Randomness

Congrats to all the RBF-ers who got into NYC!! That is awesome!! It seems like most everyone I read who wanted to get in, got in, and that never happens!!

I truly don't have much to blog about. Things are going well. Brent's getting ready for his next art show this Friday night, it's a one night only deal and I'll post a little blurb about it later this week. My working out is going great, I'm heading to the gym every day for lunch and getting stronger and fitter with every workout. I'm running comfortably at an 8:30 pace again, and I push my pace constantly and end my runs around a 7:30 pace. I'm going to order TI and start spending more time in the pool to work on my (lack of) swimming technique. My next race will be in about a week and a half, a little 5K close to home that was the start of all my running. I wouldn't miss that one.

So, here are a few pics from the last few weeks. We sort of made it to Pride day a few weeks ago. By sort of I mean that we showed up around 4 and at 4:05 there was a monsoon. It was insane. It had been cloudy all week due to the fires in Georgia and Florida. When we pulled up we thought it looked like rain, and right when we were within sight's distance of the festival it started raining. And then, pouring. And the wind - sideways. We quickly found shelter under the Parthenon and people started running from everywhere to get under the shelter of the building. Pippin took it well, he was calmed by the lightning and thunder so that he was really trying to jump all over/lick other people. Kids were crying and it was mass chaos. We thought it might be over quickly, but we weren't so sure about the festival's future since a lot of tents had blown off. At any rate we stood under the shelter for about an hour until we decided to just bag it and head home. We were glad for the rain since it had been over 2 weeks since we'd had rain, but a little upset because we had left some tools in the backyard that we had been working with. We drove home, 4 miles, and there was nothing. Not a single drop of rain at our house. It's insane! We've had virtually no rain this summer. We got a small amount last Friday, but we're still between 9 and 12 inches below where we should be, according to the weather people. We need rain. I'm watering my flowers and garden every day, I am not excited about our next water bill......













So, all the tourists are gone and downtown living is back to normal. No more planes circling overhead with country music banners, tour buses are gone, the streets are full of business people instead of cowboys and life is good. It was nice to not be woken up by massive amounts of firecrackers signaling the end of another day of festivities last night. I'm sure they all had a good time and will be back next year.....



















Last weekend we finished wiring for the new chandelier for that hangs over our new kitchen island. We're now (supposedly) less than 3 weeks away from the arrival of the countertops. What I wouldn't give for a dishwasher, a sink, and my gas cooktop. I would looooove to boil some pasta. We've started watching FoodTv again and it's nearly agonizing. We've already put together our dream team of the first stuff we'll start whipping up when it's time: our awesome Jambalaya, Chicken Marsala, homemade Fettucini Alfredo, Halibut wrapped in Bacon. We also got the fridge all wired up for water and ice now. Thank GOD!! It's been 10 long months of old fashioned ice making and literally taking empty water bottles to work and filling them up with filtered water. And we drink a LOT of water.

And we went on the tour of homes last Sunday afternoon in a neighboring community. There were some beautiful houses on there, and some crappy ones. It was funny, some of the least assuming looking were the nicest on the outside, and some of the homes we've drooled over were pretty crappy. There's one house that was only open for us to tour the gardens (the whole thing is under renovation) It's a late 1800's Italian style house and it is unbelievable. If I had a pool like this I'd never leave. Ever. The steps lead up to a covered concrete patio area with little tables with white linens and roses. We walked the whole thing and covered 12 houses around the 'hood in 2 hours, in 90 degree heat. A nice lady was driving around a massive SUV giving rides to anyone who needed it, I thought that was great. But we sweated it out and I call that my exercise for Sunday. I love tours of homes.

Ok, that's it for now! I'm gonna get my evening session of toning/weights in and then clean the potty. Exciting times, eh???

Rae

Exercise-

Sunday - 2 hours walking
Monday - 4.2 miles run, 2 mins Stairmill, 20 mins abs
Tues - 4.2 miles run (so far)