The last few times we’ve tried to do laundry, our less-than-3-year-old front loading washing machine [you know, the expensive cool-looking kind] has stopped just before the final spin. No error, no beeps; it just won’t drain and then the “no spin” light comes on and it just stops. The door lock stays on, but no other lights. We can push the cancel button, which unlocks the door, but then we’re left with completely wet clothing and the whole bottom of the inside of the washer is filled with water. Grrr.
Being the I-can-do-anything type, I went online and googled our issue. A bunch of certified repairmen informed me that I needed to replace either the door lock [which appears to be working - for $48.50] or the control board [which is a PCB - printed circuit board - costing over $100]. Me? I figure the drain tubes or the pump [both inside] are clogged with goo. Cat hair, people hair, cleaning gunk; you never know what something will turn into once it’s left to congeal in a plastic drain tube. Blech.
I took the top off the washer, removed the front panel, removed the door and then removed the entire front of the thing. There were several steps in there over which I’ve glossed, but you get the idea. I used a pliers to open the clamp holding one end of the drain tube — the one attached to the pump. OMG — the water that came out of there STINKS. The scent of rotten eggs wafted out and permeated the laundry room. My cat came out of nowhere and was literally climbing over me to see from where the dead smell was coming. Sometimes, pets are gross.
After opening up the clamp on the other end, up where it meets the inside back of the washer, I removed the entire drain tube and brought it over to the kitchen sink. I filled it with hot water and let it sit and then carefully blew through it to force any goo out. I then sanitized my face.
The pump needed cleaning, so I wiped it out — which consisted of me rummaging around with my index finger to remove anything ::gag:: inside. I put everything back together and realized, “wow — there’s a lot of exposed metal in there”, as I found that the itchy area on my pinky finger had actually been sliced and diced by something inside the washer. Once I’d sanitized and sand blasted my finger to remove any germs, I put a load of clothes in and crossed my fingers for half an hour as it went through it’s cycles.
People, IT WORKED! I am a genius. Yes — you can make a note of that and send me congratulations. Send sanitizer too, I’m running low for some reason.
Just a quick post — I had wanted to share this earlier, but LIFE got in the way!
Sunday morning when I woke up, I was famished — I’d run the Lady TrackShack 5k the day before, and we’d cleaned the entire house afterward. I know — woo-hoo Saturday, eh? Anyway, I decided I wanted french toast. The SO is a Type 1 diabetic [diagnosed at age 6 and been on insulin since], so we don’t have things like regular bread or pasta in the house. What I did have was some great wheat-free, gluten-free brown rice bread which was sweetened with fruit juice. Of course, I didn’t get any photos, so you’ll have to imagine how it looks. Also, the SO threw out the bread wrapper so I don’t have the brand — but everything in the recipe was obtained from our local Publix, so it’s not a scavenger hunt finding the ingredients.
Caitlin has been waxing poetic for the past month and a half about using pumpkin in everything. She had stocked up during the holiday season, as here in Orlando, things like that are considered “seasonal” and they tend to disappear during the rest of the year. HOWEVER!! I searched our local Publix and found small cans of both Libby’s canned pumpkin and an organic brand — both for $1.59 per can. I bought a can of the organic canned pumpkin; both brands had the same ingredient: pumpkin, but I like the idea that this one was organic.
So, I took one egg, a cup of vanilla soy milk, 1/2 cup of the canned pumpkin, a tablespoon of pumpkin pie spice and whisked them all together using a fork in a small mixing bowl [for added flavor, add a teaspoon of vanilla extract -- of which we were out]. Then, I took two pieces of the brown rice bread [which is VERY dense] and dropped them in the mixture and let them soak. Meanwhile, I heated up a small frying pan in which I had sprayed some canola-based cooking spray. Once that heated up, I dumped both pieces of soaked bread into the pan and cooked them to my liking.
I plated them up with a small tab of real BUTTAH on both and some Vermont 100% maple syrup. It was outstanding. Adding the pumpkin to the mix gave it a depth of flavor that really added some good creaminess that would have normally come from adding fatty milk to the recipe. It definitely left me feeling full and satisfied.
