Ignore the random people in this picture. I think it’s a cool sign.
We were THIS close to the track….
…and it was a beautiful day.
And look! The women competing in the heptathlon getting ready for their 200m race. Butts in the air…
Pushing off the blocks…
Burst of energy at the beginning of a short, fast race.
Check it out! It’s Maggie Malone, she of the cool name and the world-class javelin-throwing arm.
And HERE is a picture that shows all three of the men who will be running the 5000m race for the US in Rio. You can see Lagat (check his bib) and the other two are in Chelimo (in the Army shirt in front) and Mead, in the green shirt behind. I took that picture because I was that close. Such a cool day.
Yesterday was the coolest day. We went to the next to last day of the US Track and Field Olympic Trials at Hayward Field (home of Prefontaine and Bill Bowerman), and it was INCREDIBLE. It’s highly unlikely we’ll ever watch the actual Olympic Games in person, but yesterday, we got to watch the best track and field athletes in the US compete for a spot on the US Olympic team – those were actual Olympians, and it was unbelievable to watch. I mean, I’m saying this even about sports I don’t care about and know nothing about, like the high jump and the javelin throw. Those were neat to see (and the woman who won the javelin throw has the best name – Maggie Malone), but we were really there for the running events. Us and everyone else, really. The place was packed by the time the men’s 5000m final started. Watching an Olympic (near-Olympic 5K) is NOTHING like watching a neighborhood 5K. There were 16 men competing, and since we didn’t know anything about any of them, we decided to cheer for the oldest guy, Bernard Lagat, who is 41 years old and holds the American record at this distance. I got video of them coming around during the first lap.
I forgot to mention that we had AMAZING SEATS. We were right in the center of the long straight stretch of the track, on the starting line side (behind them – we could see butts in the air at the start), IN THE FIFTH ROW. We were on the wrong side for the finish, but we could see plenty.
My plan was to get that video (accomplished), then conserve my battery (I was down to 13%) and get another short video as they came around for the final lap. That first lap was relatively slow, and I wanted to be able to contrast that to the effort they’d be putting in on the final lap. On a track, a 5K is 12 and a half laps long, so I had plenty of time to watch a few laps and then get ready to record again. The race was crazy exciting. Two guys were out front at first, but they tired out and didn’t end up staying in front. Then there were another two in front (way out front), and then, right at the end, everyone else started catching up. The guy we were cheering for, Lagat, was in the middle of the pack the whole time…right up until that last half-lap, when he SURGED AHEAD AND WON. The 41-year-old won the race. It was incredible, and I was screaming my head off and then his face crumpled in happy tears and so did I. I was highly susceptible to those athletes’ emotions yesterday. So was the lady next to me.
Anyway, I’d have video of that last lap (or at the least the part right in front of us, like in the earlier video – I had every intention of cheering, not recording, as they headed to the finish), but my phone chose the moment I pressed the record button to crap out on me and tell me my camera crashed. SO ANNOYED. This is the last disappointment I’ll take from you, phone.
You can watch official video of that last lap (like I just did) here. If you pause the video at 41 seconds and squint, I think you can see John (grey jacket and his hat) and a blur that might be me, 5th row. Or I might be imagining it. But we’re there!
It was so cool. Honestly, seeing this in person was one of my top five reasons for moving to Eugene. Tomorrow I’ll post some of the pictures I took.
It’s been six years (SIX YEARS) since my last post like this. Back in May 2010, I was in Boston for work, and I tried my hand at selfies. I was using an actual camera, not a phone, and it didn’t have a forward-facing camera, and it was hard. See attempts here.
Now, six years later, selfies are more of a thing than ever, I have a front-facing camera, and I still can’t do it (god, I’m old). All I was trying to do last Saturday was take pictures of pretty scenery with my smiling face in front. (Yes, I could have asked John to take the pictures. NOT THE POINT.) How do people do this?
Okay, a couple were semi-successful. Here’s one from today with RAINBOWS.
