muscles., construction and flowers

Perhaps it was a mistake to go have a workout today where I concentrated on my legs, when afterwards I just had to run up and down five flights of stairs 20 times moving stuff from the basement to the attics. It's like doing Stairmaster after a heavy workout AND a bike ride.

Our building is going to have yet ANOTHER round of construction work done to it, and this time it's pretty major. Right now they are re-roofing, which entails scaffolding and the constant sound of slate being cut and stuff falling from the roof. Starting June 1 they are going to tear up the basement (hence us moving all of our stuff out of storage down there), and dig all around the base of the building, and in the courtyard, and will close the coffee shop downstairs, as they rebuild the 120 year old foundations. Apparently the whole building is on wooden piers and they need to be replaced with concrete. Of course, I upped the insurance, I mean, what if the whole joint collapses? That loveliness is due to continue until the end of November.

Yippee. It seems I am just never going to find a peaceful, quiet, non-construction zone place to live in Norway. At least I'm getting some good workouts out of it. That's something, right?

Speaking of workouts, yesterday I rode my bike over to where the flower and plant sellers hangout by the Oslo Cathedral and bought my summer balcony plants. (See previous picture.) It took a bit of thinking as to how I was going to carry 12 plants home on my bike, but I rigged a basket on the back and loaded them up carefully. I felt so bloody cliché European, riding my bike with baskets full of flowers, down the (really very rough) cobbled streets and trying not to mow down the dawdling tourists. It was fun, and something I have always wanted to do. I only needed a big baguette sticking off the back to finish the picture I have always carried in my head. I am definitely in much better shape than last year, I can ride my bike anywhere and have very few problems with the hills, unlike last summer where they killed me. Well, they still hurt, and I huff and puff, of course, but I can make it up the hill without walking the bike, so that is progress. My legs are so much stronger now, I can see the definition and I am no longer sore after a ride.

I came home, got into my bikini, and pottered about in the sun filling the balcony planters with fresh dirt, pelargoniums and some other little flowers, all in shades of fuschia and pink. I miss real gardening, so for right now I just have to content myself with the balcony plants and the occasional extra pot or two. That's ok, at least I got to get my hands dirty in the cool dark dirt.