip it.

Thanks for reading!

Reunion

Last Saturday night I went to my 40th high school reunion. This was a big deal for me because I have never been to any previous reunions. My memories of high school are okay but not great. My high school was very cliquey and I never felt popular.

Some background - I live a few hours away from my hometown and I don’t have a Facebook page.

First the good part. I reached out to two former best friends ahead of time. Both of these ladies were so warm and welcoming to me. They came to my mom’s house Saturday afternoon before the reunion. One of the girls was a grade ahead of me so she didn’t attend the reunion. She could have because it was open to other classes but she is the caregiver for her elderly mother. The other girl has been attending all the reunions.

As far as the reunion itself, all I can say is meh. I saw several people I hadn’t seen in 40 years and it convinced me that people don’t change.

There was one bad part about the reunion and I am baring my soul to you readers by writing about it. A woman came up to me and the first thing she said was “I have a memory of you and it’s bad / you’re not going to like it”. I’m not kidding - that is how she greeted me after 40 years.

She said that in 10th grade I had written something about her that wasn’t nice. I have no memory of this whatsoever but it certainly made me feel bad. I told her I didn’t remember writing anything like this but if I did I was sorry. The rest of our brief conversation reinforced that she is not a nice person. Which makes me wonder if I did write this because I disliked her 40 years ago. How would she have seen it or known about it anyway?

My mom said the whole thing is silly because even if I wrote anything, I was a 15 year old kid.

My husband thinks it is hilarious that this woman has been coming to reunions for 40 years just waiting to confront me. I have been wracking my brain trying to recall this and nothing rings a bell. Oh well.

Did I get to say hello to a few people from the past? Sure, but who cares. They have their lives and I have mine.

Running Update

First of all, you may have noticed that I made some changes to the look of my blog. The picture behind the heading was taken in July in the Adirondacks and is a view of Algonquin from Iroquois. I blogged about that here.

This post is a running update.  Before I started blogging, I ran my first half marathon.  It was the Big Cottonwood in Salt Lake City Utah in September 2018. You guys, it was hard! I felt great for the first 9 miles. Miles 9 to 10 were so-so.  At the 10 mile mark, I was done in.  And I still had a 5K to go. I had to walk the last 5K and I was crying and blubbering the whole way.

But the silver lining (aside from the fact that yes, I did complete that half marathon) was that I knew I could comfortably run 9 miles. So, I signed up for and ran the StockadeAThon which is a 15K (9.3 miles) last November.

I am doing it again this November. I have routinely been running 3 to 4 miles but with the race only a month away, it is time to increase my mileage. On Saturday I ran 5 miles and it felt great. It took me 1:01:50 (12:22 pace).

Here is a screenshot of my running year to date:

That is 221 miles in a year, not a month! It doesn't appear likely that I am going to make that 450 mile goal I set for myself. On the other hand, I will meet my goal of running 12 races this year. 

The Lindenwald Trail Run was number 8. I was debating whether it counted as a race, because it was free and it was so low key. But, on the other hand, we had bibs, it was timed, and there were prizes. That makes it officially a race.

Coming up this year are Lawson Lake 5K trail run on Columbus Day, Squirrely Six 6 mile trail run on Halloween weekend, the above-mentioned StockadeAThon in November, and the Last Run 5K in December. Those four will officially give me 12 races and who knows - maybe I will even do a Turkey Trot for lucky 13!

Thanks for reading!

Kinderhook Trail Run

Saturday was a beautiful and warm sunny day and my husband and I took advantage of that by running the Kinderhook Dutch Farming Heritage 4 mile trail run. The course traversed the farmlands of Lindenwald, Roxbury Farm and the Luykas Van Alen House.

Lindenwald was the home of U.S. President Martin Van Buren and the property is a National Park Service registered site.  There are tours of the house afterwards, but we passed as we had done that in previous years.