So yeah, you can make healthy french toast for breakfast and you can make it taste like real french toast!
The Lady TrackShack 5k was held this past Saturday morning. It was clear, sunny and brisk. The course was through tree-line neighborhoods and over cobblestone streets along the areas surrounding Mead Garden in Winter Park. The trees protected the runners from the consistent 16 mile-per-hours winds that were buffeting the Orlando area. There were some nice “hills”, one water area and a nice neighborhood lady offering free coffee out in front of her house. They even had an all-girl live band playing great music as we ran out and as we returned to the finish.
This race had starting corrals based on pace-per-mile; it also included walkers. It relied on the common sense and good intentions of the runners and walkers as to which corral they chose. You can see where I’m going with this. There were no race officials gently encouraging anyone to get into the correct starting corral. Hence, those of us who did line up correctly at the end of the 9 minute-per-mile corral [based on our pace-per-mile] found that once the race did get going, we had to literally run at a 13+ minute-per-mile pace as we bobbed and weaved to get around walkers who lined up in the 7 and 8 minute-per-mile corrals. I had originally decided that for this race I was going to try running negative splits. Alas, that was not to be as I wasted quite a bit of energy trying to get out to open road that never materialized.
Having sinuses and lungs full of left over gunk from that virus we came down with last week didn’t help either. But I’ve found that my lungs have an almost super resiliency thanks to running and that even though I was aware of the crud in there, it didn’t cause me much grief and certainly didn’t keep me from running. The air was chilly, as it was in the low to mid 50s, and there was little to no humidity — that can tear up some lungs — and I saw several young women breathing hard and wheezing, but I felt good and my breathing wasn’t an issue.
Here are my stats, via my Garmin:
Distance Time Total Time Pace
1 Mi 10:41.1 10:41.1 10:42
2 Mi 10:32.11 21:13.21 10:33
3 Mi 10:41.14 31:54.35 10:42
0.2 Mi 1:49.52 33:43.87 9:08
I’m a member of the Big Pants Family!
I find that when running, I generally look way better in my head than I actually do in reality. Photographic evidence has time and again proven this out for me. 
The course seemed a little long, but it was really enjoyable. There were 2077 women participating. I came in 86th out of 235 in my age group [45 - 49]. It definitely wasn’t my best 5k, but it also wasn’t my worst.
I know, I know — the previous template was lovely. However, it had too many kinks and quirks in it that were bugging the heck out of me. This one is cleaner and doesn’t have any bugs [that I know of].
Been busy with life and will return soon! I have a 5k tomorrow in Winter Park — the Lady TrackShack 5k. Hopefully by tomorrow morning, the virus that’s turned into a nasty head cold that’s been tormenting me for a week will lay off long enough for me to finish with a decent time. I did a short run Wednesday after work, but man did my lungs burn. I think I’ve gotten most of the gunk out of my lungs so it shouldn’t be too bad tomorrow. We’ll see.
Happy Friday — have a great weekend!
So I read up on my black toenail [the link has a gross photo; mine is rather beautiful in comparison IMHO] — the one and only injury I received from the Disney Half Marathon — and found that unless it is still painful, there really isn’t anything I need to do with it. It will most likely fall off in a few weeks, with a thin, pale replacement nail already in place underneath. In fact, it should be back to looking normal [whatever normal is for toenails] within 3 months. I hope.
It looks pretty Goth at this point and truthfully, I kind of like it.
Maybe a few dabs of black nail polish to my other toes would make it a little less noticeable. Any suggestions for bedazzling it?
Initially, I thought my shoes were at fault. They were in a way, but in actuality, it was due to the puddle I ran through that got my foot completely wet. The cold caused my feet to shrink up and even though I had really great socks on, my foot began to slip when I ran downhill. The cold also caused me to [thankfully, I think] not feel it as my toe jammed into the toebox of my shoe. It doesn’t hurt at all now, so I’m just waiting to find a lone black toenail hanging out in my sock one day when I change shoes after work. Would it be completely disgusting or strange if I kept it as a memento?
