Hectic

Sorry i've been neglecting the blog.. I've packed my schedule so tight with activities i can't fit everything in. I decided to take some time tonight to quickly update some things.

First and Foremost: Kyle and I booked a spur-of-the-moment trip to Aruba. I am in desperate need of a vacation. Work has been beyond crazy (thankfully so in this economy), i have new responsibilities, plus all the high school drama that's found it's way to my cubicle door is more than a sane person can bare let alone a semi-nut like myself. We are outta here in 2.5 weeks and i can't WAIT to sink my feet in that glorious white powdery sand again. This is my third time back in almot 4 years, and i have missed it ENORMOUSLY.

Here's a pic! drool baby drool! lol

That's the view from the palapa.. I'm digressing just looking at it! lol

Ok, back to reality here...

I'm back in my weekly Yoga classes, and tonight was an AWESOME class (missed last week's because of SNOW!) A lot of Sun salutation and deep stretching, and Savasana was DEEP. This was, by-far the seepest savasana i have ever been in. I wish i can have her instruct me prior to my weekly Sunday night slumber bout, it is sure to make me sleep deep lol. The rest of the week is jam packed with high energy aerobics classes.. love that class too.. i have absolutely no co-ordination what-so-ever, but that's ok.. makes for good comedy.. i laugh, which is very therapeutic! I am getting the hang of it though.. so i only mess up the really tricky moves, i'm almost in sync with the the rest of the class! it's still funny as hell though! lol!

Then in between all of that, i'm packing and un-packing from my weekend trips to Kyle's, playing this damn game on Facebook that i'm TOTALLY addicted to-thanks Kyle, grocery shopping, and oh tanning.. i know i know.. but if i don't, when i get to ARuba i'm going to look like one of these suckers! (yes, that's a land crab from Aruba, and it bit Kyle on our last trip in '07! lol.. we wanted to see if it could swim! it didn't like that very much! lol)

Anywho, so i'm going a couple days a week to get a decent base so i don't ruin my trip.. like Kyle did when we went... men just don't listen when we tell them to put sunblock on! well he found out the hard way!

Back to tanning.. i find it kind of therapeutic as well.. i put my i-pod in the ears and i put on some snappy tunes and dance away while in that radioactive closet! it's fun, and the light makes me feel better too.. not so dreary.. since all it does around here is snow, rain and be overcast! you'd swear i lived in Seattle or something! jeez!

Oh, my friend Jess and her DH are going to meet us in Aruba mid-trip! they are going skiing then hopping on a plane to Aruba! can't WAIT! we are going to have a blast!!

So basically, in a nut-shell, that's my life right now.. when/if i have time or something interesting to write about i'll chime in. I also stopped blogging for a short while because i was in a very negative place and i saw it in my posts.. life makes me angry sometimes, and people make me angry and i can't see funny things when i get like that.. SO! hopefully! my trip will snap that outta me.. in the meantime.. I hope everyone is safe, happy, healthy and blogging away!

Keeping Busy for The Winter

Yesterday i signed up for more classes at my former high school. I will be going for another round of Golf lessons starting on March 19th (because i can't remember a damn thing from my last round of lessons). I'm SYKED!


I will also be going back to my Tuesday night Yoga family! Jeanne will be my teacher again. A side note about Jeanne. Last night i received, in the snail mail, a hand written letter from her thanking the few of us that waited patiently in class while she endured a 4 hours Joisey Jam on the Parkway on our last day of class last semester. She also thanked us for not even bringing up the fact that she offered a free class that night, 1 week prior to the Winter semester starting, when we signed up. So in double thanks she's offering a 3 hour double class for any and all that want to attend free of charge one week before classes start. I thought that was extremely nice of her and it really just goes to show you the caliber of woman she really is. I love my Yoga teacher!


My 3rd class is high energy aerobics. That class is held 3 days a week. So on Mon, Wed, and Thursdays i will have Aerobics. Tuesday is Yoga and when my Thursday aerobics class ends Golf lessons start until mid April. Not to mention the workouts on Tuesdays and Fridays at work and all the Wii fit games i play at night my bod is going to be super tight for the Summer! I can't WAIT!

So how are you keeping busy this Winter?

Happy Birthday to me

6 months later! lol
Kyle was FINALLY able to acquire the WiiFit i wanted for my birthday! He surprised me Friday night after work.. Needless to say I've been WiiFitting all weekend and tonight as well.

I'm ADDICTED!

