Flat-tire

As I write this we are sitting on I95 waiting for AAA to come and help us with a flat tire.  The good news is we are at a rest area and not on the side of the highway being buffeted around by the giant trucks hurtling down the road.  It’s noisy but we are safe at the rest area.  We pulled in and I smelled burning rubber.  The warning light about a soft tire had come on earlier in our trip so we stopped and put air in the tire.  We hoped it would make it home but sadly that is not the case.  Changing a tire at anytime isn’t fun and it’s hard on a Volvo so we’d rather wait for AAA.  I should add that a man who was walking by who spoke with a Spanish accent asked if we needed help and offered to change the tire for us.   I was quite touched and thanked him for the offer.  There are good people everywhere .

Am concerned for the puppy who is in his crate.  Dog sitter left and I said fine as we were only about an hour out.  Should have been fine.  I did get in touch with a neighbor, actually the father of our regular sitter, and he was going over to let him out.  Feeling anxious though.

PS: It took the tow-truck almost exactly 45 minutes, as promised by AAA, to get to us and partly because he came from the south so he was going north but he had to go past us to the next exit and then get on the south side of 95 and back to us.  It took him exactly 6 minutes to change the tire to the little spare.  We were on our way.  However, another little wrinkle, the main streets in Beaufort were shutdown for the Christmas parade so we had to drive all the way around by Parris Island to get to Dataw.  It just wasn’t easy to get home.

Walking and puppies

Once again it has been a very busy week.  Since it was the end of the month I wanted to get to my goal of walking 100 miles, which I managed with 10 miles to spare, the total was 110.1 miles.  That puppy is keeping us moving which is good for him and for us.  I like that it seemed almost easy to get to 100 miles but walking the dogs two to three times a day does make a difference.  Our morning route is usually three miles and then the other two are a little over one mile.  I have it all mapped out on my Runkeeper App, which I love by the way, so I know pretty much what the distance is without even running the app.  Am once again participating in a Virtual Challenge with a group of ladies I have never met.  I was introduced to the group by a friend who lives in Greensboro, NC and during the winter they like to motivate themselves and others to walk and exercise and then record that in the group to achieve a challenge.  In February of 2015 we walked the Appalachian Trail – virtually.  One of the members kept track of the miles we posted and moved us along the trail on a weekly basis.  This year we are walking the Great Wall of China.  Occasionally we get pictures of where we might actually be if we were really walking there.  It is a fun thing to do and shakes up the routine a little bit.

John has been working with Wyke (aka puppy) since our training on Tuesday and they both are doing a great job.  The neat thing is John is losing weight and looking great with all this exercise.  He is not normally a big walker but he has done all the mileage with me and then some.  I am pleased for them both and the partnership they are creating as they walk and work together.  Miss Q just does her thing and really could care less about all this training stuff.

The Weekend Off

We had helped our friend Ash pack up and move to Tennessee a month ago.  She, however, left quite a few things behind from this first phase of her move.  Most importantly, she left her coats and scarves and gloves etc.  Ash works in Chicago sometimes and was in desperate need of those coats.  We decided to take the left behinds to her as we wanted to go to Asheville and have a little bit of a break from puppy love and training and just maybe get a good nights sleep that didn’t end at 5AM.  So we packed up the car with the boxes and her very special painting and headed to Asheville.  We drove in two cars through the Great Smokey Mountains to Knoxville.  That is quite a road, I felt as if I was driving in the Grand Prix.  Very curvy.  Delivered all the goodies and were treated to Ash’s famous chili and cornbread.  We saw her new home which is going to be wonderful when she finishes her magic on it.

We had a great visit with our daughter Margot and a fabulous dinner out by ourselves at my new favorite restaurant, Zambra, in Asheville.  We have adopted a theme for Christmas giving that looks at gifts that address something that the person wants, what they need, what they would wear and what they would read.  Last year we went to Malaprops in Asheville to buy the reads and we did so again this year.  It is such a treat and I love going to a local bookstore and buying real hardcover books for everyone to enjoy.   Just a few weeks ago, Louise Penny, who is a wonderful author from our part of Canada, was there as part of her book tour for her new book, #12 in the series,  A GREAT RECKONING.  If you enjoy a well-written mystery that involves well-developed characters, give it a try.

No recipe this week, I didn’t do much cooking last week, we just ate leftovers from Thanksgiving.  Lots of turkey and Caesar Salad!