Another fall week

I didn't have a terribly eventful week. It was significant that it was freezing on Wednesday and Thursday, and I even saw a few snowflakes falling. The weather is important on a daily basis, but when it comes to life in general, it's really not important. When I read historical records that talk about what the weather was on a particular day, I think, "I really don't care." When I read old blog posts, I find myself apologizing for making boring posts, but I have found that the apologies really aren't necessary. So I won't include one.

Anyway, on Tuesday evening I ran on a trail near Legacy Parkway; I hadn't been on the portions I went on that night. (I won't bore you with the details of why I chose to go there, because it's ridiculous.) It was fun to be in a new spot, but honestly I find straight, flat running routes to be harder than winding or steep routes—it's a mental thing. Since it's wetlands there, there are tons of mosquitoes. They leave me alone when I'm running, but I stopped to eat a Kind bar, and I got bit, even though I put on repellent.

On Friday afternoon I ran up Mueller Park. North Canyon is truly better, but I felt like I should give it a turn during the fall. I had to wait until the afternoon so it would be warm enough, but that meant the fall colors weren't as vibrant (it wasn't a golden hour).

Then I went home and made apple-grape bread, using the last of our own grapes and some of our own apples. It is fantastic to use our own produce! It makes me so happy to pick apples from our own tree on a fall evening! I picked a lot of them this week before they froze.

Then I went to a stake "fall carnival," but none of the activities were very fall-like. I didn't feel like doing anything, and then I realized it was because I had spent two hours running followed by two hours cooking. I was exhausted.

Saturday was the first day of "Little Haunts" at This Is the Place, where there are trick-or-treating and other Halloween activities at the park. The park has speakers that play faux pioneer music. For Little Haunts, they also mix in some "Halloween" songs. I deliberately put "Halloween" in scare quotes. Most of the songs have little to do with Halloween (such as pirate songs and Harry Belafonte), and some have literally nothing to do with the holiday (the yellow polka-dot bikini!??). Even the songs that are actually Halloween songs are quite annoying. My own Halloween playlist is way better, even though I'm not entirely satisfied with it.

In this age of streaming, it seems outdated to still purchase and own music, but I like owning music, and I especially enjoy collecting holiday music. So here are the current numbers of songs in my playlists, but I'm always adding to them:

New Year: 27 songs

Valentine's Day: 17 songs

St. Patrick's Day: 97 songs

Easter: 181 songs

Fourth of July: 123 songs

Pioneer Day: 131 songs

Halloween: 175 songs

Thanksgiving: 98 songs

Christmas: 1,373 songs

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It was a good week for pumpkinundation roundup!

Crumbl is a surprisingly popular and successful cookie company, but they do a horrible job when it comes to scheduling holiday flavors! But that's a topic for another day. This week they had a Crumbl Pumpkin Roll Cookie. It was a cake-like pumpkin cookie with frosting and a cinnamon topping. It was good, but I was disappointed (especially since I waited twenty minutes for them to take this out of the oven). Pumpkin chocolate chip cookies work because the chocolate breaks up the monotony of the pumpkin cookie, but here there was nothing to break up the monotony. Also, the best thing about real pumpkin rolls is the cream cheese frosting. I don't think this was cream cheese frosting. It was a fine cookie, but it should have been so much better. 6/10.

It's a good thing I still have some leftover CVS Health Pumpkin Spice Cough Drops from last year, because I was at CVS this week and they didn't sell them. These are my favorite cough drops. 7/10.

 These Yasso Pumpkin Cheesecake Frozen Greek Yogurt Bars have frozen pumpkin Greek yogurt base with a graham swirl. I really like the flavor and the texture. It doesn't have that weird tang that regular Greek yogurt has. 7/10.

This Bonfire Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffin from Maverik tastes like a giant pumpkin chocolate chip cookie. It's 600 calories, but I'd say it's worth it. 8/10.

Peanuts and candy corn have been a thing for at least a decade, so it's nice to see them combined in a Twisted Sugar Harvest Peanut Butter Cookie. It was the first time I'd been to this cookie shop. The cookie has a nice peanut butter flavor, and the frosting almost had a bouncy texture. 8/10.

Philadelphia Pumpkin Spice Cream Cheese Spread is a fine, nice cream cheese. 7/10.

Happy Apples aren't great, but I had higher hopes for this Happy Apples Apple Pie Caramel Apple. It's a caramel apple with graham pieces and white chocolate. It did not remind me of apple pie, and it was overly sweet. Lots of decadent apples are just as sweet, but they taste better than this one. I found myself wishing I were eating a plain apple instead. 6/10.

I used my Pumpkin Lover's Cookbook to make a Fall Vegetable Omelet, which is a regular omelet, but the filling consists of pumpkin, peppers, and onions. (I omitted the carrots because I didn't have any.) Cutting the vegetables was the hardest part, and it was very enjoyable. 8/10.

These Pumpkin Spice Bantam Bagels are cinnamon bagel bites filled with pumpkin spice cream cheese. The bagel part just seemed like regular bread, while the cheese was a bit tangier than I would have liked. They're OK. 6/10.

I got this EOS Natural Pumpkin Spice Lip Care two years ago, and I still have tons of it because I don't use many lip care products. It tastes like the spice of pumpkin cereals such as Frosted Mini Wheats and Life. 7/10.