TGIF & BB11

I am so glad it's friday. It's been a long week all the way around. So much work & work pressures, swim lessons 4 the kids 4 nights this week (and for the next 3 weeks), and ramping into the half ironman training. Come on weekend! Daddy needs a haircut.


I got in some great speedwork last night, first set of intervals since the marathon. I did 0.3 mile fast with short rest intervals in between, all on the treadmill. I increased the speed with each fast run, from 7.1 to 7.8. Total run was 4 miles. 7.8 is about a 7:30 min/mile pace, and I don't see how you fast guys can keep that up for any length. Actually, I can't see it now. So let's say I'm looking forward to increasing my speed and endurance to be able to keep that pace for more than .3 miles. Still, speedwork = fantastic!


Then I crashed and slept for over 9 hours last night. Looks like I needed the recovery time. Today's a rest day. I was originally planning to do the Triangle Sprint tri in Raleigh, NC on sunday, and backed out of it thanks to where it fell in the training plan. So tomorrow is only supposed to be a 5 mile (long?) run, then sunday on the plan I have a 750m swim, 13.5 mile bike, 3.1 mile run. I think I will go visit the 'rents sunday and do that same plan anyway. Or maybe I'll get lazy or get sucked into something with the girls.


I did get to watch the first Big Brother 11 last night. Ah, that is what makes summertime bearable for me. The glory of BB. I'm already sick of this whole "high school clique" thing they are trying to do. It's a cool twist to align people into teams, but there's aready enough uncomfortable social positions in the middle of this recession; I think they could have called it something better than that. I like the outcasts and the brains, but I was totally hoping that Jessica was going to come back. I thought they would at least tell us something about her and Eric. Jessie is an idiot meathead, but he does make for some good BB entertainment. It's going to be a great season. I think either Kasey or Jeff will win.


And I haven't posted much about the garden lately, but it's still going strong. Here's a few pics to finish things off:


Ignore those weeds. Right to left, there's the pepper patch (54 plants), then 16 tomato plants already over 5 feet tall and loaded with green fruit. The corn next to it is about waist high, it's going to be a late corn crop if we get anything at all. Then we've got green beans growing up and in front of the fence, and the squash/zucchini is growing in front of that (the yellow flowers you can see on the far left). In the very back, you can see some raspberries growing behind the cherry tree. I've also got some cucumber plants growing in a cage between the tomatos and corn, and they are about to put out a huge crop. Hundreds of cucs from 3 plants. If you like pickles, the best ones are the pickles you make yourself. Grow your own cucs! I've got an egglplant growing in that cage as well. The harvest so far has been tons of squash & zuc, some raspberries, blueberries, and we're still getting some strawberries too. We've gotten a few pepper, but they don't come in hard until later this month. check it:






Peppers & Raspberries & Strawberries: the strawberries are in front, they lept over the wall. I thought I would show a closer pic of these. The raspberries are the large leaf canes on the right, the pepper patch is on the left. I've harvested a few bannana peppers already, but the main crop is still to come. There are maybe a dozen hot peppers already growing on there. Yum!! I love me some hot peppers.




Here's a closer shot of the Squash/Zuc patch. Squash plants get very big around, but don't grow very tall. Just wide. And they can't take the august heat, so they put out most of their crop in June/July. In between those, I put crawling vine plants so that when the squash die out, the vines can take over that space. I've got watermelon, butternut squash, pumpkin, and a few that I don't know what they are. but they're growing great!
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Get out to a farmer's market this weekend! They are flush with fresh veg, and the farmers need to sell their crops. If you ever wanted to go vegetarian for a day (or a weekend or longer) now is the best time of the year to do it. Have a great weekend!