Daylight in the swamp; this morning's sunrise (you can't see them, but there was a family of wood ducks on the pond to the left and under the tree!)
A gorgeous Saturday morning. Low 60's, not much humidity, and abundant sunshine. I put in 13.5 miles today, a nice and steady long run.
A few good wildlife encounters; I surprised a mama deer along the trail. I also had a rooster ring-necked pheasant land on the trail right in front of me only to do an about-face and hightail it back into the bush in road runner-esque fashion. The aforementioned wood duck family was a treat. The little guys were making a cute whistling noise that echoed across the pond.
The highlight was spotting 27 bunnies along the trails! In terms of sheer numbers, that is the most I have ever seen on a single run. And, it makes for a perfect 2.0 bunnies-per-mile ratio (a new BPM PR, eclipsing a previous best of 1.75 BPM on 12 mile run!). It was astonishing. They were everywhere! Of course, it is easy to pad the stats when you meet a mom and four little dudes in one spot. :) Still, there was a lot of fur on the trails today!
Bunnies, bunnies, everywhere! The was bunny #24 this morning, the only one who cooperated long enough for a photograph.
I was just reading an article in the local paper talking about about how the rabbits have had such a favorable year, and that many bunnies are having second batches this summer. A number of the bunnies I saw were quite small, so I think that is obviously the case. I am officially declaring this the year of the rabbit!
Thankfully, none of the bunnies I encountered were this vicious... :)
As of late, I have rarely been running without my camera. For some reason, yesterday I forgot to take it with me.
It should come as no surprise that this would be the day I encounter a mama deer with her spotted fawn less than a half mile into my run. They even stopped in an open area to watch me go by!
Later in the run, I ran into yet another deer in a wooded area along the trail. She was sharing a grassy patch with one of my resident bunnies. Both of them also stopped what they were doing to check me out. I started laughing. All that was missing was Mr. Bluebird on my shoulder and it would have been a Disney cartoon come to life.
Remember your camera next time, dummy. :)
But, the camera was with me on Sunday morning. That was my day off from running, so I got up early and headed out to Elm Creek for what ended up being a really nice 2 1/2 hour hike. Lots of good birds, including several common yellowthroats (this has been a fantastic year for them; I have seen more this season that ever before), and I even got scolded by a pair of indigo buntings, obviously getting too close to their nest. Flowers are blooming, butterflies are cruising around, and it truly looks like summer.
Here are a few photos from Sunday:
Mud Lake at the Elm Creek Park Reserve
The sumac is starting to turn a reddish color
Here is the brilliant papa indigo bunting that was upset with me. His camouflage is not very good! :)
Daisies along the edge of the trail
And, once I got home from the park, I made bacon-wrapped meat loaf, sour cream and chive mashed potatoes, and asparagus for Sunday's dinner (the leftovers have been making for the best cold meat loaf sandwiches, too!)
In 2008 on the 4th of July, I ran in the 32nd annual Firecracker Run 10k in the town of Excelsior. I had so much fun last year that I decided to partake in the 33rd annual running.
Excelsior Bay on an overcast 4th of July morning
Excelsior is a pretty little city on the south shore of Lake Minnetonka. It still has a lot of small town charm despite being swallowed up by the metro area. They have a cute downtown area with lots of neat shops and restaurants, as well as a fairly impressive view of the lake.
A family of geese floating on Lake Minnetonka
For a weather forecast that had originally looked kind of nice, the day sure started off gloomy. Temperatures were around 70, it was overcast with occasional drizzle, and extremely humid. It felt steamy. Oh well, at least the cloud cover would offer a break from the sun, right?
Pre-race set up down in Excelsior Commons Park
The race starts and finishes at the Excelsior Commons Park. It runs through scenic residential areas to the east of the downtown area. The course is largely flat, but there are a couple of rolling hills to keep it interesting.
This race also really seems to embody what it is to be a "fun run." It has great community support (everyone seemed to know each other), and it is quite social. There was an interesting mix of a number of very talented local runners, as well as some runners who looked like their legs hadn't seen sunlight in years. There is a little something for everyone at the Firecracker Run!
