Bark Less, Wag More

This morning the fog was so thick when I went out to the dune top deck that I could not see the ocean - morning light was breaking up the clouds overhead, and temperatures were in the upper 60s; a morning dove was cooing gently.

The training schedule called for a tempo run this morning, the last "fast" miles we will run until the half marathon in eleven days.  I was trying to hit my goal pace, somewhere between 10:20 and 10:40 per mile, and so I was happy to run four miles at an average of 10:38; Martha also felt that she had run close to her goal pace.  But it was very warm and we have not acclimated ourselves to these temperatures.  Still, it was a confidence-builder to be able to hold a steady pace, without split marks and in warmer temperatures, on such a warm morning.

This afternoon we drove over to Beaufort and spent the afternoon tasting olive oil at the Beaufort Olive Oil Company and walking up and down Front Street.  I spent some time in the Maritime Museum, where there were new exhibits about Blackbeard, and I watched an interesting DVD on the excavation of a shipwreck local experts believe is his ship, the Queen Anne's Revenge.  I especially loved the quote by John Masefield above the door:

"All I ask is a tall ship,

and a star to steer her by."

It was warm and sunny and the narcissus were blooming on Front Street as I walked down to the harbor and then back again.

Then we returned to Morehead City and the Friendly Market for another stop on our World Food Tour, China.  The menu consisted of Taiwanese pork belly buns, egg roll bowl, baked sweet and sour chicken, fried rice, and Chinese egg tarts, most of which were new to us.  Their post on Facebook had said, "To help celebrate 'The Year of the Dog, @sally_no_fm will be slipping a special fortune cookie into one randomly chosen customer's bag for this week's World Food Tour to China dinner! One 'lucky dog' will WIN the next stop to Argentina on us!"  (Argentina is the next stop in the World Food Tour).  Sally, by the way, is a beautiful, gentle dog who can usually be found lying on the floor in the Market, sometimes her nose just at the very edge of the swinging-doors to the kitchen beyond which she is forbidden to go (thus "Sally No").

 
When we returned home, we warmed up the Chinese dishes and then broke open our fortune cookie and found this inside:

 

So WE are the winners!  We are looking forward to Argentina, and we are enjoying the feeling of having won some small bit of fortune.