LI Ashtangini

Moving

2008-08-03T15:06:00.000-04:00

I'm moving my blog to WordPress. You can find me here.

Well......

2008-07-31T16:27:00.002-04:00

Hmmm, looks like it's been a while. I have nothing to say.

Seriously.

Maybe Monday?

Day starts out very bad......

2008-07-16T09:47:00.002-04:00

It can only get better from here, right? I slept for 10 hours last night and could not get up at 5am to practice. Just couldn't do it. I've been absolutely exhausted lately, not sure why.

As seen on my commute in to work today on suburban Long Island:

Quality Cesspools
You Dump It, We Pump It

Yeah.

The commute in today was a total nightmare. The two-lane road that I take to avoid Cold Spring Harbor was being re-paved so I had to wait for an extra 15 minutes just to get out of Huntington. THEN Roslyn Village, on the other end of my commute, was a total construction nightmare. Basically it took me over an hour to get to work when it normally takes about 35 minutes. The best part is, when I got to work, the bathrooms were out of order. And they are STILL out of order. If they aren't fixed by noon, I'm out of here!

Surely this day has to end eventually and I can start over, right?

Offensive?

2008-07-15T09:48:00.004-04:00

I don't normally do politics on my blog as I'd much rather yammer on about my boring life but seriously WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?????? This cover is neither amusing nor thought-provoking. It's simply offensive. I think I need to move to Canadia.

Blog slacker

2008-07-14T12:31:00.002-04:00

I've been woefully remiss in my blog posting. Here are some highlights:

Practiced in my little yoga room on Thursday and Friday. Can't wait til it's all set up and nice! However, I did notice that my hands touch the ceiling during sun sals. Ooops. Oh well.

Went to the Huntington Shala for last class with that teacher until she returns from India in a couple of weeks. Had a decent practice, better than last week for sure. Second series looks a whole lot easier than it really is. We went up to ardha matsyendrasana, skipping laghuvajrasana and kapotasna. We partnered up and did a little supta vajrasana. It was nice but MUCH harder than it looks, for sure.

Went to not-so-anonymous shala on Sunday. G is sooooo sweet. I just love him! I picked up Anna in Roslyn and we drove in. I'm pretty sure I frightened her with my crazy driving but it was nice to catch up in person. When I was leaving G asked if I did dropbacks against the wall when I practice at home. I told him sometimes, not lately because I've had this weird hamstring thing that was affecting my whole leg. He said to also backbend against the wall and start trying to climb up. Fun!

We had some very unusual issues while shopping this weekend. Three different things that we bought came with missing pieces! We bought two stands for the playroom downstairs to put the tv/video games on, and one is missing a piece. We bought a patio set and all the screws were missing. And we bought an electric griddle and the power cable was missing. I guess we had bad shopping juju this weekend? BF was agitated but he did manage to put together my new bookshelves in the living room. Hopefully the house will be in such a state soon that I'll be able to take some pictures. Stay tuned!

No title

2008-07-09T09:49:00.002-04:00

I have no title for this post. I'm feeling rather uncreative this morning. I haven't posted in a while so here are the highlights:

The house is finally in a semi-livable condition. The kitchen has been scrubbed numerous times. The a/c has been repaired. The bathrooms have been cleaned (the kids bathroom has been hosed down TWICE and I still think I smell a funny smell). Most of the boxes have been empty and carted away by the trash men. BF has decided we needed a bigger tv. Um, yeah. We even put up some flowers and plants in the side yard. Two tomatoe plants, herbs and some annuals. We managed to revive the sad looking hydrangea bush. Our plan is to transplant the hostas that were planted seemingly randomly all over the side yard into a row growing next to the driveway. This weekend we will go pick up a patio set that we found that wasn't too terribly expensive, and I will buy BF his new grill for his birthday. Still lots of painting to do and the carpet hasn't been cleaned. Grrrr.

Practice notes:

I did manage to practice today in my YOGA ROOM. It's not at all set up yet, all of my buddhas and icons are still packed away in a box, there are spare yoga mats tossed about, nothing on the walls. But I did get in a good hour this morning, including a short and very sloppy headstand. I have something going on in my left hamstring still. It mostly hurts when I'm sitting in a chair. The pain is like a dull, annoying ache under my bumcheek. Standing forward bends seem to aggravate it too, so I've been doing them very gently. I certainly don't want to make it worse, I've read too many stories about people blowing out their hamstrings and not being able to practice for 4 months, 6 months or more.

Special pazzles out to Anna today.

Being in love

2008-07-03T14:58:00.001-04:00

This post is dedicated to all of my single friends out there.

Top 10 reasons I am in love with BF.

1. He's friggin' hot. Maybe not to you, maybe not to the lady down the street, but to me he's the hottest thing around. He's not tall or burly or particularly muscular. He's certainly a little shorter than the guy I had in my head. But in my eyes he's totally fantastic looking and he does it for me every time.

2. He's the best kisser ever. Seriously.

3. He makes me laugh. All the time. Every day. Stupid humor, intelligent humor and everything in between. Sometimes I think his stupid frat-boy jokes are funny but I don't laugh just to screw with him. LOL.

4. He's one of the smartest people I've ever met. I think it bothers him that he doesn't have a formal education, but he knows a lot more than a lot of people I know who are educated out their ass.

5. He's a 'guy's guy'. A 'manly man'. He can fix things like the car, plumbing, whatever. He likes to take care of the yard. He loves cars and baseball and big slobbery dogs. As a former musician, I've dated a lot of 'sensitive, artsy' type guys and now that I've switched sides I would never go back.

6. I can take him anywhere. I've taken him home to Florida to meet my family. Remind me to post about attending my cousin's wedding with him someday..... I've taken him to fancy parties on the Upper West Side, dive bars, expensive restaurants and everywhere in between. Never once have I had to worry about what he was saying or what people thought of him or whether he was bored to tears and wanted to leave. He's funny and charming and he can make conversation with almost anyone.

7. He's generous with his time and means.

8. He's a really great father. I don't think it comes all that naturally and he puts A LOT of effort into being the best dad he can be. I sincerely hope that one day his children realize that he really did try his very best to give them the best childhood they could possibly have.

9. He supports my yoga practice. He rarely complains when I get up at 5am, leave the house at 5:30. Or when I'm never around on weekend mornings. Hell, we picked out the house we just moved into partly based on the fact that I can have my own room to practice in.

10. He accepts and loves me for exactly who I am and has done so from the day I met him. He has loved me at 210 lbs., 150 lbs. and every size in between. He accepts my nutty psuedo-environmentalist tendencies (he draws the line at an indoor composter, however), my crazy southern-redneck family, my unbelievable need for order and control and so many other things that are escaping me right now. And that's really the most important thing of all. He's never once tried to change me or make me into something I'm not and can never be.

I know that there are many of you who are single and loving it. I was once also, and would be happy to be that way again. This is not a 'you need a guy to make you happy' rant. I just wanted to let all of you out there who are searching for love know that he's OUT THERE if you're looking for him. AND he might not be what you expect. He may not match that picture you had in your head of what your 'ever after' was going to be. Be open to the guy who isn't that tall, or who has kids, or who doesn't have a college degree, or who is nerdy or whatever else may come your way. As long as YOU know you are fabulous, he will know too and if he's worth his salt, he'll never let you forget it.

RUFUS!!!!

2008-07-03T11:01:00.003-04:00

Rufus is on the Pug-A-Day widget on my blog, to your right! Mommy's fatty fat bastard! Snugly snarfiness!

We have moved. Our new address is:

Dirtiest 5 bedroom/3 bath house EVER
Huntington, NY
Evil Island

It's done. And it's dirty. I don't think the people who lived here before us cleaned. EVER.

Random sampling of emotions over the last 48 hours:

Elation

Impatience

Hostility

Relief

Joy

Disgust

Anger

Love

Amusement

I have settled nicely into sheer exhaustion. And BF and I managed to not kill each other.

Tied up in a bow

2008-06-30T09:10:00.003-04:00

Went to Anonymous Shala for practice yesterday. It was so hot and sticky. And the Gay Pride Parade was scheduled to go down Fifth Avenue, right by Anonymous Shala. I almost bagged it then realized that it would be days before I could practice again, so I'd better get it in gear. Plus I had to give Anna the mysore rug that I ordered for her from LA. It was a slow, heavy, pokey practice. Two or three times I stopped and just sat there, saying to myself 'you can do this, really, you can finish this, you are not that tired'. I quit at ubhayapadangusthasana. When I couldn't get up and actually stop myself on my sit bones, I knew it was time to throw in the towel. The backbends were good though, I actually was able to press forward into my armpits for the first time. Now I think I know what people are babbling about when they say that! I also got a really nice fingertip grab in marichy c. I think I'm figuring out how to move the binding shouler forward and down so that the arm can really rotate behind. Fascinating. For the first time in a long time I also got wrapped up in supta kurmasana. That was nice too.

G: Can you put your shoulders under more?
Me: Nnnngggghhhhh. Nod head slightly.
G: (Presses shoulders under legs) How's that?
Me: Nnnnngggghhhh.
G: Chuckles

The packing went pretty well this weekend, we are almost ready. I think there may be two or three more boxes that need to be packed. I'm so tired though! The heat here is brutal.

Fate is a funny thing

2008-06-28T20:42:00.003-04:00

So after work on Friday I tried to catch the 5:11 train out of Penn. I ran for the train and when I got to the platform the train was packed, standing room only. I was hot and cranky and had to pee desperately so I said 'f it' and went back upstairs to the concourse to wait for the next train. I went back down to the platform to catch the next train. When I got down there, I realized I was on the platform that has the booze booth on it so I decided I needed some kind of 'de-stressor'. I bought a beer (seriously, I never drink beer) and turned to figure out which end of the platform was the front of the train. As I walked toward the front I saw a guy and thought he looked like a guy that I used to work with at the big evil law firm about three years ago. He was also pretty friendly with BF at the time. I tapped him on the shoulder, hoping it was him and I wasn't going to humiliate myself. Turns out it was! And he lives right here in Port Washington. It was so cool to catch up with him and now we have friends on Long Island! It was very cool.

Today I went to the led half primary/half intermediate class at the shala in Huntington. It was pretty good, my stamina is definitely improving but my hip flexors and quads are still REALLY stiff. Backbending was pretty tough today. Bhekasana. As if. I did one ustrasana and felt really dizzy and nauseous. I'm not exactly sure why. I did a second gentle ustrasana then we blissfully went on to UD. The teacher was trying to help me with headstand (again....poor woman, she thinks I might actually be able to do it, LOL) but she did give me a REALLY helpful tip about what I'm doing. Apparently once I get my hips over my shoulders with my feet still on the floor, I pick up one foot and my hips sag back down so they are no longer balanced over the shoulders. Well that's not gonna work now is it!?! Definitely something to practice with at home. Of course, now that the apartment is filled with boxes, there is nowhere to practice. Shiva only knows when I'll practice again after tomorrow. Tonight BF was trying to get me to blow off class tomorrow. Um, I don't think so!!!! I probably won't be able to practice again until Wednesday morning at best.

Stay tuned for a very un-LIAsh-like post coming soon to a computer screen near you!

Achey

2008-06-27T09:56:00.002-04:00

First, for the general diary stuff. I went to class today. I was supposed to have a private last night with Christopher but we ended up blowing each other off, for various reasons. He wanted me to meet him up on Mars at like 5 instead of 5:30 downtown. Uh, dude, I have a JOB! So I said, you know what, I'm moving on Tuesday so I'm a little nuts anyway so let's push it back to next Thursday. Cool.

Practice today was tough. I practiced Sunday then Wednesday and Wednesday was, well, pitiful. So I really haven't done much this week at all. My practice space in the living room keeps getting smaller and smaller due to boxes and bins and such. Therefore, I was REALLY stiff today. My right knee gave me that tiny warning pain it gives on the inside of the knee when my hip is too stiff to be doing what I'm doing. If that makes any sense. My knee is like my early warning signal. Any nagging pain on the inside and I know my hip is stiff. There's also something going on in my left leg, it's hard to explain. Right up under my bumcheek, my hamstring is quite sensitive and painful. Forward bending has been difficult all week since last Sunday. Then in the front there is a nasty tightness that turns into pain whenever it is stretched. I managed to lumber my way through the whole primary today though, so that's something. And three decent but tight backbends. Actually, given how tight I was, I'm surprised I could backbend at all. At this point I actually have the ability to THINK when I get up there so on the third one I tried to breath into the hip flexors to help them lengthen. I'm not sure if it really worked but it was cool that I had the presence of mind to do it! Slow and steady progress, as always.

I keep thinking of good 'substantive' blog topics when I'm offline. I have such a hard time remembering my ideas when I'm online! Moving on Tuesday and nothing is done in the house. Scary!

PISSED OFF!!!!!

2008-06-23T10:52:00.003-04:00

OK, maybe I take my work a little too seriously but I wrote the following letter to Lee Gomes, a journalist with the Wall Street Journal. He wrote this article regarding company anti-spam practices.

Mr. Gomes,

I'm writing in response to your article in the Wall Street Journal dated June 18, 2008. First, I would like to thank you for alarming the CEO of my company (a company which shall remain nameless) with your poorly researched and clearly non-technical article regarding anti-spam practices. If Dow Jones as a company has chosen to disallow its users from accessing their e-mail marked as spam, that is unfortunate for you and your co-workers. However, that is not necessarily standard practice with anti-spam vendors, and isn't even standard practice for Postini! Normally companies will implement a system, much like the one Postini normally provides, whereby the users are notified that they have messages in their spam queue and they can browse to those messages and choose to either release them or not. Not only have you misrepresented anti-spam technology in general, but you have made e-mail engineers like myself, as well as IT as a general group, look like controlling, e-mail patrolling jerks. I thought a journalist was supposed to bring all of the facts of a subject to light in their articles. My mistake. So, thank you Mr. Gomes, for making my job and the job of e-mail engineers everywhere that much harder. I suppose I should expect nothing less from the newspaper that brought us an article entitled "10 Ways to Get Around Your IT Department".

Fuckmuppet.

Seriously....

2008-06-22T12:00:00.003-04:00

It's Sunday and G is back so I went to Not So Anonymous Shala for class. It was good to see him, he seemed full of energy and extra cheerful. So, I figured after yesterday's BRUTAL Laughing Lotus class I would be really sore and stiff but not so! Actually, I've found that I have the best Sunday practice if I do some sort of ultra-criminal class on Saturday. Anyhoo, there is some soreness in my front ribs, which Anna thinks is the result of the MULTIPLE vasistasanas. How did she manage to get me to go to the class that REPEATEDLY did the one pose I hate? I'd go again though. I did a little bit of R&D before I got started, pigeon, firelog etc. I did 4 A's and 4 B's (very unlike me, I hate the B's). I was so tuned in during padahastasana that I missed G going to the front of the room for chanting and bolted upright during Om. Oh well. Standing poses were pretty good, I feel like I'm really making progress. No help in UHP, whatever. I need to learn to do it on my own anyway. New perspective on Janu A from G, that was interesting. Assists in Marichy A, B and C from the assistant, I just love her. I notice that C is coming along. I got my upper arm in front of my knee and managed to get my wrist wrapped around my ankle so that my hand was behind, all on my own. Wow! It actually kind of startled me, the assistant laughed. The navasana was still pitiful, perhaps I should do more of them during practice. I'll try that. After Navasana, I looked up to find G because we had discussed me doing bhujapidasana. It was two weeks ago, I didn't expect him to remember. I caught his eye and he said 'oh, it's the look'. LOL. I asked if I should keep going and he said 'yeah, sure' with moderate enthusiasm so I did the whole thing except setu bandhasana.