(The running exercise is, by far, the most hysterical.) I love all the games but the tightrope walk so far.. I just don't understand it at all at this point.. I've gotten through it a couple of times, it's just the balance part.. I'm standing about as even as anyone could and it's making my Mii tilt like she is going to lose her balance.. I guess I'll have to keep at that one.. that's my CHALLENGE challenge lol.

I love the Yoga too.. It's helping me with my form and balance so when i go back to class in January (almost February) I'll have better balance and I'll be better at the forms too.. I'm so glad i have something to bide my time through the down time between semesters. lol!

Tonight i Wii'd for 1 hour and 6 minutes and i only technically "worked out" for 45 minutes. It felt great! I'm glad i have something like this to get me through the winter! Now i want Jillian's(trainer from the biggest loser) WiiFit game. The one the Fit comes with is pretty hard.. but once i unlock all the games I'll need a bigger challenge, and almost all my balancing games are unlocked.. well on the easy levels anyway. There are plenty of levels and challenges to keep one busy for a LONG TIME, but if ever i want to go all out i would like to have Jillian's challenge around to use.

The Ab workout was a hard one.. my abs certainly do feel it today.. but that's good. That's what i need.

If you don' t like to "work out" i highly recommend this little device. It's almost like you AREN'T working out because it's a lot of fun. I would highly recommend it to anyone.

Yoga should be mandatory

Tonight was my last class for the semester (I'm desperately hoping to get into Jeanne's class again for the winter semester, but it fills up quick). It started off very grim. I arrived in the high school parking lot to emptiness (usually you can't get a spot close enough to the building), but i grabbed my yoga magazine and started to read hoping other's would show up. Thankfully they did!

About 10 minutes before class was to start i headed inside and was greeted by one of the adult school teachers (I think he said his name was Todd, but i could be mistaken), he proceeded to inform me that Jeanne was stuck in traffic on the parkway (REALLY BAD ACCIDENT) but hoped to arrive about 20 to 7 and that i was more than welcome to wait in the resource center (where class is held).

About 4 of us started our stretches, and laughed, and talked about the anxiety we all felt about getting into the winter class. More people arrived and before you knew we were getting ready for breathing.. One very nice gentlemen decided to do Jeanne a favor and started us on our breathing, shortly thereafter she arrived and praised us, her pupils, for being patient and understanding, and knowing that we were not pressuring her got her through the 3.5 hour traffic jam she endured just to teach us a class she could have cancelled. For our reward we were going to have a restorative Yoga class. Yeah, it's what i needed big time.

I didn't understand what it meant, but i was a very willing participant! Basically restorative Yoga is when you never get off the mat. You never stand up, you do all movements lying down. I hate to admit this but i had better stretches and felt more relaxed in this class then any Yoga class thus far.

After twisting like a pretzel, literally, we went into Savangsana, deeply into it actually. So deep that as cold as that room was i didn't feel it.. after a while i didn't even feel the floor underneath me. It was like i was floating.. i was in Yoga sleep.. aware of my surroundings, yet not awake, i heard everything Jeanne was saying and also my mind was quiet. No pictures, no sounds, no ideas, no anger, no stress, nothing.. just quiet Yoga sleep. Until the guy next to me snored lol, scared the crap outta me! but i quickly recovered and found my quiet again.

I was very angry today for a few reasons, some of which are personal, and it took her traffic experience, restorative Yoga, and the guy next to me snoring, oh and the Chinese food tonight to help me out of that anger. Sometimes, even though being angry is bad, God makes on feel that emotion just in time to cure it. Had i not been angry i may not have had the experience i had tonight. I felt it leave me every time i had to hold a pose, or breathe a little deeper, or stretch a little farther. I found my total peace in Savangsana, and now I'm so happy i wanna cry! lol

Jeanne was kind enough to give a poem as a hand out with a tea light candle. She said whenever we need focus between now and the next semester in 6 - weeks, to light the candle and meditate, she also offered this poem by Carolyn Hoppe

Light a candle for help for each
Heart that's in need

A candle for every
Compassionate deed,

Light a candle for smiles on
The children's faces

A candle for peace between
Countries and races

Light a candle that shines like
A star in the night

Light a candle of hope

For a future that's bright

The trick is to Yoga and take vitamins!

I've been so busy setting up my other blogs that I haven't been paying attention to detail and I’m a little back logged.

Tuesday was my 2nd hard core, biggest loser style butt whooping by my corporate physical trainer. This session was just as grueling as the first, and I’m loving my metabolism right now. It's burning away. I'm already seeing some results.. I weigh in tomorrow, but I'm guessing 3 lbs at least.

