working out

Krav Maga

Well hey there! It’s great to see you again. Thanks for stopping by. 🙂

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to take a self-defense class geared towards women. I had taken the class about four years ago and figured it was time for a refresher. You see, I have somewhat of a Napoleon complex going on. I tend to think that I’m tough as nails with all 5 foot 2 of my badassery. I mean, I’m not totally off my rocker. I do know when to keep my mouth shut, but I like to believe that I could hold my own in a struggle if it came down to it…even against a man.

We spent a little over two hours in there learning some techniques that are based in krav maga. Everyone grabs a partner and we take turns holding the pad for the other partner to punch/kick. But before we got to all of that fun, we determined where our “bubble” was. in other words, how close is too close for a stranger to get. The exercise included getting into two lines and walking towards your partner until she yelled out to stop. Now, notice I said yelled. Some ladies neglected to bring their big girl voices. I hope that somewhere along the line they find those voices, especially should they ever need them. Me? Former cheerleader, tomboy, tree climber, trapeze flyer, performer with no microphone. I’m loud. And if I don’t want you near me, you’re gonna know. The instructor tells everyone, “hey, watch her and be loud like her.” I have crazy expressive eyes and when I’m in this class or possibly in danger, I just have crazy eyes. I will tell you a story with these eyes and if I don’t like what you’re up to, that story is gonna start with F*&K and end with YOU.

Anywho, we got through our brief warmup and figuring out our comfort zones. On to punching! Straight punches, heel strikes, and hammer punches, oh my! No gloves. Just blasting through that pad (and pushing my poor partner over). But ladies, you don’t just have those hands fo punching. Don’t ever be afraid or ashamed to gouge eyes and scratch faces. The overarching theme was FIGHT FOR YOUR LIFE. Whatever it takes. A well placed forehead to the bridge of the nose. Whatever. Oh, and hey, those stems! Groin kick! I tell ya, I P90X-ed the hell outta those kicks.

Last time, we learned escaping from a bear hug from behind – bend at the waist, elbow, elbow, elbow, elbow, elbow, elbow (is he off yet??), elbow, elbow, (oh he’s off now?), hammer punch to the base of your neck, hammer, hammer, hammer, groin, groin, kick, kick, kick, punch, punch. I’m done a la Wendy Testaburger. This time we worked on removing a choke hold from the front. The reality is that the move might not fully remove the assailant’s hands from your throat, but it’ll move them enough that you’ll still be able to breathe. And fight. For your life.It’s called a pluck and should almost always come along with a groin kick. Like they said in the Simpson’s, it ain’t Krav Maga if there’s no groin kick.

We do these drills for about 90 minutes before we’re ready to go to simulated attacks. We split into two groups and go into two rooms where our “attacker” is in a padded suit with a padded helmet. All of the ladies stand in a circle with one lady in the middle. They guy in the suit walks/stalks around you, saying some pretty ignorant sh!t, touching you, he pulled my hair (hard!), but you can’t react until he’s truly attacking you. Every word out of his mouth was pretty much the equivalent of overtuning the smallest string on the guitar and his hands on my neck was when the string popped.

There was a Timberwulf sighting at that moment. Pluck, kick, hammer, hammer, hammer, hammer, kick to the chest while you’re on the ground. I’m done. The instructor picked me to go first. Good to have it out of the way so I could just focus on cheering on the other ladies, and in some circumstances, providing hugs and words of encouragement like “in through your nose, out through your mouth!” because one girl was pretty close to hyperventilating. A LOT of tears were shed in that class. Some because, and this is just an educated guess, it was too real and too reminiscent of something that had already happened. Some because they just didn’t realize they had the power within themselves. And some just because like hip openers in yoga, this will just release some emotions right up outta you.

They have the class annually and I really shouldn’t let three years go in between taking it. But next time I go, I really have to remember to cool myself down better and to stretch better. Why? Class was Saturday; today is Tuesday and my shoulder is still crying. Icy Hot and Tylenol are my friends, but a little discomfot is better than not knowing how to protect myself and the options that come with that. I cannot recommend enough that every female get out there and find some sort of self-defense class and take it and take it seriously. It just might save your life.

Step Off, I’m Doing The Hump

 

HUMP DAY!!

It’s a great Wednesday morning to be alive, wouldn’t you say? The sun is shining…ok, it isn’t, it’s actually raining, but hey, still woke up and body parts are still functioning. And since said body parts were still functioning this morning, I took them all down to the dungeon to put them to good use. Three days in a row, lol. 18 more makes it a habit, or so they say. I don’t know that I put full faith in that concept.  I’ll still do my best to get down there and put in work daily, though. Except Sunday. That is a day of rest. And football.