Here's where it gets dicey. I lay down on my back to do the chakrasana after supta padangustasana, rolled my feet over my head and farted. Um, unfortunately somewhat loudly. It totally came out of nowhere and I was mortified BUT I didn't lose my cool, I managed to execute the best chakrasana I ever have and just kept on going like nothing happened. To my fellow anonymouse shala-mates, I'm so sorry, I really didn't mean it. It happens, I guess. Moving on, I did my three backbends (with restasana between, need to work on that), five breaths each (longer breaths than last time). Then I did my baby dropbacks and saw the floor again, yikes! I also managed to remember paschimatanasana.

So I moved to the back of the room for finishing and that was pretty good too. I actually managed to gather up my legs and do a half-headstand with bent knees for about four breaths. Now, I know that doesn't sound like much to long-time headstanders but I seriously am afraid of headstand and rarely can do it without the wall, especially in a room full of people.

All in all, it was a fantastic practice, even with the flatulence.

In other news, we just got back from seeing The Incredible Hulk movie. Seriously, I really liked it. And, much to the chagrin of the men of the house, I really hate action movies. This one was good, even if Liv Tyler was a bit much with the pouty face and big sad eyes. Definitely better than Iron Man. If you have older kids who can handle it, definitely go see it.

Doggies are so cute

2008-06-21T19:03:00.002-04:00

I went to an early vinyasa class at Laughing Lotus with Anna. It was such a fun class, early in the day, the teacher was so sweet and I loved her music selections. The studio had a great vibe and the facilities were nice. I bought their intro special, three classes for $30 so I guess I'll be going back! After a loooooong series of modified sun salutations and standing poses, the teacher dove right into handstand and I dove right out the door to the ladies room. My fear of handstand is stupefying, seriously, plus I was feeling a tad lightheaded and dizzy, so it seemed like a good time to use the facilities and splash some water on my face. When I came back she was having everyone prepare for viparita salabasana. Yeah. The teacher had us do it at the wall but she did it at the middle of the room. Very nice! Anna and I had a few giggles along the way, especially when I ran away from handstand. After class we had a bite to eat and talked and talked and talked. And petted doggies. We think we saw a shiba, plus there were staffies, what looked like a Brussels Griffon pupppy, and two Italian Greyhounds who were terribly cute and very friendly. Naomi Watts was sitting right behind us, I could only see her in the reflection of the glass but she was gorgeous nonetheless. That's the fun of living in NYC or LA. You never know who you might run into!

On the drive home I wrote up a lovely, introspective, probably far more interesting blog post in my head. And of course it's gone now. I need to figure out how I can keep these posts that get written up in my head. Usually my blog ends up being a diary rather than any interesting rumninations.

I've been doing some ruminating about my YOGA ROOM that I will have in the NEW HOUSE. I can't decide what color scheme to go with - either a jewel-toned with lots of brightly colored silk pillows and heavy incense a la Jivamukti and Laughing Lotus or a spa themed color scheme with lots of Zen elements and a nice, neutral paint color a la Home Simply Yoga. If anyone has any opinions, I'm all ears! I'm also hoping to make this house as 'green' as I can without spending a ton of money redoing stuff that doesn't need to be redone. If anyone has a good book or online resource for natural methods of cleaning I would greatly welcome that information. I think I realized (in the middle of the night last night) why the kitchen in the NEW HOUSE is set up the way it is. It has an odd but nice-looking double sink that's separated, there's a built-in oven in the wall but also a regular stove/oven combo. It's a frigging Kosher kitchen, DUH. Had to share that revelation with everyone.

That's all for now.

Boring today

2008-06-20T11:43:00.002-04:00

I had a low-motivation practice today. I finally heaved myself out of bed at about 5:40. I managed to get on the mat by about 5:50am. I did some sun sals and started the standing then gave up. I was just sooooo not motivated. BUT, since I was there, on the mat, I decided to do some of my favorite backbends. So that was fun. And really, at least I practiced. I'm going to a vinyasa class (bad lady!) with a friend on Saturday morning then full practice on Sunday at Not-So-Anonymous Shala. So, really, it's a fairly decent practice week. Every week gets just a little bit better. BF keeps whining when I want to go to bed at 9pm sharp (or earlier) and this contributes to my inability to leap out of bed at 5am. I guess I'm going to have to put my foot down and go to bed on time.

I made banana bread last night, it's pretty tasty. And I bought a piece of salmon at Whole Paycheck. I'm going to take up DZM's challenge for today and Google a recipe when I get home, using the ingredients in my fridge and pantry.

Other than that, it's pretty boring around here. My co-workers all took dumbass pill today so everyone seems about 20 IQ points dumber than they were yesterday. I have no idea what's going on there but it's annoying!

Update

2008-06-19T11:05:00.003-04:00

I got an update on Rocky yesterday afternoon. The lab results came back on the tumor and it is Grade 1 Mast Cell tumor which basically means it's non-cancerous. The margins are clean so they believe it will not grow back. Yay! Little Rockefeller.....such a sweet boy.

I practiced this morning. I argued with myself in my head for about ten minutes before I hauled out of bed at 5:05. Threw on yoga clothes, went downstairs, turned on the heater, got all set up and went to it. And, seriously, I did the whole primary series. In my living room. Didn't drop any vinyasas, even in-between. Also did baby dropbacks. I didn't see the floor this time but that's ok. What's even more miraculous is I'm not in pain from the backbending any more. The annoying pain in my hip seems to be dissipating. Dammit, Teacher was right! The more I practice the easier and less painful it gets. I almost didn't get out of bed but then the realization that I have another private one week from today launched me right out of there. Nothing like the fear of disappointing your yoga teacher to get you out of bed at 5am! AND I did it all in about an hour and a half. Including a 25-breath savasana. Outstanding.

No other real news to report, Mercury moves out of retrograde today (is that how you say it? I don't know) so hopefully this house thing will get rolling full steam. We have a lease but we don't know when we can move in! Jeez!

I'll have the weekend to myself, it is our weekend to have the FSC but they will be with their father in Smithtown pretty much the whole time. Let's see, what WILL I do with my time?????

I'll be sore tomorrow

2008-06-15T12:50:00.002-04:00

I had a fantastic practice. For the first time in months I did the entire primary series except for setu bandhasana. AND I managed three good backbends, five (quick) breaths each. AND I did my baby dropbacks on the wall. AND I saw the floor on the third one. That's right, SAW THE FLOOR. It freaked me out so I came right back up. That was enough for me! I forgot to do paschimatanasana after my backbending (oops). Went behind one of the big pillars to do my finishing. Frigging shoulderstand felt fantastic. I don't know if it was the humidity or the heat or what but it just felt GOOD. The sub whipped me into Marichy C which is still REALLY scary. I can't figure out how to breathe into my chest in general and in that pose in particular. It's like a big neon sign that says 'belly breather, belly breather'. What can I say, wind musicians don't breathe into the chest. We're taught to breathe all the way into the belly and to exhale FROM the belly. The assistant gave me some good advice about that though so I'll see how it goes. By the time I was all finished, I was totally blissed out and wiped out so I was grateful for savasana and had no trouble doing my 25 breaths. In spite of the fact that the room was complete chaos. I attribute that to the fact that the sub is a little 'green' as a teacher. Now I'm just in a really great head space. Nothing could piss me off today. I think......

For those of you who have been keeping little Rockefeller in your thoughts and prayers, he's fine. The tumor was larger than they thought and the surgery took a bit longer than it was supposed to. He has a lot of stitches and the incision is longer than we expected. We'll call him scarface now? He's ok though, and his big brother is VERY happy to have him back at home.

Worries.....

2008-06-12T11:49:00.001-04:00

Rocky is in surgery today. Meep! :(

Boring practice post

2008-06-11T11:14:00.002-04:00

I managed to haul my lazy bum out of bed this morning at about 6am and get in an hour's practice. A whole hour!!! I actually worked up a sweat and everything. I'm quite proud of myself. I tried to backbend and the first one was quite stiff so I did bridge instead, working the legs really hard. Walking up and down the stairs is now quite difficult. I did my required 25-breath shoulderstand and halasana. I can't yet make it to 10 breaths in my half-headstand, so that's where the work is. I also managed 25 breaths in savasana and only got truly distracted by the monkey mind once.

Stay tuned on updates regarding the house! I don't want to jinx it by blogging about it before it's all settled.

Required reading

2008-06-10T15:59:00.003-04:00

Anyone who has any love or compassion for animals should read this.

Puppymill investigation

Please don't buy puppies. Adopt or rescue!

Reality

2008-06-10T15:24:00.003-04:00

This is going to be a disjointed post. Mostly due to the fact that my head is rather disjointed right now.

It's blazing hot here in the greater NYC area. I don't deal vey well with the heat, which is why I moved out of Florida to begin with. It's only June. June is supposed to be nice weather here. Not 98+ degrees.

It's ladies holiday on my planet right now, so no practicing. Probably tomorrow though. I'm planning on making another private appointment with Batman for maybe a week or two from now, as motivation. Apparently Boy Wonder won't be at Anonymous Shala on Sunday, which is a major freaking drag.

Today I'm calling up my father's creditors, telling them that he has passed away with no estate. It's very depressing. Nothing like seeing his death certificate to bring home that fact that, yes, he's actually dead.

My (obviously insane) boss left me in charge while he's out at a conference, so I'm basically doing two people's jobs right now.

We haven't started packing yet, and the process of getting a lease signed is dragging unbelievably. Now we're going to have to make an appointment with the landlord's attorney to hash out the lease.

Fuck.

In India they.....

2008-06-07T16:08:00.002-04:00

I'm all for ashtangis going to India. In fact, I would love to go there myself to practice one day. They just have to address that whole showering/toilet/stray puppy issue. But I get really irked when people come back and are full of 'well, this is how Sharath does it' and 'Guruji says this' and 'Guruji doesn't like that'. I prefer it the way Teacher does it. He just says 'my teacher taught me this way, so this is the way I teach it'. I went to the led half primary/half secondary at the studio in Huntington. Or so I thought. Turned out is was a led primary but not everyone was allowed to finish. I distincly remember having a discussion with the teacher/owner last week about how she changed the format of the Saturday led primary class to be led half primary and half secondary up to ustrasana. I thought that sounded like fun, and certainly more asana practice than I would get in the vinyasa class that comes before it so I figured I'd go. Otherwise I would never go, I despise led primary. I really dislike going at someone else's pace. So I get there and it's a different teacher and she just got back from Mysore like literally last week. OK, whatever. I need to practice so no biggie. The class starts and she announces that 'we are going to do it like they do it in India'. Which means led primary only, everyone goes up to Navasana and if you can't bind the marichys then you won't go past that. So during navasana she (very publicly) taps like five people to keep going. She stops two more at kurmasana. There were only two people who finished the whole primary series. One guy asked if he could just TRY bhujapidasana and she's like 'no, just sit and watch and do the vinyasas with us'. Um, fuck that. I did my backbends and finishing along with three or four others and left when the 'advanced practitioners' were in shoulderstand. Oh yeah, you're not surprised that I wasn't one of the ones who wasn't asked to keep going are you? Because I wasn't. I didn't really care that I was stopped, it wasn't that big of a deal. It was more the vibe of the class that I found to be a problem. I need to find out if she's the permanent Saturday teacher because if she is then I think I've hit a dead end again for finding a steady class. I know that I'm picky about my teachers, I can't take a class with just anyone but I don't think I'm being particularly picky here. She just rubbed me the wrong way. Very 'I went to India - holier than though' kind of attitude. The whole time it was full of 'Sharath says this' and 'Guruji says that'. Um, if I wanted to know what Guruji and Sharath had to say, I'd fucking go to India!

More Not So Anonymous Shala drama that I won't go into here. Apparently not only are we not supposed to blog about our teachers but we aren't supposed to blog about our shalas either because they're monitoring us. Not acceptable.

Still working on getting that lease signed so that I can sleep at night again.

It's soooooo hot and I'm exhausted. BF is adamant that I go to the movies with them tonight to see Indiana Jones but I don' wanna!

Savasana is the hardest pose

2008-06-04T16:51:00.002-04:00

So, I know you're all dying to know....

I did my sun salutations today. Then Pashimatanasana, sarvangasana, halasana (15 breaths each, mind you), sirsasana prep (feet on floor) for only 10 breaths, that was all I could do and I 'took rest' for 25 breaths. For what it's worth, sarvangasana is difficult when you haven't done a full practice. I was so stiff my arms felt like they were going to break off under there. I don't usually have much trouble with shoulderstand so I'm assuming it was because I hadn't done a full practice, and also because I'm still a little sore and stiff from the private with Teacher. Oh yeah, and did I mention that he whipped me into Marichyasana A, B AND C like it was NOTHING. And it never hurts. How does he do that???? Magic Mysore yoga teacher juice?

It looks like we are FINALLY going to receive a lease for the house that we've been trying to rent for almost two weeks. Happy dance! It's a great house and is a real bargain. We actuallly started looking again this week because we started to get antsy about not having a lease yet. Nothing in this price range compares to this house at all. So, fingers crossed that all of this will be resolved by early next week because it's time to start PACKING!!!!!!

Private and surgery

2008-06-03T09:33:00.004-04:00

First off, my little Rockefeller is having surgery on Thursday. All this talk of Mercury in retrograde has me nervous about it but it's supposed to be fairly simple. He has a mast cell tumor on his eyelid. It sounds more gross than it is, basically a tiny patch about half the size of a dime on his eyelid is a teensy bit swollen and all the hair has come out. It changes in size and shape according to the allergens in the air and his excitement level. The vet did a needle biopsy on it and deemed it 'suspicious' so it needs to come off. Because my ex is a painful bastard, that's all the information I have (even though I'm paying for half the surgery, HELLO). Supposedly he keeps his eye and eyelid? Hopefully he doesn't look too funny when he comes out, not that we care but I don't want people to see him and be grossed out or feel sorry for him. He's such a happy lovey little dog. Mama's boy! Our bigger worry is that Rufus will be without his brother all day on Thursday. This doesn't sound like a big deal except Rufus is a very insecure pug. I mean, like, when he gets separated from Rocky or either me or my ex, he CRIES. LOUDLY. And it's annoying. He's going to annoy the crap out of my ex's wife. I'm ok with that, tee hee. She's kind of a bitch to me. And to my ex, if you must know.

Here is a picture of Rocky with his tumor. You can see on his left eye (to your right) the eyelid is swollen and you can see a red spot.

Here's my baby boy as an overgrown puppy:

Play with me mommy!!!!!!

OK, so the private with Teacher. It was pretty weird. I've only ever done a private by accident, like when no one else showed up to class but me. It's very disconcerting to have someone stare at you like that for over an hour and a half. Here are the highlights:

1. Must practice more consistently. The current goal is to do three days a week full practice and at least two more days a week surya namaskara and more if possible.

2. Finishing postures (sarvangasana, halasana, sirsasana, padmasana) are the most important ones. I must work toward 25 breaths in each. Bah!

3. My breath is GOOD. If I just stay with what I have for that, and work on the bandhas and dristhe, I'm doing what is supposed to be done.

4. I should be doing all of primary, even if I modify. There's no reason to stop. I am perfectly capable RIGHT NOW of getting my toes up off the floor in bhujapidasana.