President Martin Van Buren was very contemporary for his time - he had one of the first indoor flush toilets.  He also had a modern coffee maker; in fact if he were alive today he would have a Keurig machine, an espresso maker, and all kinds of coffee making gadgets.  Yes, I remember that from my last tour of the home.

The trail itself is great because it is dirt and grass, with absolutely no rocks and roots.  Part of the trail runs right alongside the pastures.  The cows and baby calves were all out there mooing like crazy! It was reassuring to know that the fence that separated the animals from the runners is electrified.  We were warned not to touch it, and apparently the cows knew too!

I felt really good and the only difficult part was a steep hill at the very end, but I ran it without having to walk. My total time was 50:47 (pace 12:42). This run was super low key; there were only 60 or so runners.


Lindenwald - you can see the finish line water station at the right

Last year's run - photo courtesy of National Park Service

Afterwards, we stopped at a nearby farm to buy some apples and cider donuts to bring home.

Thanks for reading!

My Free Vacation - continued

You can read the first part of My Free Vacation here if you are interested!

The company provided breakfast for the attendees, not spouses.  The first morning, I asked my husband to bring me a muffin from the buffet and I made coffee using the Keurig in the room. I'm not a big breakfast eater so that was fine. 

On Saturday, the second morning, my husband was too full from dinner to eat breakfast so he made me go to the buffet in his place. I brought him back an apple!

After breakfast, I headed out for a walk alongside the ocean. Clearwater Beach has the whitest sand I have ever seen.  And it stays cool to the touch too. It also has the warmest ocean water - probably due to it being the gulf side of Florida. We always go to the Atlantic side.

Clearwater Beach

After my walk it was back to lounging at the pool. However, I had a little task to keep me occupied, aside from books and crosswords. The company had all kinds of skits and games going on for the attendees. This was to break up the work and make it feel "fun".  There was a printed handbook of all the attendees with their pictures and profiles (bios). There was an answer key with a "fun fact" about each attendee.  It was a Match Game to pair up the fact with the correct person.

Hey, there was no rule that spouses couldn't help!  I truly enjoyed reading the bios and looking at the pictures and I filled that whole darn thing out.

Hotel pool early in the morning - the railing to the right overlooks the gulf

I sat with the woman that I met the previous day and that was nice.  The guys were done around 2:45 pm and had a good 4 hours to relax until cocktails and the award dinner later that evening.

My husband and I were in the hot tub watching a beach wedding, when we noticed a pod of dolphins leaping in the ocean.  It was really breathtaking to see!

The view from the pool railing at sunset - it felt like being on a cruise

That night was the award dinner.  My husband was not expecting to win any awards.

Then it was time for the winner of the Match Game.  Only 28 out of 80 or so attendees handed their sheets in, and apparently only some of them were actually correct.  Out of the correct ones, two winners were selected and my husband was one! He got two prizes - an Amazon Echo Dot and a set of wireless earbuds. I just knew that I - I mean he - was going to win! 


For dinner I had salad, teriyaki chicken, potatoes au gratin, asparagus and broccoli and rolls and butter. Other entrees were short ribs and grouper. That is the first time I have seen grouper as the fish selection at a catered function. Remember the scene in the movie "She's Having A Baby" where Elizabeth McGovern cooks grouper for Kevin Bacon? It goes without saying that I didn't have any grouper.


Dessert was the bomb - instead of a slab of cake they served three mini cakes: one cheesecake, one tiramisu and one lemon meringue tart. We headed back to the room content and satisfied.


I had intentions to get up early Sunday and do everything - pool, beach, hot tub, fitness room - one more time! But no, I had my husband bring me a muffin, drank Keurig coffee, packed up and we caught our Lyft to the airport. 

It was a great free vacation!

My Free Vacation

This post is coming from sunny Clearwater, Florida where I am enjoying a free four day three night vacation. No, I don’t have to sit through a time share spiel, nor did I win a radio contest.