So, body is functioning, but oh so sore. It’s being stubborn and acting like we’ve never worked hard before. And really, we aren’t even working that hard…yet. Knocking down the T25/PiYo hybrid calendar because I’m a Beachbody fool. One of the things I have been amazed at in these last three days is how much less these two programs suck this time around. I swear to you that the first time I popped in a T25 or PiYo workout, I didn’t even make it the whole way through. I gave up. I sucked. Not any more though. Now, I am awesome. A couple levels of it.

Hey, remember our door ghosts? I totally thought that we exorcised ourselves of that particular demon, but just when we got comfortable, that damned garage door went up by itself again. Yesterday, we had tried resetting all of the codes and that kept the door down for a good 12 hours, but alas, the poltergeist has returned. Lovey did some further investigation and it seems that perhaps the super duper laser beam sensors aren’t quite correct as well. It’s always an adventure.

Speaking of adventures, you ever talk to Microsoft support on the phone? It’s probably more of a nightmare than an adventure, going round and round in circles, fighting the language barriers, rephrasing myself 5 different ways, the party never ends! ‘Nuff about that, though. It’s done.

I’m still trying to work out what I want to do, if anything, for my birthday. Maybe I’ll just buy a pole again, lol. That’s less than half of a weekend stay up in the mountains and I’ll keep it forever…or until I sell it again. I guess it’ll partially go the route of, will the landlord allow me to bolt up to the ceiling. I think she will. 🙂  But I need a fallback plan and I don’t have one. Where would you go? What would you do? Keep in mind that the budget is limited to under $1000 and it has to cover two people. See how hard that is?!?! I am totally accepting ideas here. I know it’s my birthday and I should pick, but I just don’t know what to do with myself. So typical.

Welp, much to get done and time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping, into the future. And happy Back To The Future day if that sort of thing floats your boat. Have a great day and don’t get caught humpin around.

 

Something Strange Is Afoot

 

Happy Tuesday, boos and ghouls. Remember some time back when I thought our house was haunted? Yeah, still is. Or we have an electrical problem. But the ghost theory is more fun.  Our “ghost” problem began last night when Lovey went to put some garbage into the can that’s in the garage. Upon coming back into the house, he commented that it was strange that the garage door was open. Yes, strange indeed.

This morning, upon rising from slumber, I checked the door, and what do you know? Open again. And quite cold in the garage. Ok, door back down. Lovey off to work. 8 am door check: good. 9 am door check: good. 10 am door check: open. DAMMIT! WHY?!?!?!

Made a call to the folks who installed the garage door. To say that the woman who answered the phone wasn’t helpful is a pretty strong understatement. The point that she got across with the most clarity is that they wouldn’t be sending anyone out to look at it. So, I get it, I work in IT, I understand that when I have a problem that I cannot replicate it is hard, if not impossible to troubleshoot. However, necessary to throw other folks under the bus and reiterate on several occasions that you won’t be coming out? Nope. Glad I don’t have to deal with them.

Instead, I turn to my BFF, Google. Being the BFF that it is, Google gave me quite a few things to try to get this problem figured out. Fortunately, we live in a super low crime area, aka a retirement community, where I don’t think anyone farts without the neighborhood being aware. Randomly opening garage doors are a reason I’m happy to live here. A loaded 9mm, and scary assault rifles and shotguns are why I’m not afraid to live here. Bang, bang, I shot you down. (On the real, I hope I never have to do that. I never want to end a life, or even injure someone. I was bummed for a week when I hit a bunny with my car when I was younger.) Currently, still working on working this out. Boy is it annoying.

Made it successfully through day 2 of the self-created workout program. So much legs. So much jelly trying to get back up the stairs. Man, am I getting old. But, don’t tell anyone, least of all me, because I insist on continuing to act like I’m 25 even though my body is sayin, “Hey bitch, you wanna make some real fucking money?” Ha, no, Butters, really it’s just wanting me to take it easy a bit. But no. Snowboard season is coming up and either I prepare now or I pay some dire consequences once we hit the mountain. Be prepared!

And with that, you know what? I’m out. Still tons to do today. Peace!

It’s. My. Life.

