Need a physio

This is a really short post tonight - I'm in agony as I quickly type. I've done something to my neck/shoulder muscles and have pain ripping across on side of my chest and collar bone area. Deb is currently googling physios for tmrw morning cause I am not getting any relief despite heat packs and nurofen. It bloody hurts !!

Not much again this week to report. I worked all week and the highlight was Skippys (Happy Hour) at the Emb. I tried my hand at some new food including toothpick bites. They were very popular and I got great feedback...and empty plates back into the kitchen.

Next weekend is a long weekend here. We are off to Gettysburg which is in Pennsylvania. Just doing a day trip and will be touring the very famous battlefields where the civil war was brought to an end. Stay tuned for that post. We will head up to Philadelphia another weekend which I am really keen to see.


We have booked tickets to see Boy George and Culture Club in two weeks and I am in the process of booking tickets to see KISS that same weekend. They are touring and playing in full costume and makeup. I can't wait !!!

I groaning in agony so will finish up. My last pic is me at Costco exploring the kids Halloween costumes. I'm thinking I can squeeze into this one if I really tried.

Doggles

It has been a quiet week given I've been working. The days are long with early starts to ensure the dogs get a walk. Cricket runs with us twice a week but somehow that's not enough as he's taken to digging a hole around the side. I'm sure it's him and not Macey. I've moved some wooden sleepers over the first hole but he moved to another place to dig. I've now covered that so I'll see what his next move his. Maybe he's trying to play chess with me or something?

 

I went to Costco today to scout out some prices for Happy Hour food.  It's always a trip of adventures when I go to Costco. I managed to nick the huge bag of frozen peas at the checkout so peas went everywhere. I think everyone noticed before me. I bought them anyway, only lost about a cupful but the floor will be pretty yucky once the peas melt and get stood on. And then I was loading the car and noticed the lady opposite me had parked really really badly - she just pulled in on an angle and there must have only been an inch to the next car. I saw here trying to move it slowly but eventually she come over and asked me for help. Directions or driving?? She asked me to park her car. OK, I jumped in and shit myself to see an old man sitting in the back seat. I said g'day but he said nothing. Another 'Weekend At Bernies' flashback. Anyway, quick reverse and straighten and the car was parked away nicely. I noticed 'Bernie' get out of the car and slowly walk away with his walking stick. 

DOGGLES - sunnies for dogs !!

On the way home I saw this car with a dog hanging out the window. I had to get a photo. After two sets of lights and a slight wrong turn by me, I finally caught the car and snapped this photo. CHECK THIS OUT !!! 

A friend commented 'Doggles' on my Facebook post so I googled and bugger me, Doggles are indeed sunglasses for dogs. 

I can't imagine Cricket or Macey wearing Doggles.


We met our friends for the weekly Saturday morning brekky run. We really enjoy catching up with them and love what we learn from them. We have decided to do a 'Turkey 10k Run' on Thanksgiving (25 Nov). There are such races all over so we are going to pick one and do it. There appears to be no turkey stunts and antics so it's just about burning calories in preparation for the 'carb coma' of Thanksgiving. It's sounds like our Xmas Day but bigger. I'm very excited about it - the eating that is, not so much the 10k run.

It was a bit wet today so we decided to take the dogs for a quick drive and run in the park for something different. It doesn't take much for cabin fever to grow here. There is a community hall thing near the park and a big group were having a picnic. Cricket decided he wanted 'in' on the action so off he went and next thing there was a bit of excitement amongst the group as he was under the table, around their legs and generally saying hello as he does best. I tried calling him back but he was there in the thick of it. God I hope he didn't steal any food. They seemed surprised more than anything.

We bought Macey a thunder coat to help her with the stress of thunder storms. It's nice and tight-like to make her feel like she's being hugged. It seems to settle her a bit and I thought I might buy one given it's makes her look like a skinny chick.

You may recall I saw a coyote last week. Well yesterday we took the dogs walking and then swimming as usual. We'd been there about 15mins and then a dog starts barking up the hillside about 100m away. It was like a younger dog bark. It just kept barking and barking and we couldn't see any walkers who might have a dog. I'm sure it would have been a coyote, maybe a mother protecting pups?? So we left and it was barking for quite a while as we walked into the distance. I will have to be careful where I walk now as I don't want our dogs to get into a fight with one.