5. Must 'take rest'. I hate savasana but apparently I must do it no matter what. Again, BAH!

6. I should 'sit' either upon waking up or just before going to bed. A little meditation. I'll buy that.

And here's the stuff that I'm putting on the shelf for now:

1. Eating meat creates some kind of acid that will prevent me from binding easily in the marichy's. Um, yeah, we'll see.

2. I can get my toes up off the floor in bhujapidasana. Whatever!

3. I sleep too much. The fact that I sleep more than 8 hours on a regular basis (I'm a 9 - 9.5 hours a night kind of girl) is part of the reason I have such a hard time relaxing in savasana. Teacher cited some recent sleep study or some such. Um, again, doubtful but I'll take that under advisement.

So, those are the highlights. My current plan is to do this maybe twice a month. It's EXPENSIVE, not that Teacher isn't worth it but who has the money to pay someone to teach them privately? Oh yeah, rich people. And I am not rich.

Privates (and private)

2008-06-02T16:23:00.002-04:00

I have a private with the former Teacher today. In two hours. Let the nervous peeing commence.

I have absolutely nothing to post about. Everyone is going private, it sucks. I mean, I got invites and everything but isn't blogging about saying what you want to no matter what? Probably not. I know I don't say whatever I want. Because there are some people in my non-yoga world who read this blog. So there's a lot of stuff that goes unsaid in my own blog because it's public. I get it.

Did I mention I have a private? At 6:30? Ummmmm, yeah.

More on that tomorrow.

Mellow rock hits of the 70's

2008-06-01T11:43:00.002-04:00

That was the soundtrack this morning in the car on the way to Anonymous Shala. I was in a great mood, really looking forward to my practice. And therein lies the rub. Because it SUCKED. It sucked all day long and twice on Sunday. I stopped several times during sun sals. I was soooo tired and felt like I couldn't breathe. Lately I've been doing a lot better during sun sals and standing, able to really get up a flow and not 'putzer' so much. I must have stopped ten times today during standing alone. I just felt exhausted.

And then I got to tiryangmukhaikapada paschimatanasana. My nemesis. The pose I hate the most in the primary series. Not the pose I hate the most ever (that award goes to vasisthasana) but pretty freaking close. In over two years I have made incremental progress. I mean, I don't sit on the block any more because, really, what's the point? My butt has probably dropped about an inch toward the floor. Maybe. On a good day. The butt cheek of the folded leg will NEVER get to the floor, it seems. And that's where the spiral began. Here's what it sounded like in my head:

You'll never be able to do this pose.
You're way too fat to be doing yoga.
Look at how thin she is next to you. You'll never look like that.
Why can't I do this pose? Everyone can do this pose but me!
Because everyone else is thinner than you. And way more disciplined than you.
I'm tired of not having a teacher! If I had a consistent teacher maybe I could actually DO this crap.
Not likely.

And on and on and on. Boy Wonder came over to help me out. Basically he pushes his leg up against my 'listing' side so I don't fall over like a bloated yacht. And that's when the tears began. I cried into my towel for a while. Then moved on. Then cried into my knee in Janu A. I skipped Janu B, I didn't even mean to. Frankly I wasn't in the mood at that point to jam my heel into my perineum anyway. Hurts my wound. I finally (mercifully) got to navasana. I lay down to backbend and got up once and it felt so bad I didn't go up again. I just picked up my stupid smelly heavy rubber mat and went behind one of the gigantic pillars to cry in peace.

And that's when Boy Wonder followed me. DAMN! Of all the days for him to notice me!

We kind of introduced ourselves to each other. I explained that my attendance seemed sporadic because I live and work on Long Island and it is difficult for me to get into the city. He offered to give me more poses next Sunday. Which is really sweet and I was, of course, very touched. Need I remind everyone that I HAVE ALREADY BEEN GIVEN ALL OF PRIMARY SERIES????? I told him I had but that I was stopping at navasana because I cannot do bhujapidasana at all. But I told him that if he was willing to teach me it, we could give it a go.

So, yeah, that's my day. I'm not allowing comments on this post because, while I dearly love and appreciate the support of the cyber-shala, I'm CERTAIN that people are tired of my 'woe is me' posts. Frankly, I'M tired of them. I just felt like I had to get this all out.

Did I mention that I'm pretty sure that this meltdown has PMS written all over it?

ARGH

2008-05-30T05:11:00.001-04:00

It is the ass crack of dawn. WHY AM I AWAKE??????

Congrats to K!!!!!

2008-05-29T14:52:00.001-04:00

My friend K got into Pace University to pursue his Doctorate in Professional Studies in Computing.

Way to go!!!!!!!!!

The Eagles!

2008-05-29T10:12:00.002-04:00

As in, the Southern/Country Rock band. Yep, we saw 'em last night. I've always loved the Eagles, since I was a little kid back in the 70's. They were really great, subdued but great. And they are OLD. BF kept calling it geezer rock. I must admit, there were a lot of older (older than me) people there, many canes. They started at about 8:30 and when we left maybe around 11pm they were still playing? I was exhausted and my sinuses went crazy in there for some reason. I'm only allergic to cats so I'm not sure what that was about.

I loooooove live music. Almost any kind of live music. Classical, jazz, rock, pop, blues, bluegrass, salsa, opera, whatever, bring it on! One summer I think I went to maybe 5 concerts at Jones Beach. Santana, James Taylor, Kiss, Pearl Jam and I can't remember the other one. And summer is the BEST time for going to concerts of any kind.

Well, I don't want to get too overly excited but it looks like, of the two houses we found that we actually wanted to rent, we got one of them. We got the one that I liked and didn't get the one BF liked (mostly because of the dogs). The house is freaking huge, there's a master bedroom suite with a walk-in closet, bathroom and sitting room (my yoga room? not sure yet, it's carpeted). That's upstairs, in the attic (it's an A-frame house). On the main floor, open kitchen/dining/living room with fireplace and slate tile floors, kitchen has fairly new appliances and nice cabinets. Also two bedrooms and full bathroom. Honestly that would be plenty for us. But the basement has, I think, three finished rooms, one 3/4 bath (has shower, no tub) that is really nicely done plus the laundry room, which is normal unfinished basement. There's a really nice big deck all the way around the house. There's not too terribly much yard but we're ok with that. It also has central air conditioning and is in Huntington, not too far from Huntington Village. Biking distance but not walking distance. The only glitch is that there is a tenant there and she's supposedly paying less than market rate rent and doesn't want to move. But the landlord wants her out so out she goes (hopefully).

No practice today but tomorrow I'm working from the city so Shala in the morning! And everyone does primary so I don't have to watch any acrobatics. Yay!

Raining.....again

2008-05-27T10:07:00.002-04:00

It's raining again here in the greater NYC area. We had a glorious weekend weather wise so I probably shouldn't complain but I'm so tired of rain! Supposedly the rest of the week will be fairly sunny so I guess one day isn't so bad.

No practice yesterday or today. Yesterday I was too darned sore! This morning I was exhausted. Part of the problem being that I didn't go to bed til 10. Tonight, bed at 9 and practice in the AM all by my lonesome. No mysore in Huntington tomorrow night, we're going to see the Eagles at MSG. Woo!

On the house-hunting front, we MAY have found a place so keep your fingers crossed that we get it. The rental market on Evil Island is painful, so there's no guarantee that just because we want a place we'll get it. Sigh.

Happy Birthday Z!

2008-05-25T14:41:00.002-04:00

It is Z's birthday today. He is 9 years old (according to his father some days, he may not make it to 10). So happy birthday Z!!!!!!!

Let's see, I posted last on Friday, I think. It's only a three day weekend and I'm already losing track of time. On Saturday morning I went to the studio in Huntington for the led primary/secondary class. I met the owner of the studio, she taught the class. She's SOOOOO NICE and I really enjoyed her teaching style. She's traditional when appropriate, gives great assists and adjustments and provides really workable modifications when necessary. Even though my backbending is really not 'there' yet, I enjoyed all of the backbending we did. And it was great to practice with OTHER PEOPLE (as opposed to by myself, half-assed, in my living room).

After class, I drove to Huntington Village to hang out for a bit before I looked at the first house of the day's real estate shopping. I have now found two things about Evil Island that I actually like: the classic rock radio station and Huntington Village. I had a gigantic iced tea at the Crackhouse, did some people watching then wandered around for a while. Huntington Village has great shopping (non-chain store type), great looking restaurants, at least two clubs/bars that have live jazz and it's just gorgeous.

After an hour in the village I drove to Northport to look at a 'rustic' beach house. It was definitely rustic and not for us. After that I drove to a different section of Northport and looked at two houses. One of them I really liked so we'll see how it goes. Then I proceeded to get lost amongst the gigundous houses of Huntington Bay. By the time I got home it was time to shower, get dressed and go see the Memorial Day fireworks.

This morning I dragged my sore back (as well as the rest of me) out of bed to drive into the city to practice. It was a fairly lackluster practice but I persevered until Navasana, skipping no vinyasas. My upper back is very sore, especially around the ribs. Perhaps I'm finally learning how to twist in the thoracic spine instead of the lumbar? I've been working very hard on not twisting out of the pelvis during marichy C. Backbends today were not happening. I'm pretty sure I whispered 'fuck' upon coming down from one of them. Very nice.

Today I'm baking a cake for Z's birthday. We're grilling sausages and hot dogs and corn tonight for dinner. Yum! I'll take pictures.

Backbending day - and it's FLEET WEEK

2008-05-23T09:58:00.003-04:00

I practiced this morning. Yep, that's right, all by my little self. Sun sals, a little standing then I decided I was too tired for standing. Besides, I felt like doing a little back bending. So that's what I did. Shalabasana, Dhanurasana, Ustrasana, and a couple of very tight UD's. UD has been rather tight the last couple of weeks. It almost feels like something in my shoulders is getting ready to open, they have been really noisy for a while now. And my hands seem to be getting closer to the floor in Prasarita C. Now if only I could get my HEAD closer to the floor. The backbends felt pretty good and there's no pain now, sitting here in my management cube.

I looked at two rental houses last night. Yeah. So anyhoo, the search continues. One good thing is that I've narrowed the focus. I had previously been casting the net pretty wide but I really don't want an hour's drive to work, so we're going to stick to the Huntington/Centerport/Northport area. Tomorrow is a cottage on the water. The broker said it's 'rustic' so I'm trying to prepare myself.....The location appealed to BF so I figured I should give it a shot. Perhaps if it's too 'rustic' we can fix it up a tad? Who knows.

It's Fleet Week here in the greater New York City area. What is Fleet Week, you ask? Check it out: Fleet Week. I believe they have Fleet Week in other locations like San Fran, South Florida, etc. It is also the Friday before Memorial Day so it's quiet here in the management cube. Perhaps I can sneak out a little early? BF is getting his car delivered today, Shiva willing. It was a logistical nightmare getting him the car he wanted for the price he wanted but his (and my) persistence paid off and it should be delivered to our house today.

That is all.

Mysore style....sort of

2008-05-22T09:28:00.002-04:00

I went to the Mysore class in Huntington last night. It was kind of odd, not exactly what I'm used to. However, it was a thousand times better than trying to practice alone in my cramped living room so I'll take it!

Basically, instead of people just wandering in shortly before the class starts and starting up their practice, everyone waited to start until 7:15pm (class start time), did the chant together then started their practice. Also, everyone only did half-primary. There were six people in the room, including me, plus the teacher. To be quite honest, it was nice that there were no 'superstars' in the room, no one doing crazy third or fourth series. No one there could even stand up from UD. So it was much easier for me to have my normal 'challenged' practice. I am well aware that we're not supposed to compare ourselves in the Mysore room but I have a hard time believing that I'm the only one who does that. Usually I am successful at brushing it off and not worrying about it. The teacher was a sub and I thought he was really cool. There were no heavy-handed adjustments, he seemed to work more with energy than brute strength. Sometimes I do need the brute strength, but not always. All in all, it was a good experience and it will be a good option for me, especially when we move to that area next month.

On the house-hunting front, I'm dreadfully tired of staring at Craigslist, tired of brokers, tired of the whole thing. I'm going to look at two houses tonight, one in Huntington and one in Kings Park. I would love for one of them to work out so I can stop looking. The other option I have discovered is a house in St. James that is WAAAAAAAY too close to the ex-wife (like, three blocks). I'm going to look at it but it's probably not going to be a good option for us.

Rain

2008-05-21T09:54:00.002-04:00

The nasty weather yesterday delayed my arrival to the led primary class in Huntington. I was a little over five minutes late so I didn't go in. It would have been my first class and I was a little reluctant to show up late to my first one. Tonight is Mysore style there, it starts later, at 7, so I won't be late and I'll have a chance to get settled, not feel frazzled, etc.

Somehow BF woke up earlier than I did, at 6:15. And he got up out of bed! I should have gotten up with him and 'convinced' him to do some yoga but I was feeling lazy. Perhaps tomorrow morning, since I'm going to class tonight.

Life is currently very stressful here, BF is buying a new car and I'm trying to find us a new residence about 45 minutes from here (but close to the Huntington studio, so that's a plus). Lots of driving....sigh. Once it's all said and done we'll have a 40-45 minute commute from home to Port Washington where we both work. However, we'll be able to carpool and use the HOV lane. I had a suburb meltdown moment last night but it passed and I'm trying to be ok with this move even farther out onto Evil Island.

The soreness feels good

2008-05-18T15:35:00.003-04:00

Wow, it's Sunday afternoon and I haven't posted since Thursday. Yikes! That's what the FSC do, they steal the time away.

No practice on Friday. On Saturday I did get up and go to a 10am class at Jivamukti. I felt a little off-balance and ploddy (is that a word?) but I'm glad I went. Shalabasana is hard for me! I don't think I realized that until yesterday. A Jivamukti class is full of sun salutations and chaturanga after chaturanga. My arms and chest are sore. Not bad like it used to be in the beginning days but sore nonetheless. And I like it! It means I worked hard and I like that! Then I had a big salad for lunch with a friend and we did a little shoe shopping at DSW and had a mani-pedi. Fun day. I hadn't seen the teacher at Jivamukti (my favorite Jivamukti teacher) in about two years. She's so great, just hippy-dippy enough but also very warm and real.

We bar-b-que'ed last night with the children. I tried to make more ARTISAN bread but it didn't cook all the way through because I tried to make a loaf that was too big. Back to the drawing board. Then we walked with kids and dogs (not an easy task, let me tell you) to get ice cream. Afterward I was so stressed I had to have a cocktail. Seriously.

I got up this morning and went to the Shala. I had a lovely practice. I'm still a little weak, the endurance isn't what it once was. Also received a lovely pat on the back from Anna. She's right, many times my practice can be fairly graceful. I attribute that to two things: A lifetime spent being clumsy (one of my main reasons for starting a yoga practice in the first place) pushes me to try extra hard to be graceful AND my teacher in LA has an unbelievably graceful and smooth practice and I try to model mine after hers. And no, no one has ever told me that I have a 'bad' practice, or that it looks ugly. Just the voices in my head! My hips are still super tight, I'm still having trouble catching my toe in trikonasana. Craziness! Practice felt really really good, I didn't skip a single vinyasa. I did punk out on quite a few, taking my knees to the floor but I did every single one. I almost always skip a couple but I must burn those calories and get that upper body strength back! I think I'll practice a little tomorrow morning.

The little skinny dog next to me is farting up a storm, I must go find something to plug up his butt with. Ugh, he STINKS!

