At least I think it's annual. I just don't feel like going back to look.
If I could say one thing to 2011, it would be this: Don't let the door hit you on the way out.
While there were some fun highlights, it was a rough year for us health-wise. Ben went through a colectomy in May, lived with the colostomy for 7 months, and finally had it reversed (snap & cap, as he calls it) just a few weeks ago. He's finally feeling normal again, and looking forward to getting back in the gym.
Our second grandson, Button, was born. Abbie got her truck. My 21-year career as a homeschool mom came to an end. I started running. We gave away the Rib-mobile. We experienced our first big earthquake and responded with typical eastern panic. We met Henry, our neighborhood bear. I discovered Georgetown Cupcakes. Turned 50. The Man-mobile got a motor.
It wasn't a bad year, just not the best one we've ever had.
So I'm looking forward to regaining the positive momentum in 2012. And since I'm nothing if not a glutton for punishment, I'm going to put my goals for the coming year right out there in the very public blogosphere.
1. I'm going to read through the New Testament (and parts of the Old), concentrating on the red parts (the words of Christ while he was on earth), and doing a study of every verse that refers to the Word of God. Last year I read through the whole Bible, and while I never regret doing that, I just want to concentrate on a theme this year.
2. I'm going to run a half-marathon. And then I'm going back to running the way I really enjoy it: five or six miles at a time. Maybe find a 10K or two. I'd like to run a 5K in 30 minutes.
3. I'm going to publish my favorite photo I take every week at Darcy's P52. I'm starting the year with a new lens, so I have no excuse not to keep up with this. Really. Hold me to it.
4. I'm going to complain about the dog hair less and love the dog more. This may be the hardest one.
Here's to a clean slate, a new year full of opportunity, and 366 days in which to
Be thankful ~
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Weekend in review. Oh I crack myself up.
So what is this, Thursday? Yes, Thursday. And now I'm going to post pictures of last Sunday. It's a good thing I don't try to pay the bills with this blog.
Last Sunday we went to have the big, festive dinner with most of my family. We were missing one brother, two nephews (and one wife), a great-nephew, and two of my daughters, but we had fun anyway. My brother grilled the most amazing ribeye roast and we cookied ourselves to death with a lot of these
which we also decorated, and some of these.
Bess was her usual tolerant self, probably because she's so arthritic she requires help getting on her feet.
The nieces.
The nieces and their mom just before they all burst out laughing. I think this was before the food coma set in.
Abbie playing with bokeh. Good thing she has a generous mom who lets her use the good lens.
And the GRANDparents looking young and chipper as ever.
Ben made it through almost the whole day before he had to catch a short nap, and this week he's feeling a lot better and going back to work.
The rest of the week has been eaten up with editing, building a tool shed out back, and babysitting. Next week Abbie, Man-squared, and I are going to visit the grandbabies (and their parents). I'm taking the week off from the gym and running, hoping that will cure my recent case of burn-out.
Be thankful ~
Last Sunday we went to have the big, festive dinner with most of my family. We were missing one brother, two nephews (and one wife), a great-nephew, and two of my daughters, but we had fun anyway. My brother grilled the most amazing ribeye roast and we cookied ourselves to death with a lot of these
which we also decorated, and some of these.
Bess was her usual tolerant self, probably because she's so arthritic she requires help getting on her feet.
The nieces.
The nieces and their mom just before they all burst out laughing. I think this was before the food coma set in.
Abbie playing with bokeh. Good thing she has a generous mom who lets her use the good lens.
And the GRANDparents looking young and chipper as ever.
Ben made it through almost the whole day before he had to catch a short nap, and this week he's feeling a lot better and going back to work.
The rest of the week has been eaten up with editing, building a tool shed out back, and babysitting. Next week Abbie, Man-squared, and I are going to visit the grandbabies (and their parents). I'm taking the week off from the gym and running, hoping that will cure my recent case of burn-out.
Be thankful ~
Saturday, December 24, 2011
The Man-mobile.
If you've been reading here any length of time (bless your heart and thank you), you might remember way back when we bought what the girls in our family affectionately refer to as "the purple truck." On April 18, 2006, we bought the 2001 F-150 4x4 from my brother's company when his boss decided he didn't want to put a timing chain and new clutch in it.
In his ever-optimistic-when-talking-about-rebuilding-vehicles mind, Ben just knew he could do the repairs himself and have a great truck for a pretty low price ($1100). So we bought Big Barney, and Ben drove it home, hiking himself forward on the seat so he could reach the pedals (it's a pretty big truck).
