stretching

Thwack

Oh man, oh man, ohhhhh maaaaaaaan.

Sometimes, there’s just a mental state that sets in and all one can do is sing along with something that requires only the tiniest amount of though. Enter the above. Plus it’s just fun to sing along with in its nonsensical way.

Something I learned the hard way last night is that I am no good the next day if I go to sleep, am woken from said sleep to do work, then have to try to go back to sleep. You see, I like my sleep which means I’m usually in bed by 10pm because 5am really does come pretty quickly. When my work phone rings at 11:30, I’m groggy at best and grumpy at worst. Then when I’m done with work at 12:15 and I go back to bed, it’s 45 minutes of tossing and turning and trying to relax and shut off my mind to get back to sleep. Yes! Being the boss is awesome.

This morning was my second go-round with Fit & Bendy. Knowing that the warmup in the video wasn’t quite enough for me, I knocked out 100 jumping jacks before I got started. Realistically, still not enough of a warmup, but better than nothing. Again today, I am feeling like I stretched and I could tell the difference from just one session in the opening of my upper back and shoulders. The real test will be to see if I get any movement from the upper back when I go to the chiropractor as he usually has a pretty tough time getting my upper back to adjust. That will be a small victory that ends up getting squashed by all of the other things that are out of place (right leg turns out, hips out of line, shoulders mild disaster). I am also seeing the tiniest bit of progress with my split as well, on both sides even! There’s a section for middle splits and I do that as well, however, I think that I fall into that category of people whose  femurs sit deep in the hip socket which in turn does not allow for center splits. I promise you that I am not simply making this up as an excuse. I have X-rays and MRIs that show exactly that, but I’ll still work on getting them as far as my body will allow.

Thursday. Thirsty Thursday. No. But I can’t think of a word that starts with “th” that applies to me going to the firing range. Thwack Thwack Thursday. And it’s been the kind of week where thwack, thwack, thwack is certainly needed. It’s the little things that let me blow off steam and help keep me sane. Little things…firing off that 9mm and pole dancing. It sounds funny, but you’d probably be surprised how many gun enthusiast pole dancers there are. I mean, without even thinking, I know of five. It’s always fun to see one thing bring people together to learn that they have so much more in common.

Throw your hands up and just say ho! Hasta mañana.

Insert Techno Beat Here

Move – slowly out of bed
Shake – the headache I woke up with
Drop – it like it’s hot

This morning was a tough one indeed. Don’t you just hate when you wake up with a headache? I do and I did. Luckily there were no weights involved in this morning’s workout. I actually skipped the assigned P90X for the day so I could do my new DVD. I heard about it through a 90 day splits challenge group to which I belong. It’s called Fit & Bendy and it’s by Kristina Nekyia, who is trained in all kinds of flexy stuff.

The DVD goes for approximately an hour and is broken up into 6 sections, I think.  It’s been several hours ago. First there’s an all-over warmup, followed by a splits warmup, stretching for splits, shoulder/back warmup, backbend work, and a cool down. I was familiar with all of the stretches in the video, however, each of them had its own little tweak that made it new. Mostly the new stuff involved PNF.

Realistically speaking, the all-over warmup isn’t enough of a warmup for me personally. I think I need to put in a half hour of cardio or something to that effect before I really feel warm enough to get a good stretch going. I would imagine that most folks would need a little more, but on the first time out, you live and learn. I’m not going to go through every single thing in the video, but there are hamstring, quad, and groin stretches in the splits part, working for both front and center splits as well as upper and lower back stretches in the backbend section.

At the end of the video, I was tired. Granted, it was also 6:30 in the morning and I was fighting a headache, but it’s more than just stretching and less than a full-on workout. The best part of it all didn’t happen until about 2.5 hours later when my body felt GREAT! I really and truly felt as though I was taller and just had better overall movement.

Let’s take an inventory by memory of the current list of items in the stretching arsenal:

·        Fit and Bendy DVD

·        Cleo the Hurricane DVD (Which I don’t use because I don’t find it to be safe for my body)

·        Valentino Brothers DVD (front split, side split, general stretching)

·        P90X (1,2,and 3) DVD (there’s some sort of stretching in each of those)

·        Foam roller

·        Lacrosse ball

·        Maxi-Flex stretching band (ha, go look that up)

·        Daily glucosamine/chondroitin (yummy fish oil burps)

With all of these things, one might imagine that I will certainly get that MF split soon. At least I better.

Porky Pig just popped out of a cartoon window and I second what he said.  That’s all folks!

Mistakes Get Made

Oh, Monday, how you sneak up on a girl. Jerk.

While snowboarding on Sunday could quite possibly be “the thing”, it also is a bit of a bummer because we got back home yesterday and I immediately realized that the weekend was over. Tears may or may not have been shed. But of course, Monday brings good with it and not just work.

Good, but a conflicted good. You see, today I have a spin pole workshop with some ladies I used to dance/train with until I walked away a while back. Why did I walk away? Ask the chorus up there. Not all of it, just never shined through in what I’ve shown. I really feel like that sentence sums up my previous attempts at dancing. I have stories to tell and it’s as though I have writer’s block of the body. I am really and truly hoping that the time away has been helpful. I know I’ve lost a lot of pole muscle, but I can get that back. I think that the time away has freed me up a little from the constraints I placed upon myself. Ah, the pole world – you labeled me, I’ll label you. And we’re all unforgiven whether it be by ourselves or those we used to call or still call friends.

