New Year Resolved

This year when the new year rolled around, I actually set a goal. I determined that this year, my goal would be to ride 100 miles in the Sea Gull Century bike ride. This may have been a little presumptuous considering that I didn't even own a bike at that time, but nonetheless, that is the goal I set. I would like to announce that this weekend, I officially achieved my new year's resolution for 2008. I actually rode 100 miles on my bike yesterday, and the only snag in the day's adventure was that I forgot to bring any socks. I ended up buying some guy's extra pair of old socks for $5 bucks, only to find out they were selling socks inside. Oh well. Justin finished in 5 hours 12 minutes, and I finished some time after that. Here are the pictures:

Here we are in our matching spandex outfits, ready to start the ride. The lady taking the picture for us had to try three times before actually taking a picture. (It was kind of awkward after asking if they had any socks that I could buy, going back a few minutes later asking if they would take a picture for us...and then having to go back three times since it didn't actually take.

During the four hours Justin had to wait for me to finish, he had time to take this picture. He also had time to fall asleep on the concrete wall by the finish line, leading some to wonder if he was dead or alive.

I clearly wasn't there to snap a picture of Justin when he finished, but he was there waiting for me. (Notice the ugly black socks that I was wearing--bad idea for someone who doesn't have a tan to begin with.)

And I made it!!

All in all, it was a great ride. It was perfect weather, and a completely flat route, and I actually had a great time. I'm not enjoying myself quite as much today, however, because it hurts to sit, I can barely walk, and every muscle hurts, but at least I accomplished my goal!

Chuck Norris, Black Belt Patriot

So, I know that it's been a while since I used my blog as a place to publish my personal opinions on random topics, but I really couldn't pass this one up. We all know that Chuck Norris doesn't have a chin--he has another fist. And we know that his tears can cure cancer (if he had ever cried). And that before the boogey man goes to bed, he checks his closet for Chuck Norris. (If you didn't know any of these facts, look here.) I think sometime in the near future, Sean Hannity might start checking his closet for Chuck Norris as well. You may not be aware of this, but Chuck Norris, the great patriot that he is, has written a book entitled "Black Belt Patriotism" in which he outlines his common sense solutions to America's problems.

No. I am not joking. Truly, Chuck Norris has outlined a plan to return America to its greatness of previous generations. Some are referring to this as "a cultural manifesto on rebuilding America." He's not just keeping the Texas range safe anymore. If you're not intrigued yet, another review stated, "Norris does not disappoint in any respect, even in conveying plenty of personal stories as well, many told for the first time in this book, personal accounts with border agents and troops abroad to stories of American-heritage revisionism and his weekly work-out plan with his family's nutritional diet."

I think if our whole country followed the Chuck Norris' family diet, we'd be in better shape already. (Pun very much intended.)

This book was brought to my attention because the radio morning show I listen to on my way to work had him as a guest visitor. I think my whole day went better just knowing that Chuck Norris is out to save America. And while I think it's pretty hysterical that Chuck Norris is writing a political book and expects to be taken seriously, he actually made some pretty good points. Maybe a lifetime of rooting out evil on TV brings some sort of clarity otherwise only attainable by those with an education.

This post is an invitation to all, to share with me your love of either America, Chuck Norris, or entertainer-politician-authors in general. (And did you know that Chuck Norris is 68? Dang, he's in good shape for his age!)

Home Canning, Part III

After last's year's inaugural run of home canning, we learned a very important lesson--not all home canned goods are worth the effort. We were trying all sorts of crazy things like pickles, salsa, and spaghetti sauce, all of which we ended up throwing away. This year, we decided that we should just keep it simple.

On Saturday we went to the farmer's market in Old Towne Alexandria, and haggled our way to a great price on heirloom tomatoes and peaches. Okay, haggling might be a bit strong of a word. Really, we asked the farmer if we were to buy a whole box of peaches, if he'd give us a deal--and he said, "Sure. I'll give you 25 lbs. for $20 bucks." In case you haven't priced out peaches lately, that is a very good deal. (They were originally $2.29/lb) We did the same with the tomato dealer--we got 12.5 lbs of tomatoes for a steal!

So this year's canning went much smoother than last year. All we had to do was blanche, peel, and stuff in the can. Easy peasy!

We started by putting all the peaches in the fridge. It looked pretty cool, so I took a picture.

And here are our tomatoes. They look funny because they were grown to taste good (rather than ship well). We have been fully indoctrinated on the importance of buying locally grown food.

