I'm All Busy-ness

I had a very productive day today, and it feels great. Finally got the house back into shape after returning from Florida on Tuesday. A long time in coming, I know! Cleaning, de-cluttering, baking a boatload of cookies (more on that below), swapping out snowmen for bunnies, ... :-)

Tomorrow (Monday) evening our Cooking Light cooking group meets for dinner. On the menu:

Spicy Black Bean Hummus: Margo
Wine: Barbara
Moroccan Country Bread: Pam
Frisee Salad with Persimmons,Dates and Almonds: Renee
Mixed Vegetable and Rice Pilaf: Diane
Chicken with Dark Beer (Coq a la Biere): Mary
Roasted Banana Bars with Browned Butter-Pecan Frosting: Laura
Swag Bars: Barb (to take home)

Unfortunately, persimmons aren't available at this time of year, so I'll have to substitute some other type fruit. Photos and raves tomorrow.

More foodie stuff: Lionel Cheng and I will be learning how to make homemade chocolates (including tempering the chocolate) next Saturday afternoon with Helen Distad, wife of Trevor. I can't wait. Bloggable for sure.

Got a few more Fetzer volunteers since yesterday: Sue Arnold (she's in it for the cookies she said!), Mike Holmes (lead biker), Sue Christian, Chris Kujath. Thank you one and all!

From AF: Coming soon, Beyond the Epic Run, a film about a couple from Switzerland who ran around the world. 25,000 miles. Five continents. All on film. Check it out. Thanks for the tip!

I have to give kudos to Pam King (and probably Peggy and Julie as well) for running her very first 14-miler in preparation for the Med-City Marathon. You go, girls! I'm very proud of them. I'll get the low-down from P.K. tomorrow at Cooking Light. : )

Today I baked a boatload of cookies for the Cookie Monsters, the winning bidders in the cookie-of-the-month-for-a-year auction last December. The $ raised is the prize money for the Fetzer 20K on April 11. This year the prize money is divided equally between open and masters runners: $150 to the first open runner, $150 to the first masters runner. The first runner of the opposite sex from the winner receives $100 for a total of $500 in prize money. Thanks, cookie monsters, for your support! And enjoy your monster cookies.

There's a pound of butter, 1 1/2 pounds of peanut butter, 6 eggs, 1 pound of brown sugar, 2 c. white sugar, 9 c. oatmeal, ... in that bowl. It weighs a ton!

Following are the photos from my long run in Sarasota a week ago Saturday morning. Just over 15 wonderful, sunny miles. There were lots of people out running and walking. The road/bridge from Sarasota to Longboat Key was a very popular destination for exercise.

Rochesterfest Triathlon training: Tomorrow morning, early 5:30'ish, I'm back in the pool then will hop on the bike. For anyone that's interested, Shaun Palmer will be available for (triathlon) swim stroke guidance at the pool at the Y on Wednesday at 6:30 PM. Contact me or the Y if you're interested.

Well, there's more on my list but it's now 9:30 and I haven't had any "chill" time yet today so I'd best sign off. I'll save the rest of my "to be blogged" list for the next post.

Have a wonderful Monday!