My session consisted of the following:
3 sets of each
Wide legged squats with weight 15 reps
Squads with tension band 15 reps
Jumping Jacks 1 minute each set
Chin Pull Downs 40 lbs 12 reps
Standing Chest Press using band 45 seconds
Arm raises with him as the resistance 45 seconds

Abs 2 sets of each (I’m not sure of the name so I’ll give the description)
Lie on back, legs together, lift to 90 degree angle while holding weight lift upper and lower body up 1 minute
Bicycles 1 minute
After the session I popped Potassium, Magnesium, Complete B complex, and Calcium vitamins, and lucky for me I had a Yoga class that evening as well.

My Yoga instructor attended classes while we were on break for 2 weeks to learn new stuff. She brought Pilates style Yoga to the class that evening. It included tension bands, blocks and movements that were very similar to those that I had to use in my physical therapy sessions for 6 months this year.. I joined Yoga class to stretch and relax, not do PT, I do that anyway everyday at home as a part of my healthy spine regimen.
After we were finished learning our "new" moves, she guided us into our hamstring balancing act.. I love this move and it has diminished all tightness in my hamstrings and legs that the next morning i did not feel any pain from my work out with the trainer. The session prior whooped me hard to the point that to even go to sit down do use the facilities was extremely painful. Now I know how to combat this issue. Yoga and Vitamins!

Living up to my title!

OK! It's a Crazy Place and I'm here to live up to my name. I have a lot of different topics tonight that are wrestling around in my bean for the honor of making it to POST status.. It's almost like having 2 kids that fight constantly, and before you know it you scold and punish both of them and send them BOTH to their rooms even though you know one of them just didn't deserve it.. Well, that is kind of like what I'm having a conflict with so I'm just going to ramble on until I'm done! lol
First, i woke up in a combative mood.. Never a good thing for anyone. I was cranky but pretty tolerable during the day. I apologized to my co-worker in advance that i woke up combative.. (oops.. just realized.. forgot to give one of my PAIN IN THE ASS customers her tracking #.. oh well! she'll have the package before i get back to her anyway. OOPS!!! totally got side-tracked and didn't send out the Daily Sales Registers! OMG! you people can run your own report.. (see notes from dept meeting.. my boss said effective 10/13 i am no longer responsible.. those asking can see him-i love this guy! but i still feel guilty because a memo never went out to the reps.. this procedure kind of just HAPPENED to stop-oh well) OK where was i? Oh yeah... So i get through my day and decide to go to the park for a walk before Yoga class (because my lunch-time work-out with the company trainer wasn't enough to kill my sour mood). I actually walked for 5 minutes than ran my ass off in hopes it would get out the rest of the anger.. For the most part it worked.. i mean i RAN for nearly a mile non-stop.. i was so physically exhausted i didn't have the energy to be angry anymore! After my run I head to CVS for some lotion, but ended up buying another travel mug and a small box of cheez-its.. why? i have no idea. i get to class and wow was it a KICK-ASS CLASS!!!
The first (almost) 20 minutes she taught us breathing exercises (last week was the Buddha Breath). This week, if i remember correctly, it was the continuous breath(<-Correction 10/21/08 it's the "complete breath"). I was very relaxed by the end of that lesson. Then we did stretching and poses then went into Savasana. It was here that i finally think i, for the first time EVER in my life, was neutral. The best way to describe this is i had NO THOUGHTS, NO PICTURES IN MY MIND, NO DIALOGUE OF ANY SORT, NO TENSION, NO EMOTION, I was not sleeping, yet i was not awake, i heard her speaking, yet i didn't. I was in a trance-like state i guess you could say. I was amazed to say the least, and very appreciative..
Towards the end of Savasana my instructor read a poem (Update 10/21/08: Called Celebrate the Journey), she mentioned the name of the book but i cannot remember. It had the word YOGA and POEMS in it. In any event, the poem was perfect, and peaceful, and it made sense! I do remember that while she was reading it a picture popped into my mind's eye of myself and my SO getting married and (at first) I was reading this poem to him, then it quickly changed to my God Mother reading this to the ceremony go-ers. lol i am going to Google this and see what i can come up with because i think this is a sign of some sort. lol (I found nothing, i'll just have to ask next week lol) (Update 10/21/08: IT's called ONE SOUL:More Poems From the Heart of Yoga by Donna Faulds-and it's on order!)