So Here I am about to put the peeled tomatoe into the bowl. (Note: I woke up and walked directly out into the kitchen for our canning adventure, so if I don't look quite as beautiful as usual, pray forgive.)

Then Justin took them from the bowl and put them in the cans. He wore his red shirt just in case he spilled. (He has maybe had a few tomato drips down his shirt recently.)


And now it's on to the peaches. Tip: If you cut an "X" into the peach or tomato before blanching, it makes it really easy to peel.

Peeling the peaches is fun to do, fun to do, to do, to do...

The tomatoes are done! But what happened to the 5th can? I swear we put 5 cans into the steam bath...

How sad! The bottom blew off the jar, so we lost 1/5 of our tomatoes.

But it turns out we had way more peaches than we anticipated.

All in all, we ended up with 4 jars of tomatoes and 13 jars of peaches, and it only took 3.5 hours from start to all cleaned up and blogged about. It should be a peachy winter!

European Adventure: Conclusion

So Spain was amazing! Here's what happened next:

We left Ronda and headed south and drove along the beach past Malaga to a little beach town called Torrox (close to Nerja). We didn't actually bring beach towels with us, so we showed up amidst the crowds of people with their beach chairs and chaise lounges, and set out our hand towels and sat down. Fortunately, we found a grassy area, so the hand towels were adequate (but it was pretty funny).

After a lovely afternoon at the Mediterranean, we drove up to Granada and went on a moonlit tour of El Alhambra. We didn't know what to expect, and were pretty much blown away at the intricate decorations on the walls and ceilings. A very impressive building. We stayed the night in Granada, woke up late the next morning and had a lovely breakfast (at noon) of churros dipped in hot chocolate pudding (good, but could have used WAY more sugar) and gazpacho. It turns out that I really like gazpacho--it really hits the spot on a hot day.

Justin doesn't count a vacation a vacation unless he's climbed there...so he found a random mountain called El Chorro, and we headed off the beaten path to find it. We expected it to be in the middle of nowhere, and thought it was more than likely that we'd have to sleep in the car. In fact, when we saw a sign for El Chorro right in front of a tiny dirt road, we assumed that was the turn off. We took our little Ford Fiesta off-roading a little ways before seeing a road down below and deciding that maybe we should try that instead. It turned out that El Chorro is actually a major Spanish tourist attraction, much like Zion National Park combined with Lake Powell. (There are huge limestone rock faces and a really deep reservoir in the middle of the desert.) It also turned out we didn't have to sleep in the car because there was a sweet resort called La Garganta that had lovely little apartementos for us to rent. We liked it so much we stayed two days. The first day we went climbing with our chain-smoking, f-bomb dropping climbing guide, Sergio (the highlight of the trip for Justin.) And the next day we spent swimming at the clean, beautiful, not-too-cold lake (the highlight of the trip for me). We were going to climb up to this little pathway built across the gorge at El Chorro, but I had a last-moment panic attack, so we didn't do it.

Instead, we drove back toward Rota to catch our flight--which we thought would be around 8pm the next night. We stopped in Jerez de la Fontana to sleep for the night. Fortunately for us, we woke up at nine that morning (an hour or two earlier than the rest of the trip...it turns out that in Spain, they stay up late!) and called the air-base, because the flight had been moved up to 11:25 am instead. We high-tailed it back to Rota with just enough time, only to find a sign at the car rental shop that said, "Back at 11:30." STRESS!! We started booking it (with all our stuff) onto the base to sign in, and then we'd worry about the rental car after that. Fortunately, a nice family in a minivan stopped and asked if we needed a ride, and they drove us to the terminal on the base. Once we were checked in, Justin ran back to the rental car place and returned the car, and then ran back. Let's just say he was kind of sweaty. :) But we made it on the flight, and got back Sunday night.

It was a perfect week adventure! Click here to see the pictures.

European Adventure, Days 2 and 3: Arcos and Ronda

So we actually made it to Spain! We sat at the terminal at Dover pretty much all day Monday, but for some reason, it didn´t seem that bad. There were a bunch of nice people there (some of whom had been waiting for 5 days to make it on a flight). We flew on a C5--which is a huge cargo plane. It was pretty awesome. The best part was that there was enough room to lie down on the floor and go to sleep.



