Changes in Latitudes

On Friday July 17th, Marius and I picked up our little waterdog. He wasn't quite 8 weeks old, but already so good at sleeping through the night. We love him! He has very few accidents in the house and is already used to driving in the car. I have already trained him to sit and fetch. Today he is 9 weeks old! We are up in Nordland (north of the Arctic circle) with Mom, Dad, Tron and Rigmor. Pancho is learning how to be a waterdog, but the water is a bit cold up here. He'll get used to it soon. We just got back from an easy hike, which really wore him out. Hopefully I have some more patience to sit and write a bit more about the trip. I never got around to Madrid, sorry about that!

  We have been getting frequent updates on our puppy from the breeder. She says she has fallen in love with him and hopes to take him to dog shows when he is old enough. He's now 5 weeks old, and this weekend Marius and I took care of him and Sookie (his mom)! The breeder said that this is usually never done, but since he was a litter of one he needs lots of stimulation, and she thought it would be a nice way for us to meet him; and she was also able to sneak away for the weekend. 2 weeks old and his first adventure in the grass - not usually done so young, but since he doesn't have siblings he needs lots of stimulation. 3 weeks old and getting his first taste of solid food 4 weeks old and on the move! 5 weeks old - very brave and so fun to play with!

On Saturday, May 23rd, a single Spanish waterdog puppy was born. He was described to us as a black, stub-tailed male (en sorte, stumpehalet hanne --- sounds cuter in Norwegian). We finally got a picture of him and an additional description, as told by the breeder:  this boy will make his mark someday; strong and compact. The breeder told us that she chooses older males because they show good genes for a long, happy life. Thus, as a result, the litter is usually small. We are allowed to visit him for the first time after June 19th, and can take him home mid July. Names have been brainstormed, but we'll see his personality before we decide. Just a little black slug for now

I realize I never got around to posting about Madrid. I wanted to upload pictures from Marius' camera, but that has been hard to remember the few times I go to Oslo. So I promise to post something with the pictures I took with my phone. So news since Easter... April 30th I logged over 1000 kilometers of running so far this year. I saw at the end of March that I could get myself to do it, and I did! It was a great night in Bergen for making that goal as well. June 1st I'll start my training cycle for the Oslo Marathon. My second attempt, so I'm aiming for anything better than 4:09:00 - my finishing time last year. My shoes that carried helped me run past my 1000th km this year also surpassed their 1000th km of their lifetime My favorite running spot lately is Fjellveien - a road which runs along the rim of the valley just above the city- Great views of downtown, fresh air, gravel pathway. Experimenting with some new ways to fuel - quinoa berry bowl ...

I have moved around the Sars Centre (for Marine Molecular Biology) a bit now since beginning here with a 50% position last November. Now I am moving my way up the ladder. Last week I began full-time as a research technician for the cnidaria facility (sea anemones). My main responsibility is keeping the animals alive by regulating the tank system, feeding and washing the animals. I have become quite technical with the new position. So in the morning when I come in, I prepare the food ( artemia  sea monkeys) to feed the Nematostella (anemones). And then prepare the batch of artemia  due for feeding the day after next. Then I give them some time to eat. In the meantime, the resesarchers put boxes of animals in the incubators to stimulate reproduction. I pull out packages of eggs and fertilize them. Cultivating brine shrimp/sea monkeys/artemia The boxes get washed on a schedule - each one is done once a month. And that takes up most of my day. However, next week I...

March 29th was the half-marathon in Madrid that I got from Marius for Christmas. It was my fourth half-marathon and I trained a solid 15 weeks to earn a new personal record. Prior to this race, my personal record was 1:47, set in Lisbon in March 2013...I was around 30 seconds shy last year when I ran in Bergen coming in at 1:48 - I forgot the exact seconds. We had a few days in Madrid before the race, but I will write about those later when I can get the pictures from Marius' camera. The course looped the northern part of the city and finished in a very nice park. There were nearly 17,000 runners, and I definitely blended in with the crowd. Marius was much easier to spot with his blond hair. Even though I wore my American flag shorts, there were so many people that it would have been difficult for Marius to spot me through the crowd. So I encouraged him to do his workout and keep an eye out for me at 10:45am.  The course was not flat, like I had thought it would be. Rathe...

This year I have happily logged nearly 450 miles in preparation for my fourth half-marathon, which will be in Madrid on March 29th. I have put in 15 solid weeks of dedicated training in hopes of setting a new personal best. To date, my best time for 21 km (13.1 miles) is 1:47, but I'm aiming for a sub-1:45! A couple of weeks ago I set a personal best in the 10k.. 45 minutes and 25 seconds. I bet if it had been a race then I could have shaved off more time. I've been running 6 days a week. Occasionally this is twice a day, but only in the last couple of weeks when the sun has been shining and the days have gotten longer. Being in Bergen has made my training really enjoyable since we haven't had many days below freezing to create ice obstacles for me. I don't mind cold temps, but ice is not fun. I haven't signed up for a marathon yet, but I will have to choose between Amsterdam and Oslo if I want to reach my goal of at least 5 full marathons before I'm 30. An...