Yours truly before the start of the race
At 8:30, they turned us loose on the streets. I managed to put myself in a good position at the start so I avoided a lot of congestion. Runners quickly fanned out and we ventured into the residential areas.
The route is pretty; lots of nice homes and many big trees in these older neighborhoods. The roads were also sort of winding, so there were a few twist and turns.
I thought it was hard running on Saturday. Even with no sun, it was still kind of warm and the humidity was off the charts. I tend to labor in stuff like this and felt like I was sucking air.
And, for the third race in a row, I didn't wear my watch. As a little experiment, I've been trying to run by feel and not be too concerned about time. The only times I heard were being called out at the one mile and five mile marks.
My race was going better than I had suspected. When I got to the five mile mark, I had passed that in just over 38 minutes. That was enough information to give me a little boost; I was on a good pace and running faster than I had originally thought.
Winding back into downtown, the runners made a beeline to the finish in the park. I had a decent kick at the end, too, passing a few folks coming down the home stretch. There is a really good crowd at the finish here, so when you run into the chute, there are a lot of cheering spectators.
I crossed the finish line in 47:08 (results here). Not only was that almost 2 1/2 minutes faster than last year's time, but it was also my second fastest 10k ever. The race ended up being a rather satisfying performance for me, especially in such humid conditions. Nice! Even better, they give you a red, white, and blue bomb pop popsicle at the finish line! :) Talk about a treat after a warm race.
The only bad thing that happened is that I did not get to partake in my semi-regular, post-race tradition of Chinese takeout. I checked out several restaurants in my neighborhood that are of the Asian persuasion, and all were closed for the 4th!
Crap.
With no plans to do any cooking, I dined on a rotisserie chicken from Lund's, all the while learning a valuable lesson to become more aware of what businesses close for national holidays.
Until next time,
Jean
PS - My race finish on Saturday was not nearly as wild as the finish of the NASCAR race. Good golly! Rock on, Tony.
Always nice to have a day off from work. Love these holidays. Of course, it felt like a Saturday (I even e-mailed my folks to wish them a happy Saturday!).
I had a nice long run of 11 miles. Gorgeous morning in the low 60's to start, and very calm. The run was good. I felt pretty spry today. I encountered 8 bunnies today for a decent .72 BPM. And, the wild raspberries are getting ripe. I found a nice patch along one of my trails and stopped for a berry break! Good stuff.
Following my run I headed up to Elm Creek Park to see what was happening. As it turns out, lots!
Many of the babies are starting to appear. Baby chickadees following mom around demanding food. A pair of house wrens were wildly upset with me as their babies were nearby in the thicket. A mama American redstart was feeding one of her children. And, a juvenile downy woodpecker was busy eating elderberries (he looked like he was still working to perfect his woodpecker moves).
(By the way, all of those birds I mentioned in the above paragraph were seen in one location. I didn't move from my spot for at least 20 minutes. I also saw some catbirds, heard the red-eyed vireo, and photographed a curious red squirrel here. It was wonderful!)
A photogenic red squirrel at Elm Creek Park
I also found this pretty red baneberry plant (I believe)
Tonight's dinner was from the pages of "Urban Italian" again; grilled (in my case, George Foreman grilled!) shrimp wrapped in pancetta and sage leaves and drizzled with lemon juice. I served it with a tabbouleh I whipped up (which was not from "Urban Italian" - it was from Ellie Krieger), which seemed like a perfect summer side dish.
Grilled shrimp wrapped in pancetta and sage served with tabbouleh
A delicious meal. The shrimp had great flavor, nicely accented with the salty pancetta, earthy sage, and bright lemon. The tabbouleh was light, flavorful, and fresh tasting. Hopefully this will give me the fuel I need for the Firecracker Run tomorrow! :)
Not a great photo, but this is one of my regular bunnies per mile...
He though he couldn't be seen, but the ears make for terrible camouflage! :)
Good running the last two days. Temperatures have been somewhat cool, in the very low 70's, with plenty of cloud cover. Quite a contrast from last week. I felt almost speedy out there.
Safe travels to those of you traveling for the holiday weekend. I am staying put again this year. Battling the traffic heading "up north" is no fun, and it looks like the weather is going to be gorgeous down here.