I am tagging along on my husband’s business trip. My husband has his own business; this trip is the annual meeting for a company he works with. The company was encouraging spouses to attend. The only cost was my airfare and they even paid $100 towards it.

So while my husband is in meetings I get to be on vacation.

Clearwater Beach - the very last tall building is our hotel 

We flew to Florida on Thursday; it was great timing because we could check in to our hotel right away. We hung out at the pool and beach. The first night was a meet and greet at the hotel with drinks and a casual buffet dinner. There was sushi, meat and cheese board, chicken and beef sliders, French fries and veggie pasta.

It felt a little awkward for me since I didn’t know anyone other than my husband. I was tired from our early flight so I went up to the room. He stayed with the group since they all had to go to their first meeting right after for an hour.

On Friday hubs had meetings until 3 pm so I was on my own. I did a run on the treadmill in the hotel fitness center and then spent about 4 hours at the pool. Why is it so easy to do on vacation but impossible to do at home? Probably because the music is playing and the view is beautiful. I met another wife at the pool which was really nice.

Sand sculpture in the hotel lobby 

Friday night the company shuttled us to the owner’s mansion nearby. There were appetizers and drinks and a delicious catered dinner of steak, salad, potatoes, rolls and pasta. They had their pool covered over with a dance floor / stage like in “It’s  A Wonderful Life”. This big guy was jumping on it to prove it was safe. They also had karaoke and a belly dancer for entertainment. The vibe was much more relaxed than the previous evening. We sat with the woman I met earlier and her husband, plus several other nice people.



Big guy and belly dancer for your viewing pleasure. That is the pool below them.

The company owner's wife led a tour of their mansion which was pretty cool! Later on, the belly dancer's fire sticks set off a real fire and a group of younger guys started singing karaoke to a rap song with lyrics mother f*&$#....that is when my husband and I decided to Uber ourselves back to the hotel!  

That wraps up the first two days of my free vacation!



Swagbucks

Recently, I discovered Swagbucks.  Swagbucks is a rewards site where you can answer surveys, browse online and shop, all while earning points (called Swagbucks, or SB for short) which can be redeemed for paypal cash and gift cards.

I used a promo code from a blog that came up in a Google search. That earned me 1,000 SB which is the equivalent of $10.00. That blogger certainly earned some money or Swagbucks from his referral, but I'm fine with that. To earn the promo, I had to make an online purchase of $25.00. On Labor Day all the retailers were having sales, so I ordered two dresses from Old Navy (half price).

The dresses retailed for $40 and $35 but half price they were $37.50. I also earned an extra 260 SB for shopping through the Swagbucks site. After my sales and SB, the $75 purchase cost me $24.90 or something like that. Both dresses were super cute too!

However, I don't want to spend money to earn SB points. Thus, I have been doing a lot of surveys. This is what it looks like on the website.

Lots of surveys available to take

I also redeemed my first SB for a $25 Visa gift card. The gift cards themselves go "on sale" so I redeemed 2,160 SB points for the card.

Swagbucks emailed me a Virtual Visa card, which means that it's good for online shopping or you can add it to apps like Dunkin Donuts. It is legit! I used my Virtual Visa to pay a race entry fee (for a very inexpensive local race coming up) and used the balance to buy Kind Bars from Amazon.

I must confess that I did purchase LaraBars first thinking I had used my Virtual Visa, when I actually used my credit card on file with Amazon.  The second time around, I got it right and used the Virtual Visa.

The Kind Bars and the LaraBars were on sale and Amazon was offering free Prime for 30 days, which I signed up for.  Prime means free shipping. Yes, I now have a lot of bars in my house.

Is this a productive use of my time? At night, I am usually watching TV and playing on my phone anyway, so I figure if I can earn something all the better.