We did make it to the coast, and we did have a wonderfully pleasant day, and with the sun out, temps in the mid-60s felt great.
We did what usually works out for us: hit the road with a general destination (or at least direction) in mind, and then just see what we see. You know? It worked out pretty well. Our first stop was at the Sea Lion Cave, a place we didn’t know even existed until we noticed it on our handy road atlas. (Our cell service was pretty much non-existent all day, so we relied on good old-fashioned maps.)
Apparently, this is where the Stellar sea lions live. Off to one side was a path to the elevator that takes you down 20 stories to the actual cave (fall and winter home of the sea lions). Way over in the distance is the Heceta Lighthouse. We’ll visit that some other trip.
A similar path in the other direction took us to the lookout where we could see the rocks where about 150 sea lions were sunning or playing in the surf.
It’s breeding season, and the male sea lions were shouting about it. Lots of roaring. They’re a noisy bunch.
We headed further north after that, stopping in Newport for a late lunch and a little browsing. Newport has a pretty harbor, but it’s a working port and the harborside factories or whatever where they deal with the raw fish and crabs smelled AWFUL.
Looks nice, smells bad. But they had a friendly California sea lion willing to pose for his fans.
After that, we found a mostly empty beach and read for about 3 hours.
There’s this really nice house I see on my bike ride with a really nice backyard. The back is all tall wrought-iron fence, and there are rose bushes blooming along the top of the fence every few feet. Pretty. The other day I noticed that the yard between the patio and the fence was all dirt, and I briefly wondered what they were going to plant there. Today as I rode by, I noticed it looked different, but I was a couple minutes past it before I figured out what it was. (I’m very observant.) Sod! They sodded the whole thing. Maybe it didn’t register because it was still flat? Very green, very nice. I might not have noticed at all, or it wouldn’t stuck in my head, except that our yard has fresh sod (fresh from March, I think), and you can still see the edges of each piece. I wonder how long it takes for it to all mesh together?
Game Night was great (of course), and my hair cut today went as smoothly as could be expected. I really like the salon and my new stylist. The color is great, and the cut WAS perfect, but David got a little snip-happy in front right at the end. The cut right before the color is how I think I want it, where it’s longer in the front and the angle from the back is more obvious.
It’ll grow, and I can get it there. In the meantime, it’s certainly not bad. It’s just not as much me as I want. We’ll leave aside that not-me is kind of the point.
John and I went for a walk the other day (the one I could barely walk back from), and I took a bunch of pictures of this really nice public rose garden. Today, though, I’m not showing you any roses. Sorry.
First this sort of sweet, sort of really strange bench. Does it want to hug you? Squeeze the life out of you? Feel you up inappropriately? Hard to say.
Then, this tree. It’s some sort of cherry tree that was planted in 1847, and now it needs cables to keep it together. No climbing allowed, sadly.
I saw a podiatrist today, and while discussing what is wrong with my foot, he referred to my deformity. Apparently, I am deformed. Really. (Mildly, but really.) The doctor pointed out (although I will be getting it checked out for real) that my right leg is longer than my left leg by enough (no measuring occurred), and that I have been overcompensating for it when I run (he can see by the callus pattern that I roll outwards on my left foot and inwards on my right), and that overcompensation finally caught up with me. The pain I’ve been feeling is a spasm. He taped up my foot to help relieve the spasm, and he says I can go back to running pretty much immediately, as long as I ease into it. If it still hurts by the end of this week, or if it changes how it hurts, I should come back, but there’s no sign of a stress fracture right now.
YAY!!
He also gave me a lift for my left shoe to help make up the difference, and I should wear supportive shoes (like my running shoes) or get supports to put in my other shoes (like my Chucks, which have ZERO support), and only wear shoes like that for the next 6-8 weeks. I should stay away from flats, sandals, flip-flops, slippers, and any other shoe without support until the spasm is all better. Oh, and I shouldn’t even wander the house barefoot, so I’ll be wearing supportive shoes ALL the time for a couple of months.
