Saturdays

Sundays have been my favorite day of the week for a long time, as evidenced here and here (yep, that's 2005, people!), here, and, of course, here, where I pontificate on my longstanding love of Sunday.

Sundays, move over; Saturday is in the house.  Saturday is totally my new favorite day.  I still love Sundays; Sundays are awesome days full of teaching yoga, breakfast with good friends, and food prep afternoons....but Saturdays?  *sigh* Saturdays are my new boyfriend.

Saturday morning I'm up early to enjoy the full duration of the day.  Spin classes and yoga take up the morning and the early afternoon.  Come 2pm, I'm home planted in the Great Red Chair of Sleep watching the Food Network.  Gatsby and I venture out mid-afternoon for a walk and he finds his Saturday joy sniffing and snorting and running around.  Other than that, I don't leave the house. 

Maybe I should...I probably sound kind of anti-social.  But here's the thing:  Monday-Friday I interact with around 200 people directly, and am in the presence of more than 2000.  On Sundays, I directly interact with around 50 people.  Saturdays?  I can limit my direct interaction to 2 people if I choose: my spin instructor and my yoga instructor.  I need not speak to anyone else.  So, in a way, Saturday is my day to refuel.  To practice as much self-care as I can possibly manage in a 24 hour period of time.  Sometimes that self-care involves other people--friends, family--but more often than not, once I'm home from yoga it's the Kelly-n-Gatsby show for the win.  

So, while I will never lose my deep love for Sunday, I am very happy to welcome Saturday to the fold of days that make me feel very happy and very lucky.  Tonight, my self-care involves the Wild game, Sliver (don't judge me), Ben & Jerry's pumpkin cheesecake ice cream, and chex mix.  Gatsby is barking up a storm protecting our castle from some unknown, unseen threat.  Life is very, very good.

I don't often laugh at the misfortune of others, but...

I really don't laugh at other people.  I'm not much into physical comedy--usually I'm all "oh my gosh, is that person okay?  How is that funny?"  But I get it, lots of people are amused by people falling on their faces...Chris Farley and Will Ferrell made careers out of it, so I just accept that I'm in the minority.

Tonight, though, I got it.

So, at my spin studio, there's a women's locker room with one bathroom stall.  Tonight, there's a woman in the stall when another woman comes into the locker room headed straight for it.  The woman pushes on the door, and it opens....the other woman had forgotten to lock it.  If you're starting to laugh, just wait.  That's not even the funny part; that happens all the time and everyone is all apologetic and embarrassed and goes about their business.

Not tonight.

Tonight, the woman in the stall, upon being "opened," proceeds to launch herself at the door with a velocity that really only belongs in the "run for your life" category.  Meanwhile, the woman who tried to open the door accidentally is using the proper protocol of apologizing and backing quickly away---which proved to be exactly the right thing, because bathroom stall woman is gunning for bear here.  But....the door opens in.  So, when she attacks the door, the door stops in its closed position, and the woman bounces off of it.  She bounces backward onto the toilet, which doesn't have any more give than the door, so she bounces off of that too.  Over the span of about 3 seconds, the woman ends up rebounding off of apparently every square inch of the bathroom stall sounding like thirty tennis balls in a dryer, and ends up square on her naked bottom on the floor of the bathroom stall.

I'm sorry, folks; it may be mean, but I DIED laughing.

And the best part (or the worst, if you're this poor woman) is that as I'm watching all of this, as she come to a splat on the stall floor, she *sighs.*  As if to say, "Of course.  This is exactly how my day would end, with my ass on the bathroom floor.  FLM."  I mean, we've all been there, right? (Well...not *there.*)

So, ladies, what can we learn from this?  If the bathroom stall opens, calmly reach out a hand and block the door--that's it.  The other person will stop when they see the destination is occupied; there's no need for a panic.  One must stay calm in all situations in which one's pants are around one's ankles.  Seriously.

2013 Cleanse Conclusion: My Spidey Sense

Today, the last official day of the cleanse, was an absolutely fantastic day. A cleanse resets the body, so food tastes better, the body moves a little smoother, the mind thinks a little clearer...everything is just, well, easier.  Here is a list of the awesome things I did today:

1.  Slept through the plows clearing the road in front of my house and my driveway.  More importantly, Gatsby did too.

2.  Returned to spin class with one of my favorite instructors, Natalie, for the first time in two weeks.  Natalie is an animal on the spin bike, and I get my best calorie burn from her.  I told her that this was my first post-cleanse workout, and she was all "Holy shit." I said don't worry, if I fall over I'm clipped in, and winked at her. She yelled "Don't say that!"

3.  Grocery store trip #1 for grapefruit, which I was desperately craving.  Got home and didn't have time to eat desperately craved grapefruit before heading to yoga, so I enjoyed an UltraClear on the way instead.

4.  Yoga.  Felt as amazing as spin class in a completely different way.  Spent a good amount of time in handstand.  Appreciated that I didn't have a gut full of diet coke and other crap.

5.  Grocery store trip #2 for post-cleanse staples. Also to inadvertently demonstrate to the woman at the meat counter that I am something of a roast beef connoisseur.  I don't know how that happened....she asked me about the difference between two types (the best she could offer me was that one cost $3 more than the other) and I waxed poetic about flavors, herbs, and sweetness for far too long.

6.  Home to make Gatsby's day complete, make pesto for tonight, and NOT GRADE PAPERS.

A most glorious day, indeed.

2013 Cleanse Day 2

The first thing I was aware of this morning, even before I opened my eyes, was the screaming headache that remained from cutting out caffeine yesterday.  The headache progressed through my spin class, prompted me to skip my second spin class (the endurance class I love) and sent me home for a nap.  It subsided for a bit during yoga, but now that I'm staring down the barrel of countless projects that need to be graded by Monday, suddenly it's back.  What's the lesson here?  I seriously needed to detox this caffeine from my body!  So, while the headache was painful, it was also a good motivator.

So...you're wondering what I got to eat today, right?  

Well, yesterday I eliminated refined sugar, caffeine, artificial colors/flavors/sweeteners, and flesh foods (meat, fish, etc.). Today I added eggs and other dairy products to that list, making today not a lot different from yesterday except for the fact that egg (whites) are my normal "go to" food whenever I need a low calorie, high protein treat.  So, I ate some oatmeal with brown sugar for breakfast (not from a package, of course).  I had an apple, walnuts and pasta for lunch and a snack.  I had some tea and another apple later in the afternoon, and some edamame for dinner. I had some UltraClear as well, which is one of the components of the cleanse.  I'll be adding that in more each day as I eliminate foods.  I'm going to have some brown rice later, and my last scoop of UltraClear.  Then it's off to bed.

I've definitely got "cleanse brain," that kind of foggy feeling that makes me forget my purse for spin class (and then look for it at spin, forgetting that I forgot it).  This will last for a few more days, and then as I get back on schedule with better foods, my energy and clarity will return.

The most important element to remember while cleansing, in my opinion, is to not underestimate the role food plays in everything we do in our day to day life.  Changing what you eat will affect your energy, your mood, your perspective, even your social life.  Sometimes for the better...sometimes not.  We are a nation that functions on food.  We are motivated by it, we celebrate with it, we even use it as a measure of intelligence and sophistication.  The worst thing I can do while cleansing is to act "business as usual."  I have to honor my energy and be sensitive to the mood swings as they arise.  

Tomorrow I cut out grains, nuts and seeds.  There goes my oatmeal, pasta and rice.  I'll be able to eat fruits, veggies, and legumes.  Means I better get some lentils on the way home from teaching yoga tomorrow--and I better write it down; I'll never remember with Cleanse Brain!

A Crossroads

Let's face it, folks, this blog has been languishing. I haven't been holding up my end of the bargain by giving you all good reading material, and I know that. I have lots of excuses, but most of what has kept me from writing is simply that I've changed a lot since beginning this blog six years ago, and even more so in the last two years, and I just wasn't sure where this darling blog should go.

It started as a "hey, this is me" blog. Then it turned into a "Kelly the writer" blog. Then a "Kelly the teacher" blog, "Kelly the yogi" blog, "Kelly the funeral director" blog, "Kelly the yoga teacher" blog, and "Kelly the grad student" blog. And it was in this reflection that I began to struggle---I'm done with grad school (yippee!), hanging out here doing my normal writer-teacher-yogi-spinning-Gatsby lovin' thing, and I'm all worried about my next blog identity.

This blog is, and has always been, called "I am what I am." Nothing more, nothing less. So, you can watch for more posts from me simply being that--what I am. I complain, I laugh, I love, I study, I read, I watch tv, I veg out on Facebook, I read blogs, I write, I learn, I practice..... I do a lot. And I want to share it with you. So, read on :-)

My new love

If yoga is my marriage, then spinning is my new midlife-crisis torrid love affair. I am LOVING it. My sixth ride was the magic ride--where as soon as I started pedaling my legs/body/brain thought "YES!!"

So, now I'm a spinner. Not a cyclist--I don't do the real road stuff as a solid measure of self-protection. I don't belong on two wheels on the road in any format...yet. Now to work on not destroying my hips and knees......