More yoga today

2008-05-15T16:23:00.003-04:00

I did a little practice today. Little Buddha stood by watchfully on the couch. I have nothing to say about it other than it's frustrating to have all of my endurance taken away from me. BAH!

Made another loaf of ARTISAN bread last night. The tip from Laksmi regarding using a cookie sheet for the steamer pan instead of a baking pan worked out well, I think. I promised the FSC I would make more this weekend so we'll see how it goes. I made another batch of dough last night, it's in the fridge.

I may go to Jivamukti on Saturday. That should be super embarassing but I don't care. I've gotten FAT and I need to move my ASS. Plus I can see my friend S in the City after class. She may even go to class with me. That would be fun!

I got an e-mail from the studio in Huntington that does some Mysore and Led classes. They are going to start doing a led half primary half second class on Saturday mornings. Hmmmm, now that I might be interested in. Plus next week I'm going to start going there on Wednesday nights for their Mysore. It's cheaper than going into the city and hopefully the studio is less dramatic and annoying than Anonymous Shala.

Fighting with BF today, and I'm not even sure why. I'm just being a crankypants beeeeatch.

Over and out.

Back to the mat

2008-05-14T09:26:00.002-04:00

Asana report:

I did it. This morning I rolled out my mat and got on it. It was a horribly criminal practice, and only about 30 minutes or so but either way, it was a practice. The goal right now is to just get on the mat. Once I can get consistent about that, the next goal is to actually have a 'mostly' non-criminal ashtanga practice. Because I've decided I'm only going to the Shala on Sundays. I'll save a lot of money and avoid some of the drama and politics in the place to boot. It's a win-win, I say. And how did I find the motivation to get back on the mat, you ask? A conversation with BF last night (mostly paraphrased, I don't remember the exact words).

BF: OK, this mood of yours has got to go. It must stop now.
Me: Blank look
BF: I've had enough of it.
Me: I probably need to do some yoga.
BF: Yes, so why don't you do it.
Me: I feel like the moment I step on my mat I'm going to burst into tears.
BF: So, step on the mat, have a good cry then do the yoga, for god's sake.

I didn't cry, but I did get on the mat. I practiced with two of my favorite yogis, Rufus (aka Little Buddha) and Rocky watching. Most of my strength is gone, hopefully I can get it back soon with some consistent practice. Twists were hard. I couldn't get my toe in trikonasana (yeah, let's talk about backpedaling for a second, shall we?????).

Me: Oh, I can't get my toe any more!
BF: You know, it's a myth that you have to be able to reach your toes to do yoga (that's quote from a Yogaworks marketing card that I keep on the fridge).

No inversions (end of Ladies Holiday), did a little shalabasana for backbending. Did I mention it was criminal? OK, it wasn't criminal, it just wasn't ashtanga!

Perhaps another brief practice after work? BF is on a field trip with one of the FSC today so I'll have some nice alone time to work on some hip openers and stuff.

BF is a pretty darned good yoga teacher, no? :)

ARTISAN bread and blueberry cobbler

2008-05-11T21:10:00.008-04:00

I have no asana report, so I'll report on other stuff going on in my life.

My grandmother passed away on Friday. Seriously, my relatives are dropping like flies recently. My grandfather last September, my father a week and a half ago and my grandmother on Friday. She had alzheimer's and has been in a nursing home for several years, so to be quite honest, she's in a much better place now. I'm a little sad, but glad she no longer has to live that way. I can't go back to Florida, I have no time off left (new company doesn't do bereavement) and am broke from the trip to Florida for my father anyway. It agitates me that I wasted the trip on my father instead of my grandmother, but what's done is done.

Ladies holiday arrived yesterday so I couldn't go to the shala today. Drag.

I made some ARTISAN bread today. I took some pictures, here they are. The first picture is the dough on the pizza stone after it had risen, right before I put it in the oven.

This picture is the bread after it came out of the oven. I forgot to take the picture before we cut it, so we had already eaten half of the bread when I took the pic.

The freaking ARTISAN bread ROCKED! BF was totally psyched about it, asking me all day if the bread was ready yet. If you don't have the book, you must get it.

I also made a blueberry cobbler. Again really yummy. Here is a pic.

I gave the dogs a bath and then took a little video. They are so frigging cute.

PS I edited this freaking post THREE TIMES. ARGH.

Another Meme

2008-05-09T14:49:00.002-04:00

Since I can't think of anything to post that isn't either pouty or totally negative, I'm doing another Meme.

1. What were you doing 5 years ago today?

Living in Brooklyn with my ex and our two dogs, working for a gigantic law firm.

2. Name 5 snacks that you love:

potato chips and onion dip
cheese
cheese
cheese
cake

3. What are 5 things on your ‘To-Do’ list for today/ Or things you’ve already done today:

take the suitcases to storage
get the car washed
mop the kitchen and bathroom floors
give the dogs a bath
practice YOGA

4. Name 5 things you would do if you won five million dollars:

Pay off student loans and other debt
buy a house
buy BF an aston martin, because he loves them
buy some shoes
buy my mom and brother a house or condo or something each

5. Name 5 bad habits you have:

leaving half-empty diet pepsi cans around the apartment (drives BF nuts)
drinking diet-pepsi
eating cheese
?
?

6. Name 5 places you’ve lived:

Tallahassee FL
Brooklyn NY
Jersey City, NJ
Los Angeles, CA
Port Washington NY

7. Name 5 jobs you’ve had:

switchboard operator
grocery bagger
admin assistant for a ballet company
web site admin for school of music public relations office
email engineer

I quit

2008-05-08T10:19:00.002-04:00

I'm quitting Ashtanga. That's right, you heard me. What's the f'ing point anyway? I can't tell if my crazy life is forcing me to drop my yoga practice, or if my lack of a yoga practice is causing my crazy life. Any thoughts?

T (12 year old FSC) asked a girl to a dance. How freaking cute is that?????

Rant

2008-05-06T13:04:00.003-04:00

Did I ever mention on this blog that I hate Long Island, and more specifically, I hate Port Washington? On a daily basis I am besieged by hostile, horrible, ill-mannered, loud, driving-impaired Long Islanders. Evil, horrible people.

Another nail in the coffin of my ashtanga practice:

I go to the Port Washington LIRR parking office. In order to obtain a Port Washington parking sticker (you must have a sticker to park in the LIRR lot on weekdays), you must have a driver's license, auto registration and rental agreement or utility bill, all with a matching address in your name. So I went out and got said driver's license and registration (no picnic in NY state, mind you). Now, I am not on our rental lease, as we are in BF's apartment that he rented before I moved here. And I am not listed on the utility bills. So, being the thorough, well-prepared girl scout that I usually am, I called ahead to find out if there was anything I could do. And I was told to bring a bank statement or credit card statement, anything with a matching address.

So I went on my lunch hour to the parking office. I brought a savings account statement, a credit card statement, my tax return and my (hard-won) license and registration. The man behind the counter said oh, a new permit, you'll need to wait for 'her'. Whoever the fuck 'her' is. OK. I maintain my sunny disposition, because, as I see it, being nice will get you much farther and it's usually easier anyway. 'She' comes to the counter. I give her a sunny 'hello' which is completely and rudely ignored. The man explains to her that I want a new permit but I don't have a lease or utility bill.

Her: You don't have a lease?
Me: I'm not on the lease here but I live here
Her: You don't have a utility bill?
Me: They aren't in my name.
Her (with evil, stony look): Well whose name are they in?
Me: (silently WTF). Well, they are in blankety blank's name.
Her: Well who is blankety blank?
Me: (silently again WTF?). He's the other person that lives in the house.
Her: These won't do, this is a savings account statement. You'll need a checking account statement (me wondering what's the difference at this point). Or a cell phone bill. Do you have a cell phone bill?
Me: (silently...was I supposed to bring every fucking bill I've ever received at this address?????). OK, I'll get that and come back.

No 'sorry for the inconvenience', no 'I know this is a pain in the rear but we have to weed out the fakers'. Not even a 'kiss my ass'. She just turned and walked away.

So I walked out to my car and had a mini-meltdown, wondering why the FUCK I live here and why the FUCK people on Long Island have to be so fucking stupid and rude. I got in my car and of course, on my way back to work some driving-impaired Long Islander almost sideswipes me in the process of trying to cut me off to get to a parking spot on the street.

The funny part? I'm only getting a parking sticker so I can park at the train station when I go to work in the city. And I'm only wanting to go to work in the city so I can go to a fucking yoga class. I MUST be out of my mind.

I'm back

2008-05-06T10:19:00.002-04:00

I was IM'ing with a friend of mine in LA, one of my former coworkers at 'evil company that imploded'. So far this year, he has lost his job, his favorite uncle has passed away, and just a few days ago, his wife and his mother (worked at the same mortgage place) lost their jobs. We agreed that 2008 SUCKS. And it's only MAY! Last night BF and I drove by this photo place here in town where I dropped off a picture of my mother that was taken last year. She wanted it scanned and a few copies printed. I dropped the picture off with them about a week before I went on vacation. They CLOSED. With no notice. No phone call. THEY HAVE MY PICTURE! It's honestly not that big of a deal but it just seems like every month, every week, every day brings me some new blow or handicap. What did I do to deserve this????? Seriously, how bad is my karma?

Last night BF could not sleep. He has developed a nasty case of tinnitus that keeps him awake and is slowly driving him insane. He was referred to an ENT but of course can't get in until like June 3 or something. SO, when BF cannot sleep, guess who else can't sleep? Therefore, no sleep equals no yoga practice. Honestly, I've been giving some serious thought to just giving up on the practice. My body is clearly not cut out for it anyway. I mean, here I am two years later and still stuck on half-primary. Seriously, why am I doing this?

Meme

2008-05-03T17:17:00.002-04:00

I am: not as technically proficient as people think
I think: everything happens for a reason
I know: that BF loves me
I want: my dogs back
I have: great hair
I wish: I could connect with my family
I hate: people who aren't accepting of others
I miss: my dogs
I fear: people laughing at me
I feel:  tired and sad right now
I hear: music all the time
I smell: like Cracker Barrel
I crave:  things that are sweet
I search: for the good side in everyone
I wonder: what will happen when I'm old
I regret: nothing
I love: dogs, fresh cut flowers and the beach
I ache: in my right hip
I care:  too much about what people think of me
I always: walk around and not under ladders 
I am not: nearly as uptight and cold as people think I am
I believe: in reincarnation
I dance: whenever I can
I sing: in the car, always
I cry: during yoga class
I don’t always: express my gratitude for the generosity of my friends 
I fight: rarely
I write: not very well!
I win: when I set my mind to it
I lose: money, all the time
I never: leave the house without sunglasses
I confuse: myself, all the time
I listen: not often enough
I can usually be found: on the computer 
I am scared: of getting old  
I need: to give in to the fact that I live in NY now  
I am happy about: the richness of my friendships (new and old) and the wonderful, open relationship I am in with the BF

Out of the cave....

2008-04-30T13:14:00.003-04:00

I have been debating whether to post this or not. Back and forth in my chattery mind.....it's weird to me to blab it out to the world but it's also weird not to? So here goes, this'll be a long one, settle in kids.

First, I want to get down on permanent cyber-paper a smidge of the conversation I had with Owl. We were talking about school (university, grown-up type school) and I was talking about playing (or, not playing) the clarinet. And she wanted to know (as does everyone) if I play any more. I do not. She observed that perhaps that is the issue with my hips. Which leads me to the next paragraph.....

Later that day I went to M's class. M is my teacher. She is also one of my dearest friends but I like to check in my practice with her every once in a while. She's wonderful with alignment and she totally 'gets' my strange body shape (that's not self-deprecation or self-flagellation, it's just the truth). My legs and arms come out at an angle that's a bit different from the typical person. Not enough to make me look weird to the uneducated eye but enough to make certain poses more difficult than they could or should be. Like Tiryangmukhaikapada, that pose is a killer for me. And all of the Marichyasanas are much harder than they really should be. Internal rotation is not my friend. But I digress. So we started working on Tiryang and she noted that I've backpedaled a good bit on internals and on hip flexor stuff. And she's absolutely right. I knew it before I walked into the room. But it hit me like a ton of bricks and I lost it. Complete meltdown in the middle of the room. Embarassing but strangely satisfying and purging at the same time. So lots of yoga homework to do. As it always is. And I carry on with my sad little half-primary.

After class I went to dinner with A, my friend who had the open heart surgery. He's doing very well, pretty much back to normal. And during dinner I noticed that my mother had called, as well as my cousin (mom number 2). Then cousin called again. Shit. So I called said cousin, in Florida, waking her up at midnight. She wouldn't tell me what was up, just made me call my mother.

Turns out my father passed away on Monday afternoon. He had a heart attack (his second) while he was at work. I don't know any more details than that, honestly. My family isn't much for communication, and I'm the least communicative of the bunch. More significant is the fact that he and I have been estranged for approximately 10 years or so. Basically since I moved to New York. For reasons that are best left to another post, as this one will be lengthy anyway.

So now I'm full of crazy feelings. Tearing up at inopportune moments (the line in the cafeteria at work today), feeling incredibly angry, frustrated with BF, who didn't seem to clean or pick up anything in the house other than do dishes while I was gone. Etc etc etc. And now I have to go to Florida (a place I DESPISE more than I hate Long Island) and deal with long-forgotten relatives, my mother, my father's bits and pieces left behind. When people find out, of course the first thing they say is 'I'm so sorry for your loss'. What loss? Did I lose something? I lost this relationship long ago. My mother wanted to know if I wanted to 'say goodbye' to my father before they cremated him. Um, no. First of all, that body is not my father. Second of all, I find the practice somewhat revolting. Apparently his coworkers insisted on a memorial service, which is to be held on Saturday. Tomorrow I get back on a plane again (I'm really quite tired right now of flying) and go to Florida for three days to deal with my taciturn brother and hysterical mother (oh, by the way, my parents have been divorced since I was 14 but my mother will use any excuse to be dramatic) and various and sundry relatives who I won't even recognize at this point.

How do I get my chatty brain to SHUT UP right now? Oh yeah, yoga.

Random thoughts from LA

2008-04-28T13:03:00.002-04:00

The A-number one thing I want to say is IT IS FUCKING OK TO BE NICE ALL THE TIME. All right? So everyone shut the fuck up and either be nice or not but stop judging.
So there.

It is fucking beautiful here. I had breakfast with Owl this morning. We had a lovely talk, about yoga and her spectacular Editor, who I'll be practicing with later this weekend, about academia and school and more yoga and how lovely Cranky/Happy and Anna and the rest of the cyber-shala is (are?) - ugh, I've completely lost the ability to create a proper sentence. Too much food and sun. Owl is just so lovely, intelligent and vivacious and so freaking young-looking. Did I look that young at her age? Hmmm, NO.

I peeked through the window where Owl was practicing this morning and watched someone give a baddha konasana adjustment by standing on someone's knees. Their knees. No, really, their knees. WTF?

My teacher in NY will be absent from the shala for a while and I am sad.

Seriously, if I could move back I would even be willing to live in the Valley. That's right, I'd pick the Valley over suburban Long Island.

I'm tired and I love it here and I don't want to go back. Except I have to.

Everything is better in LA

2008-04-28T01:03:00.002-04:00

I have so much to post, I don't know where to begin. As I drove over 'the hill' from the Valley back down into the West Side, with the LA Basin spread before me, I felt a wave of nostalgia and longing so strong I almost cried. I need to live here.