 

It’s my life
It’s now or never
I ain’t gonna live forever
I just want to live while I’m alive

Sometimes, we (meaning I), just completely forget this. It is my life. I’m not gonna live forever. And I do want to LIVE while I’m alive.  It really literally isn’t now or never, but figuratively, it might as well be.

Last night I was handed some interesting news regarding my job. Nothing bad, just something that may cause me to be way more “in front” than I was planning to be quite so soon. While my job has been new and exciting thus far, things are gonna ramp straight up to overdrive next month.

After I had some time to absorb this news, I started thinking about my own well-being. I started thinking about the things that I’ve seen others do that I want to be able to do. I started reminiscing about the things that I used to be able to do and my body balks at them now. And I started thinking about how if I didn’t make a change, there would be no changes forthcoming.

Typically, I would have this revelation and then say to myself, OK! We’ll start this on Monday. But that’s how I would usually do things and the usual way hasn’t been getting things done. I decided to start this morning. During the week, I’m always up at 5 to get my workout/yoga in before I start work. I slack for a while and check Facebook/Instagram/email/Candy Crush before I get moving. Then before I know it, I’ve wasted too much time and I haven’t gotten everything done that I wanted to do.  Yes, I’ve wasted too much time to complete things in an almost 3 hour window.  Moral of the story: smartphones are the devil.

With this newfound (ha!) insight into my life, I figured I would try something new. The devil was to stay on its charger until AFTER I finished all the things I needed to do and it could come out to play when it was Instagram time. Whaddaya know, it worked! This morning I got my groove back with Cize (Shaun T), then probably bruised up my core with my weighted hoop, and finished it off with some yoga focused on the second chakra as it is Sacral September after all. Know what? It felt great! Something as simple as leaving that fucking phone alone left me all kinds of time this morning. Even enough time to buzz and gua sha my leg.

Buzz = using my magic wand to loosen up muscles and gua sha = something similar to Graston which you’re just gonna have to look up on your own. You’re welcome. You learned something today.

Even though it’s only been one day, I feel that I am now on the right path. I can start to believe that I am exactly where I need to be. This path of putting down the electronics and getting on the mat and being more present is where I need to be. A little more fit and a little more happy is where I need to be. I can see the path I should be on to meander around where I need to be and perhaps those branches that lead to where I can go.

I’m a work in progress, even at 41 years old. I’ll probably always be a work in progress and that’s ok. If you’re not making progress, then what are you doing? Question I had to ask myself. Do you need to ask it of yourself? Are you where you need to be? Do you know how to get there? Do you even want to? These questions – and many others – can only be answered by you….or the next episode of Soap. ( I SO hope that the theme song started playing in your head!)

Until the next time, all 4 of my readers, I hope you find all that you are seeking.

Hold On, Ready Or Not

And aspirin. Yeah, that’s the ticket. Because I forgot how much pain P90X inflicts upon my body. Is this just a woman thing? Guys, do you remember how much it sucked the last time you started working out hard? Of course you do because that’s the way you’re wired. But oh no, not us ladies. We forget these painful things until they are upon us again. Like childbirth. Because really? If you could really remember what that felt like, would you go through it again? Yeah, some of you would. I would not and I don’t remember.

So let’s see…a quick body check:

  • Neck – finally feels better after two hard snowboarding crashes.
  • Shoulders – ouch
  • Upper back – tight
  • Delts and pecs – don’t even ask
  • Obliques – don’t turn around quickly
  • Abs – surprisingly painless
  • Hips – that neverending story of discomfort
  • Quads – I have scootch leg, I swear
  • Hammies – not too bad
  • Hip flexors – trying to claw their way out of my body
  • Calves – need more stretching but at least they don’t hurt
  • Feet – need love

 
So those feet, let’s chat about them for a moment. If you watch football, and of course you watch football, or any other sport, or you STRUGGLE TO POINT YOUR TOES, perhaps you’ve heard of plantar fasciitis. This little nasty can happen when the fascia on the bottom of your feet tightens up. From what I understand, it hurts a lot. Right, Eli?
Don’t wanna get that? Hell, no. Me either. To work towards never having this terrible ailment, get that lacrosse ball out and roll out those arches! If you’re like me, it’s gonna hurt like hell, but you’ll suffer through because a pointed toe/foot is so much prettier than a flexed one. And we all use and abuse our poor feet so much, they deserve some lovin too.
You’re still here? Go get that ball and get to rolling! I’ll see you back here tomorrow after work, Zumba, and, as come on, Shoulders and Arms and Ab Ripper X?!? I’m done.