Man-squared was twelve years old.
The boys immediately started tearing it apart and bought a timing chain kit and clutch ($400). The details are foggy (that happens with the passing of large quantities of time), but at some point, a problem beyond our capabilities was encountered, so arrangements were made for Barney to be transported to the truck doctor to have the timing chain repair finished by the professionals with the fancy (and expensive) tools.
When the fancy-tool guys tried to put Barney back together, they realized that somehow the cam had shifted, rendering the motor useless. Kaput. Done. Finished. Never to run again. But at that point, they had spent many a fancy-tool-using hour working on it, which meant that even though we had no truck to drive, we still had a huge bill ($1200). Barney was transported back home, where he sat for several years.
Until one bright, hopeful day when Ben had the idea to take the old motor out and put a new one in ($700, 2 weeks, tops—but that's a totally different story that I may or may not tell someday depending on the reaction I get to this one). I raised an eyebrow and looked over the top of my glasses, but wisely kept my mouth shut. And thus began the process of taking the old motor out, an evolution that began several years ago, maybe in 2009?
Truck parts began to be strewn about the property. Some were in Barney's bed, some in 5-gallon buckets in the garage, and a few in the creeping junipers on the hill next to the driveway (I think those are still there, now covered with three years' worth of fallen leaves).
More time passed. Ben began working on his MBA. Then he got sick. Had surgery and recovered. At some point Ben decided when they got the truck running it would be Man-squared's (who at this point is 18 years old) since he is now 6 feet tall and can reach the pedals. Finally a new motor was delivered ($1300) last summer, and the rebuilding began in earnest.
Now I'll make public the confession I shared with Ben yesterday: I never in my wildest dreams thought that truck would run again. I viewed it as a very expensive bonding experience between father and son, even when the three-times-daily trips to Auto Zone were occurring in the last few weeks.
So imagine my shock and awe when I was sitting at my desk working a few days ago and I heard the roar of Barney come to life! I ran out with my camera and videotaped the sound so I could prove to my brother it was true:
Elijah's truck 11/14/2011 from Karen Sargent on Vimeo.
All that was left was getting it registered and insured, and Man-squared now has his truck, which has been renamed "the Man-mobile."
The Man-mobile also has a new exhaust, because what 18-year-old can drive a quiet truck that sounds like his father's? Man-squared chose larger pipes and something not quite as obnoxious as flowmasters, and Ben and I actually like it. It has a deep, manly rumble. And that's important.
So we have Abigail's girly truck and Man-squared's man-truck, and of course, old Blue-and-White. All's right in the world.
Be thankful ~
In his ever-optimistic-when-talking-about-rebuilding-vehicles mind, Ben just knew he could do the repairs himself and have a great truck for a pretty low price ($1100). So we bought Big Barney, and Ben drove it home, hiking himself forward on the seat so he could reach the pedals (it's a pretty big truck).
Man-squared was twelve years old.
The boys immediately started tearing it apart and bought a timing chain kit and clutch ($400). The details are foggy (that happens with the passing of large quantities of time), but at some point, a problem beyond our capabilities was encountered, so arrangements were made for Barney to be transported to the truck doctor to have the timing chain repair finished by the professionals with the fancy (and expensive) tools.
When the fancy-tool guys tried to put Barney back together, they realized that somehow the cam had shifted, rendering the motor useless. Kaput. Done. Finished. Never to run again. But at that point, they had spent many a fancy-tool-using hour working on it, which meant that even though we had no truck to drive, we still had a huge bill ($1200). Barney was transported back home, where he sat for several years.
Until one bright, hopeful day when Ben had the idea to take the old motor out and put a new one in ($700, 2 weeks, tops—but that's a totally different story that I may or may not tell someday depending on the reaction I get to this one). I raised an eyebrow and looked over the top of my glasses, but wisely kept my mouth shut. And thus began the process of taking the old motor out, an evolution that began several years ago, maybe in 2009?
Truck parts began to be strewn about the property. Some were in Barney's bed, some in 5-gallon buckets in the garage, and a few in the creeping junipers on the hill next to the driveway (I think those are still there, now covered with three years' worth of fallen leaves).