Got very drunk last night at the GasLite. Sang Rock Star by Nickelback. Was far too hung over to have a private with M so I just hung out with her all day today, walking from Santa Monica to Venice and stopping for lunch along the way. Friday I practiced with my very first Mysore teacher, it was nice to see her. Then I had all of my hair cut off (gave that to my friend/teacher M to give to a friend of hers that does weaves for cancer patients) and went for a massage with Butch. It was QUITE a massage. I'm never shy for Butch, he gets into the groins and hip flexors. He sees ALL of my business, it's pretty funny. He says that most of my flexibility issues are tendon tightness and not muscle issues. According to him, my muscles are pretty soft. The tendons are another story. Friday night I had dinner here at the house with C and the girls. I made sangria and we had Suziecakes cupcakes. It was lovely.

Saturday morning we all got up and went to the Festival of Books at UCLA to a kiddie concert then trekked up to Malibu to hang out, have a little lunch and get out of the heat. When we got back, I went to Maha and took a vinyasa class. After that it was a lovely two-margarita dinner at El Cholo then karaoke at the GasLite. So much fun! Tomorrow morning a light breakfast with Owl!!!!!!

It is lovely here. C and the girls are so much fun, and she's so generous with her house and hospitality. I do miss the BF though. That is all for now.

Big ol' Jet Airliner.....

2008-04-24T14:18:00.002-04:00

Steve Miller Band. Love them.

It's absolutely gorgeous here in the greater New York City area. I'm all packed and ready to go. So much stuff to do when I get to LA!

Princess Ralph's!
SuzieCakes!
Yoga at Maha
Private with M!
THE BEACH!
Coral Tree
Fritto Misto
Bikini Wax
Haircut
Massage with Butch
THE BEACH!
Sangria with C
Gaslite!
Dinner with A!
THE BEACH!
Malibu
The Grove
The Promenade
The Co-op
Nook

Very excited! I'll be posting soon.

Food hangover

2008-04-24T08:39:00.002-04:00

I'll start out in a happy place then I'm going to do my rant.

I had a GREAT dinner last night with Amy, Anna and Cranky. We had tapas and sangria at Pipa. The food was seriously fantastic, I think I have a bit of a food hangover right now. There was sausage and cheese and some kind of beef thing and some veggie thing and some mushroom thing and these fantastic potato thingies that were so good. And the sangria was fantastic (but not as good as mine, ha!). It was nice to see Cranky and Anna again and to meet Amy, she's lovely and vivacious and sweet. It was such a fun evening.

And now for the rant. If you have children, you might want to skip this one. It's take your offspring to work day. Fuck. In my humble opinion, work is the one place in the entire world (other than the shala) where I won't be exposed to children and their jam hands and their little voices and their pounding feet. And this day RUINS that. Usually I take this day off. FUCKETY FUCK FUCK FUCK. How come there isn't a take your fucking dogs to work day? How come I can't bring my fucking dogs to work? HUH????? FUCK. Or, as Laksmi says, FCUK. TRIPLE FCUK. FCUK, they are here already and it's not even 9am. Thank heavens I'm leaving at noon to go home and pack. Jesus.

Mongolian BBQ

2008-04-23T15:40:00.003-04:00

I went to lunch with a friend today, we went to get Mongolian BBQ and sat outside in Bryant Park and ate lunch. All veggies, mmm, was good but now I'm STARVING and no food until at least 6:30. BUT Cranky is bringing some cupcakes for us all to have. Yay!

So I was chatting with my friend K the other day. He calls Ashtanga 'the cult'. I always laugh but I guess it hits home a teensy bit? I mean, let's list what we 'do or don't do' for Ashtanga:

We don't drink very often, or if we do we do it the day before a Moon day or on Fridays
We go to bed early so we can get up at 5am (or thereabouts)
We change some of our eating habits; Some of us eat no meat or less meat, or no dairy, or just diet to get smaller so our practice will be 'better'
We 'salute the sun' and face the East while doing it!
We chant
Many of us alter our work schedules, or travel fairly long distances, just to practice with our other 'cult members'
Most of us do our practice in a 'shala'
We don't practice on the Full Moon or the New Moon or when we're menstruating
Some of us make what could be called 'pilgrimages' to India to commune with our guru and to help improve our practice
WE BLOG ABOUT IT endlessly
We befriend likeminded people, probably some of whom we might not even ever be friends with if it weren't for 'the practice'

It goes on. I suppose if I look at it through his eyes it does seem a little cultish. Ummmm, WHATEVER. K reads this blog and I know he's laughing right now. I'm ok with that. If he weren't laughing at me about 'the cult' then he'd be laughing at me for something else.

No power cable

2008-04-23T10:03:00.002-04:00

I forgot to bring my power cable with my laptop today to the City office. Ooooooops. Fortunately my coworker/team member isn't here today so I borrowed his. Whew!

I practiced at the Shala today for the first time in maybe three weeks? My mat was still there, thank goodness. They put new shower curtains in the bathroom and put new faucets in the showers. The old ones always came off in your hand. I know, such things to complain about..... The best part was, Anna and Cranky were there practicing too! Fun!
I did my half-primary and realized I really need to stop slacking off on the vinyasas in the seated poses. I got really tired and skipped a couple. I started crying again after my Marichy C assist from BW. WTF is that about????? I just don't get it. Is it because I can't do it so I have a woe is me moment? Weird. Backbending was tough but I did three and no lower back pain or tightness at all afterwards. I think really concentrating on bandhas during updogs really helps with that.

Happy Birthday!

2008-04-22T09:11:00.004-04:00

I would like to welcome Rachel Audra to the world. Rachel was born on April 19 at 8:59pm, weighing in at a strapping 6lbs. 14.5 oz and measuring at a towering 19 in. long, at Bethesda National Naval Medical Center.

Rachel, you are sure to be a constant source of joy to your parents. You were a long-hoped-for baby and they certainly went to some trouble to have you! I can't imagine a baby who is more fortunate than you to have such intelligent, educated, fun and funny parents as yours are. Your mother is the single most intelligent woman I know (and I know a LOT of smart women!) and I am lucky to count hers among some of my dearest and longest-lived friendships. And your father is one of the nicest, funniest and most creatively talented people I know. Kid, you got seriously lucky!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RACHEL!!!! I can't wait to meet you.

OK, seriously tearing up as I write this so I have to go now.

Just do it?

2008-04-21T11:58:00.002-04:00

A woman is often measured by the things she cannot control. She is measured by the way her body curves or doesn’t curve. By where she is flat or straight or round. She is measured by 36-24-36 and inches and ages and numbers. By all the outside things that don’t ever add up to who she is on the inside. And so if a woman is to be measured, let her be measured by the things she can control. By who she is and who she is trying to become because as every woman knows, measurements are only statistics, and statistics lie.

© Nike

Edited slightly for punctuation preferences....

I bought three pairs of pants yesterday, and lots of shirts, for wearing to work. And I ignored the numbers, found clothes that fit me and flatter me and are comfortable. And I didn't hear that annoying voice so much. Take that, voices in my head!

Heart opening....maybe

2008-04-19T11:20:00.002-04:00

It's Saturday and I did my practice!!!!!!! Very very very exciting. I did it with the tv on (bad lady) but really, so what. Dogs are snooozing/snoring on the couch. I'm still sitting on my mat as I type this, I was so excited I just had to post. Oh, and I didn't do any finishing but I don't care. I did my half primary all by myself!!!! And UHP is actually really improving, as is ardha badha. Good stuff! Before my UD (which didn't feel bad but wasn't good, haven't done it in a while), I did an ustrasana and felt an odd feeling in the center of my chest, right between 'the twins'. It wasn't a pain, more like weird discomfort. Heart opening? Maybe. That would be good.

I have taken all of the latest blog rumblings about body issues and self-loathing/body loathing to heart. I'm making a concerted effort to stop the mindless negative chatter. My body is useful, strong and can do all kinds of fun things! I will continue to try to get rid of my belly chub simply because belly chub is supposedly unhealthy and given my family history of unhealthiness, I have to be careful. But I'm going to BE HERE NOW with THIS BODY of THIS MOMENT. We're going to the outlet mall tomorrow in Riverhead, so that could be a good challenge. My goal is to not get attached to the number on the tag. THE TAG NUMBER IS NOT IMPORTANT.

What IS important is that my snoring pug is SUPER CUTE. I like the caps today. It was a good practice. Happy Saturday! Next Thursday night I will be in LA!

A different direction

2008-04-18T10:03:00.002-04:00

I practiced at home this morning (that's not new) with the BF. We did three A's , two B's, the first three standing poses (without the twisters, he's not ready for those yet) and a few seated poses. He complained the whole time. :)

Even though trying to practice and teach him at the same time is difficult, and I am not getting in the vigorous body workout that I used to, I think this is a good new direction for my practice. It seems that in going back to the beginning with him, I am going back to the beginning with myself. A beginning I can now barely remember, from three years ago. When I remind him of things that I feel are important (breathe, heels out, press your hands to the floor, relax your neck), I remind myself. And it hit me. THIS IS WHY PEOPLE DECIDE TO TEACH YOGA. I know, kind of a dumbass A-HA moment, but an important one nonetheless. And it sets my mind to brewing about things for the future......ways to get out of the 'management cube'.

Anyhoo, the Pope is in town this weekend so I may not be able to get to the Shala on Sunday. We'll see how that goes.

Oh, and BF has a really hard time breathing through his nose, more so in the morning than other times but mostly all the time. Any thoughts on how to get things cleared out in the morning so he can breathe? I already suggested the neti pot but I don't think he's going to go for that.

F Yoga

2008-04-16T08:17:00.002-04:00

Here is my new Fuck Yoga t-shirt. As you'll see, someone cleverly put it in a sanskrit-like font. Friggin' funny, I tell ya. I want to wear it to the Shala but I don't think Batman would approve.

And here's the cake I baked on Saturday in my cramp-induced stupor. Looks yummy, right? It's all gone already. I only had two pieces.

Softball

2008-04-15T09:36:00.002-04:00

I joined the company co-ed softball team. My right arm hurts. This is NOT going to be good for the yoga.

I dragged BF out of bed this morning for another round of 'ashtanga'.

In the bed:

Me: Come on, honey bunny, it's time to get up. (Yes, this is actually how he likes to be awakened when it's early - 6:20 is early to him).
BF: My knee hurts
Me: No it doesn't, come on now, get out of bed
BF: My stomach hurts
Me: I'll fix that, now come on, get up
BF: It's Ladies Holiday
Me: Honey, you don't have a uterus

We get downstairs, get the mats out facing each other.

Me: OK, take a deep breath in through the nose, now exhale, let it all out
BF: Buuuuuuuurp

We did three A's and two B's and then he complained that it hurt to be in down dog.

Me: What hurts, your wrists?
BF: No, my arms
Me: Oh, good, that's good
BF: WTF????? face
Me: Relax your neck, see your navel.

Then we did Padangusthasana (he is able to grab his toes with a bit of a bend in the knee) and Padahasthasana (he is able to get some of his fingers under the feet, again with a bend in the knee). Then trikonasana. Ummmmmm, I have a hard time teaching that one, so any pointers from those of you who are actually teachers is much appreciated. So that was enough for today, about 20 minutes. I'm hoping to talk him into taking a 'basics' class this weekend, we'll see how that goes. I don't think he should learn all of his yoga from me since I'm not really trained to teach!

We had the kids this weekend, that was pretty fun. They were at T's baseball game most of the day on Saturday and I had Ladies' Holiday so I was grouchy. I did bake a cake though. I took a picture, I'll have to get it off the camera and post it. It was pretty yummy. After dinner on Saturday we took the dogs out for a long walk around town to get some Italian ices. Rocky tried to jump over the low wall into the Sound, scared the LIFE out of me.

It's the Belt that gets you

2008-04-11T09:36:00.002-04:00

The Belt Parkway, that is.

Toll for Verrazano Bridge - $10
Toll for Goethals Bridge - $8
Filling up the gas tank in New Jersey - $40
Snuggling with 'The Boys' on the couch - Priceless

The Boys Are Back In Town!

Doggies

2008-04-10T16:52:00.003-04:00

Going to get the boys tonight from New Jersey. Here are the newest pics.....so cute.

If you can see the reddish bump above Rocky's eye, that is his little mast cell tumor (at least, that's what we think it is). The vet did a needle biopsy a couple of weeks ago which came back 'suspicious' so it has to come off. Soon. Poor little guy!

So friggin' cute......

It's the bandhas, stupid......

2008-04-09T09:04:00.002-04:00

OK, well, I'm not stupid but perhaps I have a bandha problem? I've always been weak with the bandhas. Perhaps it's time to start giving them some love. Today I practiced at home (shout out to me for getting motivated!), just sun salutations and the standing poses. But I thought to myself, before I started, today I will focus on the bandhas. And I did. And while my right hip definitely feels that familiar gripping, the low back pain is not there. Of course, I didn't backbend, but I think I'll play around with this some. That's the beauty of the home practice....free to work on stuff that in the Shala might get me in a bit of trouble.

In other news, I actually dragged BF out of bed at 6:30am and taught him the sun salutations. He was pretty darned good considering it was his first try at them. Poor man has really tight hamstrings and calves but fortunately for him he's very strong in the upper body so he can deal with the weight there for a while until stuff evens out. Part of our verbal exchange this morning:

Me, demonstrating samastithi: So, stand with your toes touching lightly, distribute your weight evenly through your feet, blah blah blah, try to engage your core so your shoulders are expanded but not up around your ears.

BF: Wow, that makes your tits look nice.

Yeah, this is gonna go really well.....we'll try again tomorrow morning. For the record, this was partly his idea. He wants to lose the weight that he gained when he quit smoking in January and this is something we can do together. We also take walks and after we move to Huntington we may get bicycles but for now this is the thing that's most available to both of us. Problem is, he's not going to get out of bed on his own that early in the morning so I have to play mommy/drill sergeant to get him up.

If you're thinking of getting a pet, please go to an animal shelter. The economic downturn and housing crisis have created a shelter crisis. Read this sad story.

If I ever had to give up the boys like that, I just don't know what I would do. I feel terrible for all of these families who feel that they have to give up their pets. If you can't adopt a dog or cat, give a little money or time to an animal shelter. They can really use the help right now.

I tried.....

2008-04-08T10:42:00.002-04:00

But everything hurt. After 4 A's and 1 B, I felt the old familiar tightness in the low back in the up-dogs so I stopped and did some stretching. I tried to do a little shoulderstand but that wasn't working out either. I will try again tomorrow.

Fuck yoga.

And where is my Ladies' Holiday????

Crab.

Back to the grind

2008-04-07T20:15:00.002-04:00

Of daily practice, that is. I have no more excuses now. This morning I woke up at 5:15, went downstairs and lounged on the couch until about 6:45 then went back upstairs and got back into bed for another 20 minutes or so. So, now that I'm going back to bed at the right time (between 8:30 and 9), I can get up at 5:15 and practice. By myself. :(

I really did a number on my back this weekend at my Saturday vinyasa class. It's a good thing Sunday was a moon day because I could still barely walk on Sunday morning.

So I'm trying to finish 'What Are You Hungry For?'. And I came across this passage:

"By nurturing and asserting your own internal standard of beauty, you can honestly express the beauty of who you are, not who you wish you were."

