Run, Mama, run...

An astonishing number of people today had signs saying "Run, [whomever], run!" This seemed strange to me, and slightly passive-agressive somehow, because - what, we needed reminders? It's a footrace. We've got *numbers on our torsos.* But then someone's sign near the end said "Run, Forrest, run!" and I finally caught the Forrest Gump reference, and mystery solved.

So Mama ran, and did pretty decently for the first half-marathon. It was hot, and hilly, and I still was within my target time by several minutes. The most fun moments were finishing the hills around mile five, feeling good still, meeting Dorothy and Renata around mile seven, and really from mile nine on was pretty decent all around. I averaged about an 11 minute/mile pace, which sounds slow, but worked out well over the long run. (Hah!)

People were pretty upbeat, there were tons of water stops where you had to all but defend yourself from eager water-purveyors, and one amazing woman around mile ten stood on the sidelines and said to the runners passing her, "You look so beautiful! You look great! You're doing so well!" and I got a little weepy because she had Track Coach Authority, and I felt beautiful and like I was doing great and like things would be Okay. Which they were! I sprinted the last 100 yards or so, wobbled off into the chute, wolfed down a banana, a bagel, and still and yet more water before Renata and Dorothy nabbed me at the place for meetups. After figuring out that we were stuck in a massive traffic jam because of all the closed streets, we had lunch at an Irish pub and then came home. I took the world's nicest tub and actually feel pretty good.

Renata took some "before" pictures, like the above, and some "during" pictures which are about what you'd expect, minus the momentarily confused guy on the right. We skipped the "after" for reasons of dignity. She was a total trooper, shuttling me around all day from start to middle to finish, and I am so glad to be here doing this fun thing.

I'm a pirate!

Peter had quite the pirate crew over for his birthday... we had a treasure hunt (for pirate booty), a pirate pinata (filled with more pirate booty), and a cake (decorated with Transformers, for reasons that remain unclear to me.) We now own pirate hats, a Jolly Roger flag for just in case, and many more legos and Star Wars guys. Even Mama dressed like a pirate, which it says something when you can whip up a pirate costume from things you already own (black kerchief for a hat, admittedly borrowed from kids, boots decorated with skulls, skirt and t-shirt, and that's about it, but I was piratey.) It came as an ironic blow that there were actual pirate stories on the NPR this last week, involving not-funny pirate antics and anti-pirate heroism. We're vintage pirates, not contemporary pirates, and that makes us cool rather than all vicious and terroist-affiliated. Until Talk Like A Pirate Day (September 19th)... arrrr, ye skurvy sea dogs.

Birds, and how.

So watch: I'm going to be all thematic and stuff.

First, we took the kids yesterday to an event at one of the local nature centers where they could see a bird of prey up close (a rough-legged hawk, this time) and hear a little talk about her. We like this kind of thing, such that it turns out each kid actually has a toy bird of prey to bring along for the fun. Grace's is a perigrine falcon and Peter's is a great horned owl (identified by the nature center expert) that used to be Mike's. We saw a turkey vulture as we were driving up that was, frankly, the biggest damned bird I've ever seen. {alert readers: now we're doing a transition. Yes, I'm finding myself teaching a lot of writing basics these days; why do you ask?}

Speaking of birds of unusual size, I had a thing happen to me today that wasn't quite my fault, but it felt as though it was a confluence of events that could be traced back to me. Let me describe it in order of phenomena observed. 1. That Christmas wreath on the side of the house could really stand to be swapped out for a pretty spring one! 2. We're ready for church but don't need to leave for a few minutes - how about I do that now. 3. Oh look, some bird poop under the wreath. 4. Holy $*#&! There's a bird nest! Oh, Jesus: I have just spilled baby birds and unhatched eggs onto the deck chair where I carelessly laid the wreath. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Birdies. Holy goodness, they're tiny [!!!] and totally vulnerable and you're not supposed to touch them, right? 5. Reinforcements arrive, in response to my incoherent shrieking about having murdered baby birds, and calmly scoop teeny birds (3) and eggs (2) back into the next and affix the damned wreath back onto the wall. 6. I mourn all through church about being a murderer of teeny birds. The kids are largely unworried and reassure me that the mommy will come back, perhaps because that's the kind of mothering they're accustomed to - I may bitch a lot, but I don't up and desert them. 7. When we get back from church, we confirm that the mommy bird has indeed returned, and all is well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well. No photos of the tiny birds, though. They prefer to recuperate anonymously. Although we may sneak a few pictures as they get bigger.

Finally, Easter eggs, which... wait for it... come (as you might be aware) from birds! We got them at the grocery store, though, and dyed them up right pretty. The kids each did six, we managed to spill only one container of dye on the hardwood floors, and they produced a lovely rainbow of eggs, which the Easter Bunny obligingly hid while we were at church worrying (or not) about the fate of our teeny robins. The egg hunt was good fun and the plastic eggs filled with chocolate were almost as popular as the real eggs. One real egg was overlooked, our careful accountants noted its absence and set out to find it and restore balance to the universe, and were successful, at least egg-wise.

In which it is spring again!

So it's plants, plants, plants at our house - the ones I ordered have come in the mail, the ones already growing have begun to emerge from underneath the mulch of last fall's leaves, and we planted some seeds in our teeny terrariums. Peter chose sunflowers, Grace chose cosmos, and I'm hoping we get a good transplant success rate. We did lots of raking and uncovering today, and noted which trees and shrubs are budding - the trumpet vine is particuarly pretty, and Grace gave it a little pep talk. Tomorrow I'm going to plant the various things that came in the mail (only one casualty there) and hope that we don't get (another) late snow. I was reflecting today on how little I got to enjoy our garden last year - we moved in July, so I spent the month between moving in and starting work unpacking, prepping my syllabi, arranging afterschool care, and orienting myself and the kids to our new neighborhood. This year I get spring - lots and lots of new plants to make friends with, open spaces to fill in, larger plans to draw up, a vegetable garden to put in, and (blessedly) the time off from work to accomplish all that.

Next up for the blog: Peter's birthday party pictures (pirates!) and a report on tomorrow's long run (aiming for 12 miles, since my half marathon is coming up soon and my running has been a little off for the past two weeks.)