More time passed. Ben began working on his MBA. Then he got sick. Had surgery and recovered. At some point Ben decided when they got the truck running it would be Man-squared's (who at this point is 18 years old) since he is now 6 feet tall and can reach the pedals. Finally a new motor was delivered ($1300) last summer, and the rebuilding began in earnest.
Now I'll make public the confession I shared with Ben yesterday: I never in my wildest dreams thought that truck would run again. I viewed it as a very expensive bonding experience between father and son, even when the three-times-daily trips to Auto Zone were occurring in the last few weeks.
So imagine my shock and awe when I was sitting at my desk working a few days ago and I heard the roar of Barney come to life! I ran out with my camera and videotaped the sound so I could prove to my brother it was true:
Elijah's truck 11/14/2011 from Karen Sargent on Vimeo.
All that was left was getting it registered and insured, and Man-squared now has his truck, which has been renamed "the Man-mobile."
The Man-mobile also has a new exhaust, because what 18-year-old can drive a quiet truck that sounds like his father's? Man-squared chose larger pipes and something not quite as obnoxious as flowmasters, and Ben and I actually like it. It has a deep, manly rumble. And that's important.
So we have Abigail's girly truck and Man-squared's man-truck, and of course, old Blue-and-White. All's right in the world.
Be thankful ~
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Thoughts for the day. Unfortunately, there aren't many.
Only in Virginia can you sit next to an open window listening to the river babble quietly and enjoying the warm breeze on December 21st. Ben likes it here because he says we have four distinct seasons. I think we have nine or ten. I'm not complaining though. It makes running in the dead of winter much more pleasant.
I am in the process of increasing my weekly mileage ever so gradually. When I do my "long" runs, I try to run them very slowly. They (whoever they are) say that if you do a weekly LSR (long slow run) it helps increase your endurance. Yesterday I ran a 6-miler (yes, I know I've done that before, but then I missed two weeks and had to regress) (sorry for all the parentheses), constantly reminding myself to slow down. I really felt like I was crawling, but when I got to the halfway point, the stopwatch on my iPod said 30:02 (as in, 10-minute miles). That is not slow for me. That's actually the fastest I've ever done 3 miles. So on the way back I made even more of an effort to run at a turtle's pace. I don't know the exact time because apparently I am technologically challenged when it comes to operating my stopwatch, but according to the clock in the car, the whole 6 miles took me 61 minutes. How it is that I can run 6 miles in 61 minutes and feel like a failure is beyond me, but I'm just laying it all out there tonight.
And I never thought I would hear myself say, "I'm excited to run a 7-miler next week."
Be thankful ~
I am in the process of increasing my weekly mileage ever so gradually. When I do my "long" runs, I try to run them very slowly. They (whoever they are) say that if you do a weekly LSR (long slow run) it helps increase your endurance. Yesterday I ran a 6-miler (yes, I know I've done that before, but then I missed two weeks and had to regress) (sorry for all the parentheses), constantly reminding myself to slow down. I really felt like I was crawling, but when I got to the halfway point, the stopwatch on my iPod said 30:02 (as in, 10-minute miles). That is not slow for me. That's actually the fastest I've ever done 3 miles. So on the way back I made even more of an effort to run at a turtle's pace. I don't know the exact time because apparently I am technologically challenged when it comes to operating my stopwatch, but according to the clock in the car, the whole 6 miles took me 61 minutes. How it is that I can run 6 miles in 61 minutes and feel like a failure is beyond me, but I'm just laying it all out there tonight.
And I never thought I would hear myself say, "I'm excited to run a 7-miler next week."
Be thankful ~
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Names have been changed to protect the ignorant.
My daughter Leah works for a major publisher of Christian educational products, and knowing my editorial nit-pickiness, every so often she sends me examples of errors that might make me laugh (or cry). She told me once about editing a history text in which the authors referred to the "Hoover Damn."
Just yesterday she forwarded me this email, written by a student who wanted to thank her English teacher for help. It read:
Mrs. A:
Thank you for your help I didn't know about any, and I was thinking that I have been and I never know where different tenses.
S.
Her teacher commented, "Yeah, I still haven't figured out what she was saying. I quit."
Me too.
Be thankful ~
Just yesterday she forwarded me this email, written by a student who wanted to thank her English teacher for help. It read:
Mrs. A:
Thank you for your help I didn't know about any, and I was thinking that I have been and I never know where different tenses.
S.
Her teacher commented, "Yeah, I still haven't figured out what she was saying. I quit."
