August 18, 2010
Also, thank heaven for Trainer
Ow. *whimper*.
On a 3½% tip, the stairmaster that looks like actual stairs is *much* more effective than the other kind. This kind? Is made entirely of pure evil and PAIN.
I’ll be doing it again tomorrow. *sigh*
Also, why do I find that Jimmy Dean planets commercial to be so cute?
In other random thoughts, did you know that iPhone’s autocorrect feature is adaptive? That is, over time, it will recognize things that you type regularly – onomatopoeias that you use regularly, or words that you intentionally misspell (I CAN haz cheezburger!), etc. A recent conversation made me think about how interesting it would be to gather a group of people and compare their personal lexicons for their iPhones. I suspect this would reveal some interesting qualities about the users and their relationships to the people they text and email the most.
July 28, 2010
Special Forces, all right
Trainer has decided to get creative. And by “get creative”, I mean “indulge his long-denied fantasy of being a drill instructor”.
Ow.
He’s been cribbing moves from special forces training manuals, apparently. Which is why I was crawling like there was barbed wire a few inches above my body, crouch-walking the length of the exercise room several times over, and various other things that had my legs shaking with exhaustion by 15 minutes into the workout.
*whimper*
If I had wanted to be special forces, I probably would have, you know, SIGNED UP TO BE IN THE MILITARY. As it is, it will probably TAKE special forces to get me up the stairs to my condo by the time I get home this evening.
On the plus side, the gold lamé dress is going to look fantastic, and I’m pretty sure that’s not something they let you wear when you’re special forces. Not unless The Nanny is their new wardrobe consultant.
June 8, 2010
In which our heroine gets some good news
and maybe delivers a tiny little PSA:
1) Guess who has two thumbs and no cancer, for sure (for now)?
2) Jagerbombs are never a good idea. Especially on a Monday.
3) Playing pool (or doing pretty much anything) well is a great way to take your mind to a more positive place. Once you start handling one thing well, no matter how trivial it is, the rest of everything seems a little less daunting, somehow.
4) This does not make me any less apprehensive about the Furniture Assembly Project I have scheduled for this weekend. Regardless of the sweetgum tree’s intentions, I suspect bruising will be involved.
5) I’m stocking up on bubble bath and Viognier. These are always good things to have on hand, when bruising is anticipated.
May 24, 2010
Sweet Gum Tree
This. This is why Dr. Taggart *really* warned me about going to school in “The South”. Of course, it didn’t happen until I’d been out of school for a while and had decided to make my stay more permanent.
See, where I’m from, we don’t have anything called a “sweet gum” tree. Our trees? Would cringe in embarrassment at such a moniker. They are called things like Oak. And Elm. And Beech. And Birch, who is forever trying to prove how manly it is. Maple gets a pass for having a “fancy”, two-syllable name, but only because of its delicious, delicious syrup.
And to a point, they still drop pollen and annoying little propeller things or wormy-looking flower things everywhere. But they do not drop little balls of evil (called gumballs, though they are not sugary or tasty or anything you’d ever want to put in your mouth) all over everything:
Little balls of evil that coat the walkways and grassy areas of your condo complex. So that when you’re carrying something heavy to the trash area, in the dark, you might step on them. And they might roll. And you might falls, possibly partially under the heavy THING you were carrying, ONTO MORE STUPID GUMBALL THINGS.
And then you might wind up with several deep bruises, roughly the size and shape of the stupid little gumball things. Except, of course, that one spot on your hip, where you fell on several of them that had gotten stuck together, so you have a 3-4 gumball-sized bruise.
It might have seemed like Dr. Taggart was talking about cultural differences and the inability to find really good Italian or rye bread, or the extent to which I’d miss a salt bagel with Taylor ham and cheese, but I now understand that this is what she meant.
Beware the sweetgum tree, and all of its Yankee-attacking booby-trapping-ness.
Ow.
May 7, 2010
STILL upset
Last night, I played twice. I won one, I lost one.
I was annoyed at my coaches both times. But the one I’m still mad about, was the one where my coach essentially told me that I was going to lose, so I should use the game as a learning experience, and experiment with different types of shots/English that I don’t normally take. I missed my very next shot, and lost.
Now, I’m not an idiot, or illogical, most of the time. And I knew I was going to lose – the girl I was playing was on a completely different level (we can discuss her ranking/sandbagging/completely snotty attitude later).
But there’s something about someone else saying out loud – someone who was supposed to be on my team – that completely demoralized me. And afterward, I told him I thought that was a jerky thing to do – and it was implied that I was overreacting, that I was taking it the wrong way.
I don’t know. I think that in general, unless you have something to say that will get me closer to winning the game at hand, maybe you can just shut the hell up. Telling me that I’m going to lose under the guise of “taking the pressure off” doesn’t survive a cost-benefit analysis.
Asshole.
May 5, 2010
FAMINE!
-roared the anguished Humbug, who suddenly realized that that was exactly what he’d eaten twenty-three bowls of.
