zumba

Another Day in Pair Of Dice

No, I’m not in Vegas and it isn’t looking like I’ll get there in 2014. We certainly want to go back,though. It’s been 4 or 5 years since we’ve gone. This time, we’ll do it in the summer though so we can check out the pools. No swimming in January, that’s for sure (at least not for me).

Others on my list of places to go include, from near to far more or less, Garden of the Gods, Crested Butte, Park City, pretty much anywhere in Cali since I’ve never been there, Banff, New Orleans, the northeast adventure (PA/NY/DC), and pretty much all of Mexico. I’ll leave my outside of North America list for another day. Have passport, will travel!

Yes, I’m on that vacation kick because, well, I like vacation and work is slowly driving me insane and I STILL haven’t even started doing the new position yet, at least not full time. When I get to doing this full time, they may very well put the pedal to the metal and bump that mother up to 100, making my drive to insane a heck of a lot shorter. I’m hoping that isn’t the case, but a very wise man once told me “wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which fills up faster”. Translation: yes, it’s gonna suck. You said you’d go all in for a year so have at it. Just keep dancing.

Dancing. Exercise. Zumba. I love that class. And now I have something additional to work on because I can’t just go in there and move around and sweat and be satisfied. I want to actually LOOK LIKE I’m doing it right. Tough one since I’m not Hispanic nor do I have more than one ounce of rhythm. Such a shame. I did get a hint to help me along my way from my instructor (whose hips NEVA lie) who is also a Samba dancer. He said, and I’m ~~making this up~~ paraphrasing, get out of your gringa ways and move your hips in the way that is completely unnatural to you! Yeah, yeah. I get it. In my head. Now what my body wants to do is a totally different story. Just keep dancing, just keep dancing.

From dancing to other fun physical stuff: handstands. They’re something that I’ve wanted to be able to do for quite some time. Why? No reason. Just thought it would be cool to be able to bust one out whenever I feel like it. Maybe on the mountain with my snowboard on, who knows? I suppose I’ve just never really put the effort into working on them (and this week I haven’t been putting in effort to working out very hard), BUT, Aerial Amy (over there in the blogroll in case you don’t want to search for this post again) mentioned how she’s going to do the 28-day handstand challenge. We have different obstacles to overcome, but she’s starting on Feb 1 and so I think I’ll join her. Perhaps Nina would like to join too. 🙂 Still a couple days to figure it out. Yes, I am going to add one more thing to the daily repertoire. Workout, stretch, handstands, write, breakfast, work, lunch, work, Zumba/pole/aerial, dinner, write, sleep. Totally do-able (insert eyerolling emoticon here). If I were feeling really outrageous, I’d add the 750 words a day challenge for February as well, but I think I’ll stick to just getting some (at least 100) words down a day.

Yesterday I realized that I hadn’t broken my goals down by month. Today seems like a good time to do that since there are only a few days left here in January. So let’s see. What should we do in February?

28-day handstand challenge
28 days of working out. Preferably P90X3, but snowboarding can substitute if I ride hard
12 split-specific days of stretching, 20 minimum total stretching days
28 days of blogging
28 days of writing lab assignments
Set up private and find my place in PDP with the L’Ru ladies

I’d go on, but I’m sure that’s ENOUGH! Just goals. I’m going to aim for them but I’m not going to beat myself up over missing any of them. Maybe blogging, but not the others because these are lofty goals. I swear a goal should be to clean the house top to bottom, but boy is that not fun. It isn’t even that it’s so dirty, just dusty mainly, but that’s gonna have to wait until a warm day where I can open windows and not be a dust-sneezing monster. I’m not entirely sure why this house has so much dust, but it does. It’s literally dusty within an hour after cleaning. Air ducts need cleaned much? Probably. Are we going to pay for that in a rental? No. And neither will the owners so we just have a dusty house.

You know how I enjoy my morning chats with you four, but the time has come for me to get a move on. Happy Hump Day!

Que Lo Que Ves?

Lotta ass in this video. You’ve been warned.