This ties in with Cody's post for today. Perhaps if I could be more 'in the moment' (with myself?), I could stop comparing myself to, say, Scarlett Johanssen (or whoever, just an example). OR stop comparing myself to, say, me a year ago. Or five years ago. Or ten years ago. How about Be Here Now, as the book says? Can I just Be Here Now? Can I Eat Here Now? Practice Here Now?

I still want a Fuck Yoga shirt.

Untitled

2008-04-07T09:43:00.001-04:00

I want one of those shirts that says 'Fuck Yoga'.

No practice

2008-04-03T16:34:00.000-04:00

And I don't care. I'm too f'ing tired to care. I will go to vinyasa class on Saturday morning. After I work from 6am to 8am. Then, after vinyasa class I will work from noon until about 2pm. Then I will work from 4pm to about 7pm. Then I will go out to dinner with BF and sleep. I will practice on sunday morning at 9. Then I will work from 4pm-about7pm. Then I will be done with this crazy work thing.

I hope.

Please, Shiva, let the rest of this go smoothly from now until Sunday night. I can't take much more. I had the worst meltdown yesterday evening after I got home. I'm so tired.

That is all.

Yesterday's post

2008-04-02T09:18:00.002-04:00

So I received a few comments from the kindly readers of my blog yesterday that I was being too hard on myself. While normally that would be the case, this time I really wasn't. I swear! I was just pointing out things that I think should probably be worked on. So, to answer some of the commentary:

No, ustrasana doesn't feel too terribly crunchy in the lower back as long as I work really really hard. But it is not a really difficult backbend for me, for whatever reason, so I like to practice it. It really helps me open up the shoulders as a prep for UD.

As far as backbending in general goes, I don't work too terribly hard on it but I do try to work on it every time I practice. I have the type of body that loses flexibility, strength and muscle memory really quickly. If I didn't backbend for maybe seven days, I would backtrack in a big way. With my tweaky lower back, I can't afford setbacks.

UD is monumentally easier now than it was when I first started practicing ashtanga. At that time, I wasn't even strong enough to get my head up off the floor. I must have practiced UD with my head on the floor for six months. Now I can get in three strong UDs on a good day (with a lot of rest in between). As far as the feet winging out, it's bad for my freaky lower back so I try really hard to be mindful of that. If I'm pressing into the feet the way I should be and dropping my inner thighs, the feet don't wing out as much. I tend to have 'turn out' naturally, for whatever reason. My knees and toes want to open up and drop out to the side. If I had a different body build I might have been a decent dancer, ha, NOT! However, this is not the best way for me to backbend, it throws off the hips and causes the lower back to do all the work.

As far as how these particular two poses feel, they feel pretty darned good! And they feel better with every week of consistent practice. I do concern myself with the upper back because I have to carry around these boobs and that's a lot of work! It does cause some shoulder rounding and upper and mid-back tension. It's hard to open the heart when it's all caved in trying to hide size D breasts!!!!! :)

So, there you have it. I appreciate everyone's concern that I was being overly critical of myself, the cyber-shala comes through once again! One thing you will notice, not one derogatory word about the way my body looks. I was actually pretty excited about the pictures, I thought they were really revealing, both of the good stuff and the stuff that needs to be worked on.

Asana report....with pictures!

2008-04-01T20:09:00.004-04:00

I did a home practice today! Yay! I did all of standing then sitting through Janu Sirsasana A, then did Marichy A and C. BF assisted with UHP, Paschimo, Marichy A and actually managed to wrestle me into Marichy C! He's such a good ashtanga assister. Now if only I could get him to practice.... Marichy C on the left side is actually getting a teensy bit better. Right side is absolutely impossible. Then came the backbending. For your viewing pleasure we have Ustrasana and UD. Please feel free to critique the backbends (but please don't critique the tiny apartment or the messy living room).

So you'll notice in the ustrasana, very little bend in the upper back, and too much crunching in the low. The hips and thighs look like they're in a pretty good spot though. And notice the neck looks strained. Very stiff in the neck and shoulders. In the UD the hands are NOT under the shoulders. Also, feet winged out to the side. Bad lady! The stiff upper back is also far more pronounced here. I found these pictures to be very helpful! Anyone have any ideas on how to get the upper back to bend a little more?

PMS

2008-04-01T14:22:00.000-04:00

Random thoughts for today

2008-03-31T19:22:00.002-04:00

Hard to Handle by the Black Crowes is a COVER. I had no idea! How did I not know this? It was originally written and recorded by Otis Redding and was released in 1968, the year after his death.

Yesterday while I was getting my mani/pedi, Scheherezade was playing on whatever cd mix thing they had going. Scheherezade is a beautiful piece by the Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov and is based on the story 'A Thousand and One Nights'. It has the most amazing clarinet part (ok, there are other amazing parts too, but I play the clarinet so that's what I pay attention to). If you've never heard it, definitely try to get your hands on it. Oh yeah, I play the clarinet. Actually, the whole truth is, I have a bachelors degree in clarinet performance. Little known facts about LI Ashtangini.....

Today at the grocery store the Scherzo from 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' by Mendelssohn was playing. I couldn't help but remember my sophomore year in college, my professor assigned the excerpt from this piece to me. I don't remember the exact tempo setting but it's FAST. REALLY FAST. So I had to break it down as slow as I possibly could and I would practice it every day at the same slow tempo for a week. Then the next week I would take the metronome up two ticks and play at that tempo for a week. And so on until I was playing it at the correct tempo. It reminded me that my yoga practice is somewhat like that. You start out slow, maybe you can't do everything but with practice it gets better and easier until you can't remember not being able to play the Scherzo from a Midsummer Night's Dream, or not being able to do chaturanga after chaturanga. Interesting, no?

I do still remember the tendonitis though. I don't think that will ever go away. Perhaps a reminder to be mindful and practice ahimsa.

Lacrosse.......a cold weather sport?

2008-03-29T18:31:00.002-04:00

I took Z to his lacrosse practice yesterday. It was FRIGID. And I forgot his jacket. Not that he could have worn it over all of the pads. Still, I'd be the crappiest mom ever, lol. After practice we went to McDonald's (yeah, I know, don't even go there) for a McFlurry. I guess Z wasn't that cold. Lacrosse is brutal! and confusing. and boring. Fortunately for me, his mother did not show up. I haven't met her yet and I'm trying to keep that particular life event at bay for as long as possible. I also got a whole lot of stuff done yesterday: cleaning the house, paying bills. I felt bad because Z spent most of the morning watching cartoons and playing X-box. So, when it was time for his brother and his father to come home, he had been mostly cooped up all day with no entertainment. Both children got wildly wound up over dinner and consequently got yelled at several times until bedtime at 9:30. While I was totally annoyed at their wildness, I could kind of relate because Z had literally had no interaction with anyone but me all day!

I went to the afternoon Mysore on Friday and came home barely able to stand. I don't know what it is about practicing in the afternoons but I simply can't do it. I can't tell if it's the teacher (I don't think so), the fact that I've been sitting all day or some strange combination of adjustments. It feels like the problem is UHP. I certainly don't want to bad-mouth the teacher in any way because I don't think it's that person's fault but something about their adjustment/assistance in UHP renders me completely unable to get up and down. The pain is high up on my hip in the back. Basically, once it (whatever 'it' is) happens, I can stand and I can sit but the transition between is horrific. While I was getting out of the car I felt it spasm and I was afraid I was going to fall over right outside in the street but I recovered and got myself into the house. By morning it had worked itself out and I had no more pain. But this happens EVERY TIME I practice at the afternoon session. I just don't get it.

I went to the shala this morning, it was quite crowded! It was one of those Sundays where we end up making three rows instead of the normal two. I had a really good practice. I actually feel a little bit of my flexibility coming back, which is nice. I'm still only going up to Navasana. I'm actually thinking of approaching Teacher and asking him to re-teach me the second half of primary. I would really like to start all over with the rest of it. My backbends felt pretty good (no clue what they look like, I'm probably better off that way) and I did three dropbacks against the wall. I don't seem to be getting any closer to the ground though. I do, however, feel like I'm really finding my feet. I'll just keep plugging along and see how it goes, I guess. When I left I had that lovely happy feeling that I used to get all the time when I practiced in LA. Gosh, I love that feeling. I must remember that feeling tomorrow morning when I'm trying to do my home practice at 5:30am! I also drove the the shala this morning, and that was GREAT. I left the house at 8am and was on the mat by about 8:45 or 8:50. And afterward I was home in about 40 minutes. I did the laundry, had my car washed, got a mani/pedi/waxing (inspired by Cranky's flawless pits, HA!), went for a walk with BF then cooked him dinner. And now I'm working, moving mailboxes. Again. I'm VERY tired of working!

I got the book that Owl recommended. It's pretty good. I think I'd like a little more theory, a little less practical application/practice. I mean, the practices in it are a good idea, I think I'll even try them. But I really want to hear more about what they think. Perhaps I just need a shrink to figure out what the F is wrong with me. More on this topic in the coming days, I think.

Still working

2008-03-27T19:20:00.001-04:00

There is absolutely nothing interesting to blog about. I'm here, working my ass off. I have not practiced since Sunday. Which is completely tragic. Sleep is simply more important than my yoga practice right now. And I won't even be able to go to my vinyasa class on Saturday. I have been drafted to stay home with the 8-year-old while his father and his brother go to a baseball tournament in Patchogue (yeah, more bumfuck). AND I have to take him to Lacrosse (sp???) practice on Saturday afternoon. BF says there is a 40% chance that Z's mother will show up there. Fun, huh? I haven't met her yet but she did manage to exhibit some more of her psycho behavior this week. This will not be fun.

Ah well, friends from far-away places are coming to visit soon. And I have my trip to LA to look forward to. And this work thing will only last another week or so. I'll practice again eventually.

Payback

2008-03-25T18:40:00.002-04:00

I haven't been this tired in a long time. I haven't worked this hard in a really long time. I think this is payback for the year and a half that I did almost no work at all and got paid a ton of money for it while I was in LA. I had to postpone my trip to LA til the end of April. Honestly, I'm too tired to even be that upset about it. I'm hoping that all this work manifests itself at bonus time.

I practiced in the new Prana that I got from Cranky on Sunday. Prana is very comfy! I may buy some more from her, if she has any more Larges left on payday. I also got 'Anatomy of Hatha Yoga' and the Matthew Sweeney book from her. I'm so glad she recommended the anatomy book, it's already helped immensely. In addition, I ordered the big gigantic Yoga book (Yoga Journal), which came on Friday, and also the Third and Fourth series Encinitas DVD. BF is so cute, he watched the whole thing with me. He actually seemed moderately interested. I looooooove the Yoga book. I love yoga pictures, I'm such a dork. Plus, I didn't realize that my first mysore teacher was in there. I'm not sure why I never knew that, I've seen the book many times. She has the most beautiful practice.

I'm exhausted and I just ate my weight in cheese. Which I think is ok because I haven't eaten much else all day.

I'm even too tired to use the F word.

Neglected blog

2008-03-25T09:25:00.003-04:00

Alert, this post has almost nothing to do about ASS-TANGA or even yoga. It's my personal life over the last few days.

I feel as though I have neglected my blog. However, in my defense I have been working some serious hours, plus trying to spend some quality time with BF AND trying to practice ASS-TANGA YOGA (or even any kind of yoga for that matter) in the midst of all of it. Here is the rundown:

Last week the director (boss's boss) basically said 'you have to have all of these users converted to the new email system by April 11. (Never mind the fact that I'm supposed to go to LA from April 2-7). This AFTER we decided to move said e-mail systems to a new storage unit, thus requiring a total rebuild. So most of my life has been taken up with rebuilding the system and moving users.

On Saturday (after working Friday night until maybe 9pm), I got up, went to the 8:30am vinyasa class here locally in PW, came home, showered and got presentable then BF and I took a field trip to Arthur Avenue. Yummy food and cool stores that sell all kinds of Italian food-related things. It's a meat-lover's paradise, BF was in hog heaven. We left the Bronx and took the scenic route home through Upper Manhattan. BF had never seen Inwood, Hudson Heights, Washington Heights or the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Went home, had a little dinner, watched tv, went to bed about 11?

On Sunday, I got up at 5am to move mailboxes. I went back to sleep after that was finished at about 5:45 and woke up late for mysore at 9. I didn't make it onto the train until the 9:10 (I like to get the 8:40 if not the 8:10 on Sundays), so didn't show up to the Shala until 10:30.....BECAUSE SOME FUCKHEAD DECIDED TO TAKE A STROLL DOWN THE LIRR TRACKS. Fuck. We sat on the train for like 20 extra minutes outside of Woodside waiting for the cops to come get this asshole. When I got to the Shala......FUCK, NO TEACHER. We had a sub. Fuck fuck fuck. I have to say, I didn't much care for her, but it takes me a while to warm up to a yoga teacher, so it's most likely me and not her. Had a lackluster but ok practice, I was glad I went so that's what matters. That'll teach me to not check the schedule before I leave. Then I had to run uptown to the Upper West Side to run an errand. I didn't get home until almost 2:30. Then, dinner with BF's Aunt and Uncle. In Smithtown. Or, bumfuck, as I like to call it. FUCK. Then home, more working and supposedly sleep.

Also had depressing phone call with my mother on Sunday afternoon during the drive to Bumfuck, er, Smithtown. My grandmother (Alzheimer's, nursing home) is slowly passing away. Apparently she's not very responsive, yet she cries all the time. She can no longer walk and her eyes don't even focus any more. I believe my mother and my uncle are preparing to put her in hospice care. I know this sounds horrible, but I'm ready for her to pass. SHE'S ready for her to pass. What a horrible disease this is! It's just so unfair to be trapped in your own body! :(

I was on call this weekend so on Sunday night I was paged at 10:30pm (I was asleep, was hoping to go to the city to class), 4:30am (had to talk to someone in Romania for 10 minutes.....that's fun when you've been awakened from a dead sleep, let me tell ya!), went back to sleep til about 6 (there was no way in hell I was going to class at this point) and went downstairs to shower, discovering that we had some kind of major issue and the data center had been trying to get ahold of me for like 45 minutes. Oops. Hurried into work where I sat on what we call a 'Sev1', or Severity 1, call until about 10am. I thought I was going to be skewered for not recognizing the widespread issue right away but thankfully I dodged a bullet.

So, yesterday I'm trucking along, working on my conversion. I remove the next server that has to be rebuilt and went home. At about 8pm I get an e-mail from the boss that something is broken. I spend the next 5 hours staring at my computer trying to figure out how to fix the problem. I couldn't fix it so I went to bed, got up at about 5:30, sat in front of my computer again and miraculously figured it out in about an hour. FUCK.

No yoga. And seriously, if anyone needs yoga right now it's me. I don't even care what kind of fucking yoga it is right now. Fuck. I guess I'll try to practice at home in the morning if something doesn't fall on my head today. I swear, these last few months I feel like all the forces of the universe are conspiring to keep me from my yoga practice!

I'm still working but I'm posting anyway!

2008-03-21T11:57:00.002-04:00

So there.

The director of my group decided that my e-mail conversion project for 1200+ users needed to be stepped up a bit so he told the CIO that we would have it done by April 11. Without asking me. Very nice. On top of that I had to rebuild both systems (clusters) from scratch because they decided we needed to be on a different SAN. Again, very nice. So I've been working like mad to get these servers built and now I have to actually get the users on them. Please shoot me! A LOT of diet pepsi consumed. It's my stress thing. I can feel that I need water though. Later I'll go get a big bottle of Poland Spring from the cafeteria. Oh, and in the midst of this conversion I'm supposed to go to LA. Ha!

In other news, I tried to practice bit yesterday morning. I did some sun sals, a little finishing. Today is a moon day, thank goodness. I should have practiced but I'm very grateful for the 'official' day off. I've been up until 9 or 10 every night working at home after I leave the office at 5. I will go to my 'hot vinyasa' class tomorrow and to the Shala on Sunday. Speaking of moon days, the full moon (almost) was gorgeous last night. It's freezing here still, 34 degrees this morning when I left the houe. And it rained all day Wednesday, I got nasty mud on my new pants which did not come out in the wash last night. Very annoyed! They are sooooo comfy, my new pants. I'm ignoring that they're the 'wrong' size.

That's all for now, nothing very exciting going on over here in LIA-land. Just work, work and more work.

Send good thoughts to Anna, she should be out of surgery now!

Still working

2008-03-20T14:20:00.003-04:00

No time for posting. But I wouldn't want the three people reading this blog to think I had disappeared. Still here. Working. Working. Working. Maybe time for posting tonight. Tomorrow is Anna's surgery (I think). So send her some good vibes!

xoxoxo

LIA

Working....and a meme from Annabella

2008-03-19T10:58:00.002-04:00

I've been too busy working to post. And I didn't make it to the shala this morning, so I'm going this afternoon. I am. Really, I am. I brought my new yoga clothes that I got from Cranky.

I don't have much to say, so I'm doing the meme I stole from Anna's blog.

1. What is your occupation? E-mail engineer.

2. What color are your socks right now? White (and damp, ugh)

3. What are you listening to right now? Two women in my office yapping.

4. What was the last thing that you ate? Low-fat multi-berry muffin

5. Can you drive a stick shift? Is there any other way to drive???? I've heard of those automatic thingies....

6. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? Green

7. Last person you spoke to on the phone? My mother, I think. I hate the phone.

8. What's your favorite yoga pose? Ustrasana

9. How old are you today? 36.

10. Favorite drink? Diet pepsi.

11. What is your favorite sport to watch? NCAA football, GO NOLES!!!!!!!

12. Have you ever dyed your hair? If so what color? Yes. Currently auburn, has been blonde also.

13. Pets? Rocky the Boston Terrier and Rufus the Pug. And the BF.

14. Favorite cake? Carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.

15. Last movie you saw? Ugh, something the BF thought was bad, I can't remember.

16. Favorite day of the year? Memorial Day.

17. What do you do to vent anger? I don't.

18. What was your favorite toy as a child? I was more of a book kind of kid.

19. What is your favorite, fall or spring? Spring.

20. Hugs or kisses? Ok.

21. Cherry or Blueberry? Raspberry.

22. Do you want your friends to respond? Yes!

23. Who is most likely to respond? No clue.

24. Who is least likely to respond? No clue.

25. Living arrangements? Banished to the burbs.

26. When was the last time you cried? Ladies holiday.

27. What is on the floor of your closet? Shoes, an old yoga mat

28. Who is the friend you have had the longest? Ilene, I've known her since sixth grade.

30. Favorite smell? the ocean.

31. What/who inspires you? My friends, Christine, Anissa, Melissa, Sheri, Julia. Also my cousin Freida.

32. What are you afraid of? Being laughed at

33. Hamburgers? Sometimes.

34. Favorite car? Mine.

36. Number of keys on your key ring? One on the car key ring, two on the house key ring

37. How many years at your current job? two months.

38. Favorite day of the week? Fridays.

39. How many states have you lived in? Floriday, NY, NJ and California.

40. What’s your dream job? Hmmmmm, you mean this isn't it??? ha.

Totally forgot....

2008-03-17T11:15:00.002-04:00

I bought a Manduka eco-mat on Sunday. It is frigging fantastic. I've been a Jade Harmony mat devotee for a long time but I can't stand the shedding any more, and it's so freaking narrow. The Manduka is really heavy but I LOVE IT. It's soft to the touch, sticky right away, unlike the black Manduka but no shedding, and really wide and long. It's fantastic. The best $70 I've spent in a long time. I highly recommend!!!!

Slooooooow practice

2008-03-17T10:37:00.002-04:00

My God, 4:30am is early. Too early. However, the LIRR graciously dimmed the lights on the 5:09 train from Port to Penn this morning. I am grateful to them for that.

Friday we got the report cards of the future step-children (can I just call them FSC???). They were fantastic, really, they couldn't have been better. Z improved on everything he needed to and T is still at the tippy top of everything. He even managed to improve his 'unsportsmanlike conduct' knock from last time. He gets VERY frustrated if he doesn't perform as expected in sports activities. So we took them to Cheeseburger Cheeseburger. And I had a Cheeseburger. Very few fries though. It was yum.

Saturday I took a vinyasa class at the local yoga studio. Then I went shopping. For pants. Yeah. Well, I bought two size 14's and one size 12. So what. SO FUCKING WHAT. I'm comfortable, so there. F YOU, stupid evil voice in my head!!!!!! And when I lose these 15 lbs. I will have these pants altered, just like the ones before them. So there.

I cooked the men of the house a roast. It was pretty good, I had a little bit myself. Z ate like 10 rolls. The boy is such a carb-o-holic.

I got up early on Sunday and went to practice with Batman. Apparently there is some sort of track work going on so we had to get off at Shea Stadium and take the 7 train in. For those of you who know the NYC transit system, I won't have to explain any more than that.....

It was a good practice yesterday. Batman cranked me into Marichy C. Twas very nice. I did three whole backbends, yay. I think this stopping at Navasana thing is going to work out just fine. The question is, how am I going to explain myself when I start adding poses back in???? Oh well, I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. After class I had breakfast with my friend and her boyfriend. I hadn't met him yet, so that was nice. He's VERY cute and so nice. I hope it works out for her, he seems like a really good guy and she deserves just such a man.

I went home and slept for two hours after Sunday's class. Apparently the BF and the children came home from their movie and were downstairs for over an hour, I never heard a thing. Had the white noise machine on full blast. I was exhausted. When I got up, BF came home from taking the children home and we had a little bite to eat down the street. I had a big salad with a little chicken. I have been very happy with the eating this weekend. I've had some fattening/sweet things but not too crazy. Plus plenty of exercise, yoga plus I took a long 'power walk' up and down the hills of Port Washington on Saturday.

Got up at 4:30am this morning (yeah, it's a sickness, this thing we do). On the train ride in I questioned my sanity. I got to the shala and practiced very slowly. There's some kind of nagging pain in my right hip that comes and goes. It's in the back, kind of high on the hip, I would love to find out exactly what it is. But, very few knees down in the sun sals and also very few in the vinyasas so I think my strength and stamina is finally coming back. Still no jumpbacks though, maybe next week. Flexibility is still hiding out there somewhere. Perhaps more nighttime 'mini-practices' with hip openers. I need to get BF to take some pics.

I've been here for an hour and a half and have done NO WORK other than talk to my boss on the phone for about 20 minutes. Very nice.

Blubber forecast is still 40% and dropping.

Searching for a positive body image

2008-03-14T09:49:00.002-04:00

Lately I've been watching 'How to Look Good Naked' (and no, I don't normally watch Lifetime). I cry every time I watch it (I'm a sap, don't tell my all-male coworker group, they think I'm a tough bitch, ha!). One, because all of the women they have had on the show are beautiful, healthy, normal sized women who don't see themselves clearly and that's always sad and two, because I always see myself. They have this segment where they line up a bunch of 'larger' women (probably between a size 12 and size 18) smallest to largest, in their underwear. Then they have the featured woman pick where she thinks she belongs in terms of her size in the lineup. And they always pick at least two sizes larger than they really are. I stopped at Old Navy very quickly Wednesday night after dinner to see what they had in the way of pants. I tried on some 10's and 12's and even the 12's didn't really fit. It totally threw me for a loop. So today, I'm thinking, is my worth really in the size of my pants?????? Why is my ability to feel attractive so closely correlated to my clothing size? I know that I need to lose some of this weight to be healthier, I'm petrified of things like heart disease, diabetes, digestive diseases like colon cancer. And I will certainly keep striving for that. But why is my self esteem all wrapped up in whether I can still fit into my size 10 designer jeans (I can't, by the way!)? I hate this struggle and I feel like I've gone through it every single day of my life since I can remember. It's exhausting and I'm tired of it but I can't figure out how to give it up. And I KNOW that no matter how much weight I lose, the judgemental voice will always be there. I know in my head that this is not about how thin I am. But really, what IS it about then?

Home practice today. I worked hard in the sun salutations, did most of the standing sequence then did some hip openers and backbending. Shalabasana, Ustrasana, Dhanurasana. No UD though. I did prop my self up on a block for some bridge, just to work on finding the feet. :)

I ordered some good stuff from Amazon with a gift certificate my brother sent me for my birthday back in January. World Tour 2000 with SKPJ, the Encinitas DVD where Guruji does led third series and the Yoga book by Linda Sparrowe. I love the pictures in that book. I used to practice with one of the models for that book, Lauren Petersen. She has THE MOST AMAZING PRACTICE I've ever seen. And she's so nice, really the most down to earth person ever. So it'll be cool to have a big book full of pictures of her and others. I'm also buying a bunch of stuff from Cranky today. Yoga clothes, the Matthew Sweeney book, and the Anatomy of Hatha Yoga. Fun! I looooooove yoga books. I'm such a geek.

Cranky is coming to visit us and practice with us in our Shala!!!!! Yippeeeeee!!!!!

Breaking things

2008-03-12T12:06:00.003-04:00

I totally forgot to post about what I broke at work yesterday. It was extremely stressful. And the thing was, I knew it was going to break when I did it. But I had to. So I was in the office until 8pm with one of my coworkers on the phone with Microsoft trying to get it fixed. Ugh, I hate dealing with environments where I don't know what's going on! It was a very public break too, down for hours. Sheesh. And I was STILL able to get up at 4:15am, get on the 5:36 train and do my 'currently abbreviated' practice. Woo hoo! yay me! Now for two days of home practice. This will be the test....

Blubber forecast 40% and dropping

2008-03-12T09:42:00.002-04:00

Perhaps some of this weight is coming off. Just a teeny tiny bit. I think I'll go to Old Navy and buy some inexpensive pants. I need some pants for work (I used to wear jeans and sneakers or flip flops, especially in LA, but I can only do that on Fridays now) but I really don't want to spend a ton of money on clothes while I'm at this size. I know that's lame but I don't care. I won't give in to this extra weight.

Practice was nice today even though I was a little tired. Anna was there and man does she get there early! She was already at eka pada sirsasana. FWIW, her LBH poses are AWESOME. Very flexy, that girl. I asked some newbie dude to scootch over so I could be next to Anna. He hadn't started yet so it wasn't too terribly rude, was it? I didn't want to be in front of all the bags or next to the wall either. I have to say, it's really nice that there's a friendly face in the shala other than the teacher. The newbie dude had the book with him and was using it but turned to the left for trikonasana instead of to the right so when he came up to stand I whispered to him to always turn right. He was too cute, I love the real baby newbies (as opposed to your average beginner like myself). I do love BW also, he's SUCH a good teacher. He's the only teacher who can get my head to my knee is marichy A, and it doesn't even feel that intense. Now I just have to figure out why I can't bind myself. It makes no sense to me. Whenever someone assists me, all they do is tuck my hands together so I know it's not that far. Ugh. We also had a giggle today about the EXTREMELY LOUD CHANTER. I know some people don't even want to hear a soft chant but that doesn't bother me; as a matter of fact, when I first moved back to NY and started practicing at the shala, I was a little embarassed that I was one of the only ones who didn't say it out loud. This person, though, is DISTURBING. I mean, it's LOUD; if you're all in your head at that moment, it will literally make you jump out of your skin. I shouldn't complain, though, because my top had a really weird icky smell to it even though it is clean. Not sure what that's about, I think it's time to ditch the Oxumwear. The shala has some nice looking Prana pants and they are all size large, yay! Also need a new mat, I'm thinking of getting the Manduka eco-mat instead of another Harmony. Any opinions from blogland?

I've lost my backbend completely. I can no longer come up. It's weird. For a while there I was making A LOT of progress. For a few weeks I was even able to come up three times! But now I'm stopping at Marichy C and I still can't come up. I get to the top of my head then can't get any farther. So I did some bridges, whatever. I'm not going to stress it. Still taking my knees to the floor 80% of the time too. Again, whatever. Hopefully it will all come back soon. For whatever reason, Ladies Holiday has dragged on forever this month. It's still here, barely, 6 days later. That's kind of a long time for me. Ever since I went off the damn Pill everything is much more unpredictable. Ugh. No inversions today, decided I might have made things worse by doing inversions on Sunday and Monday.

I need some core/abs/low back exercises that I can do on my living room floor in front of the tv with very little extraneous equipment. If you have anything good, I'm all ears. I've been doing a mini-yoga practice at night in front of the tv, just hip openers and virasana and stuff. I'd like to add some ab stuff to that, it's time to get off my ass and get my core in gear. So if you're reading this and you have suggestions, please help!!!!

Why do people talk at full volume on the LIRR at 5:30 in the morning? Why? Why why why?

Yay!!!!!!

2008-03-11T13:38:00.001-04:00

I bought my plane ticket to LA. WOO HOO!!!!!!!!!! April 2, I'm so freaking excited.

Get a hobby!

2008-03-10T14:24:00.002-04:00

OK, my boss and his wife need to get a hobby!!!!! Apparently she is going into labor (third child) like right now. I was hoping I would get another week before being thrown out here on my own. Today I'm doing stuff I have no idea how to. Grrrr, I hate that. Fuck. If they think I'm going to fucking work in Port Washington on Wednesday and not go to class they are out of their minds!!!!! I'm way too frigging sleep deprived for this. 4:30 came way too early today for this nonsense. Double-fuck! Must get crack (aka Starbucks) and some sugar right away.

More backsliding

2008-03-10T09:55:00.003-04:00

I went back to the shala, back to Batman on Sunday. I saw Anna and Eeyore there, that was nice. It was a nice, mellow Sunday, not as crowded as usual. I assume due to the David Williams workshop. As I began to practice I realized just how much strength, stamina and flexibility I really have lost due to my slacker home practices. However, I'm trying to let go of my frustration and just get back on track. I skipped Mari D, did Navasana then tried backbending. Not happening. If I can't 'feel my feet' and I feel like it's going to be too much weight in the arms, I don't do it any more. I just end up crunching the hell out of my lower back and I REFUSE TO DO IT ANY MORE. Eeyore is sooooo sweet and he has the nicest practice. Anna too. And the best part was there was a chick in there with bigger boobs than mine!!!! Woo hoo!!!!! I always feel like such a freak in there with all the skinny teeny tiny girls. I say, good for her! Oh, and Batman put on a cd of chanting or some such. It was nice at first but then it started to sound really weird. It did distract me from the constant self-berating voice in my head though, so I was ok with it.

I got up at 4:30am this morning to go to the Shala again. Practiced with BW, I forgot just how lovely it was to go to his class. He's just soooooo great. I practiced gently and was still stiff as hell but I'm hoping that will go away in a few weeks. Also did some hip openers last night while watching tv, made BF give me some adjustments. He'll be the only yoga teacher who has never actually practiced yoga, ha! Home practice tomorrow, and back to the Shala on Wednesday morning.