We lost internet on Friday morning. I thought it would be an outage in the area but it was still down Friday night. I was able to run some diagnostics online on their website and then got help from the online chat person. They had to send a tech out but he didn't come until today (Sunday). Poor Deb was having technology 'withdrawals'. The tech came today and it turned out that our line was cut - we don't have underground cabling here. It runs from our house up to the house behind us. He said it was clean cut and he suspects tree-trimmers may have done it. Thankfully, we are back in communique' and the world is in balance again.


Something very exciting this week was the purchase of a little Nespresso machine. I decided the coffee machine I bought last month was never going to satisfy my desire for espresso (as it only made brewed coffee like Starbucks). So I bought a little Citi-z and I felt like I was in heaven yesterday having my first cup. There is a little machine in the kitchen at work so I'll take some pods to work and can enjoy a good cup there too.

Well not much else to say. A couple of pics from the dogs swimming yesterday. Cricket looked cute with his front leg bent at the ready. 

 

Coyotes and Farthings

So this week featured dinner at a lovely Italian restaurant, a coyote sighting, the high wheel (penny farthing) race and my first ride home from work. Penny Farthing is not a common term in the US - they like to call them High Wheels.

My working adventure is not panning out as planned. Having trouble getting access to the system so with no computer, no work. Dogs are happy cause I'm home until they get it sorted. Deb's work mates are happy to as I have cooked some cakes this week while I was home. But I was able to ride home from the city after work one day. Took me 90 mins for about 25k. It took about 25mins to get through the city due to heaps of traffic lights to stop at. The bikers here ride through red lights all the time, while they avoid traffic, they just ride through lights anyway. It was a long slight incline all the way home so it was quite hard work, especially on the mtb. I was close to home and as usual, a group of deer were on the front lawn nearby - gave me a fright but they were not phased.

I was walking the dogs the other day and they were running together in the forest as usual. I keep an eye on them and when I glanced over, I noticed another dog running up behind them. It was a coyote, looked just like the one in the picture. I called for the dogs as they had not seen it - the coyote rang away thankfully. I had been told there were some coyote in the forest park so I wasn't as scared as I thought. The website said they are unlikely to attack and to keep a distance from them. I worry though that the dogs would run up to it to play and a fight might start. Hopefully we won't see one anymore. They usually come out at night so not sure why it was out during the day.

Friends from home gave us a voucher for a lovely Italian restaurant as a farewell gift. We went with our two good friends and thoroughly enjoyed the evening. The food was excellent, the service was spot on and we really enjoyed the night out. We took some food porn pics to show our friends at home. Deb had a lamb rack and I had slow braised beef ravioli. We had entrees and dessert and were totally stuffed at the end. 

Next week is restaurant week here in DC. It happens twice a year. Restaurants offer 3 course dinner and/or lunch for around $35 and it's a great way to check out a restaurant for a great price. I'm not sure we'll get out this week but we'll see. 

And I discovered Root Beer is NOT ginger beer. My mate B tried to convince me it was made from ginger root. I said no, I don’t think so. Anyway, I bought a dozen in a pack (it was only $1.99 so what does that tell you!!) and tried some. Nope, it’s definitely not ginger. It’s actually sarsaparilla favoured as I suspected. I like sars but this is a bit blah tasting - cough mixture is a great taste match I reckon. So I now have 11 cans of root beer in the basement waiting for some aussie sucker to come and drink it. But I did taste a better bottle of root beer at the Frederick bike race and it was more pleasant to drink. So I must have bought the home brand version at Safeway or something. 

We went to a town called Frederick again, we were there about a month or so ago. We took our friends as they had not been and also it was the annual high wheel (penny farthing) race. It was a stinking bloody hot day - high 30's or over 100 on the old scale. We were just dripping with sweat and exploring all the air-conditioned shops. The high wheel race was awesome, I loved it. Those big bikes are just such a strange design. I've never really looked at one and watching the people ride them was so interesting. Despite the heat, many riders were dressed in period costume which was heavy and hot., some of the pants were wool. They had some riders from London competing and I would really love to ride this little event next year. I will make some enquiries about it but I would need to borrow a bike. I don't want to buy one. They only had about 4 women racing so it would good to add to the numbers. Deb has visions of us packing this big-wheeled bike in our removal in 3 years time !!  I couldn't help get my moustache painted on and Batman made an appearance.  Check out the short video in the blog post before this one for a quick look.