We made it to Spain early Tuesday morning, rented a car, and headed out to the hill towns of Andalucia. We went to Arcos de la Frontera in the morning (a beautiful white-washed city built on the side of a cliff, with small winding roads similar to venice). Then we set off to the next little town, Ronda, and that´s about when we hit a wall. Not literally, although, driving in Spain where we don´t know what any of the traffic sign mean, it´s probably fortunate that we didn´t hit a wall. And that we´ve actually found our way to the places we want to go. Anyway, we were both about to fall asleep by the time we made it to Ronda...so we found a hotel and took a nap.



We spent the evening wandering around the beautiful little village, again white-washed and built on the side of a cliff with an impressive bridge across a gorge. Anyway, this afternoon we´re heading to Granada, and tomorrow we are going to do some rock climbing. So fun!

European Adventure, Day 1: Dover

Just to give you a little explanation of the entries that are to follow, Justin and I decided on Saturday night that we should just take the risk, and hop on a military "space-a" flight to Europe. The reason this is a little risky is because it is not uncommon for people to get over to Europe only to find there is no room on the flights coming back. This could be bad as we checked the prices for tickets heading back from Europe, and they were all about $2,000 each. So, you can see we are taking quite a gamble. Our original plan was to head to Italy, but reports of people getting stuck there were pretty high, so we changed our plans to go to Spain. And after a quick conversation with Cousin Ted about what to see in Spain, we both became very excited about our destination.

Day 1:
We were going to try to get up really early and make it to Dover AFB in time for the flight that was heading to Spain at 8:40 am. But let's be honest, Justin and I decided at 7 pm Saturday night to go to Europe, so we didn't exactly get to bed early, and we decided that we'd just aim for the 12:40 pm flight instead.

Here's what was supposed to happen next: We would leave our house at 8:00, drive two hours to get to Dover (Delaware) and hop on the flight to Spain at 12:40.

Here's what really happened: We left our apartment at about 8:55 am. We were cruising right along, an hour later than planned, but still plenty early for the 12:40 roll call. And then, at 9:43, our plans came to a screeching hault--or at least traffic did. Now, we all know that DC traffic isn't known for being kind and accommodating, but this was probably the worst traffic experience I can recall. You know things are bad when passengers are getting out and walking alongside their cars, and when the driver of the car in front of you gets out, grabs his deodorant, applies it and gets back in the car. It literally took us about four hours to go two miles. By living at 9 am we thought we'd for sure make the 12:40 flight, and if not, we thought that there'd be no way to miss the 4:20 pm flight later that afternoon. But...we did! (Actually, we arrived about 4 pm, only to find that the 4 pm flight was canceled.)

Anyway, it turns out that a tractor trailer somehow went over the edge of the Bay Bridge (the one bridge across Chesapeake Bay from Maryland heading toward the beaches of Delaware) so one side of the bridge was closed. And it is kind of a weird sight to see a huge truck in the bay, so there was plenty of rubber-necking.

Long story short, we ended up staying the night in Dover and actually had a great time. We watched the Olympics (which I LOVE), and screamed at the top of our lungs for the USA swimming relay team, and found an amazing little place for dinner. (Justin ate a 24 oz. steak. That is a lot of meat!!)

Now we're off to hang out at the terminal and hope for the best. If we don't get on the flight today, our European vacation may turn into a New England vacation...but here's hoping!

Happy Birthday America

So, these pictures probably won't look super patriotic (we have no pinwheels, tiaras or sparklers), but this was probably my favorite 4th of July in memory. Here's why:

1. We got to spend time with Ali and Jim
2. We did not capsize into the Charles despite the fact that Jim (though he be a certified helmsman) had never had anyone else in his boat, or sailed on a red wind day. I did get soaked with river splash, hoewever.
   
3. We got to break a Happy Birthday America pinata made by Jim. It turns out that Jim has been making a plethora of pinatas. (Although technically Will was the one to actually break it, we all benefited from the spoils.)
4. I was reminded how much I enjoy playing frisbee.
5. We wandered around Boston's Freedom Trail, felt the spirit of '76 and were filled with patriotism from the cradle of the revolution.
6. Watched the best failed western TV show pilot ever made.
7. Spent some time on a slightly chilly, uncrowded beach. (Although, it turns out that I did not get tan.)
8. The best fireworks show I have ever seen in my life...accompanied by the Boston Pops and Rascal Flats.
9. Besides one minor spot, we did not hit traffic the whole way home.
10. Did I mention hanging out with Ali and Jim?

It really was a fantastic weekend in Boston. Here are the pictures: