Overdue Update

– Ack, almost a week has slipped by without my noticing — or updating. Sorry about that. I had started to write a post about time management, but it got too long and uninteresting to bother with. It will have to suffice to say that my perfect daily schedule would run about eighteen hours long (work, running, blogging, chores, errands, creative stuff), and that’s not counting time for eating or pausing to sit for a minute. Instead, my life tends to follow the pattern outlined in this Hyperbole and a Half post.
– I discovered how easy it is to make polenta/grits this week. I’ve made the firmer kind of polenta before, but I don’t really care about it one way or the other — but when it’s made with more water, it’s almost like a savory oat bran. I love it topped with poached eggs, because it’s sooo good with the egg yolk mixed in.
– I’ve run over thirty miles less this month than I had by this point in June. Granted, I was training for my first official half-marathon in June, whereas July has included a taper, a week-long rest (post-race), and generally sporadic running due to an achy foot. The pain of it is that my brain got used to all those endorphins, so now it’s about ready to chew its way out to go looking for some on its own. Not a great feeling.
– The only upside to not running as much is that I sleep a lot longer. This has happened several times when I’ve had to back off on my running. I don’t know the exact science behind why my body would want to stock up on sleep when it’s burning fewer calories than usual, but I like to imagine it’s because when I’m racking up a high weekly mileage, my brain thinks we’re constantly on the run from tigers. Too dangerous to sleep!
– I made raspberry jam with my homegrown raspberries. I picked and froze them as they ripened, so I had plenty for making jam. I used a ‘Less Sugar Needed’ pectin and followed the recipe that called for Splenda, but I used stevia. It came out just as I like it — lots of fruit flavor, not too sweet.