Miss Minty Fresh

Sometimes I embellish upon the truth.  When I say “I used to be an athlete,” it’s one of those times.  

I should clarify.  From 5th grade until 12th grade I played a school or municipal-sponsored sport of some kind…basketball, softball, field hockey, and javelin throwing in track.  For a couple years in college I marched junior corps (P.S. more intense than any other sport I’ve ever played) and I also played rugby for a semester at JMU.  A summer and a half of drum majoring at senior corps, bicycling and walking all across Philadelphia, and of course, dancing a couple times a week, has always kept me in, at the very least, passable physical condition.  I generally feel somewhere between ambivalent to pleased when I glance at myself in a store window or a mirror.

Both of my parents have an athletic background and you’ll always hear me brag about what a badass hardball player my dad is.  I learned how to throw and catch and shoot a free throw at an early age.  Curiously, I could never quite execute a layup, nor could I get through a volley of tennis without hitting the stupid ball over the court’s fence.  Despite these challenges to my hand-eye-coordination, I never really struggled to be at least decent in the sports I chose to participate in.  That is….except for the being an athlete part.

I know I was a bit of a frustration to my dad.  In high school, he’d tell me, “Em…if you could just sprint faster you could play softball at any college you wanted to attend!”  I made up for it by hitting the ball farther.  (If you and I were chatting in person right now, I’d interrupt my own story to say that I have never, ever beaten my dad at a sprinting race across our backyard.  I haven’t tried since he’s been diagnosed with heart disease, but I digress).  When I started playing field hockey in seventh grade, I was petrified and sweating every day before practice…we started the morning with a half-mile run, and if it wasn’t under a certain time (I think eight minutes?) we’d have to run it again after practice that day.  Guess who usually ran a second time?

In gym class we completed the Presidential Fitness Challenge, and this damn thing always brought down my gym grade.  Always, always, always.  If you weren’t lucky enough subjected to this thing, it was basically a measurement of one’s fitness level by testing, measuring, and timing ten or so different modules.  The fastest mile I ever ran was around 8:45, and let me tell you…I was jumping for joy when I first got it under 9 minutes (but I was still under the 60th percentile).  I could never jump very far or very high, and I could never do the bent-arm hang (and forget about pull-ups).  I feigned flexibility because I have a long torso and have no trouble reaching past my toes when stretching.  I wasn’t terrible at the short wind sprints, but that is relative; it means that my ranking was around the 70th percentile.

Why am I blabbing about all this?  I went for a run tonight.  And by “run”, I mean I went for a jog/walk/jog/walk/jog/walk/jog/walk/jog/walk.  It wasn’t fun.  But…I want to keep at it.  I’ve recently learned that there’s such a thing as a duathlon; a race with the format of run-bike-run.  (I also don’t swim well, surprise surprise).  I have no idea how I’ll feel tomorrow, but I must keep it up…running has always been my Achilles tendon and if I don’t make my attempt to conquer it now, I don’t know when I ever could.

If I find the courage to actually register for the duathlon, I will keep you all posted.  And by “you all” I mean Judith and my mom.  Seriously….anyone else reading?  Show me some love so I know this isn’t completely all for nought?

Miss you, Pennsylvania.  I was repping my boys during my walk/jog:

Miss Minty

I have many initial observations about central Florida (that’s a whole post in itself) but one of them is already forgone conclusion:  there are no skies like Florida skies.  They’re wide and expansive, but low-ceilinged.  The clouds are puffy and layered and fast-moving.  Sister-in-law Sarah and I happened to be out and about on a beautiful evening and walked over to Lake Eustis originally to see if I could catch a glimpse of a gator (you can see a couple posts ago what came of that) and it turned out that we were about to witness an incredible show.  See for yourself.

Being self-employed means I have some extra time on my hands.  It means I can wake up at nine-thirty, drink coffee, eat oatmeal, and listen to podcasts until eleven.  What happens at eleven?  I’ll hop on my bicycle and head to the downtown Orange County Library.  I have a reading list the length of the Nile and plan to do some personal penance for not ONCE utilizing the Free Library while I lived in Philly.

Orlando has quite a few main roadways that have bicycle lanes but I prefer to take the winding residential route…the eye candy is just too good to pass up.  I am not a designer or architect, but I really find residential architecture pretty fascinating.  As a geographer, I want to see how the design of the house fits the climate, topography, cardinal directions, etc.  I’m usually disappointed (McMansions) but here in Florida, I’m so happy to see that older neighborhoods have quite a few beautiful and modest examples of how the residential architecture fits the climate and lifestyle here.  

I have noticed a few recurring examples of home styles that my amateur understanding is identifying as Mediterranean (usually Spanish but also Italinate-looking), Arts & Crafts, and Mid-Centry Mod.  I’ll outline each style next week.

freshly,

Miss Minty

Some of you may be familiar with this picture of Ben and me:

I thought it was so sweet and I felt so happy when I looked at it that I should do something interesting with it.

So, because I subscribe to The Storque and they feature amazing Etsy vendors, I happened to be lucky enough to find an awesome artist, Kate Gabrielle.  Her shop is called Flapperdoodle (I know).  I sent her my picture.  I told her a little about what I wanted.  She sends me drafts, I give her incoherent verbal edit requests.  She listens, and a couple drafts later, this arrived in the mail:

I know.  It’s disgustingly cute.  She did such an amazing job.  The final copy is watercolor and ink on a nice piece of matboard.  And yes, this is what we’re going to be wearing when we get married.  

I had to post about her because she just came out with her 2011 calendar and I thought some of my Philly phriends might be interested in making a purchase.

Thank you again, Kate!