And what brings this up you might ask? Well, let me tell you. Last night, I went back to Zumba after a holiday hiatus of five weeks, as my phone was so nice to tell me. As we were dancing (or spazzing) up a storm, I started listening to the lyrics of the song that was on and trying to decipher them. My Spanish is not great at best, but I’m quite sure we were dancing to some song about a chicken. Zumba is also where I first heard that song up there, Veo Veo. Again, disclaimer on my Spanish, but between what I know and what the interwebs tell me, this one is similar to a kid’s song that they’ve just put a nice beat to. Anyone who is fluent can jump in and comment here, but my (very loose) translation is along the lines of “Lookie lookie, what’s that you see? A little thing, what’s that you see?” Internet says it goes through some letters that the thing starts with. No wonder there’s so much Ass in the video when supposedly the first letter is ‘A’. Regardless of what it means, I enjoy it.

Back on that Zumba tip, I forgot how much I missed it when I wasn’t going. Twice a week is my goal – Tuesdays and Thursdays. I swear it’s a coincidence that the teachers on those days are Hispanic. Anywho, we have a gentleman on Tuesday and a lady on Thursday. I like the Tuesday class because the instructor, Dan, makes it difficult. Not to the point where folks can’t do it, but it is Car-D-O! There’s also quite a bit of hip shaking and grinding fun. I like the Thursday class because Helene shouts stuff out in Spanish and it’s a good place to practice that while I work out.

Dan likes to go around the class and hip shake or grind on/with students. Don’t go getting all up in arms – NOBODY is complaining. I had always been able to avoid the grinding, not really by my own doing I don’t think, but there’s a chance that I rolled an eye once or twice. Knowing the formula, after the first bits of the song, I can finish it without a whole lot of paying attention to the instructor. Imagine my surprise when I glance up and see Dan making a beeline for me. Ummmmm….well, this isn’t a grinding song so what the heck do you want? He stopped right in front of me and put his right arm up and angled his left arm down, which, although you can’t see it, I’m sure you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about when I say it’s the international sign for “let’s dance”. Ok, in my case, it’s the sign for “try not to embarrass yourself” because I am NO dancer. Ask anyone who worked with me in Turks and tried to get me to dance. Or anyone in Ixtapa for that matter. The only time I can dance is the only time I can speak Spanish – when I’m drunk. I mumbled something similar before we did a little salsa with a turn out and one back in. I stepped on no one’s feet and I knocked no one down. I call that a win.

While it’s only been two weeks and change, I’m not ready to call my splits progress a win. But there’s a long way to go yet in this year. Pictures are more for me than you, so sorry about that.

I’d say that this looks like zero progress, lol.
Lots of time left in the year, thank goodness.

It’s the last day to sign up for the writing lab that I’ve mentioned. If I can remember to pick up one item after I shower this morning, then I will enroll. I have until, I believe, 2pm my time today, to stop being such a damn procrastinator. I have these books inside me and I know that at least one person would be down to read my mind drivel. Just need some confidence and focus and perhaps some encouragement. Yeah, that’s the ticket. Jump on this bandwagon now so you can say later, “I knew her when she was just blogging about working out and doing splits!”

Have you ever considered penning a book? Or two? Did you do it? What helped/hindered you?

Since I’m not that famous writer yet, I’ve gotta go get ready for work. Have a great hump day!

Seven Whole Days

So we’re a week into the new year. Doesn’t it feel like the holidays were already forever ago? No? That’s just me? *Cartman voice* Screw you guys, I’m going home.

I really do feel like Christmas was forever ago. I suppose that could be because I more or less skipped it this year. I didn’t put up the tree or the village as I wasn’t feeling it (and we weren’t even home the entire week of Christmas, so whom exactly was going to see that work? No one.) Maybe I’ll get back into the swing of things this year, maybe. I guess I’m one of those Scrooge-type people that could seriously do without all the extra stuff, just let me have a couple days off of work.

Speaking of work, this is new for 2014: I got a promotion. While it isn’t official for another week, I’ll be leading my little team of 2 (and a half) engineers whilst shaking the hands and kissing the babies of other departments. Is it my lifelong dream? No, not exactly, but I can do it and I can do it well, so onward and upward after a rather interesting process of getting to this point. I swear I watched one person in particular do a complete 180 in regards to how said person was acting towards me and my interest in the position. Weirdos.

Anywho, work schmerk, let’s talk about my breakfast sandwich maker. I LOVE IT! Now that I’m in my healthy breakfast sandwich mode (egg whites, smoked salmon, slice of cheese on a whole wheat muffin) , it’s so much easier to just throw the stuff in the machine, walk away and come back to a sandwich. Gives me time to do things like start writing the daily blog post. 🙂 I know that healthy breakfast and slice of processed American cheese don’t go together, but man is it good. Although, I am considering finding a different cheese because my sandwiches get too hot and therefore cause more of the cheese to end up on my paper towel than ends up in my belly, but that’s probably not such a bad thing either.