We've been watching some Olympics. The Aussies haven't done too well in the pool but well done the girls in those non-traditional sports. Great to see. 

I had my first session with the PT at the gym today. Was fairly good, but will see how the body responds tomorrow. 

Quiet finish to the weekend. Hot again and a week of temps in the 30s again. We walked the dogs this morning and both were hot and stuffed. Poor Macey had a lay down so took the chance to capture the moment.

 

Frederick High Wheel Race

Here's a short video of the high wheel race at Frederick. Crank the music up and remember, we're putting the band back together, we're on a mission from God !!

Weekly blog update will come tomorrow.

Back to Work

Started a 3 month block of work this week so not much play time was had. I did manage to take one day off as I haven't got computer access yet so I went and visited that stinky corpse flower again - it bloomed early in the week. By the time I got there though, it was starting to close again and as I write this on the weekend, it has fallen over. So it doesn't bloom long and for something that happens every 3-6 years, I can see what this is a rare and spectacular thing to see. My mate B went the day before me. There is a live camera feed on the flower so I text B when I was there. He was in the city shopping. He told me to wave at the camera and he took a screen shot on his phone. Check me out in the bottom right hand side waving my arms. He was laughing in the shops and I felt like a complete dick - but as you can tell, no-one was noticing anything !  I had wished I took my batman mask - how funny that would have been.

A real popular thing in DC and in the US really is food trucks. They are everywhere and see every kind of food you can imagine. There is a website that allows you to follow your favourite food truck each day too - as they move around. Here's a pic of the trucks in the city at lunchtime. I don't frequent them but the smell of the food is fantastic. 

I went for my first session with a trainer at the gym. She was good, older like me and runs/rides and is a running coach. She seems quite compatible with Deb and I. But the cost for a 1 hour session is expensive so we are no likely to do regular training with her. I managed to survive the first session which was more an assessment of my fitness and abilities. I seemed to do ok and look forward to getting back into the gym along with running and riding again. I did notice that I was about the youngest person in the gym beside the trainers? It was a Saturday morning so maybe the young ones were still in bed? I saw our neighbour on the treadmill too - not sure if she was more shocked than me. 

It was game day again on Sunday. We went to the afternoon game with our good friends and I was thrilled the Nats WON against the San Francisco Giants !!  This is only the second time I've seen them win. It was 1-0 and it was a home run that scored the run. Wow, there is really nothing like a home run. It's like a 6 in cricket but on steroids. Today there was a classic catch in the outfield where the catcher crashed into the padded wall and some great pitching at lightning speeds. For info, the pitching speed is about 95mph which is about 152kmh. The mid-game President's race is always a favourite - such a stupid, funny and unique thing to do. My mate's favourite player, young superstar Bryce Harper, didn't play today. We had a $5 wager that Bryce would hit a home run - something my mate assures me every game we go to. He is a great player for a young fella but I've yet to see him hit any home runs. Anyway, he didn't play today so that $5 stays tucked in a pocket in my wallet for next time.

 

I started reading a book on a short history of America. I wanted to get an overview to help me understand things better when we travel around. I think I will know more about US history than Australian history but I guess I have the perfect opportunity to learn.

Well, not an exciting week to blog about but there were some good times as usual. The pics below show the dogs enjoying their nightly carrot treat as I cut veggies for dinner. They have taken some getting used to, especially for Cricket, but now they hang around when I start preparing dinner waiting for their carrot. And the other pic is this beautiful BMW. It was an i8 - it's electric. It looked very sharp and swish, unlike the usual BMW style. 

 

So I learnt something this week..the President carries 'the football' and also carries 'the biscuit' = the bag with the gadgets to release a nuke when he's mobile and the plastic card that has the launch codes. Watched a political chat show discussing Trump carrying the football and biscuit. OMG, it was like a scary horror movie but you usually thank god the movie is not real…but this is a possibility. Apparently when he got his security briefings this week, he asked the flunky many questions about launching nukes. Maybe we have something worse than guns to worry about here?