Spring Lake Five

Here's a picture of us from the Spring Lake Five & I just realized that my Guinness hat gets a workout.  I think I wear it in every single race.  I'm such a weirdo!  I wish I could say it's my lucky hat, but I'm not too sure about that!  LOL.

Spring Lake Five Hundred Degrees

Oh so how is everyone out there celebrating Memorial Day?  Hope you are having a good time & make sure to thank a soldier!  For some of you that read my blog from places outside the United States, Memorial Day is always observed the last Monday in May to honor all the men & women who have died while serving in the Armed Forced protecting our freedom.  It's also the kickoff to summer here & with that there's a lot of parties, BBQs & of course parades to honor Veterans.

As with all summers here on the Jersey Shore, there's the Spring Lake 5.  This year was my third year running it.  It was super hot & not my best run.  Probably my worst.  Not to mention it was unbearably hot & my knee is just not the knee of a runner.  I don't care what the doctor said, it hurts at times & I am beginning to think five miles may be my limit.  I shouldn't complain, but it just wasn't my day & even though I started the day with great intentions, things just didn't go my way.

Many of you (thanks five faithful followers) have followed my antics of running, biking & swimming for the past two years.  I hope I haven't bored you.  I try to be super honest & hopefully funny, maybe not funny to some, but hey, I try!  But it's not always easy to pick yourself up & dust yourself off when you get kicked in the gut.  

& I don't usually complain about things, or try not to on my blog, but yesterday was a bad day & even though I consider myself a fun, positive person, it's hard to look back & pick up some pieces of your life when you were hoping some of those pieces were buried somewhere deep under a rock.  Under a rock with a big tractor trailer parked on top.

But I've realized in lately that you can't change things or people & you can't look back, because you're not headed that way.  You always have to look forward.  Easier said than done right?  Right.

So this morning, I got up, put on my favorite running shoes & gimped out another 5 miles.  I may never be the best runner, but I'm never giving up.  Have a great Memorial Day!

Survivor Tree

As many of you know I volunteer at the 9/11 Memorial.  There's a tree that has been replanted, fittingly named, the Survivor Tree.  I have enclosed a link (credits to & courtesy of our Volunteer coordinator) where you can see it & note that there is now a happy family of birds living there.

This tree - a Callery Pear Tree is a pretty normal tree, nothing unusual or extraordinary, but a nice tree with pretty flowers.  Not a pear tree like the kind we see in the produce market, but a flowering fruit with tiny berries usually eaten by birds. Forgive me for I'm not a tree expert or arborist, I'm just giving you the few facts that I know.  Anyway, the tree was one of the trees planted at the WTC site.  This particular tree was unearthed from the rubble on Halloween 10/31/01.  It was placed in a pile of garbage, to be discarded until one of the rescue volunteers (who was an environmentalist or tree expert - again not 100% sure of his title) noted that it could be saved.  This pear tree is a hardy tree that grows well & remarkably thrives.  The only thing that usually kills this tree is high winds, or storms, but not this tree.  Found under tons of rubble, it was plucked from the site, taken to Van Cortland Park in the Bronx & nursed back to health.  I have heard from a number of sources, that it was also struck by lightning while in the Bronx.  Crazy, right?  I will have to remember to take a close up picture of the tree next time I am there so you can see the difference in the regrowth.  The difference in the bark is amazing & the 30' in regrowth is as well.

The tree was replanted at the WTC site in December of 2010.  I can also tell you that seeds from this tree were taken & are set to be grown & replanted at the Shanksville, PA site as well.  I believe the goal of the arborist is to replant one tree from seeds grown from the survivor tree in every community where there is a 9/11 memorial.

But back to the birds........I noticed on April 16th (Jerry's birthday) when I was working that a bird had taken a liking to this high up perch.  I had no idea it had been building a nest there.  & only a month later, here's the great news, that a family has picked this tree (of all trees at the site - although the rest are still very young & probably not an ideal place for a bird condo) to live!  Very cool indeed.  The birds have also been spotted drinking from the waterfalls.  Just goes to show that nature always finds a way.

I have enclosed a local news link, for those who want to see the replanting.  Enjoy!

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local/new_york&id=7857410

Into the Abyss

You know when you go & do something & then you think for a minute, wait, what was I thinking?  I always do that & yesterday was probably the biggest - what was I thinking kind of day!

For a long time I've been thinking about venturing into real estate.  & no, I didn't sign up to become a real estate agent, but I've always want to do that on the side, or be a florist.  Which is actually laughable, as I do not have a creative or artistic bone in my body.  But that's another story in & of itself.

Last night I took the plunge & put an offer in on a house.  I should say revised offer, as I had gone back & forth a bit with the owner.  After looking a few houses in varying parts of the same neighborhood, I settled on one that was a tiny bit over my price range, but still a good deal.  There were two that I thought were a bit better, but one was not in the best neighborhood & the other one was sold as quickly as it came on the market Sheesh!  No luck there.

The risky part is that I am buying this as an investment property.  & along with that comes all the headaches of being someones landlord.  Yeah yeah, I know, say what you want about real estate as an "investment" these days, but you know what?  They're not making any more land, so something tells me that I'm making a sound choice here.  That years from now when I have accumulated (remember I'm a hoarder) some decent properties, I can sell them all & go live in my dream house on the beach!  Hey, a girl has to have a dream, right?

But if you're wondering, this is what I think about when I am running.  All these silly thoughts of what am I going to do for my future, as up until now that has consisted of investing in Gucci, Prada & Manolo.  & while beautiful things do make me happy, they don't really have much of a return on the original investment.  But back to my running, which hasn't been much lately. Twice this week thanks to good old Mother Nature, who has not been very cooperative weather wise.  But it looks like a great weekend coming up & I hope to get outside & get some great runs in, because I know that will help clear my mind of all the anxiety I've been having about emptying my bank account into this new money pit.

Have a great weekend everyone!