Squash Army

polskagirl01

Geared towards those of us injured/unwell runners who might be moving more slowly, maybe not even able to run, maybe finding the monthly challenge thread difficult to keep up with. Here we can talk about non-running life challenges and what we're learning along the way. Discussions about pets & hobbies are also welcome.

The "Squash Army" of 2023 sprouted from seeds that fell into a pot that was then placed outside... and they ended up taking over part of the yard. Battles were fought with slugs, a lawn mower and early frost, providing plenty of metaphors for the challenges we face in life.

polskagirl01

I'll go first 😁

I started this group because MFP is apparently phasing out the newsfeed and I realized I had been using it as a safe place to talk about my health journey and other things (like gardening adventures) without bothering all of my Facebook friends about it.

Here are some roses I got from a friend. She had dug up all of her roses to expand their driveway, and brought a bunch of them over to me. I have Long Covid and have difficulties with being upright for too long (huge difference from pre-covid me who was running all day in the mountains and had just scored a new HM PR in October 2021). So she came over and did most of the work, while I alternated between sitting down and slowly helping. Good friends are a treasure. And I appreciate all of you who have been listening to my non-running ramblings on the newsfeed or earlier monthly threads.

I think some sort of trellis for these to climb on might be good for next year.

quilteryoyo

Shoot. I messed up and lost a post I had started.

Thanks for setting this up @polskagirl01 . I hope some other folks will join us too.

I love roses, but the only one I have planted is a cutting from my grand mother's bush that is down at my gate - a quarter mile from the house. My late husband didn't like roses for some unknown reason, so we didn't plant any here at the house. I've been thinking about getting some, but have to find the time to make a good place to put them. You have a great friend to no only give you a beautiful bush, but to also help set them out.

BTW, I think you are doing great with the hand you have been dealt and hope you improve as time goes by. It has to be really frustrating for you.

Today, after my struggle of a wun, mom came up and helped me trim more tree limbs from along the driveway. I really appreciated her help. I think we did 5 Gator loads. We got quite a bit done, but still have a long way to go. I love where I live, but it takes a lot of work and time to maintain.

Before we got started today.


Another angle of before.


After we quit for the day.


Another angle after we quit.

henridw2095

I bookmarked the thread, too. Running doesn't come easy for me. After alternating walking and running for a few months, I now run "ASAP" (as slow as possible) and capped the distance at 5km at a time for 2024. I have a very tight hip flexor, and running makes it worse to the degree of easily getting tendonitis in that area when I frequently run faster than ASAP or longer distances. I've been focusing on strength training to address some of the underlying issues (the idea is to strengthen the core and glutes) and plan to do more yoga and mobility work. I still find slow running very helpful for cardio fitness.

I haven't had a garden in a long time, but sometimes I grow things indoors.

quilteryoyo

@henridw2095 Love your acronym. 😎.

quilteryoyo

Well, my newsfeed disappeared from my laptop sometime today. I must admit I am a bit more bummed about it than I expected to be.

I did a gym workout this morning and then worked at daycare for about 5.5 hours. It was nice that the kids were excited to see me.

quilteryoyo

I did a driveway wun this morning. I walked 0.5 miles for warm up, then did a 1/1 min run/walk x 12, then walked 0.7 miles for cool down. It wasn't horrible. Pace was pretty slow, but better than yesterday. Avg was 13:37 min/mile. Overall, the avg HR was 128 with a max of 152 bpm.

This afternoon, mom had to have a follow up mammogram and ultra sound. They were running behind, so had some long waits. Turns out the spot they were worried about was just a lymph node, so all is good and nothing needs to be done.

polskagirl01

@quilteryoyo what a relief about your mom's spot not being a problem!

I continued my slug battle with more hand-to-hand combat (gathering the slimy little #### by hand). The second round of planting is just now starting to peek up through the soil. I also got a bag of diatomaceous earth and sprinkled that over all the beds. There may be fewer slugs inside the beds lately.

My son, upon seeing my dismay the other night after I went out with a headlamp and saw how many there were, immediately jumped to action. He made a map of our yard and made battle plans, with place names and a diagram of a border wall he wanted to build. Today he was printing maps for the various countries participating in this war... I have my own flag, he's got one, and apparently NATO and the UN are involved as well... and he went out and made an "as-SALT" line around the boxes using a whole jar of table salt 😆 I'm just thankful he didn't put it inside the boxes near my plants. Apparently the flags are out there too. His humor is in all of the little details, so I'm feeling loved.

quilteryoyo

Thanks @polskagirl01 . It was a big relief.

I love your son's imagination and willingness to help with the slug battle. I hope it all helps and you can get rid of them before they eat the second planting. It's so frustrating when "wildlife" interferes with our ambitions.

Had a busy day. I went to the gym early - mostly legs again. Then, I played doubles tennis with the more social group today (talk more, play less, and less intense). Afterwards, I worked at the daycare for almost 4 hours. When I got home, I walked a mile on the treadmill and got ready for church tonight.

We only played a couple of sets of tennis. Me and my first partner won tied 6-6. We just left it at that. Me and my second partner was ahead 5-2 when we had to quit because of appointments others had. It was fairly fun, but not a huge calorie burn. My fingers did okay, even though they are still swollen today. I was babying them and didn't grip my racquet real hard, so decided against playing with the harder hitters tomorrow night. Hopefully I'll be back to "normal" next week.

polskagirl01

Sounds like fun.

I had a crazy day yesterday with a kid's birthday party. I need to remember not to do them like this here anymore. 19 girls were invited and one said she couldn't come. The others were asking for present ideas. So I planned a party for 20-something people (counting birthday girl, sibling & me), complete with snacks/cake, cupcake decorating station, games, piñata... Then on the day of the party, a few more said they couldn't come, 3 showed up and the rest didn't. The ones who were here had fun, but I'm thinking we need to something differently next time. Like a fun experience with family and maybe 1 or 2 close friends instead.

Picture of roses and raspberries! I didn't realize they were ripe, because they're down by the road and I hadn't been over there in a little while.

This thread may end up just me and you @quilteryoyo 🤔
My newsfeed finally disappeared, and now I'm wondering what we do with MFP friends now that we can't see a feed of them logging workouts and meeting goals.

If anyone is lurking on this thread, join us, and tell us what you do for fun when you can't run!

quilteryoyo

I'm beginning to think it may be just you and me too. I am feeling a bit lost without the newsfeed too. I loved seeing it when I first logged on and seeing what everyone was doing. Now, the home page is just a place to navigate to other areas of the site. If it had been like that when I first tried MFP, I probably wouldn't have used it. I don't know what you are supposed to do with friends either. The site used to come up and say it's easier to lose with friends to support, so add them. But, if you do now, what is it giving you? No one is going to go to their friends list and message each one separately. I really don't know what they were thinking.

It's hard to find a community of like minds where everyone is nice. The running group is great. I know you know that, but just aren't running right now. I do hope you will be able to get back to running sometime in the future.

I would have been really upset if that many people decided to not come on the day of the party. That's just rude, in my opinion. How old are your kids? Having a sleep over with a couple of her closest friends is probably a good idea. That's what my grand daughters in FL started doing once they turned around 10 or so. It has worked out great for them. At least you have plenty of snacks to grab.

Your roses are gorgeous and the raspberries look really good, even though they aren't my favorite berry.
I'm surprised that the slugs aren't getting on those too....but glad they aren't.

I am going to go out for a wun in a few minutes, I hope, before it gets too hot and then I'm going to go get mom and we're going to work on trimming trees along the driveway until it gets hot, or we get tired, or both, or we just want to quit. LOL Probably be done by around noon.