Sidebar: My mom just sent me an email and a portion of it said: “Let your confidence be as an earthquake – a force to be reckoned with – crumbling all negativity that comes your way. BOOM!

So day 2 of P90X3 was a little rough. These workouts are only 30 minutes, but they’re still tough. Today was Agility X. (It’s athlete stuff says Tony,which explains why I had a heck of a time..no coordination.) Jumping around and squats and lunges and more squats and lunges. I’m sure my knees will be feeling this tomorrow, particularly after I tried to follow it up with some hip and hamstring opening yoga and Zumba tonight. Somewhere along the line, I probably lost my mind. Before I lost it, I might have thought that this continual stretching and exercise might get me in shape. We’ll see what happens.

By the way, I haven’t forgotten about the writing prompts (or Zero to Hero for that matter). Sometimes the writing prompts just don’t prompt me to do anything but shake my head. Sometimes the ZTH item doesn’t require an actual post. Today’s prompt is about a time you felt helpless. I don’t do helpless. I’m sickeningly self-sufficient. More than my husband would prefer I’m sure. Perhaps the one time I felt a fleeting case of helplessness was about 20 years ago when I was driving down a hill (going to Monongahela for those that know) that had just been oiled and it had just rained and my tires were none too grippy. I completely lost control of my car, sliding on the wonderful mixture of bald tires, oil and water. Took a cruise down the oncoming traffic lane much to the chagrin of the car coming towards me who was laying on the horn as though I wasn’t trying to get the hell out of their lane. Finally made it back into my own lane, only to overcorrect and start spinning, Fortunately, it ended up only being a 180, but it was a slow motion 180 as I watched the guard rail come closer to the side of my car and hoped against all hope that it held as there was a rather large downhill/cliff waiting for me if it didn’t. Fun! Obviously it held as I’m still here. I did get out of my (new at the time) car and I literally expected my car to be bleeding. Hey, what do you want? I was like 19 and it was my first brand new car. I was absolutely butthurt. Possibly feeling helpless that I broke my car. Poor thing. No sliding around in the Brown Bomber though! I TRY to make that thing spin out but the ABS and AWD and anti-slip/anti-skid kick in and all I get is a little noise. Safe? Extremely. Fun? Hardly.

Well then, I suppose the time is now for me to wrap this up and get on with the day. Enjoy your Tuesday. Stay warm wherever you might be. It’s cold out…you know, because it’s WINTER!

Happy Halloween and stuff

Well, well. Here we are at the end of the month. Here I am ironing a toga to wear to work today. With shorts. And leg warmers. And a jacket. Inside. Because no matter how much the people change, it seems that office coldness never does. But cold and happy is always better than cold and miserable. And everything is better with chicken and veggies in the crock pot for dinner.

End of the month also means looking back at what I posted at the beginning of the month so let’s see:

Continue on with the P90X. One week in and I’m going strong. Strong and sore. – Okay, I didn’t do phenomenally on this one, BUT, I did make it to the gym probably close to 15 times this month. Seeing as how I’m still paying for going to the gym whether I go or not, I’m calling this one a win.
NaNoPlaMo – otherwise known as National Novel Planning Month. I’ll be trying to head on back to Mrs. C’s eigth grade English class to outline the book I’ll be writing in November. – Unfortunately, this one was pretty much an utter failure. I’m not necessarily surprised because I’ve never been an outline writer. I just sit down and put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard as the case may be). Come the end of November, we’ll see if not outlining was a help or a hindrance.
Zumba – I need to put together at least one class so I could sub in emergencies. – This is not done. I don’t really know where I thought I would find the time. Still needs to be done but I’ll kind of combine it into something else for next month.
Teach/assist at least 4 classes – Not quite. But that’s ok. There are only so many opportunities to teach in a month. This gets knocked out of the park next month, easily.
Read two books that have been sitting on my shelf. Both start with ‘w’. – Damn, failure again. Reading is just going to have to fall off of my to-do lists for a little while.
Stretch! Try for 3 times a week. – This one is actually good. I really wanted to be in that front split by the end of October (I almost typed Coctober, lol) but the last few inches are always the toughest. A few times this month I thought I felt my back leg touch the floor so I’m good with that. I’ll just keep at it. It isn’t as though I’m 18 and trying to force my body to do something it’s only done once EVER. And that was by accident out of sheer terror.
Pole. Home or studio, but at least 3 times a week. – Did pretty good with this one. Usually home on Thursday and studio on Tuesday and Saturday. It’ll switch up locations next month, but we’ll keep the intensity and maybe add a day.
No minds – This cannot even be judged. But I’ll say that I”m getting better.

