Owls, Mud and Sneezes....

This is going to be a bit random...but here's what I've been up to lately!

Have you seen Molly the Barn Owl?? If not...I highly recommend checking her out here. She is a wild barn own that has taken residence in an owl box in San Marcos, Ca (right here in North County San Diego). She laid a clutch of 6 eggs in the box, so far 5 seem viable. As of today 1 egg has hatched and we now have baby owlet Max! It looks like another egg is starting and had a 'pipping hole', which surely means another owlet soon! If you have kids this is great to watch! I'm totally obsessed. The most amazing part is that these are wild owls...not in captivity! When watching you get to see McGee (the daddy) 'bond' and bring Molly food.

I did the San Diego Mud Run in La Mesa yesterday! So fun! It was hard...and I have a few scrapes from it but I highly recommend doing one! I'm not fast...lovely knee...but it was really really fun to get muddy. I recommend doing it for fun and not for 'the win'. During the run we had to run through big mud pits, go up and down muddy hills, crawl through pipe tunnels that are in mud, do hurdles about 3-4 feet tall, and climb a wall...all while sporadically being sprayed by a fire hose! We lucked out and it was pretty warm...kind of humid actually, but way better than if it had been cold. We had 2 teams of 4, although 2 members of our 2nd team got injured and had to forfeit the race. Bummer. I think overall though we all had a great time! I may be getting mud out of my nails and ears for a few more weeks...but well worth it!


Coming out of a mud pit...trying not to fall!!



Our team at the finish line...we all had to finish together.



Team "Doin it Dirty"...pretty darn dirty!


My shoes after we were done...note the 'tumbleweed' hanging off! The cool thing was that rather than throw the shoes away we donated them to be cleaned and then sent to Haiti.

The only unfortunate part of the entire weekend was that last week I felt like I might be coming down with a little cold...more of just a sniffle though! I really wanted to the the Chelsea King run on Saturday but opted to stay in bed and just get sleep instead. I was really starting to feel run down and wanted to be my best on Sunday (the day of the Mud Run). I literally slept almost all day Saturday and was really starting to worry about how I would feel Sunday. I got up Sunday morning and popped some DayQuil. I took extra with me b/c lame DayQuil only lasts 4 hours...what?!?! So even though I took it when I woke up I would need another dose before the race...jeesh! Unfortunately I left the extra DayQuil in my bag that I checked at the race...oops! I lucked out and even though I felt the meds wearing off I was fine during the race. I was fine after the race while we ate at an Irish Pub...until then end. Then...I totally started coughing...and it wasn't a throat-ey cough...but a deep chest cough. Great! I continued to feel progressively worse, even though by then I had taken my extra DQ. I barely got sleep last night with how many times I needed to blow my nose...seriously! I ended up staying home from work today and oh my goodness...I didn't know it was possible to sneeze this many times! My back is totally sore already just from sneezing. Ugh. Oh well...I have to go to work tomorrow at least for an IEP I have...and then I'll take it from there. All I can say is this is a doozy of a cold!