krisalis

I have 6 gmail invites to distribute. Let me know if you want one.

Peanut butter and banana sandwiches are soooooo yummmmmy. You should try one. Preferably on brown bread. Preferably with chunky peanut butter. Preferably with a slightly-overripe, just-about-to-go-mushy-but-not-mushy-yet banana. Mmmmmmmmm. Me likey.

My sister Billie found this little guy wandering around near her house on Saturday afternoon.

She took him to the Town Lake Animal Shelter where he is being taken care of until someone is able to give him a new home.

And look at this goofy puppy! He is a-DOR-able!

Ok. I have to stop looking at puppy photos now. Rosie is getting jealous.

I just popped my ebay cherry. After two initial attempts where I was outbid by 50c in the last 10mins of the auction, I purchased an assortment* of knitting needles and accessories.

Last week, I bought a used copy of Stitch’n'Bitch from amazon.com.

Now all I need is some yarn.

And someone to show me how to cast on.

Mark wants me to knit him som bed socks. I think I’ll start with something rather simpler, like a scarf. Or a square. Or a bookmark.

[* details on my acquired assortment, for those of you who might be interested to know: 3 nylon circular knitting needles, sizes 4, 8 and 10. 7-inch double point knitting needles, size 4 and 6. A 4-1/2 inch metal stitch holder. 2 crochet hooks, size J and Q. 2 packages of place markers. 1 knitting needle and 1 crochet hook gauge with a 6-inch ruler and a stitch measure. Some needle tip protector thingmajigs. ]

My sister Billie and I had a couple of scratch’n'sniff story books when we were little. As the name suggests, scratch’n'sniff books contained little stickers that were scented. Scratch the sticker and voila! The articifical scent of strawberries and cream was there for the sniffing.

The scratch’n'sniff book I remember best was a Sesame Street story about Big Bird. As far as I can recall, Big Bird was lost, and he was trying to find his way back to Sesame Street. On his journey, he came across different people who tried to help him out. Each character had an item to scratch’n'sniff.

There was pizza and cotton candy at the fairground. There was peach pie from the lil’ ol’ lady along the lane, and strawberries and cream at a nearby cafe. There were flowers at the street vendor. There was a big barrell of dill pickles at the deli.

We scratched and sniffed all the sweet-smelling pictures until they began to wear thin under the strain. Strawberries and cream was the first to go, followed closely by peach pie and cotton candy. Pizza was a little way behind. Pickle was our least favourite, and we would skip over that page without so much as lifting a finger to scratch the scented picture.

The nett effect of minimal pickle scratching was that long after the other pictures had ceased to release any of their artificial perfume, our book still smelled of pickle.

The pickle scent became the stuff dares were made of.

‘I dare you to scratch the whole pickle picture and then hold the book up to your nose for ten seconds‘

These days, I like dill pickles in a sandwich or on a burger, or even pickle spears on their own. I lurve the tiny cornichons that are traditionally served with raclette.

But I still can’t eat, or even smell a dill pickle without having a minor flashback to that darn Sesame Street book.

I did the Couples Triathlon on Saturday morning with one of my tri training buddies.

Mark and Rosie graciously got up super early on Saturday morning (4.30am!) and we drove down to the Texas Ski Ranch in New Braunfels.

Mark: Ski Ranch? Does it snow here? me: Um, they mean water skiing. Mark: Well, why isn’t it called Texas Waterski Ranch? me: Maybe because everyone knows it doesn’t snow in New Braunfels.

We got there in plenty of time, despite my sleepy headedness causing us to miss the correct exit on I-35.

I set up my bike and running gear in the transition area, got marked with my race number, collected my timing chip and watched the sun drag itself lazily above the horizon, shining weakly behind thick clouds.

Rosie was in top form, wagging happily at all who approached her and racing along the shore of the lake, splashing and scallywagging as a happy puppy should.

There were some last minute changes to the course, and a bunch of announcements which delayed the start a little bit. By 7.20am, we were lined up at the water’s edge, listening in silence to the ‘Star Spangled Banner’ before the starter’s gun finally signalled the departure of the first wave.

K and I were in wave 2, ‘female friends’, so we didn’t have long to wait until it was our turn to dive in.