It’s Wednesday! And we know what happens on Wednesday – I voluntarily submit myself to Trainer for a good pummelling. Today was no different.
Except, well… normally, he has me do X number of reps for each exercise, and that number is announced before I start, and he counts them down for me. And he’ll tell me when I’m halfway done, as a sort of encouraging measure.
Also, when he has me run on the treadmill without turning it on, for three minutes? He’ll tell me when I’m halfway done with that too – which would be more encouraging if time didn’t slow down to half-speed whenever he has me do that. Anyway.
So, normally, that’s what we do. And last week, he increased the weight I was using for a number of the exercises, and that was cool. Painful, but cool. This week?
This week, he KEPT ADDING TEN MORE.
40 reps on the leg extension? Sure. Oh, you’ve got ten more in you, let’s see ’em.
40 reps on the leg curl? Oh, you’ve got ten more in you. Let’s see ’em.
35 reps on the tricep pulldown? 30 on the assisted dip machine? Let’s see another ten on each.
I have never felt so cheated in my life. Okay, that’s a lie. But I certainly thought it was the truth at several points in time this morning.
Which doesn’t explain why – when he had me doing this squat to jump to squat to jump back thing, and he told me to do 50 reps, and then tried to tell me I was done at 40 – why, exactly, I told him that I still had ten more to do.
Because that’s just like asking for another bowl of Subtraction Stew, when you know exactly what it is you’ve eaten twenty-three bowls of already.
March 25, 2010
Biannual Tango
Longer ago than I care to admit, I had some minor surgery to remove some cancerous cells.
Seriously. Compared to what other people go through when THEY have cancer, this was nothing. In fact, the doctors all seemed to avoid saying that I had cancer, likely because the category in which I fell indicated that it was barely over the cusp of becoming cancer.
So, I had biopsies, then an outpatient procedure, and then a truckload of monitoring for a year or two after. And then I had a year, maybe two, of apparent normalcy.
The problem is, abnormal cells don’t walk around with large signs announcing their presence to doctors. They can hide, sometimes. And so, the biannual tango began.
It starts with a regular visit. And the usual tests are run. And then two weeks later, I get phone call, and the results come back “abnormal”. And so I go back, and get biopsied. And then I wait a few more weeks. And then they tell me that it’s not great, but it’s not the end of the world, and if I could just come back in 6 months, they’ll check me again. Dip, turn.
And then I go. And the usual tests are run. And then two weeks later I get a phone call, and the results come back “abnormal”. And so I go back, and I get biopsied. And then I wait a few more weeks. And then they tell me that it’s still not great, but it’s not the end of the world, and if I could just come back in 6 months, they’ll check me again.
6 7 8 and 1…
I have no idea what I would do with all of my spare time, if it all just went away. Maybe some dancing lessons.
March 24, 2010
Smile, and the rest will follow
You know how they say that if you smile, the rest of your outlook, and subsequently your day, will become positive as a result?
Well, my body, fresh from a session of training, is NOT smiling. My body is, to put it bluntly, 97% mush. The other 3%, located in the general vicinity of the bottom of my left calf, is screaming bloody murder and spasming in a comically randomized fashion.
Thus, 97% of my brain is mush, but for the 3% that (a) registers the pain in my calf, and (b) maintains basic bodily functions such as breathing, and fantasizing about caffeine and sleep. And chopping down the tree whose virtues I have extolled several times thus far, as I have discovered that it is a maple tree and guess who developed a new allergy to maple this season?
Except that as soon as I think about moving my arms like that, my calf spasms again, as if to say “Learn your lesson, you silly girl!” And then my brain twitches, as if to say, “Meh. I am too tired and mushy to learn.”
So, yeah. There’s not going to be a whole heck of a lot of smiling positivity today. I think the best we can hope for is ploddingly neutral. Who’s with me?!?
March 17, 2010
Speaking of exercise…
I was personally trained this morning. And the thing about personal training, is that I love it because it makes me do things that I would not think of doing, because I grew up in an era of Bowflex and NordicTrac commercials, where exercise was associated with machines.
Also, it makes me do things that I don’t want to do. And because I am paying someone to make me do them, I try harder and push myself more, because I have been *assigned* a certain number of reps and he is standing there counting them off, and I’m NOT going to be the wimpy client who whines and tries to cheat.
I really recommend this for anyone who *loves* to-do lists. Because once he’s started to count down those last ten reps, I get more enthusiastic about the exercise, especially if it’s one I don’t like (see: most things involving push-ups, especially push-ups with one hand on a medicine ball; see also: squat-thrusts in their various forms). Because if it’s one you don’t like, you’re only 10! 9! 8! 7! etc. reps away from not having to do it again at least until the next week, possibly longer if he decides that next week will involve the little wheely abdominal torture device.
Now, the real question – can I do the personal training in the morning AND go for a run in the balmy, 64-degree, light-until-7:20 evening?
What are you doing to get/stay in shape?
Seeking John Galt 