Blah. But treatable! So blah is okay. But now I’m all concerned about how I’ve never noticed I’m uneven. I have a regular doctor’s appointment in two and a half weeks, so I will be asking about that FOR SURE.
I finally put a basket on my bike! I’ve been meaning to do that since I bought the bike years ago. We biked over to the bike store, bought the basket, attached it to the bike, and then biked to Trader Joe’s for bread, milk, and flowers.
I swear I didn’t just buy the flowers so I could bike home with them peeking out of my new basket. Now I need a light and a bell. And possibly a rack to go over the rear wheel. I can’t wait to bike to the library! Yes, I’m a grown-up. I’m a grown-up in Eugene, where EVERYone has a bike.
Shoot, I missed a day. For those of you keeping track at home, yesterday is the first day I have missed since November 22nd. And….now I’ll just have to give up. Missing one day is the same as screwing up whole lives, right? I’d better lock my doors. The scary witch who lives in the woods at the top of the hill might be after me now.
This is about two blocks from our house. Maybe three. And sadly for the scary witch, her view out the front door (and down the hill) is of railroad tracks. Not so scenic. I should stop giving her reasons to come after me, since she’s obviously a dedicated reader (because who isn’t?), and I have let her down by skipping yesterday.
(Really, I am annoyed. I could keep it up during a cross-country move but I can’t remember to blog on a normal Sunday? I am disappoint.)
For those of you who aren’t on Twitter or Instagram, here are some pictures of the house with our furniture in it. It’s not as neat and clean as it was Tuesday night, so you’ll have to live with three-day-old pictures. Once our offices look less like disaster areas, I might post those, too.
Bathroom! Obviously.
Living room!
Bedroom!
Kitchen alcove!
Kitchen!
This concludes the photographic tour of our new home. Rooms not included have been cordoned off with a red velvet rope. Even we are not allowed in them.
A house around the corner from us has the most beautiful yard. They seem to put a lot of time into it. I’ll admire from afar (or from the sidewalk), but I really want to know what they do throughout the year.
Yesterday was an odd day. Good, but odd. We had plenty to do, so we got up relatively early (woke up around 7:30), checked out of our hotel, and had a quick breakfast at Panera, conveniently located next to Sears and Target.
First, Sears for a washing machine and dryer, to be delivered Thursday. The salesman suggested we buy fishing rods. We didn’t.
Next, Target for an air mattress, a broom, a mop, Windex, Tilex, sponges, paper towels, toilet paper, and a shower curtain.
After that, back to the house to clean. It looks great and was pretty clean to begin with (SUCH a nice change from our last place). That took a couple of hours (and we’re considering becoming no-shoes-in-the-house people), and then we started walking. We walked from the house to the library (the long way because we forgot where it was), with a stop at Noisette Pastry Kitchen for a couple of really good sandwiches. The library is really nice, but a little frustrating since we can’t check anything out yet. We walked back to the house after a while (it’s about a mile away), hopped into the car, and drove to Home Depot to make a copy of the house key (the property manager only gave us one). Picked up dinner, came home. Exciting.
The light was neat this afternoon as the clouds blew away (it was rained the first half of the day), so I took a few pictures during our walk to the library.
Yesterday, as we drove through the mountains in western Montana, we saw a sign advertising more than 100,000 used books at the Montana Valley Book Store. You know us. This is not something we could ignore.
It was in a tiny town, in the middle of the mountains (I don’t know which mountains), and the store was in this white house on the main road.
The entire first floor had ceiling-high shelves, crammed full of books. The picture I took only shows one side.
The basement (slightly scary) ran the length of the house and had all the paperbacks in it.
It was everything you could want in a used bookstore. I really like the ones in old houses. We didn’t stay long, but it helped us get through the rest of yesterday’s drive to Spokane. It reinforced my growing desire to spend all of my free time in the library, if we ever actually get to Eugene.