Another thought is of a blog that i have been following by a woman that is married to a police officer and her journey as a CopsWife. It has afforded me the opportunity to reflect back on when i first met my SO, we'll give him a name.. his name is Kyle, and i will refer to him as such for the rest of my days as a blogger lol.. ( i was just trying to protect the innocent). When i met Kyle it was a freak thing called Yahoo Personals. lol yeah I'm an Internet dater.. had better luck there so i stuck to it.. I was fresh out of a relationship by about a month when Kyle hit me up to chat. I wasn't "looking" to date anyone, let alone date someone an hour away from me.. I was just looking for some companionship on-line to kill my boredom while i healed from the break-up. I was IM'ing with a few gentlemen during that month's time. I also picked up a stalker or two, oh and one VERY angry guy! I swear.. true colors don't show through until someone gets rejected! Thankfully i found out b4 anything ever went farther than the IM box! whew!
Kyle and i chatted for some time before i actually had the guts to call him and speak to him on the phone. I guess you can say i was scared because by this time i got burned by a lot of guys, went through a divorce, and just had bad luck with cops in the dating arena. I was in therapy to heal from the years of being mistreated and also being verbally abused by my alcoholic ex-husband, and my therapist didn't think it was wise to get involved with someone new until i got rid of the old.. I agreed with him on that point as I, myself, didn't feel READY to date again. I just didn't think i had it in me anymore to love someone or trust someone with this valuable package called Me! However, after almost a month of IM'ing and e-mailing i wrote his # down and i bit the bullet (no pun) and called him. A higher power made me do it.. i was nervous.. It wasn't that high-school-girl nervous.. it was a dark fear of what i wasn't ready to deal with again.. A possible relationship with a COP (because by now i know he's a cop).
You see, the guy b4 him was a sheriff's officer, and although we had a decent relationship he was the A-typical cop.. cheater, partier, anti-relationship, anti-marriage, frat-boy. Though older than myself by a few years he just didn't grow up, and he met someone while we were together-SHOCKER! but didn't have the balls to tell me in person.. he TEXT MESSAGED me on a Friday afternoon while i was at work. I mean COME ON! have more balls officer! but i digress.
I have, at this point, a really bad taste in my mouth as far as police and relationships go. I have TONS of friends that are police. and from women to men they all suck in relationships.. why? they love to party and with that partying comes infidelity. I only personally know a few that are decent human beings in that regard. Now don't get me wrong or misconstrue what I'm saying.. I love all the police i know.. they are AWESOME individuals in their own right, but they fit the stereo-type and i can't be involved with that in a relationship anymore.
That was my mind-set when i met Kyle. Funny, because when he was telling me what he did for a living HE IMMEDIATELY jumped on the defensive about the Stereo-Type Cops have..
I reassured him that i try to trust not all Cops are like that, as i (at the time) was aspiring to be a cop and I'm far from a cheater, never have never will! when i was separated i felt guilty even having a drink with a male friend b/c i felt THAT was cheating! SO i had no choice but to give Kyle the benefit of the doubt.
I'm glad i did! I remember telling my Father during a phone conversation the day before i was to go on my first date with Kyle: "Dad, if he has a missing arm i won't care, he's great!". This is all from phone conversations and e-mail conversations i based this on.. In-other-words.. for once in my life i wasn't going for the meat-head, power trip, BAD BOY. I was going for a REAL GUY.. A guy that isn't afraid to share his emotions whether it's anger to tears (still haven't seen those though) and everything in between.
In the first few months Kyle and I were dating i learned a lot about him. I learned a lot about what he is capable of in a relationship, what his strengths and weaknesses are, what his family is like (LOVE THEM ALL!), what drives him, and what turns him off. I fell in love with him after just a few short months.. I saw what a hard worker he was, and how much dedication he put into his EMS/EMT career, his LEO career, his Coast Guard career, The honor guard, The riot squad.. He's not a Whacker, he just loves what he does.. I love what he does too, and yes, I'm jealous as hell, i will always admit that.
Kyle is an amazing guy.. partly because he tolerated me and never got angry or upset or anything like that.. What am i talking about? oh yeah, there will be people i DON'T know reading this blog lol.. I "had" at the time, panic and anxiety disorder (story for another time), Kyle never batted an eye. When i was having an attack he was right there holding my hand, trying to distract me to get me to calm down.. He was my light when it was very dark.. and he never left my side EVER. For someone to put up with that for as long as he did is commendable in and of itself. I attributed that to his police and EMT training.. he just naturally knew how to deal with those types of situations. Thankfully those days are behind us, and the root-cause of that has been found and eliminated, but Kyle is still here and i hope he will be forever.
OK, that's all i got for now.
I hope you enjoyed my transition from Wildebeest to dove and the beginning of my relationship with Kyle.