Summery Summary Part III--First Triathlon and Spencer Spit

As I wrote about earlier my friend Chris talked me into doing the Heart of the Sound triathlon with him. I trained throughout the summer, and when the big day arrived in late August, I kinda sorta felt like I was ready. The event started with the swim, and the water was 62 degrees. I am very glad I rented a wetsuit from Speedy Reedy! The 'old folks' (40+) started their swim first, and two minutes later we 'youngsters' started our swim. The water was shockingly cold but I warmed up pretty quickly. Visibility was close to zero; I had an excellent view of the plankton and kelp and the swimmers in front of me right before I crashed into them. Every fifty meters or so I would pop my head up to look for the next buoy, adjust course accordingly, and soldier on. Eventually I stopped passing people, and was worried that maybe I missed a turn or something. It turns out that I actually did pretty well on the swim, finishing 11th over all and first in my age group (!).

However, after stripping off the wet suit, changing into my cycling/running gear and hopping on the bike, I discovered to my shock and dismay that my rear tire was completely flat. I have no idea how this happened, as I triple-checked everything before the race started. Fortunately there was an attentive race organizer there who helped me set the bike on a stand, and I sprinted to my gear, grabbed a spare tube and changed the tire. I'm not sure how long it all took; maybe 10-15 minutes? Anyway, after I changed the tire and got moving the ride was awesome--Vashon Island is really beautiful. I was riding pretty well, and passed maybe 15-20 people. My time was not great because of the flat, but I finished 61st overall on the bike and second to last in my age group. On the bright side, if I do this again next year--and all my equipment works--I am almost certain to improve my time!

The third and final stage, the run, was the most challenging for me. I don't particularly like running and I'm not very good at it, and I was really tired. But I was so psyched to finish that I just kept plodding on, and came in 39th overall, 6th in my age group.

My combined time for all three stages was 1:52:59, putting me 42 out of 81 finishers. I had a great time, and I consider my performance to be pretty decent.

In retrospect, the most challenging aspects of the whole event were the mechanics and logistics--what to bring, what to wear and when, how to arrange everything in the staging area, how to change quickly, and how to change a tube with hands still shaking from the swim. I'm glad I did it, and might even do it again next year.

Spencer Spit is a State Park on Lopez Island in San Juan County. We went camping there with our friends the Moores and the Mahoney-Schafers--the multi-family camping trip has become a bit of an annual tradition, and this was a great place for it. The islands are always beautiful, and although we experienced a fair bit of rain during our stay, there were enough dry spells that we were still able to enjoy the park, the beach, and some kayaking. We brought our double, and took each of the kids out to see the crabs, anemones, and sea stars through the amazingly clear water of the Sound. And of course we enjoyed all the usual camping stuff--roasting marshmallows over the fire, singing songs, ghost stories, etc.

On the way home while we were waiting for the ferry our boys met two awesome little girls named Kelsey and Aubrietta. They are a bit older than Liam and Lochlan, but the four of them had great fun playing together and became fast friends in the way that young children often do (you know, catching garter snakes, coaxing free sodas out of the vending machine, stuff like that). Liam actually invited the girls to his birthday party the next day! Unfortunately they were not able to make it, but their dad got in touch and it turns out their mom has an excellent blog detailing all of their adventures together. Hopefully they will all have a chance to hang out together again someday soon.

Summery Summary Part II--Liam is Five, and the Block Party

It is hard for me to believe, but Liam turned five this August. For the past several months he's become increasingly interested in insects (and invertebrates in general) so he chose 'bugs' as the theme for his birthday. After a quick survey of his friends, we decided to have the party on a Monday because the majority of them were available. Fortunately I was also able to attend--one of the best parts of being self-employed is the flexibility in my schedule.

So we had lots of kids, an awesome caterpillar cake that Amy made, a bug scavenger hunt, butterfly nets, and of course the wading pool. It was great fun.

The Block Party also happened in August, as part of the National Night Out. For the second year we (OK, actually Amy) organized and hosted the event, got the permit from the City to close our street to cars, etc. My contribution this year was to suggest we have some games and friendly competitions, and the favorite by far was the Push Lawnmower Uphill Sprint. The pictures pretty much say it all. We already have a pretty tight-knit community on our street, but it's always nice to catch up with neighbors we see less frequently and meet some of the recent arrivals.

Summery Summary Part I--The Garden

So it's been two months since my last post. That's hard to believe. There are many reasons for this; primary among them is the two week vacation we took at the very end of August/beginning of September and the subsequent never-quite-catching-up onslaught of delayed work. Oh, and there's this little election coming up, which has taken much of my time (I've been the appointed PCO for my precinct for the past two years, but after the primary election, I am now the officially elected PCO. It was exciting but kind of weird seeing my name on the ballot for the first time ever). The financial-world-going-to-hell phenomenon is also fairly concerning, but for the time being I'm going to ignore that suite of issues.

Anyway, I will now attempt to catch up a bit on all of the exciting things the Seattle Stevensons have gotten up to these past couple of months.

This summer we planted our most ambitious garden yet: we grew spinach, lettuce, carrots, peas, beans, corn, broccoli, zucchini, peppers, chives, pumpkins, tomatoes, basil, eggplant, blueberries, cherries, apples, and hops. We didn't grow a whole lot of anything--except tomatoes and zucchini--but it was pretty gratifying to have a bit of everything. Between the garden and the 1/2 CSA from Oxbow Farms we share with the Moores, we had plenty of fresh veggies this summer.

Here are a few shots of the produce.