{"id":573896021,"date":"2023-08-07T19:19:48","date_gmt":"2023-08-07T23:19:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/?p=573896021"},"modified":"2023-08-07T22:56:28","modified_gmt":"2023-08-08T02:56:28","slug":"natures-candy-in-my-hand-or-can-or-a-pie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/blog\/2023\/08\/07\/natures-candy-in-my-hand-or-can-or-a-pie\/","title":{"rendered":"Nature’s candy in my hand or can or a pie"},"content":{"rendered":"

Great weekend around here, thanks. How was yours? I did garbage duties on Saturday. I let the cats lounge on me. I floated around listening to nothing. I found the weed eater, which I used this morning. Weeds needed to be ate, and the job was accomplished in the back yard and on one side. <\/p>\n

Now I need to get some better line, something less fragile than dried, crystalized cotton candy, so that unwanted grasses and weeds can be removed from tricky spots with a casual waving of the magic device. <\/p>\n

I found the manual to the weed eater, too. This was useful, because I could find the page telling me precisely which size line I need to acquire. We had a weed eater guy at our old house. He solved all of these problems easily, and efficiently. Also, that gentleman knew the intricacies of a weed eater. A craftsman know’s his tools. My weed eater’s manual also had a stamp showing the build date. It was manufactured in 2012. I know, for a fact, it has been used … not very often. <\/p>\n

Also today, I checked on the peaches, deadheaded some flowers and showed a few pokeweed plants who was boss around these parts. I rescued a frog, discovered two electric outlets that apparently don’t draw power and watered the plants. And I vacuumed. <\/p>\n

This evening we brought the first batch of peaches in. I think I ate four in the yard and three in the kitchen today? It was a warm day, the extra hydration couldn’t hurt. <\/p>\n

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We looked up things to do with peaches beyond cobblers and ice creams. We’re going to be making a lot of peach salsa. We’ll put it on everything.<\/p>\n

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Yesterday I did a triathlon. It was a backyard triathlon. No clocks, no medals. Which is to say I timed it, it was slow, and there were no finisher medals for me, because it wasn’t an official triathlon. But I did a swim-bike-run. It was my first tri since … the 10th. The 10th of October. The 10th of October of 2015<\/a>. That was a half Ironman, and a lot happened after that, so I sat out the beginning of the 2016 season to save money. After which I started a new job, and that took up a lot of time. <\/p>\n

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Sure, the really devoted find the time. Make the time. I recall reading the inspirational story of one man who was an Ironman, a medical doctor, and a father of nine. He found the time. But me, and my old split 50-60 hour schedule and no pool time had no time. Which is to say I could have made the time, but there would have been no other time. And I didn’t want triathlon training to be my only<\/strong> hobby.<\/p>\n

These are the things I told myself since 2016. Now, I have a little more time. And, one hopes, more motivation. And so it was that I had, just last month, my first swim(s) in years. And also running, which comes and goes for me due to apathy. (I see people riding their bikes and think I wish I could go for a bike ride.<\/em> I have never watched anyone run by and thought, Man, I wish I could be jogging right now.<\/em>) And so today, a backyard sprint triathlon. (Sprint in this case denotes distance, not speed.)<\/p>\n

Counting laps in a pool is hard. The mind wanders. You lose track. Was that 15? Or 16?<\/em> So, today, I used sticks. <\/p>\n

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I swam 800 yards, moving a stick from one pile to another. Then I did an easy out-and-back 20 km bike ride. It was a decent ride. I had six stop signs, and I was conscious of having to shuffle through a run after. So I took it easy-ish, but it was fun and I was pleased. <\/p>\n

I was not at all pleased with the run. I was not surprised by that, either. <\/p>\n

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In July of 2015<\/a>, when I was eight years younger and in a different kind of shape, I did a sprint tri 15 that was minutes faster than what I did today. The week before that<\/a>, I did another spring tri. (Two weekends in a row. See? I was in a different kind of shape.) In that one, I was 12 minutes faster than today. I was proud of my bike ride in that one. I had the third fastest bike leg on the course. They were roads I rode every day and, it turns out, there’s a little advantage to that. <\/p>\n

It was a brand new event put on by our old LBS. I miss those guys, and I wish we’d had the opportunity to do that one more than once. I wish for a lot of things.<\/p>\n

Anyway, my fastest sprint tri was 22 minutes faster than today. I can find 22 minutes somewhere, right? Right? <\/p>\n

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Phoebe says the answer to my question may be just through this door. <\/p>\n

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Through that door is the garage. And my car is in there. And it does go faster than my bike and feet. So she’s not wrong.<\/p>\n

She still loves sitting in boxes. Good thing we’ve kept a few kitty-sized bits of cardboard around for them. <\/p>\n

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Poseidon really doesn’t want me to write anymore about Phoebe. He’s jealous of her and whatever she’s doing, at most all times. <\/p>\n

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I love when I catch him yawning. Usually it makes him look angry or ferocious. Once or twice a big yawn has looked ludicrous. In this one, I think, he looks playful. <\/p>\n

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Great weekend around here, thanks. How was yours? I did garbage duties on Saturday. I let the cats lounge on me. I floated around listening to nothing. I found the weed eater, which I used this morning. Weeds needed to be ate, and the job was accomplished in the back yard and on one side. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,6,3,10,57,9,56,60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-573896021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cycling","category-memories","category-monday","category-photo","category-running","category-site","category-swimming","category-triathlon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573896021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573896021"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573896021\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":573896027,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573896021\/revisions\/573896027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573896021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573896021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573896021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}