Leap Day

According to Wikipedia, "a leap year (or intercalary year) is a year containing one or more extra days in order to keep the calendar year synchronized with the astronomical or seasonal year. Because seasons and astronomical events do not repeat at an exact number of full days, a calendar which had the same number of days in each year would, over time, drift with respect to the event it was supposed to track. By occasionally inserting an additional day or month into the year, the drift can be corrected."

An extra day. 24 more hours. What are you gonna do with it? And why is it not a day off from work...?

My ideal extra day would include a soy latte, the ocean, Bromley, exercise, my camera, sushi and wine.

What I'm really wondering is how many people will use the extra 24 hours to watch the Sarah Silverman/Jimmy Kimmel videos over and over and over again.

Hedman Winter Olympics

What a weekend! Our nieces on skis for the first time, ice skating, sledding and snowball fights!

Happy Birthday to Dad Hedman and Jill!

Uncle Gary called on his old ski-school training to help the girls along, and it was great to get in some turns with Eric as well. The rope tow at Magic Mountain proved to be the most difficult for all of us!

Actual Presidents Day Monday resulted in new tires on my car, which were very much overdue, and a 'sesh of very hot yoga at the Yoga Center of Cape Cod. Yoga's a funny thing... the breathing, the meditation and the self-awareness aspect might scare some people off, but I'm finding it to be just what the doc ordered. Only prob is that I can't find classes to attend when and where I want to attend them.

Anyhooo... Gary went home sick today. The virus has penetrated our walls. If we can fend it off, there will be more skiing in our future this weekend.

Revitalizing

Are you having a better time watching American Idol than you did watching the Superbowl? I think I am.

It's interesting to see what a couple of weeks will do. I've spent two whole weekends not working, the weather has gone from 50s to 10 and back to 50s again, my parents returned from three months away, the Valentine's decorations are out, and everyone seems to feel that winter is over.

The free time is revitalizing. We don't usually watch movies but just signed up for our very own Netflix account. We've both been able to go for outdoor runs, and Gary's now in a great Tuesday night basketball league in Osterville. And this past Saturday night - after a trip to Home Depot to finalize the last touches on the new bathroom! - we randomly found what turned out to the be best dining experience probably ever. The Stonebridge Bistro in Onset, MA. The music, the artwork, the waterfront, the positively impossible-to-decide menu choices... You gotta go.

I also signed up to ride the Five Boro Bike Tour this May - a 42-mile bike ride through New York City. Many of you have supported my rides each May for the Brain Tumor Society, and sadly, Nathan will not be with us this year. Gary and I will not make the actual ride unfortunately, so I will be wearing my Team Navin shirt for the NYC ride two weeks earlier. You can still sponsor me as a "virtual rider" for Nathan as we strive to be another top-ten fundraising team this year!

We're off to Dorset, Vermont tonight for a four-day weekend with the Hedmans - and when I say Hedmans, I mean Carl, Sandra, Eric, Jill, McKenna, Emily, Jake, Gary and me! Woot! Even in the messy weather, we plan to teach McK and Em how to ski at Bromley :-) Look out!

Hope everyone is well.... and don't kid yourself, winter's not over yet.

Above Water

The end of a beautiful Saturday - no work, just straight R&R. That sure felt good.

We drove out to Wellfleet today to check out the shipwreck that washed ashore in last week's storm. "50 feet of keel and oaken ribs" they call it. A very cool sight to see, and it turns out that on a 50-degree and sunny Saturday in February, hundreds of other people (and dogs) want to see it too!

We then swapped sides and walked along the bay side as the sun went down. I loved this shot, but we also saw some cool trash-art out there as well (more in my Flickr photos).

In other news, I'm very relieved to have another month of reports done at work and looking forward to some personal reading, some exercise... even girly trash like the movie 27 Dresses I saw tonight with my friend Carrie :-) Gary's pretty swamped at work too, but we're both really enjoying it at the same time.

Two things I think you should try: (1) Pandora - if you haven't already, it's an awesome way to listen to new music, and (2) the hand-held self-scanners at Stop & Shop. F U N, though you will spend more money than usual.

Hope everyone is enjoying February so far! My parents are on the home stretch this week, and we're off to ski with the Hedmans in Vermont.