J & I spent Wednesday through Saturday in Salt Lake City at the Outdoor Retailer Summer Show. I mentioned this already, but this is the largest trade show for outdoor brands to showcase their newest products, geared toward every outdoor enthusiast, from backpackers to rock climbers to paddlers to much more, of the spring/summer 2017.…
My month-long writer residency at Elsewhere Studios wrapped up what seems to be ages ago (May 30) and once again I thought I’d give you a long overdue post with some quick and dirty stats. While my book is currently collecting dust, I made major progress during my “artist in residence” program at at Elsewhere…
If you’ve been reading this blog for a long time, or if you are my “real-life” friend, you would know I am a writer. I have a degree in English and spent the better part of my traditional career as a medical writer. I do a lot of freelance writing, too, for magazines, blogs, and…
Did you know that 9.5% of our U.S. population is practicing yoga? That’s up from 6.1% in 2007. This makes yoga roughly as popular as golf. J & I are part of that 9.5%. That’s right, J has been taking yoga!!! Believe it or not, nearly 28% of those practicing yoga are males. I…
We have wrapped up our Te Araroa Speaking Tour. I plan to do a full recap soon, but let me just say it was more successful than we ever imagined and we are trying to figure out how to launch a longer tour. With the presentations behind us, we intend to regroup, switch gears and…
During the past 5 months, I read 15 books and J read 10. It may not seem like a lot for some people, but it was for us. We love to read, but when we’re on the road, we listen to a lot of audiobooks and podcasts. Our summer and fall caretaking gigs afforded us…
The U.S. manufacturing sector may appear to be shrinking, but it’s making a comeback at the same time. American production remains as hip as recycling and microbrews, particularly in the outdoor industry. We are proud that a few of our preferred gear companies produce homegrown gear. We visited our first stateside factory in April 2013, when…
I am behind on blogging. I mean, I am blogging here for Big Agnes and Gregory, but I am neglecting my own blog. My excuse is just being consumed by a major case of purging, going through our house and possessions with a fine-toothed comb. Also, we are trying to figure out our next move…
You know those life experiences that you have once and then swear you’ll never do again? Like bikini waxes. Or pregnancy and giving birth. I think snowboarding was on my list. I took lessons once, 4 years ago, and according to my very own blog post, I should not try to be a snowboarder. Well,…
J has abandoned me for the first of TWO bachelor parties this month. Strange to be separated from him for more than 1 night because not only have we been in the same time zone, state and city this summer, fall and winter, we have also spent all of the last 6,720 hours side by…
We are just about done with our tour de U.S. and when all is said and done, I will give you stats because holy cow, do we have some stats about our 4-month road trip. I know you are excited and waiting with bated breath. But before I get ahead of myself, let me recap…
Greetings from paradise! We have been at the cabin for a 5 full days and there is no cabin fever here! We are in a semi-normal routine, which includes cooking meals in a real kitchen and lots of catching up/organizing life. Yes, we are still living out of our bags and Deal is dreaming of…
This weekend was pretty boring. Aside from J’s concerts (BTW, he got to Boston with no problems tonight!), we didn’t have much going on. We just did some errands and more AT planning. But, a few weeks ago, we did something really fun and I forgot to mention it. We took a couples cooking class!!!This…
I tried to start a trend this indoor soccer season: wearing a skort to play. But I cannot take the ridicule anymore, so I am officially retiring it. It didn’t bother me when J made fun; he always makes fun of me anyways. He would ask, “Are we playing tennis?” and I would ignore. But…
Happy Superbowl! We’re just sitting here watching the game and commercials (disappointing so far, no?) as well as the Black Eyed Peas’ half-time show (Yippeeeee!) on our sweet 13-inch TV. Our 27-incher (which we understand isn’t even that big) finally kicked the bucket for good and we are not in a position to be buying…
I have nothing good to say about my pitiful job search this week, though I did invoice 8 hours of work. Woo hoo. Instead, I will just tell you about the fun stuff that’s going on here! We finished up January, and it turned out to be the 4th snowiest January in Concord since 1870…
Besides our co-ed soccer team, I sub sometimes for a woman’s team on Wednesdays. Last night, I played in one of their games. I scored. J was watching from the sidelines yesterday and he was so proud of me. He said they passed the ball to me on the wing, I stopped it, looked and…
This is our soccer record for the first winter session, which ended last night. I couldn’t be prouder! We’ve been playing with the same team for over a year now and we’ve really gotten our sh%& together. We still have a lot of players come and go each session, but there’s about 6 of us…
Has anyone jumped on the Zumba bandwagon? As usual, I’m late. My kickboxing instructor convinced me to give it a try. As uncoordinated as I am, I’ve been doing okay with kickboxing and ballroom/latin dancing with J, so I thought how bad could it be? Plus, a lot of my friends have raved about it.…
We had our first dance class last night. The dance studio said they missed us during the summer, but mostly they just missed our awesome costumes for the monthly costume ball. This month, we’re learning Salsa and Bolero, along with more Swing and Foxtrot. After class last night, an older woman told me I moved…