After Saturday's 11 miler, I took a nice easy 5 miler Sunday morning.
A gorgeous day to start. It was blissfully cool with temps in the low 60's and relatively low humidity. Quite a change from most of this week. There was some wind, but it wasn't quite as wild as it got later in the day. Good running weather, though. Were it not for the fact that my insoles were still kind of waterlogged from yesterday's run in the rain, it would have been perfect! :)
I saw five bunnies for a perfect 1.0 BPM (three were babies, so cute!). The meadow along the edge of the pond was teeming with sedge wrens, goldfinches, and eastern kingbirds. The wooded thickets were filled with cardinals and gray catbirds. What a nice morning to be outside.
The rest of the day was spent in the kitchen. You might recall me gushing about the "Urban Italian" cookbook by Andrew Carmellini a few months ago. Today I made another recipe from the book (well, kind of); I cooked up his lamb ragu.
Lamb ragu over fusilli; Urban Italian style!
The recipe in the book called for the use of canned cherry tomatoes if you can get them, but to just use regular tomatoes if you can't. I have never seen canned cherry tomatoes. I did have a pint of cherry tomatoes, as well as some leftover baby heirloom tomatoes from yesterday's pizza, so I made my own sauce out of them. The tomatoes were halved, tossed with garlic, olive oil, fresh basil and thyme, salt and pepper, and roasted in a hot oven for 15 minutes. I passed the tomatoes through a sieve and made a deliciously sweet roasted cherry tomato sauce. (Basically what I am saying is that I used this as a labor intensive substitute for canned cherry tomatoes!)
The rest of the recipe was a lot like a classic ragu; meat (lamb, and I also threw in a little pancetta and pork), carrots, celery, onion, garlic, fennel bulb (my addition), crushed red pepper, tomato paste, red wine, stock, my cherry tomato sauce, and assorted fresh herbs.
Carmellini makes a really clever addition that I never would have thought of in an Italian ragu. He adds scant amounts of ground coriander and cumin (both ingredients I use when I make chili). The coriander has a wonderful perfume. And the cumin (..."only enough to enhance the meat, not enough to really taste," says the author) added an earthy warmth to the overall dish and works exceptionally well with the lamb.
This recipe was fantastic. So rich and flavorful. And I would definitely go through the trouble of making the roasted cherry tomato sauce again. Viva Italia!
Saturday morning greeted me with a light drizzle and temperatures around 70. I did an 11 mile run again.
The light drizzle was pleasant, but it gradually turned into some locally heavy rain showers, which means I got absolutely soaked. I even heard a couple rumbles of thunder in the last mile. I know they have some pretty cool home theater technology these days, but Mother Nature still has the best "surround sound" system. Hearing thunder when you are outside is cool!
There must have been some minor storm action last night, although I was not awakened by it. I discovered a huge tree limb that had snapped off and blocked the whole trail, so I had to do a bit of climbing to get around it!
In spite of the rain, I did have a few wildlife encounters. I saw a mere 3 bunnies (a .27 BPM), but they were no doubt hunkered down due to the weather. The rain didn't slow down the robins and catbirds. They were numerous. I also saw a pair of broad-winged hawks who were whistling loudly (I know they have a nest nearby, as I have seen them in this location before). And, I stopped to chat with a deer. A doe was standing in the woods perhaps 15 feet off the trail. I just started talking to her, and she could have cared less. She didn't even move after I resumed running. The deer's summer coat is really reddish colored right now. Very pretty!
I had not made homemade pizza in ages, so I decided that tonight's dinner was the perfect occasion to return to pizza making. They were selling these little boxes of mixed, baby heirloom tomatoes at the grocery store, so I decided to use them, along with some pancetta, fresh mozzarella, and fresh basil. The tomatoes were delightfully sweet, and the pizza turned out fantastic. I love homemade pizza.
Pizza with heirloom tomatoes, pancetta, fresh mozzarella, and basil
I'm an avid runner, and I enjoy running in road and trail races. When I am not running, I can be found cooking, reading cookbooks, enjoying a glass of wine, taking a hike, going on a road trip, or simply enjoying TV!
