What you do not know because you are not me.

What you do not know because you are not me.

This month I am gonna write about something that I know that you do not know because you are not me. I have some special knowledge, really. I already read the rest of the newsletter when I wrote this. (He he).

It was Christine’s article of about buying groceries that made me thing of a different shopping experience. Not so planned.

On the Wednesday of the last week of June I dropped my kids off at school and then realized it was the day of the Third grade Picnic, I forgot to prepare a dish. Oh no. So I went to Key Food and bought 2 cans of Non-fat Vegetarian Refried Beans, 2 jars of my favorite salsa, 2 lbs of Non fat Sour Cream, 2 packages of Non-fat shredded cheese, a jar of sliced olives, a scallion, 2 bags of baked chips and a disposal aluminum pan.

I put the beans on the bottom of the tray, then salsa, and sour cream. Then I cut the green onions (with scissors, fast) and made a cross and put the olives in corners. It looked like a Union Jack. Then I got this back to PS 321 for the class picnic. I did this all between 8:40 and 9:30. Zoom, Done. Delivered. Easy.

Why, you may ask am I putting this in the newsletter? Because this is the same dish I brought to the PPTC Relay Race / Picnic. People who are not me asked me the recipe.

My Recent Athletic Endeavors While I Was On Vacation

My Recent Athletic Endeavors While I Was On Vacation

Doug Olney

I spent the July 4th holiday as I have done for the past 40 years, in Mattapoisett, Mass., where my family has a summer home.

On the 4th, I ran in Mattapoisett 5-mile Road Race for the 32nd time since 1976. (I missed running in 1977 and 2000; there is one guy who has run all 39 races). My time was 36:07, which is far off my personal best time of 26:25, but that was 28 years ago. In any event it was my 2nd-fastest time in the past 5 years. BTW, my mom, who is 74, decided to walk the race for the first time. She finished in 1:20, and ended up placing second in the 70+ age group and won a trophy!

Then this past Saturday, the 11th, I participated in Swim Buzzards Bay, a 1.2 mile open-water swim from New Bedford to Fairhaven, Mass. This event is a fund raiser for the Coalition for Buzzards Bay, a local advocacy organization dedicated to preserving the Bay and its surrounding environs. I swam the distance in 36:41, which isn't particularly speedy (the winning time was a record 20:40 and I was 79th out of 118 people), but it was my fastest time in 5 attempts by 50 seconds, and is almost 11 minutes faster than the first time I swam (the conditions that day were rather tough; this time the bay was like glass). Along with several others, I got a special award for completing the swim 5 times.

And finally today for a weekend double, I competed in the Mattapoisett Lions Club Triathlon. This a low-key sprint distance event: 1/4 mile swim, 10 mile bike and 3.5 mile run. My overall finishing time was 1:05:59, which my 2nd-fastest time in 4 attempts (the fastest was 1:03:11 in 2001). As usual I was in the back of the pack coming out of the water, but I passed some people on the bike and really gained ground during the run - mentally it helps to know that the final leg is your strongest event. I even placed 4th in my age group - this didn't get me anything however!

So even though I have graduated to a new age group, I can say that I still have something left at age 50 :-). Maybe it isn't all downhill from here....