Power Tools

This weeks portrait project is a two for one deal. 

Why do you get when you combine a power drill and peanut butter?

7/52

Evenly mixed Adams peanut butter.  Which is a welcome change from the usual runny on top/solid on bottom when the mixing is done by hand.  

7/52

Bubbles

6/52

Corned Beast Madness

The Klungle household began preparing for St. Patties day two weeks ago. We had an antelope roast and a corning recipe, we saw no reason why we shouldn't make our own corned beast.  Which is exactly what we did - 10 days in a brine, all leading up to the big event. 

Our menu for Saturday included corned beast and cabbage, soda bread, Guinness, and chocolate Guinness cupcakes.  We made enough food to feed an army and made the mistake of not inviting anyone over...This morning we did corned beast and hash, quite possibly the best use of corned beast there is. 

Corned beast/cabbage and soda bread

Chocolate Guinness muffins

Hash

In addition to gorging on food, we was also gorged on outdoor activities.    We may not be experiencing the warm weather the rest of the US is at the moment (I'm not bitter), but it did stop raining for most of the weekend.  In my book that is a win.  Saturday I got out for a run while Matt mountain biked, today we both went mountain biking.  I'm pooped.  Time to curl-up with a good book and a cup of tea.

The Oregon Trail

The best part of my day - finding out that I can still play Oregon Trail.  Yes, you heard me correctly.  I am talking about the game we got to play on the old Apple computers in the back of the room during grade school.  I loved this game!  It does seem unfair for me to talk about it and not share.  Without further ado I bring you The Oregon Trail.

Enjoy!

Baby Steps

Today was trip number two to Crystal for some skiing.  I have good news, it went much better than last week.  Don't misunderstand - I am still an awful skier, but, you got start somewhere.  I think I've finally figured out how to turn left and I am happy to report that I made it down some black diamonds with out hesitating (too much) or falling.

It snowed hard all day.  Matt's beard turned into an ice chunk.
Sadly, this picture was taken too late to display the full effect.
5/52

Motivation

My motivation took a dive these past few months.  There is no single reason, rather a laundry list that has lead to me being in a state of blah.  What is blah, well, let me tell you.  Blah if feeling like I am aimlessly afloat in a sea of indecision.  Should I or shouldn't I - run, sign-up for a race, lift, do yoga.  You get the idea. 

I am happy to report I think I have shaken the blahs.  I don't necessarily have a plan but I feel motivated to be more motivated - ha, take that motivation!  I may sign-up for Chuckanut next weekend, however, it is still up in the air as I wait to see what my work schedule looks like.  I've wanted to do this race since I started running ultras and I have to admit it is for a very juvenile reason - I love the name.  If I don't find myself at the start line that's okay, there are plenty of other goals.  I just need to figure out what they are.

The easiest blog step to take is to re-launch my portrait program (not that anyone missed it).   This time I am going to redefine portrait to mean anything I want to take a picture of.  This week - my morning coffee, which at times motivates me out the door.

When all else fails there is coffee.
4/52

2" of Sunburn

Since there was only 2" of my face exposed to the sun, that is the only part of me that got burnt.  But, I won't complain.  It was a beautiful bluebird day in the mountains.  Matt and I headed up to Crystal to try and work out the kinks before we head to Aspen.  This is a good idea in general, even better for me.  Matt has been skiing for a long time, I started skiing when I moved out here [full disclosure: I did do some skiing when younger at our local trash hill (which was awesome!), but I didn't go enough to really learn any skills], and today was the first time I've been on downhill skis in two years.   I will leave it at this - it wasn't pretty...

Beautiful day

Form, what form?!?

Mt. Rainier

The new gondola

Batting .500

It seems that cross country skiing just isn't in the cards for us.  Matt and I headed to Mt. Tahoma (outside of Mt. Rainier) this morning, we were planning to do the same trip to Copper Creek we did two weekends ago with Pat. After a butt clenching scary drive (while using chains) to the parking lot Matt turned the truck around and proceeded to drive us back down.  He was concerned that we would get stuck up there for one of two reasons.  1) The roads would get so bad we couldn't drive down, or 2) someone else would get stuck thereby finding us stuck as well.

At least we came across a 7-11 grand opening on our way home - free hot dogs, slurpees, doughnuts, sandwiches, and chips.  Once I got home I pacified myself by taking the dogs for a walk in the woods.  It was a nice day in Olympia.