Me too.
Be thankful ~
Monday, December 12, 2011
What didn't happen today.
- I finally got back on the hamster wheel this morning and I was surprised at how bad I didn't feel.
- And then I did Strive and didn't die.
- I showered at the gym and my hair didn't frizz out, and I didn't die of hunger before I got to Einstein's for a bacon/egg/cheese bagel and coffee. It was a good start to the day.
- Then I went to the hospital to see Ben and he didn't sleep all day. Apparently he got some decent sleep last night, so he was feeling pretty good. We went for a couple of walks around the loop, had a chicken-broth-and-green-jello lunch date, and by the time I left, he was down to only one tube from a high of five.
- When he started coughing, I sprang into action and his incision very thankfully did not explode.
- I didn't get nearly enough work done. Tomorrow I will skip the gym in favor of a paycheck.
- I didn't iron Mansquared's pants that he needed for work, so I tried to coach him through it over the phone. (Note to self: give ironing lessons.)
- I didn't make anything decent for dinner. Tomorrow morning I'm going to cook a bunch of chicken so I have something non-toxic to eat when I get home from the hospital.
Be thankful ~
Sunday, December 11, 2011
I think it's time for the weekend recap.
I only know this because I asked Abbie tonight what day we were in, and we determined that it is, indeed, Sunday.
Ben has been in the hospital since Friday morning having round two of the surgery merry-go-round that started last May. This is supposed to be the last of it, the surgeon's final answer. So far, so good. I'll spare you the gory details, but it appears that things will be fine in the end. (A few of you will get that. The rest of you don't want to know.)
After his surgery Friday, he was brought up to his room around four in the afternoon. I hung around for a while, making sure he had everything he needed, was comfortable, the nurses had him all settled in, etc., and I went home to collapse in bed. All that sitting around the waiting room is exhausting.
Saturday morning I was putting a chicken in the crock pot and getting ready to go for my weekly long run, when I decided to text Ben to see if he needed anything. I found out he hadn't slept at all, was in a lot of pain, and felt like he needed to get out of bed and would I please come help him because no one there would. I threw on my jeans and a T-shirt, grabbed my computer, and headed for the hospital. (I had visions of the time my grandfather was in the hospital and got sick of all the tubes, so he just pulled them all out, including the one that went clear down his throat into his stomach.) When I got to the hospital, Ben was sleeping (of course), so I stood watching him for a while. When he woke up, I got the rest of the story.
Apparently, the evening before, the whole here's-your-pain-button-push-it-whenever-you-need-it explanation got lost in the morphine drip, and he spent the night with no pain relief. He called the nurse a few times and she very sympathetically explained that honey, you've just had surgery (No! Really? Is that why I'm here?) and you're going to have some pain, completely ignoring the violent spasms going on from his ribs to his hips. When the anesthesiologist came to see him early Saturday morning, he took one look and said, "Okay, we're going to up your meds."
Thank you.
So they upped his meds and he slept all day. On the upside, I got a lot of work done. He eventually woke up and we bundled up his tubes and went for a shuffle around the 4th floor's west wing. Then he slept again.
But little by little, he's getting there, gaining some energy, going for short walks, sleeping it off, and today he even graduated from ice chips to chicken broth, and watched some football. There's light at the end of the tunnel.
In the meantime, I haven't done anything more than read about running. Tomorrow I'll try to change that.
Be thankful ~
Ben has been in the hospital since Friday morning having round two of the surgery merry-go-round that started last May. This is supposed to be the last of it, the surgeon's final answer. So far, so good. I'll spare you the gory details, but it appears that things will be fine in the end. (A few of you will get that. The rest of you don't want to know.)
After his surgery Friday, he was brought up to his room around four in the afternoon. I hung around for a while, making sure he had everything he needed, was comfortable, the nurses had him all settled in, etc., and I went home to collapse in bed. All that sitting around the waiting room is exhausting.
Saturday morning I was putting a chicken in the crock pot and getting ready to go for my weekly long run, when I decided to text Ben to see if he needed anything. I found out he hadn't slept at all, was in a lot of pain, and felt like he needed to get out of bed and would I please come help him because no one there would. I threw on my jeans and a T-shirt, grabbed my computer, and headed for the hospital. (I had visions of the time my grandfather was in the hospital and got sick of all the tubes, so he just pulled them all out, including the one that went clear down his throat into his stomach.) When I got to the hospital, Ben was sleeping (of course), so I stood watching him for a while. When he woke up, I got the rest of the story.