(I bought a book, even though I’m not supposed to be buying books. It’s a science fiction anthology edited by (and with commentary from) Isaac Asimov. I felt the need to support the store.)
Our plan worked! We have become shadows of our former selves and are drifting aimlessly through life. Or, the early morning snow cleared out and we got a perfect day for Mount Rushmore. That’s the plan I meant.
It was surreal and SO weird. What a strange thing to want to do! And how VERY strange to be driving along and all of a sudden see these giant faces in the mountainside. In person, it’s even weirder than just knowing it’s out there.
I learned something about myself yesterday. As we were driving up to the park, we caught our first glimpse of it, and THAT’S when it sank in to me that this giant sculpture actually existed. If you had asked me the day before if Mount Rushmore was a real thing, I would have said of course it is, but when I saw it, just that first glimpse from a moving car, it felt almost like learning that Bugs Bunny is a real talking rabbit. Mount Rushmore is something I’ve only heard about, only seen in movies, and I guess I never really processed it as real. I don’t do that with other things I haven’t seen for myself, do I?
We’re being photobombed by stone heads. Also, I am incapable of looking at the lens.
Thursday was a big driving day. We woke up in Michigan (barely in Michigan), drove across Indiana and Illinois (waved to Chicago and got stuck in traffic there), drove across Wisconsin, the entire width of Minnesota, and spent the night in South Dakota. 811 miles. We had to make up for Wednesday, and we wanted to be able to detour a tad to see Mt. Rushmore on Friday (which, as you’re reading this, we’ve probably already done – I’m writing this Thursday night). It rained on us almost all day, and we got snowed on as we climbed into Minnesota.
I can say with certainty that Ohio rest area bathrooms are WAY nicer than Indiana rest area bathrooms, and there was one in a truck stop barely into South Dakota that was REALLY nice. For a public rest room. It had a bench and a plant!
We drove about 530 miles today. We detoured briefly in Ohio to go see Lake Erie, and we stopped in time to have dinner that wasn’t fast food (Applebee’s is ALMOST fast food – there aren’t a lot of options right off the highway in Coldwater, MI), and now we’re about to collapse. We’ll need to do better tomorrow, but we can do that. Especially if we’re asleep soon.
The biggest decision we have to make tomorrow is whether we’re going to drive across North Dakota or South Dakota. Time and distance are the same. We’ll have to decide around midday.
For reasons that I cannot remember right now, I googled “Rachel McAdams hair” today and searched the images that appeared.
To start with, I was (and am) tickled at the categories across the top.
You can search for pictures of her hair by year, by color, by movie – the possibilities are endless!
Oh, I remember – I saw a picture of her on Tom and Lorenzo with blond hair, and I couldn’t remember what she looked like with red hair. It was important to me at the time.
So I scrolled through the results.
Rachel McAdams with short hair:
Rachel McAdams with red hair:
Rachel McAdams with brown hair:
Rachel McAdams with blond hair:
NOT Rachel McAdams:
Imagine my surprise when I found that among the many many many head shots of Rachel McAdams. That’s what’s-her-name from Modern Family. She doesn’t look like Rachel McAdams. She has hair, so maybe that’s why Google included her? Nah, Google is better than that.
But wait!
ALSO not Rachel McAdams:
Dude, that’s Keri Russell! And wait, isn’t that Emma Stone?
Why are these people who are not Rachel McAdams showing up in my Google results? Is Google sick? Maybe Google is very clever and has reached into the heads of these three women and discovered that they all want to BE Rachel McAdams, and because Google loves them very much, it wants to do them this favor and let them pretend they ARE Rachel McAdams and so they show up in search results for Rachel McAdams and….no. That can’t be it. At least because I can’t imagine any of them wishing they were Rachel McAdams instead of themselves. Not because I think any of this is ridiculous and far-fetched. Because it’s definitely not that.