Sunday, November 30, 2008

25-minute restorative yoga sequence.
Meditation practice

Baby steps. But at least they're forward.

Thank you, Chris. +1 is not enough but it's all the forum will let me do right now! 

Monday, December 1, 2008

25-minute restorative yoga sequence

Meditation

Random pull-up attempts on the bar at home.

I'm not counting or measuring anything. Just trying to commit to doing something focused and physical every day this week. Then I will try to do it again for the following week, and then the week after. When I feel ready, I will go back to measuring and goal-setting and all that stuff.

Also, I think I have fallen out of love with ballet, and this is a pretty scary thing for me. So I'm working that out, I guess.

But in any case, I very very very much appreciate the support. You have no idea. Thank you again.

Thank you again, Chris.

The "falling out of love with ballet" may be just that my schedule is nutty, but I dunno. I sort of have this sense that I never want to go, and it's a hassle to put on a leotard, and I kind of feel like I wouldn't even miss it. I mean, I haven't taken a class in over a year--just been teaching, but I don't miss taking class. And I feel like if I never went back to the studio I wouldn't miss it at all. Teaching-wise, I have just been going through the motions, and it's pleasant enough, and I like the kids, but the zest isn't really there for me.

With school teaching, even when I have bad days, I still deep down have this love for it; I look at the hard times and accept them and use them as opportunities to improve my practice because I love it so much. But with ballet, now, all that just seems like extra work for which I get very little return.

So we'll see. The odd thing is, I'm not even excited about going to *see* dance performances, which is weird. So I dunno. I do know I retired from performing at exactly the right time. As to the rest, I'm not sure. I'm just essentially numb over the whole thing.

In any case, that's not what this thing is for. To wit:

Tuesday, December 2, 2008:

Worked 12 hours.

Wednesday, December 3, 2008:

Worked over 12 hours.

Thursday, December 4, 2008:

Worked 11 hours.

These long days will be over in about 9 weeks (7 weeks thankfully bisected by a two-week Christmas break). Then my overload quarter will be over and I will have my prep period back, and I'll be back down to 10 hour days.

Going to fit yoga in tonight, if I can. *fingers crossed*

Thank you for the encouragement and kind words, guys.

Still working 10-12 hour days for the most part. But it will pass. Also I got my NBPTS portfolio nearly 1/4 of the way done. Planning to do most of the rest of it over winter break. The thing is due March 31. Considering the instructions are 300 pages long, March 31 is closer than it seems.

My progress has been basically non-existent since my last entry. Today (12/13/08) I did my usual Saturday 4 hours of teaching, though, so that was something: yoga stretches, aerobic intervals (the concept in Creative Movement today was tempo, so we alternated dancing fast and dancing slowly), and a ballet barre over the course of the 4 hours.

Also did a one mile walk.

I also have messages out to Chad to try to get our winter training schedule down. Once that happens I should have more gym time to report, and that will be good. Chad is good at kicking ass.

Again, nothing monumental, but it was better than nothing.

Oh, PS: I heard back from www.grrow.org about our adoption application. They found a dog in their program that they think would be a good match for us! Finally! We applied and got approved to adopt back in August. I am trying to coordinate with his foster mom to try to set up a time to meet him; but it's possible, if we can get together, and the meeting goes well, that I might have a dog before the year is out! This will be *very* good for my general stress level/mental health and will also force me to at least go for a walk/run daily.

lol... nah, it's not as bad as people think. Somebody recently started a Training Journal entitled, "Only Losers Can't Keep To A Schedule," and since I really really struggle with keeping to a schedule (as evidenced by my training log), I decided to dub myself "Loser."

But I don't really think I'm a loser. It is what it is (my scheduling challenges). It was just me being sassy.

Thanks for the concern, Eli. I appreciate it.

Sunday, 12/14/08

Meditation practice
Was in bed by 8:30pm! Had plans to get up at 5:00 to do my morning yoga sequence, but I had crazy insomnia all night, so I slept in until 6:15.

Monday, 12/15/08
Worked a 12-hour day. 
Also: 25-minute restorative yoga practice
Meditation practice

I have the morning yoga sequence podcast queued up for tomorrow. We'll see if it happens. Will be in bed by 9:30 tonight.

Wednesday, 12/17/08

As suspected, morning yoga didn't happen. I got to bed at 11:15 due to the ballet class last night, so I opted for a bit more sleep rather than the yoga. Trying to keep sleep reasonable since that is where I first fall down.

Will do 25-minute restorative yoga sequence before bed tonight, and meditation. I also plan to be in bed by 9:30.

