The Wrong.............er, well, Shady Side of the Street!

My mom always told me to walk on the left side of the street facing traffic, but I never really understood that til I was older. It just seems wrong since we drive on the right side. Now that I am a runner, I definitely "get it!"

Monday morning I got up early, checked email, worked a bit, then headed out for a run at about 9 am to get it done before it got too hot. I ran down to the boat ramp at Vista Point at Jordan lake and decided to walk/run back. It was beginning to get a bit warm as the sun rose higher in the sky. Normally, I would be running on the left side or the west side of the street on the way back since the road is basically a north south road. But most of the shade was on the right side of the road, so I broke all the rules, chased the shade, and ran on the right (literally and appropriately) side of the road.

I ran/walked 6.5 miles in 95 minutes! And on the way back, it's all uphill!

At The Monk......................30 Years Later!

Today I drove to my hometown of Lexington, NC and met some friends from high school that I haven't seen in over 30 years! We have reconnected on FaceBook. I wonder if I wouldn't have met them if FaceBook hadn't reintroduced me to them?

Who are these old people?

The Monk is a BarBQue Restaurant in Lexington where we used to hang out in High School after ballgames and at lunch. Remember, back in the day, we used to could leave school to go to lunch! A few of us met to plan an "unofficial class reunion" for the classes of the 70's! Probably the weekend after Labor Day at the Holiday Inn in Lexington and just hang around the pool and chit chat, no loud music to get in the way and get a hospitality room for drinks and hob-nobbing. Maybe we will get a winery tour at Childress Winery next door and have dinner there.

Stay tuned!

A Fun-filled Weekend!

This weekend was one of the few weekends that I have spent at home lately and it was still a fun and busy weekend! No laying around the house for me!

On Saturday, my daughter Jenni and I, had massages at The Spa at Bell House. Now if you don't know about this little gem in Pittsboro you must check it out. My good friend, Pat Staley, opened it up in November. No economic downturn for that business! Check out the website at http://www.spaatbellhouse.com/

Then we met up with her friend Tara and her "mommy" for a "mommy lunch" at California Pizza Kitchen at Southpoint Mall. You're probably thinking there must be a story here................well there is. You see, Tara and Jenni are turning 28 and 30, respectively, this week and they BOTH still call their maternal parental unit "mommy!"

Then Jenni and I shopped at the mall, hitting up Ann Taylor, Ann Taylor Loft, Banana Republic and Talbots! She was pre-spending her birthday money and helping me spend mine. Then she dropped me off so she could get home for a birthday dinner with Tara and their hubbies. Jim and I grilled a pork loin and sorta chilled in front of the TV, watching a Pay Per View movie, Bride Wars. It was funny!

When I first woke up this morning, it was not looking like a good boating day but by 11 or 12, the sun peeked out. Zack and Amanda came over and invited us out for a lil boat ride. Zack bought a classic 1972 Sidewinder a few months ago and keeps it at my house. too bad I don't have a car to pull it with!



We went down to Vista Point and put it in and "flew" down to the dam. That baby will fly!


Then we headed out to Redneck Cove, dropped anchor, swam a lil and just sat in the boat, listening to other people's music. On the way back, we were discussing what to have for dinner and invited Zack and Amanda to stay. They said yes! You see, Amanda is in graduate school for Nurse Anesthesia and now just has rotations for the summer. During the academic year, she had classes and rotations and studies so hard, we hardly ever saw them.

So off to Food Lion we went to get meat, hot dogs and buns and the fixins.

It was awesome to spend the weekend with two of my kids. Oh yeah, the other lives with me so I see him everyday! Plus, we will all be getting together on Tuesday at Jenni and Ben's for her 28th birthday!

Garmin Forerunner 405

I have an ipod and a Nike plus thingy to track my distance and pace while I run but sometimes it just doesn't work too good..........quits for no reason. Plus since I run/walk/run, the calibration is different. I have a longer stride length when I walk so it records a lesser mileage. I have been wanting a Garmin Forerunner for a while now. And my good runner girl friend, Joyce WON, yes WON one and she inspired me to go for it!

I had some gift cards from Dick's Sporting Goods left over from Christmas and I recently had a birthday, ok, yesterday, and I got some gift cards from the hubby and my youngest son Alex and money from my daughter. Additionally, I had a $20 off card I got in the mail. So, I bee-bopped down to Dick's after lunch and bought one. Oh yeah, it had a $50 rebate and the nice guy at the register just took it right off the total and credited it back to my credit card.



It's a little difficult to navigate but I am getting used to it. The easiest part was just to press start and go! I'll get to the details later! I downloaded it to the Garmin website and then even exported it as a .tcx file and imported that into mapmyrun.com. Are you confused now?

New Bikes!

As usual, we took our bikes down to our beach house for the week. But sadly, they were stolen off our patio the first night we were there. Our townhouse is in a golf community/development and we always felt it was safe but.......................... Now we know we should have locked them up!

We had plans to do some riding. I like to ride on the beach and Jim and I often ride to the point or back in a residential area of Tilghman beach or the abandoned golfcart paths of the old Robber's roost Golf Club behind us. Needless to say we were bummed! We had thought about buying some new ones while down there, but Performance Bikes at home was having a good sale.

Glad we waited! Jim and I met at the Chapel Hill store after work today and ordered some Schwinn Voyageurs! Black for Jim and Cream for me!

Cute Turtles!

I snapped these pictures on our last trip down here at our beach house. We have several protected ponds in our development, plus I had a new camera and was camera crazy!

Sitting on a log!


Coming up to see me. I think he thought I had some food!


Just the view, showing proximity to the houses!

Things I Hear in the Middle of the Night!

Early this morning, 12:39 to be exact, I woke up to the tune of Neil Diamond crooning his heart out on my ipod. That was really weird! Yesterday evening I had put my ipod on the dock to listen to some good "Sweet Caroline" and then it finshed. We ended up watching TV and I never checked the ipod again. When I woke up to the loud music, I was really frightened since we were the only ones here at our beach house, and I just so sure that someone must have broken in to play music a little after midnight! I was too afraid to be scared and marched right into the kitchen and saw that it was the ipod and no one else. I quickly jerked it off the dock, laid it on the counter top and headed back to bed. As I lay in bed, with my heart pounding, I was trying to figure it out, and it suddenly dawned in me that when you plug in a clock, the alarm resets to the default 12:00 am. I must have accidentally turned on the alarm and it played the ipod at midnight! I was surely in deep sleep if it took me 39 minutes to wake up!

So after dinner tonight, I took a look at the clock radio/ipod docking station and I could not see that the alarm was set to 12:00 or even that it was turned off. I give up! At least I won't have the ipod in there tonight!