Saturday, June 30, 2012

the summer slips by.

I blink and suddenly it's the end of June. Where does the time go?

Last weekend, I spent some time near Tulsa, OK playing in an Ultimate Frisbee tournament.  Our team ended up winning the whole thing, going undefeated all weekend! It was a great learning experience for me and a fun chance to play some frisbee with great women and fabulous athletes.

Unfortunately, the tournament meant utter bodily exhaustion, so I returned to Fayetteville and promptly slept for 12 hours.  It felt awesome, and I realize I need to make getting a full night's sleep a regular priority.  Challenge...accepted!

Last week was my final week of work at the writing center, and it was a busy (but fun!) week.  The summer is super intense, and I found myself with a group of clients that kept returning for me to help, so it was enjoyable to see their progress over a few short weeks as they developed as writers.

Today began early with a 10 mile run with my lady running group (so begins the marathon training!), which was great.  Then, market and the pride parade.  After lunch, I returned home to clean and prepare for our upcoming trip...and fell asleep.  Oops!  After I woke up, I straightened things up a bit, then headed to the pool with A. and swam laps. Because I love swimming laps, and it feels like it helps me work out muscle soreness that running builds up.  My swimming is coming along nicely--I have more stamina, and I'm feeling more comfortable with the freestyle stroke, being able to hold my breath for up to 5 strokes.  Sweet.

Tonight, we shopped for our trip and made pickles.  We made about 8 quarts of these guys: Garlic Dill Pickles from one of my favorite preserving site, Food in Jars.  L had tons of cucumbers from his garden, and we bought about 12 lbs of small pickling cucumbers at market this morning, so we set forth to make sweet gherkins, garlic dills, regular dills, and bread and butter pickles (which have to sit overnight, so we'll be canning them tomorrow).  An impressive array of pickled things to add to our dilly beans that we made a few weeks ago.  NOM.

Also, it turns out that pickle juice is an excellent electrolyte replacement.  After swimming, I was feeling woozy and headachy, which I initially took as the need to eat something.  But then I recalled that I moved a lot today (running, biking, swimming, walking, etc), and it was hot, so I sweated a lot.  I don't generally eat a lot of salt, so I was a bit low on salts, I think.  Once I took a couple of swigs of the pickle juice leftover from last year's batch of dilly beans (which I was craving, weirdly), I felt much better.  It sounds a bit gross; however, I don't generally crave salt, but I occasionally want pickles really badly. So, pickle juice it is!

Tomorrow will be filled with more tasks, but I hope to blog a bit more regularly on our trip. Travel is always fun, and I should have internet access to chronicle this trip.  Off for another summer adventure!

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