Apparently, the evening before, the whole here's-your-pain-button-push-it-whenever-you-need-it explanation got lost in the morphine drip, and he spent the night with no pain relief. He called the nurse a few times and she very sympathetically explained that honey, you've just had surgery (No! Really? Is that why I'm here?) and you're going to have some pain, completely ignoring the violent spasms going on from his ribs to his hips. When the anesthesiologist came to see him early Saturday morning, he took one look and said, "Okay, we're going to up your meds."
Thank you.
So they upped his meds and he slept all day. On the upside, I got a lot of work done. He eventually woke up and we bundled up his tubes and went for a shuffle around the 4th floor's west wing. Then he slept again.
But little by little, he's getting there, gaining some energy, going for short walks, sleeping it off, and today he even graduated from ice chips to chicken broth, and watched some football. There's light at the end of the tunnel.
In the meantime, I haven't done anything more than read about running. Tomorrow I'll try to change that.
Be thankful ~
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
I blogged, but it's not my fault.
I am fresh out of blog topic ideas, probably because I'm busier than a one-armed paper hanger, and never stop to consider that anything I'm doing is blog-worthy. It isn't, unless you love hearing about the laundry, dog hair, cooking, errands, and trips to the gym. But the family is once again haranguing me about lack of new posts, so here I am trying to make something up.
It's not working.
I am currently waiting for my knight in shining armor to come home and rub the workout-induced knots out of my back so I can go to the gym tomorrow and regain them. I'm up to 14 miles a week running, and plan to stay at that level for a few weeks. My short runs are 2 or 3 (or 3 1/2), and my long run last week was 6. I'm getting there slowly but surely.
And I found another half marathon I might be interested in: the Dismal Swamp Stomp in Suffolk, Virginia, which is where we used to live. The selling point of this race is that it's FLAT, and that's my kinda running. But it's just a month before the Historic Half in Fredericksburg, and I'm not sure I can do two that close together.
(Feel free to beat my family for haranguing me into writing this uninteresting slop.)
In other news, Mike passed his checkride, so he gets to come home on leave for 2 weeks, and Abbie will pass her physics class, so we can all relax until next semester's crisis. I'm trying to figure out how to set Leah up with a great guy we've found her, and Deb has surprised us all by taking a computer programming class. Mansquared put the mud guards on his truck today.
Hey! Wake up!
(Is that enough? May I stop running off at the mouth and go to bed now? Thank you.)
You're welcome.
Be thankful ~
It's not working.
I am currently waiting for my knight in shining armor to come home and rub the workout-induced knots out of my back so I can go to the gym tomorrow and regain them. I'm up to 14 miles a week running, and plan to stay at that level for a few weeks. My short runs are 2 or 3 (or 3 1/2), and my long run last week was 6. I'm getting there slowly but surely.
And I found another half marathon I might be interested in: the Dismal Swamp Stomp in Suffolk, Virginia, which is where we used to live. The selling point of this race is that it's FLAT, and that's my kinda running. But it's just a month before the Historic Half in Fredericksburg, and I'm not sure I can do two that close together.
(Feel free to beat my family for haranguing me into writing this uninteresting slop.)
In other news, Mike passed his checkride, so he gets to come home on leave for 2 weeks, and Abbie will pass her physics class, so we can all relax until next semester's crisis. I'm trying to figure out how to set Leah up with a great guy we've found her, and Deb has surprised us all by taking a computer programming class. Mansquared put the mud guards on his truck today.
Hey! Wake up!
(Is that enough? May I stop running off at the mouth and go to bed now? Thank you.)
You're welcome.
Be thankful ~
Thursday, December 1, 2011
I keep finding pictures I forgot I had.
About a month ago, Man-squared and I went to Lynchburg to visit Abbie for the weekend. That was the time I fed 20 college students a homemade spaghetti dinner and they expressed their thanks by murdering me in Mafia.
While we were there, Abbie asked a friend and wonderful photographer, Chelsea, to take some photos of us. Here they are.
While we were there, Abbie asked a friend and wonderful photographer, Chelsea, to take some photos of us. Here they are.
This was just a quick, stand-in-front-of-these-bushes-and-I'll-snap-a-few deal. I love them! I wish I could have her around when all the kids and grandbabies are here! Thanks, Chelsea!
Be thankful ~
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