Between just wanting to be able to move today and trying to early morning prep for this evening’s workshop, I spent quite a bit of time stretching this morning. First the warmup from Dynamix to wake up the body, then a shoulder opening sequence, followed by the requisite split stretching (down to the yoga block having to be pushed to get under the space left on the good side), and ending with a little lacrosse ball to the glutes and hip flexors. After showering, it’s a quick big marble to the neck and shoulder where it’s sore with the anti-inflammatory cream and I’m ready to go to work! Yes, I am slightly off my rocker. I’m ok with it though.

On on!

I’ve put the vacation countdown on the whiteboard. Hubby thinks I’m a little nuts, but it’s kind of a reminder for me of how long I have to get into bikini shape. I saw a furry bikini that just made me smile…almost laugh, and considered buying it since I don’t go in the water, I only walk around the edge of the  pool. I did think that hubby might be slightly mortified walking around with me while I’m wearing it, but he wouldn’t say so. I’ll spare him and get something a little more normal. This time. Good morning, breakfast. Egg whites, spinach, and tomato, it’s good to see you guys again. Grapefruit will be joining the party soon. Skim milk isn’t invited back though. Salads are gonna make their return next week too. It’s a healthy party!

With that lunacy, I’m going to leave you to your Monday. Because my laptop batter is dying and I have to take that aforementioned shower. More fun tomorrow when I’ll probably be even more sore but hopefully I’ll have fun spin pole stories to tell. There’s a whole big world out there. Go get it!

Well, It Isn’t

The video quality there is not so hot, but it ain’t my fault.

Sorry, this post doesn’t really go along with the song, but it was the last thing I heard before I got out of the car last night and I knew that I wanted to use it this morning. This morning, where I’m coming to you live from the basement, either in pigeon pose or foam rolling my inner thighs. Have you ever foam rolled your inner thighs? Like down towards your knee? I’ll let you in on a secret. IT FUCKING HURTS! Damn you, fascia! Damn you, ego, for wanting to move around like a 20 year old when you never even started stretching until  you were almost 30. Damn you hot knives jamming in my leg..oh no, that’s just the roller. It might be possible that I have the tightest hips on the planet. I think I need more hot tub time. Yeah, that’s the ticket. The bonus is that I can have it, I just have to make my way over to the gym. Best $20 a month I spend without doubt. I’m up $20 a month after only going to Zumba. Everything else is a double bonus.

I’ll tell ya what is not a bonus. It’s barely been above 30 degrees here for the last week. I do not mind the temperature because I spend very little time outside when I’m not fully dressed for it. What I *do* mind is the return of spiders. In case you buggers didn’t know, which obviously you didn’t, it is NOT yet spider season. I do not wish to see you (blurrily) out of the corner of my eye when I am working out/stretching/doing yoga. How do you think I can focus on what I am doing when I constantly have to worry about where you went?!?! I’d ask how you even got in, but that would just be a stupid question. I mean, you are a spider and you’re kinda small. Big enough that I’m concerned you might have the ability to bite, but still small in the grand scheme of things. Hear that, spiders? You’re still small UNDER MY SHOE! Today, you live. Tomorrow, we’ll see.

Last night I went to my first group pole class in I don’t know how long. Ugh. I’d call myself a deer on ice skates, but that would be too graceful to describe the hot mess that I currently am. Nothing like a little hiatus to take you back to square negative one. Some takeaways from class include I need to stretch even more (or get new hips), P90X3 may not be nearly enough and I might need to lift, and flow, flow, flow not herk-e. Jerk-e. I’ve not made it to the section yet that really involves weights as that’s in another 2 weeks, but I could see myself going back to the original. It might totally mess up my morning routine, but it’ll be worth it. Probably crazy with this morning routine, but you know, goals and junk.

Just as I suspected, this short week is well on its way to taking forever. Even when I have classes after work, somehow things are still slowing down. Every now and again, I consider more Zumba, but I try not to leave my poor hubby all by his lonesome too many times a week even though he is supposed to be playing Rocksmith while I’m out working out. Tough being married to me, all being expected to play video games. Ah, that reminds me that I haven’t played my own set of video games in a while. So much to do, so little time. Still have to catch up on the first three episodes of The Following. Did manage to catch up on The Blacklist though. I honestly never knew how much I loved James Spader until this show came along. Not young James Spader, now James Spader, particularly as Red. Easily my favorite tv villian-ish guy. I think these are the characters I enjoy the most. Give me a Red Reddington or a Hannibal Lechter any day. Yes, I’ll probably end up tv-dead, but it’ll be fun while it lasts.

Alright, I’m about to go head-to-head and toe-to-toe with Tuesday.Keep  your guard up and strike when your opponent’s guard is down. Work the jab and throw in a combo here and there. Don’t go flat-footed and let’s get that KO! Yeah, watch boxing much?

Who Stole My Weekend?!?

Seriously, who stole my weekend? I swear it was just Friday at 6 a minute ago and now it’s already after 7 on Sunday. I didn’t accomplish everything I should have done, but I had fun.

I need to talk stretching here for a minute. All of the muscles from my knees to my hips are tight so I use a foam roller. I stretch for splits 3 times a week (after a 30 minute warmup and using a trusted stretching video). This equals I stretched on Friday and on Saturday night, I was up a few times because my hips or possibly hip flexors wanted to have a chat. We’re hoping that doesn’t happen again. I could be dehydrated though. I’m bad about that on the weekends for some reason. Perhaps an Aleve before bed because I’m frigging old all of a sudden.

Just an absolute plethora of work is what there is to look forward to this week. But there’s also the snowboarding possibility to look forward to and that makes things all better. Except maybe not my hips. Probably does not make them all better. Or my front foot knee. But that’s what braces and hot tubs are for.

It’s a weekend. That means short posts. Enjoy what remains of the weekend.