Brilliant.

In case you missed it, a few weeks ago USDA launched the Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food initiative. www.usda.gov/knowyourfarmer

This is a pretty big deal for the local foods movement, and has potential to have some real impact in developing local food systems and supporting small family farms. It’s also impressive that USDA a) acknowledged that people are interested in local foods and b) are actually considering cashing in on the opportunity. From what I know of the food system, this is a rather large departure from past agricultural policies. The initiative also plans to promote farm-to-school projects, which just so happens to be what I do for a living. Keep an eye on this. Hopefully it will be a worthwhile project.

Back from el FOT in Prescott-like-biscuit, AZ.

There is much that could be said. For now, suffice it to say that David, Zachary and I all came down with symptoms of the flu on Friday. Like, all of them. Fever, chills, sore throat, cough, headache, aches. And when you have symptoms of the flu, by definition you also have symptoms of swine flu. Oink.

Do I think I have H1N1? Probably not. It is strange to me, though, because I’ve never had the flu that I can remember in my entire life. The term “flu” has always been enigmatic to me because I’ve never experienced it. I’m doing much better now, and just have a residual cough and some fatigue.

Anyway, because of the H1N1 scare, the university’s “don’t come to work sick” policy and the 5-7 day contagious period, I’m working from home this week. In my pajamas, which really isn’t too bad of a deal at all.

This site made me laugh until I cried.

http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/

Barf.

And pictures of fast food, minus branding, in all their naked disgustingness: http://www.good.is/post/picture-show-visions-of-fast-food/

So the girls’ KC half is in a few weeks, but knowing that I’m going to be away at the Feast for two weeks, I wanted to get my half overwith before I left. Which meant doing it this past weekend.

We were scheduled for a 10 m long run, so I figured I would just run 10 m with Robin and then do an extra 3.1 on my own. Late Friday afternoon we concocted a scheme to drive down to Cindy’s house in the sticks and run there with her instead. I was a little hesitant about running somewhere unfamiliar for my half, but decided to have a positive attitude about it and have fun.

It was a great day, and a great run. Possibly my most favourite run ever. We got there around 6:30am so we could run before the day warmed up. It ended up being perfect weather: gloomy, overcast, misty. We started from Cindy’s house and ran on the gravel roads for about 5 miles, then picked up the Katy Trail which goes across most of Missouri. Missouri really is blessed to have such an extensive network of trails.

Cindy’s husband doesn’t like for her to run alone out in the sticks, so he drives ahead of her with beverages and they meet up at predetermined spots along the route. I am so impressed. He played waterboy for us for 2 1/2 hours. He took our water, Gatorade, snacks and drove happily along to the meeting spots where he’d read the Sunday paper and drink his coffee. What a great support! Their dog Yanna also ran along with us, which provided quite a bit of entertainment.

I was curious to see if I could shoot for a half marathon PR, but partway along the route I realized that wasn’t going to happen. No one was in a hurry, so we stopped along the way to see the swimmin’ hole, two gigantic catfish skeletons thrown along the side of the road (totally disgusting, by the way, and so glad we weren’t there to smell them when they still had flesh on their bones), and we took our time getting drinks and having a breather when we met up with Cindy’s husband.

At about 5 miles we met up with the Katy Trail and ran it for the duration. Question: how is it that we were running, yet the dog was ahead of us the ENTIRE time – walking! – and would have to double back to catch up with us?? How is that possible? There were some great times when the dog would see a squirrel off ahead and would go tearing after it, again leaving us running humans in the dust. It was a good reminder of how fast dogs are. She leaped into the woods at one point and came back with sticks, leaves and debris covering her head and back. It was really funny. She ended up carrying them along for a couple miles.

So, we had waterboy stops at predetermined areas, so we knew how far ahead we’d need to run until we got water again. Having the route broken up like that helped to make it go by faster, I think. Robin and Cindy ran until we reached 10.6, then I got my drink, breather and put on the iPod for the next 2.5.

I think I actually did a good job of preparing myself mentally for the run, especially the last part. I knew it would be hard to run by myself for another 3 miles after having just run 10. But it was nice that we actually stopped at 10.6 so I didn’t have quite as far to go as I thought. The last 2.5 were hard, but not unbearable. I think it was just a little disorienting not knowing where I was or how far I needed to run until the end. But! They clocked the last 2.5 for me and cheered my on to the end. And then I was finished! YAY! 2:24. Not fast, but probably the easiest half I’ve done. I think our pace was about on par with this past April’s race (2:14), but we just took extra time at the stops and tourist attractions along the way.

And so ends half marathon training #3. I’m actually pretty proud of myself that I did it in 8 weeks instead of the 12 weeks that the training schedule has us do. In April the half marathon was run #65, and this one was #36. Not bad.

Now I get to not run for a while.

Running log, Cliffs Notes version. Mostly because it’s been so long I don’t remember anything.

#26, 8×400. Me and Robin. For some reason this one kicked our butts. I think it was hotter than we were used to.

#27, 10K.

#28, 4.5 m.

#29, 24:28 5K PR.

#30, 4 m destination run to my house.

Should have had a 4×800 run in here, but I skipped it in lieu of getting up at 3:45am and flying to Texas.

#31, 4.5 m with David in Texas. I think David was about to puke at the end. That’s a good friend right there.

#32, 9 m. Me and Robin. Started an hour after I got off the plane from Texas. Fairly insane timing, but went okay.

#33, 25:09 5K. Should have cranked the speed up sooner.

#34, 5 m. Took our time on this one because Cindy’s legs were starting to hurt again like when she was close to having stress fractures.

#35, 3×1600 race pace – kind of. 3×1600 race pace to me means “slow and easy 3 miles,” but it was on our speedwork day so it got me confused. I did 2.75 m and cut out a bit early because my toe shoes were starting to hurt under my big toes again. I didn’t want to get bad blisters right before my half.

http://37signals.com/svn/posts/1899-win-fans-by-dropping-the-potato-pancake

And here is the Julie & Julia version of the fateful episode that the article refers to.

http://picasaweb.google.com/nettinfinity/SummerHouseProjects#5371051211525539362

Working on the backsplash.

Miter saw, stand and trim

Painting the trim