Diet was the best it's been in weeks (if not months) today:

Breakfast--1 egg, 12 oz coffee

Lunch--6 meatballs, 1/2 deviled egg, 2 slices cold sausage, 2 olives, 2 cheese cubes, 2 bell pepper slices (it was the holiday party for staff at school, they had this whole spread laid out in the teachers lounge and I bypassed ALL the processed, snacky, carby, sugary treats and just ate what I listed above, there. Wahoo!) Also had 1 whole pear.

Snack (oops)--1 handful mini-pretzels, 2 Hershey's kisses. Someone left a little treat bag in my mailbox at school. However I did have the willpower to give away the rest of the candy in my treat bag to some of my students before they went to basketball practice (I made them work for it though; they had to correctly respond to my questions in French )

Dinner: 2 oz camembert, 2 oz gouda, 1 roasted chicken breast, 1.5 cups steamed green beans, 1.5 cups green salad with 1/2 oz chevre & 2 T vinegar and oil. 2 glasses white wine. 12 oz water.

I need more water and less snacks, but compared to what I've been eating the past several weeks, today was a dream.

One other piece of good news: today I only worked 8.5 hours!!!!! *cartwheels*

Still feeling pretty, too. It's coming together, just need to tweak the diet, commit to the sleep, and add the physical training piece in. It will happen soon, for now I'm just getting used to moving again and having some structure back in place.

Morning yoga is queued up again... fingers crossed!

Christmas break is in two days. I am using it as a re-centering time. Aside from some grading and other random little errands and projects around the house, my goals for break are:

1. Work on my NBPTS portfolio, and finish entries 4, 1, and 2 or 3 (can't remember which is the other written one)

2. Daily GTG on the pullup, per Chris & Steve's advice. I am not setting "get a pullup" as a goal. I am setting "do daily pullup training for all of break" as a goal. And then I will go from there.

I need to remember the Chinese proverb, "Be not afraid of growing slowly, only of standing still."

Thank you, Eli!

New strategy: Over break I am going to try to state my daily goal in my journal in the morning, then update throughout the day, and post the final report in the evening. I did that in a Word file one summer (and pasted the file in my APK log each day) when I was really busting out the training and that worked well. So we shall see.

Sunday, 12/21/08

Goal: At least 20 controlled (5-7 seconds) negative pull-ups by the end of the day.

FINAL: 20 negs

Morning yoga sequence (25 minutes). They weren't kidding when they called it an "energizing" sequence. I feel like I just had a gallon of Power Thirst

EDIT: also completed modified APK warm-up:

3 x 25 squats
3 x 10 dips (subbed out for pull-ups on account of the GTG)
3 x 10 pushups

I had no idea how out of shape I'd gotten!

EDIT #2:
35-minute salsa dance workout (totally cheeseball but I had to move)
Intermediate/advanced-level Pilates sequence: standing, seated, and mat work
Also 5 more negative pull-ups (see total above)

EDIT #3:
Updating with diet information.

Breakfast: 6 oz coffee

Lunch: 2 cups salad greens w/ 2 cups homemade chicken salad (leftover roasted chicken, mayonnaise, Sriracha hot sauce, chopped celery). 1/2 liter water.

Snack: 1/2 liter water, 6 oz "Detox" tea.

Dinner: 1/2 can chicken vegetable soup with noodles, 1 grilled cheese (whole-grain bread, 2 slices colby). 1/2 liter water. A bit on the carb-tastic side but it's what we've got at home.

More to come as I eat more.

EDIT #4: Updating with more diet info and more GTG totals (see total, above). This last 5 seemed a little rough; not sure if I'll get the last 5 to make the 20. I am less able to keep the negatives nice and slow--keeping the last 2 in this set at 5-7 seconds was really tough.

EDIT #5: Final batch on the GTG. Almost didn't get 20. The last one was probably just shy of 5 seconds. I was getting *tired* really fast on this set. But, today's goal=achieved! Plus the other good stuff I was doing. I'll finish out my diet reporting once I get dinner and any other snacks. And I may do a bit more yoga tonight; either a restorative sequence or an arm/shoulder sequence (which will be mostly pushing work, but meh. Might be good after all the pulling I did today).

EDIT #6: Diet update for dinner.


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Leaving tomorrow night to head to my in-laws.  They don't have much in the way of a pull-up bar, it may be body rows with a broomstick while I'm there, but we'll see. And who knows what they'll have to eat.

I'll post updates on today's as they come up.

As a side note, I've been rocking the sleep lately (the snow day helped) and also been keeping up with "being pretty" which probably doesn't make much sense to you dudes, but trust me, it's a big piece of the overall fitness/wellness thing (at least for me).