The Garden is a GO!

Making a new household record at 8 days germination time, the first sprout is up! It's a black hollyhock.



I also saw some grape hyacinth foliage pop out earlier this week. The snapdragons and California poppies never went dormant (the south facing brick flower bed runs at about a zone 6), but they are putting out new leaves.


It's pretty difficult to get photos of Lillian snoozing adorably, but the sun came out the other day and made her too somnolent to notice the camera.

Swim!

A lovely afternoon.

Our first 6 restaurant choices for a late lunch date were closed but found a Mexican place we'd never been to before. It was very good and a ton of food.
randomdreams mentioned that his SIL wants him to do a silly mtn biking and running race with her. He hasn't run in many years and not sure if he could very well with his Borg knee. At the rec center I counted his laps around the track and timed his mile. He was a bit slower than he expected, but hammered all the strolling old Japanese ladies.

We changed into our swimsuits. The pool atrium was so warm I felt all melty, very nice contrasted against the 8 inches of snow outside. No one was in the lap pool. I stuck my toe into the lap pool, all ready to retreat to the hot tub, but yelled, "HEY! IT'S WARM!" I threw myself in and splashed away. Swimming might be the only athletic thing I am better at than randomdreams but he jumped right in with me. He did a few laps, watched a few laps, then we kick-boarded a few laps. We called Uncle after awhile and sat in the hot tub for 10 minutes.

The grocery store is awesome during the Superbowl. We found bricks of cheese, Capons, and organic roast beef for half off. Even though we were still full from lunch it was difficult to walk away from the cupcake display. Swimming makes you want sugar.

So. Warm lap pool found. Now I need a proper suit and some goggles. Also a punch card to the pool and line up some lessons to polish my strokes.

There's some buffalo bacon thawed, so ravioli carbonara for dinner. Then sleep.