Being Neighborly

Every September our YMCA holds a Member Appreciation Picnic barbecue in their pavilion. A few weeks ago a notice was up that the picnic was being held on Friday September 6th.  There was an email to RSVP.  I didn't remember there being an RSVP in the past, but I went ahead and emailed the contact. It seemed odd that it was a gmail.com address and not a ymca.org address.

A few days later there was a notice that the YMCA Picnic was going to be on Friday September 13th.  I asked the woman working at the desk if that was a date change.  She told me that there were actually two picnics; the first one was a new neighborhood organization that is forming and was not the YMCA picnic. The new organization was using the Y as their venue. She said "You may as well go to both".

So, on Friday, my husband and I tentatively went over to the first picnic with absolutely no idea what I had signed us up for. As my husband said, we could always "Bite and Bolt". It turned out that our town was forming a Neighbors Helping Neighbors type of organization.  It is geared for ages 50 and up (yup, that's us). 

They asked us to fill out an information form with what services you can offer and what you may need.  For example, help running an errand or minor handyman tasks. The goal is to help seniors age in place and to encourage neighborliness. It turns out that this is a part of a larger national organization. 

Instead of handing in the info form, we took it home with us.  We are going to share it with a friend who is already retired and would enjoy doing that. Right now, two full time jobs and caring for our own home, cars, pet, volunteering at races, exercise and leisure takes up all of our time. I'm glad I went though! We met some very lovely people sitting at the table next to us and enjoyed a great dinner.  Stewarts contributed a "make your own sundae" station and I had a butterscotch sundae for the first time in years.😋

On Saturday night, we went to see Little River Band which was a free outdoor concert. If you remember them from the late 1970's and early 1980's their biggest hits were "Cool Change", "Reminiscing", "Lady" and "Lonesome Loser". It was a lot of fun.

Reminiscing about "Reminiscing"

On Sunday, my husband ran a 10K race up in Lake George. This race was a Half Marathon / 10K. I volunteered at the finish line water station.  It was my third year in a row doing water at the finish line. In fact, I never heard from the race organizer after I signed up so I headed straight to the finish line and started pouring. When I saw him, he said "I didn't email you because I figured you know what your job is".  After the race, there was a free barbecue for runners and volunteers.

Perfect day on Lake George

It was a fun and frugal weekend!

Last Week's Workouts: On Monday I ran 3.5 miles, on Tuesday I did HIIT with Erin, on Wednesday I did Zumba with Michelle, on Saturday I did Zumba with Tammy, and on Sunday I ran 3.5 miles. A five-workout week in the books.

Thanks for reading!

August Clean Out

At the beginning of August I decided to set a goal of cleaning out, dumping and getting rid of something every day. I have mentioned before that I hate clutter and excess.  While I don't want to be a true minimalist with a bare house, I would love to be able to name every item that I own and know exactly where it is located.

Anything beyond that is probably not necessary.  However, I live with two other people, so I can only get rid of things that are mine unless I have my husband or daughter's blessing.

Here is what left our house in August:

Trash
Old running shoes (too decrepit to donate)
Everything in my bottom night stand drawer
Black flip flops (broken)
Contents of bag in kitchen cabinet
Contents of box in older son's bedroom
Items from kitchen junk drawer
Items from top dresser drawer

Sold
Husband's wetsuit (apparently he is done with triathlons)

We sold one of these

Gave Away
Glassware (belonged to late mother-in-law; gave to brother-in-law)

Donated
3 bags of clothes
Old bedsheets
Snuggie
5 pocketbooks

Recycled
Plastic gladware
Old piano book


And there you have it - my August cleanout.  Thanks for reading!

Reading Lately

The Witch and Other Tales Retold by Jean Thompson
This book is a retelling of fairy tales in modern times. It made me wonder if the originals were based in truth as well. The very first story "The Witch" is so well done you will feel the emotions of the children. The reader will quickly realize that this is a modern day Hansel and Gretel. Instead of a witch in a candy cottage in the woods, she is an evil foster mother. I enjoyed figuring out which fairy tale was being retold. You will recognize “Little Red Riding Hood” but with a twist. I loved the last story "Prince" about how an unusual Prince Charming of sorts comes to the heroine’s rescue.  Every story was thoroughly enjoyable and some stayed with me for a while.