The swim wasn’t too crowded, but the water in the ski lake was very murky, which made it difficult to see where we were supposed to be going. I splashed my way around the course in alternating stretches of frontcrawl and breaststroke.

I came out of the water in just over 14 minutes and trotted towards transition to collect my bike and head out onto the bike course.

The bike course was about 14 miles, and for the most part, took us on smaller country roads with lovely views over fields and ranch land containing cows and other assorted livestock. We passed several houses along the way, and were cheered on by barking guard dogs, who were presumably wondering why there was a steady stream of wet, lycra-clad individuals disturbing the peace at that time on a Saturday morning.

The course also took us past a distribution center for Wal*Mart, which meant we had the unpleasant experience of being swept up in the swirling dustbowl of debris as the giant delivery trucks trundled past us on their route to or from the warehouse.

The roads were rough in places, and there were several false flats, which made me feel as though I was pedalling furiously but going nowhere. Overall, the 14 miles sped by quite quickly. It wasn’t too hot and the scenery was pleasantly distracting. I completed the bike course in about 46 minutes and dismounted reluctantly ready to tackle the 5k run.

I’m not a big fan of the run leg in triathlon. I’m not fast, I’m not agile, and I don’t enjoy this portion of the race much. My goal at this stage in the event is just to finish.

However, having said that, I am starting to dislike it less. I give myself permission to walk when the route gets tough, and I find that this minor mental adjustment means I can coax myself forward with less self-imposed pressure. (What can I say? I’m competetive by nature.)

I jogged the course at a slow but comfortable 10 – 10.30min mile pace to complete the triathlon in a total time of 1:37:21.5.

Rosie and Mark were at the finish line to greet me. Rosie followed me as I flopped back into the lake to cool down.

K. finished a little way behind me, and we chattered about the course with the enthusiasm that post-race endorphins create.

Somehow, our performance put us at the top of our age group in the female friends category, which meant we won some (empty) beer glasses, engraved with the name of the race and ’1st’. Woohoo!

Photos from the race are up over here.

Next race: Dilloman.

Pictures of Dad’s birthday, walk at Mansfield Dam, people out and about in downtown Austin and Rosie at 19 weeks old.

Lucian and Faith are expecting a baby! I’m so excited for them. And a little scared for me. Lucian and Faith got married exactly one week after Mark and I tied the knot. Is it really baby time already? I’m not ready for babies yet.

Are you following Going For Gold? Ms Shauny, of What’s New Pussycat fame, natters on about the fit bods on show and sports action in general in a most entertaining manner. Great stuff.

Andrea announces her job entails spending time with runway models. When I first saw that entry, I read it as runaway models. I had visions of her chasing little model airplanes and trains around a vast, empty conference room. Then I realised that was highly unlikely, so my next mental jump had her counselling mascara-smeared, heroin-skinny catwalk models. In reality, of course, her job entails neither of these imagined scenarios. Yet.

Toogle search for krisalis.org

Monkey is pretty cool too.

Half Bakery weighs in on the Olympics, asking which sports should be eliminated from the games.

I like the fact that the Olympics brings some of the more obscure sports into the limelight. When else would I sit glued to the telly watching such events as horse riding, synchronised diving, fencing, archery or double handed dinghy?

I like cheering on the underdogs, and watching some unlikely Albanian/Peruvian/Maldovian/insert small underfunded country of your choice here score one over on the cocky big guys (especially if they’re American).

I like watching the gymnastics and the swimming and the rowing and the athletics, and and and….well, and almost everything.

Almost.

But tennis? We’ve got the French Open, Aussie Open, US Open, Wimbledon and many other more competetive tournaments than the Olympics.

Cycling road race? It’s all about the Tour de France.

Football? World Cup! Of course, I’m also biased against football, because Britain is too messed up to be able to get a team together to compete in the sport as a country. Apparently we can manage it for Rugby with the British Lions, but not for football.

And then there’s the waste of space sport – synchronised swimming. I mean, really, what good can ever come of synchronised swimming? Fake smiles and overuse of hair products. There’s no need!

If I had to pick one sport for Olympic elimination, I’d pick synchronised swimming.

Which sport would you vote out?

Gothamist, Chicagoist, SFist(currently in beta), and perhaps sometime in the future, Austinist?

I’d go for an austinist t-shirt – something with the 360 bridge and the UT tower on it would be cool.