Last weekend Music man and I spent a few days in Laguna celebrating his birthday. It's perfect because we get free babysitting at the beach. It's the best vacation. What could be better? We arrived Thursday so we could ride together on Friday. We did a nice 33 mile ride around Laguna, Newport and Irvine. Nowadays we really prefer spending a few hours riding as opposed to formal "date night."
On Saturday we arranged to meet some friends at Stone Brewery in Escondido for Music Man's main celebration. It's like Disneyland for beer enthusiasts. They have gardens, tours, a huge gift shop and a pretty fun restaurant. I'm a bad blogger so I didn't take many food photos, but honestly, the food was really secondary to the beer. The menu isn't large so we probably shared half of the menu items between all of us and I wasn't super impressed. The standouts for me were the vegetables; the housemade kimchee and the greens that accompanied the sausage platter were out of this world. We also split the blueberry blue cheese jalapeno cheesecake and a brownie sundae for dessert. The brownie sundae was pretty straight forward and delicious. The cheesecake was definitely an acquired taste. A few of us enjoyed it but I think the majority thought it was really weird. Personally, I think there were too many components, I think blueberry blue cheese or blueberry jalapeno would have been enough. But I wouldn't kick it out of bed.
But the beer, totally worth the drive! I was DD so I nursed 1 beer and sipped a few others. They were all delicious. I was already a big fan of Stone, and all the tap beer really sealed the deal for me. So much so that I decided to advertise for them...on my boobies ;)
Sunday was Music Man's actual birthday so I woke up bright and early to make blueberry pancakes and bacon. Soooo yummy. And then Music Man and I went out for another ride. We were both pretty tired from beer and my arduous 4 mile trail run the day before, so we decided to keep it to our normal 22 mile loop. It's still pretty difficult with a category 3 climb in the beginning and ending with the final 7 miles on a pretty congested and extremely windy highway.
The ride was pretty relaxing and uneventful up to about mile 18 when I felt a searing pain and realized I had been stung by a bee. I swatted at the evil thing but it held on for dear life. I was ambivalent to stop due to lack of shoulder, the long line of speeding vehicles and a parade of mountain bikers enveloping me. I finally freed the bee but it's huge stinger was still embedded in my leg and I could not get the darn thing out. I flagged down Music Man, in tears, and my leg shook violently as he extracted the stinger. Luckily the pain really eased when the stinger was removed but I was still in shock.
A few months ago I was stung by a bee while running. I don't know if it's because it stung me through my capris or because I got the stinger out so quickly but I just had a little bump and rash, no big deal. But this time... my thigh swelled up like crazy and I had a huge burning lump on the inside of my thigh. I'll spare you the visual but it was like 1/2 a grapefruit sticking off my leg. By Monday morning I couldn't put any pressure on my right leg so walking was difficult. After seeing the doctor it turns out I'm a little more allergic than I have been in the past. I was prescribed a steroid which I took 1/4 of a dose of and that turned out to be enough to get the swelling to subside. By Tuesday I was feeling much better. It's still rashy and itchy but at least I can walk now.
Because of the pain and swelling I haven't run since Saturday. I have 13 hot trail miles on the schedule for this Saturday and I'm hoping to just get through it happily, no pace goals. And I now have an epi pen that will always be in my camelbak or jersey from now on to make my run or ride a little safer.
Oh, I almost forgot, Music Man got stung on Wednesday while riding. He got stung on the inside of his mouth and his poor lips were huge. So he'll be carrying an epi pen from now on as well. AND, because it's a weird coincidence, I have to tell you Music man's dad got stung on his ear on Friday. If you're related to me, watch out. The bees are out to get us!!!
Lastly, Little Man woke up a little early this morning and I woke up a little late so I did my work out while he was awake, which I try not to do because it's crazy distracting. The whole time I was on the elliptical he yelled "Sit down, Mommy!!!!!" and when I started my strength he questioned "What doing Mommy?". "Why doing that?" I explained to him that I was doing it to be healthy and because I liked it and he said "Yes, Sure, Weirdo" Ha!
Allow me to illustrate the real weirdo of the family:
Nice Diaper, Darth
Time to watch some Olympics! Have a fantastic week!
Love the picture! I can't believe all of the bee stings your family had to endure!
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