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
This book is about Jason Dessen, an average type college physics professor, husband and father, who is kidnapped, drugged, and wakes up in an alternate universe.  He is still Jason Dessen, but now he is a world famous quantum physicist, who has invented a machine that can transport people to other worlds. Who kidnapped him, and why? Will Jason be able to return to his old life?  It reminded me of the movie “The Family Man” with Nicolas Cage and Tea Leoni - except Nic’s character started out successful and woke up as the middling family guy. This is fast paced and I liked it until the end when it got more and more outlandish.

Little Sister by Barbara Gowdy
Another supernatural book!  This book is about Rose, who runs the family’s indie theater which her late father adored, while trying to look after her mother, who is in the early stages of dementia. Rose’s entertainment is suffering through dinner dates with her boring boyfriend Victor. During a summer lightning storm, Rose is somehow transported into the body of Harriet. Harriet is the complete opposite of Rose, and also bears an uncanny resemblance to someone from Rose's past.  Basically there are two stories going on at once, as the story follows Rose’s life and Rose gets drawn into Harriet's exciting life. I liked this book but it ended abruptly and never explained how Rose ended up inside someone else’s head (or how she got out).

Pilgrims by Elizabeth Gilbert
This was another book of short stories. They’re all real life; nothing supernatural going on here. These are the type of stories that are snippets of different people’s somewhat ordinary lives. The author was adept at creating characters who were all a little downtrodden, yet Gilbert always seemed d to convey an optimism that things would turn out okay. My favorites were “The Many Things That Denny Brown Did Not Know” about a few summer weeks in 15 year old Denny’s world, “At The Bronx Vegetable Terminal Market” which is just one thought provoking night in Jimmy Moran’s life, and “The Famous Torn and Restored Lit Cigarette Trick” which is just a little bit about magicians but ends up magical. Every story was a little gem to read.

Happy Reading!

Attitude Adjustment

In June I got a new job and I was extremely excited to be leaving the old one which was very toxic to me and caused me undue stress. Here it is only two and a half months later and the honeymoon period at the new place is over. 

I don't want to be a complainypants. This job is everything I wanted - which was basically good management.  My managers are amazing.  For example, a big stressor at the old job was the hoops everyone had to jump through to get even one day off. Here, we are encouraged to take as much time off as we would like!

The old job was a busy, fast paced environment where the work was nonstop.  On top of that, the bad managers were always having us change and redo things because their procedures and expectations were constantly changing.

In contrast, the work volume at the new job is significantly less. The managers like things done the way they always have been done, so once something is complete, that's it. The pace is slow and I'm not used to that. I started to feel dread in the sense that I am the kind of person who wants to always be busy. Years of school and decades of work train you to always be productive.

Last week I went to Lake Placid and only worked three days. There was a lot of good stuff going on after work and this past weekend which I will write about below. 

Lake Placid is my happy place

The problem was that instead of being fully present enjoying my time off in the evening and this past weekend, I was mentally and verbally complaining about work. I decided yesterday that it is time for an attitude adjustment. I have to embrace a new mindset that a laid back work environment is not bad, and maybe even good. Hey I can work on my blog so that is good!

This weekend my husband and I had two barbecues to go to which were both amazing with good food and good conversation. On Sunday we both volunteered at the Thacher Park Trail Running Festival. I didn't take pictures, but if you click on the link you can see how pretty it is. Summer finally got a long overdue professional grooming!

Last Week's Workouts: On Tuesday I hiked Hurricane Mountain, on Thursday I did a 3 mile trail run, on Saturday I ran 3 miles and on Sunday I ran 3 miles (after the trail running festival).

Thanks for reading!