I guess I’m running at about 50% for the month. For November I either need to be more motivated or I need to not try to do so much. Which way will I go? If you don’t know, you just don’t know. What should I try to do in November?

NaNoWriMo – Yes, actually write this novel. It is started. It just needs a twist perhaps. And an ending maybe. There are just so many ways the story could go. Quite fortunately, I will have a LOT of free time this month since we’re taking a trip to Florida. I see several mornings of squirrel watching on the porch with my laptop and a cup of coffee. This is the year I do it!
Teach – I am on the schedule!! November brings me four classes (would be 5 were it not for traveling). I just need to bring the funk to class and make sure that I give the ladies their money’s worth in the form of a nice workout, perhaps learning something new, and walking away with a smile.
Zumba – I need to do something with this. I can’t say what just yet. One or two of you know what I’m thinking. I just need to get it all together.
Stretch – Still want that split. Maybe I should push this one out to be by my birthday. I’m sure giving myself an extra 9 days past the end of the month will do the trick. <insert eye roll here>

I’m going to leave it at that because it’s still a lot. Might not seem like it, but I also don’t really feel like you want to know what I’m doing at every moment of every day. And if I tell you, that might create a stalker. Hahahahahaha, oh come on, not really. I’m not that interesting. 🙂

I’m off. May your day be full of treats and very few tricks. I’m on to costume two because costume one is not work (at least not office work) appropriate. Look at my Facebook photos to see it. Have a great Monday!

Going strong

I was just wondering if someone out there might do me a solid and add a couple more hours to the day. In return, I promise to put them towards reaching my October goals. I swear that I won’t use them for sleeping, Facebook, or Twitter. Only for reading, stretching, or choreographing a class, be it Zumba or pole. I’ll be waiting. You can reply here.

It’s a good thing that I love my job because it gets crazier by the moment. Yesterday, in combination with four meetings, I started training my replacement. Apparently, it wasn’t widely known that she was starting today. Umm, oops? I don’t think that it’s my responsibility to make those sorts of announcements. Which is why I didn’t. Surprise!

There are some other things in the works regarding the goings on at work, but they aren’t definite just yet. Let’s just say that I may have more than originally thought, sooner than originally planned. At least they like to keep me busy and they respect my fresh. Any time that I have even an inkling of disappointment or disgust, I just remember where I was a mere two years ago and that makes me overwhelmingly happy to have what I have now as opposed to the nightmare I had then. Pass the peanut butter.

About those October goals…..P90X is still going swimmingly (I just wanted to use that word). Into week 2 now and feeling good. I won’t lie, I was extremely sore over the weekend. Between doing legs and then a gazillion pull-ups, I was walking around looking like, oh, um, Frankenstein. Oddly enough, the only thing that fixed me was getting back to the exercise on Monday. (I know there’s scientific reason behind this, tyvm have a cookie.)

Day 4 of the month and I’m tackling 1/4 of my pole teaching goal. I revamped my class structure to make it a little more up-tempo and a little bit more difficult in the stretching and conditioning. “This is Level 2, people. Come on!” ~ that’s my Tony Horton impression. Since I’m poling today, I’ll get one of my stretch days in today. I’d like to get a class in as well, where I do work on my skills, but that may not be in the cards for today. I do still have to put together a playlist. We’re either going 80s Hip-Hop and R&B or Hair Metal. Bwahahahaha, my musical tastes are ridiculous.

Reading is going slowly because one of the books is just a difficult read. The writer writes like I do…too many damn words to say things. At least I’m not as repetitive as she is though. I hope. I will still finish the both before the end of the month.

Zumba, I hope to work on you this weekend. But there’s housecleaning and yard work to be done also. Why is it again that I can’t clone myself?

Alas, my time has run out for this brain dump. Until later….

zumba

Another Day in Pair Of Dice

Que Lo Que Ves?

Seven Whole Days

Happy Halloween and stuff

Going strong

You Missed

Nothing To See Here

Too Damn Slow

Ghosts (of Days Gone By)

Raunchy Activated