Rainy days and Mondays always get me down

2008-03-08T21:11:00.003-05:00

Isn't that the way the song goes? It rained all day. And we lost power here in our little section of Port Washington for a few hours. The BF and I didn't end up going out to the fancy steak house, we just went up the street to a local place instead. When the power went out, BF started FREAKING OUT: 'I'm bored. What are we going to do? I can't just sit here and stare at the walls all night.' Ugh, like a child.

I went to the 'hot vinyasa' class again today. I think I like the teacher, she cracks me up. She reminds me of how I might be if I were a yoga teacher. No one is allowed to slack, you have to try your hardest (without hurting yourself), you're allowed to fail as long as you try and she curses too. Cracks me up. She's a great cheerleader. I try to ignore the fact that she's an Ana Forrest devotee......not that there's anything wrong with that. It's a fun class and the heat is nice. It's not bikram heat, that would make me crazy but it's nice and cozy warm. Problem is, I think I injured myself slightly today. I'm not exactlY sure what I did but when it came time for 'inversion of your choice', I decided to do headstand with the wall (crim, yes, bad lady). I set up my arms, put my head down and when I lifted my hips I felt this searing pain that ran under my right boob all the way around my side to under my shoulder. I mean it HURT. I sat up for a few minutes, tried child's pose. I was hoping it was just gas (not uncommon in my naughty digestive system) but the pain wouldn't go away. Finally it subsided enough that I got into headstand for a few minutes but it's still there. It moved from the back to the front and now it's just kind of a dull ache when I move certain ways or take a deep breath. I hope it doesn't screw up my first practice at the shala in weeks! Looking forward to going tomorrow and seeing Anna and hopefully Eeyore, that will be nice. Also looking forward to the rain ending!

Quickie

2008-03-07T10:29:00.001-05:00

I notice on the AYRI web site that the Florida trip has been fully cancelled, even Sharath and Saraswati aren't going. I hope Guruji is ok....

Zzzzzzzzz

2008-03-07T09:28:00.003-05:00

I am sooooooo tired this morning. I went to bed after 10pm two nights in a row! Last night I didn't even get home until almost midnight. Am very pooped, and the Ladies' Holiday rages on. I'm at least two sizes larger than normal. And that's over and obove my January/February stress weight. No fun but hopefully it will be gone by Sunday so I can feel human again.

I went to the first lecture of the David Williams workshop last night. I'm glad I went, he's pretty entertaining and I like what he had to say. He talked for over two hours but I really took away (for myself) two things. The first is, if it hurts you're doing it wrong. I think a lot of times in ashtanga we forget that. I tend to think more along the lines of 'if it hurts, then I must not be capable/strong enough/flexible enough'. Funny how I always turn it to a negative connotation of the self. Currently the bhujapidasana, kurmasana, supta kurmasana sequence is what hurts me (and I can't even really do them anyway!). So I've made an executive decision. I'm pulling my practice back to Navasana for the forseeable future. I will miss baddha konasana, upavistha konasana, supta konasana (my personal all time favorite) but I think I've been hurting myself in bhujapidasana, kurmasana and supta kurmasana because I'm not ready for them. They were given to me by my teachers in LA, I think for the purpose of helping with the marichy's but it ain't working. Perhaps in my home practice I will do my lame attempts at bhuja and the kurmasanas just to get the hips to open up. I figure if I switch to Guy's, I'd get everything taken away after the Marichys anyway so what's the difference?

The second thing I took away was about the breathing. When you play a wind instrument for 14+ years, you belly breathe. That's just the way it is. In order to support all of the sound you're trying to make, you really have to get the whole abdominal cavity to fill up. But David had us try mula bandha and take deep breaths and I totally see what he's getting at. Perhaps that's why my stomach is not flat and I have no core strength? :) Have I been doing it wrong all this time? Maybe so. That is going to be my primary focus for the next few months, see if I can really strengthen the bandhas and forget about how deep in the stupid poses I'm getting. I mean, who cares, right? Well, I care but I'm going to try not to.

On a lighter note, I met Anna and Eeyore (who doesn't have a blog to link to, but I think he should!!!!). It was so nice to meet them, Anna is just like she seems in her blog, outgoing and friendly and sweet and funny. And Eeyore is sooooo nice. He's taking the whole workshop, good for him! I'm far too lazy plus the thought of getting into the minutiae of the primary series right now is a little too much for me. So I'll just go to my 'hot vinyasa' class tomorrow and to regular class with Batman on Sunday. It will be nice to have a friendly face at the shala sometimes too, so I was really glad to meet Anna. I'll be sad if she leaves for LA but very happy for her, I know what it's like to be stuck somewhere you don't really want to be. I'll be a little envious too.... :)

Making new friends....

2008-03-06T16:21:00.002-05:00

I actually did get up at 4:15am to go to the shala. And at about 4:20 or so, the cramps kicked in and I knew there was no way I was going to be able to practice this morning. So I popped two advil and went back upstairs to bed. Now I'm going to the David Williams lecture at 5:30. I'm hoping Anna keeps me awake! Very excited to meet her tonight, for sure. I'm sooooo sleepy. And hungry! Definitely must get something to eat before this shindig. I'm definitely looking forward to hearing his spiel though.

Another home practice

2008-03-05T10:16:00.002-05:00

I managed a decent home practice today. I'm just happy when I get to the mat. No major revelations or progress. Just get on the damn mat and move through as much as I can. Am also on ladies holiday, so I'm being very criminal right now. I'll be even more criminal when I practice at the shala tomorrow morning but I don't care. It's been too long since I've been to an actual class. Other than that it's pretty boring around here. I'm going to parts of the David Williams workshop this weekend so that should be pretty cool. He's doing an intro to second series 'in a way that everyone at all levels can try and enjoy'. Ha, we'll see about that! I'm going to put my ego aside and just try. I would like to go to the primary series stuff but I can't get there that early on Friday evening and I already have plans for Saturday. Plus I just don't think my practice is up to that kind of scrutiny and breakdown. For right now I'd just like to struggle and suffer in silence. I'm hoping it gets better soon.

Onward and upward

2008-03-03T11:05:00.005-05:00

What a rant that was yesterday! I was seriously over the edge. It happens every once in a while. I tell ya, being off the Pill has completely changed my cycle in some unwelcome ways! No more feeling sorry for myself (at least til next month....)

Practiced this morning, wasn't too bad. Did all of standing plus a few seated. I got started at 6am so I didn't have time for much. I've decided to lower my expectations a bit and just be happy when I make it to the mat. I did set a goal to do everything up to navasana for 80% of my home practices by the end of March. I think it's a good goal and it works for me because I don't do well without some kind of focused agenda. Now if I could just get this weight off..... Here are some pics from this weekend taken with the fancy camera.

Here's T in his boyscout uniform:

Here's Z in his cub scout uniform:

Here's Rocky resting on Mama's leg:

Here's Rufus resting on mama's leg:

It's a gorgeous day here in the Northeast. I see some tiny little white flowers starting to bloom on the banks of the creek that runs through the park across the street from our house. Was that a run-on sentence? Maybe that's part of my problem, it's been a particularly grey winter here, a sudden change from sunny southern california.

In a funk

2008-03-02T07:51:00.002-05:00

Alert -- below is mostly a rant on my personal life, only the first paragraph has anything to do with my practice.

Where to begin? I felt the pre-ladies' holiday rage begin on Friday while driving to work. It almost always hits while I'm driving because the stupidity of Port Washington drivers seems to increase exponentially when I'm PMS'ing. Friday at lunch I find out from BF that he will not be having dinner at his aunt and uncle's with the kids because his aunt is sick. In my hostile fog this of course hit me the wrong way. His family is so casual and go-with-the-flow and I'm so, well, not. I'm very structured (some would say rigid) and it's very difficult for me to deal with them. They are VERY nice people, though, don't get me wrong. So I then realize that I may not have time to get all the stuff done that I wanted to (cleaning, etc) and get even more cranky. I had been thinking about going to one of the classes at the local studio on Saturday morning, just to get moving but I wasn't sure because I knew it was major meltdown potential. When I got up Saturday morning I decided to go anyway. I went to their 'hot vinyasa' class which was neither hot nor vinyasa but I kind of enjoyed it and I liked the teacher. She was very no-nonsense, non-touchy-feely but a good coach/cheerleader, which I appreciated. I had a mini-meltdown during savasana but I managed to keep it together and I don't think anyone noticed. I did, however, have one of the best ustrasanas I've ever had. I think eventually that may be 'my' pose.

After class I'm freaking out about how heavy I've gotten and my brain is just spiraling. I keep repeating to myself that it's just PMS, it will pass but the tears remain close. The boss calls, something isn't working after I did some maintenance work this morning at 6am. We did a 'severity one' call and everyone got it figured out after about an hour. Then I find out BF and older child have to go all the way back out to Smithtown because the ex-wife has not included all of older child's cub scout patches that need to be affixed to his uniform. He and his father are supposed to go to his graduation from cub scouts to boy scouts and his uniform isn't ready. Can we talk about a mom who sends her children off completely unprepared and half-assed EVERY GODDAMNED TWO FUCKING WEEKS?????? This is one of the reasons I don't have children, it would make me nuts because I'd spend way too much time trying to make sure everything is 'perfect'. So they go to her house (an hour away--leaving me home alone with the other child, btw) and can't find the patches. They spend another two hours going to the boy scout store and getting new ones. Then I spend about an hour figuring out how to get the patches on and ironing, etc. So basically haven't really seen much of BF all weekend.

We all went out to dinner to a chain restaurant that I won't even name, I'm so horrified by it. It's 'kid friendly', you know. We had a forty minute wait to get seated then we didn't see our waitress for at least ten minutes. I was, of course, incensed, given my hormonal mood and I flagged down a host and bitched. She finally showed up after another five minutes. The children were badly behaved, as usual. Or maybe it's just that I don't have kids so I don't know how children should be expected to behave. Perhaps it's all me, this expectation that the kids understand how they should behave in public. They're not THREE for crying out loud. I always get the excuse that 'they're boys, that's how boys are' and I just don't agree with that. I think it's just an excuse for a lack of discipline and consistent behavior on the part of the parents. Again, maybe it's me. Maybe I'm just a hard-assed bitch. Yes, the woman who allows cartoons or Nickelodeon pre-teen crap to play on the tv in the living room in a continuous loop, the woman who allows video games to also be played in the living room, despite the fact that there's a tv with a dvd player AND an extra XBox 360 console upstairs in THEIR room (but the one in the living room has the 'live' subscription on the internet.....), the woman who watches stupid slapstick comedies that she hates with the rest of the boys in the house, the woman who bakes some kind of homemade brownie/cookie/cake every time they come visit, the woman who cooks/cleans/does laundry......this woman, she's a hard-assed bitch. She's mean, she's demanding, she's never pleased with anything. I'M SO FUCKING OVER IT.

By time time we got home I was exhausted so I hopped on the computer for a second and found out through Anna's blog that Teacher won't be there tomorrow, there's a sub. I totally freaked. I knew I couldn't do a new teacher tomorrow. Even if it had just been Teacher I probably would have melted down, which would be ok (sort of) but I couldn't stomach the thought of freaking out in front of someone I didn't even know. Then I started losing it because there's another decent practice passing me by. My weight is ballooning and it's mostly because I haven't been able to practice the way I usually do. I went to bed and BF came up a few minutes later so I started sobbing about how fat I am and how I need to practice and I can't and on and on and on. Poor BF, it sucks to be with a hormonal woman.

My practice embarasses me; my weight embarasses me. I don't even want to be at the Shala at the same time Anna is (we keep saying we should meet) because I'm embarassed to meet her or anyone else who practices there. I just want to slink in, do my lame practice and slink out. I'm actually tearing up as I write this. I'm just a mess.

AND WHY THE FUCK CAN'T THE EIGHT YEAR OLD LEARN TO PUT ON PANTS BEFORE HE COMES DOWNSTAIRS IN THE MORNING??????

Backsliding

2008-02-29T11:07:00.002-05:00

I got up at 5:15 (one of the dogs had his little paws on the side of the bed staring at me, it's hard to sleep through that). I went downstairs, let them out then curled up with them on the couch to watch some news. At 6 I turned off the tv (very important, must not practice with tv on) rolled out my mat and did all of standing, no backbends, no finishing. Yay! An accomplishment! I heavily modified. And I mean heavily. As in, a block was involved. As in, I did tree pose for ardha badha. I could tell that the bind was not an option anyway. I have such a hard time with balance poses that sometimes it's good for me to just take a step back and do my kindergarten yoga. I'm not so good at the grownup yoga anyway, so what's the difference, right? It still felt pretty good and I think that's kind of the point, especially right now.

I can't believe how much strength and flexibility I've lost over this month of home practice (or, non-home practice). And I've also been eating like a pig. Clearly something is wrong because I'm definitely a stress eater. The problem is, the stress should be over now. I have a job, I should be able to roll back into non-stress mode. But I can't. I can't seem to get over my resentment toward the BF either, and I'm not sure what that's about. He's actually a really good guy, even if he's a moody pain in the ass. And I have to say, he's REALLY good about the yoga. Not only does he not make fun of it or of me for being so serious about it, he actually tries to help. He asked if I was going to class on Saturday at the studio down the street and I said 'no, it's not ashtanga and I need ashtanga' and he commented that perhaps I just need yoga right now. He may be right.

Clearly my practice has suffered due to my lack of ability to go to class. I am unable to get motivated to have a decent home practice. I've tried to figure out why that is and haven't come up with any answers. Now that I will be working in the city on Mondays and Wednesdays, I'm wondering if I should go to a different shala. The new office is a little farther downtown and it would be slightly easier to go down there to one of the others now. The problem there is no shower. And that's kind of a drag when you have to get dressed up and go into the office. It was ok when I wore jeans and flip flops to work and didn't put on makeup. I need to find someone who practices there or who has practiced there and find out what the skinny is. Maybe it isn't worth it at all. Maybe I should just stick with what I have.

It's a future stepchildren weekend. That means bitchy Sonya. Oh, and my bank has placed a hold on my first official paycheck plus two weeks worth of unemployment checks that I deposited on Monday and Tuesday of this week, so that means extra bitchy Sonya. I'm soooooo pissed. Fucking wankers. I'm so tired of taking money from the BF. Funny how the stupid bank has NEVER done that to me before. I called and they were like 'it's at the bank's discretion'. WTF????

Outing myself

2008-02-27T20:27:00.003-05:00

Since I've already outed myself to several people, I suppose I can start using my first name. It's Sonya. I didn't make it up, it's not some kind of alternate personality. It's my name. Feel free to use it during commentary or whatever.

I ate my weight in cheese tonight. Blubber forecast is 70% with a big chance of jiggling.

Is this really MY life?

2008-02-27T11:45:00.003-05:00

I managed to roll out of bed at 6am, let the dogs out to pee really quick then parked them on the couch to watch me practice. I went up to parsvakonasana and gave up. That's right, GAVE UP. I don't wanna. I just don't wanna. I need the classroom and the teacher and the lack of distracting dust bunnies on the floor. I need the heat and the energy and the motivation of not embarassing myself in front of a bunch of people. I just do. I DO I DO I DO I DO I DO I DO I DO I DO I DO. And I'm not ashamed to admit it. So after I gave up at about 6:20, I took the dogs for a walk, fed them and got ready for work. And continued to be agitated with the BF, left over from last night, which is left over from last weekend. Did I mention that I hold grudges. Yeah, I do.

Since my brain is a little work fried right now, what better time than now to finish the LI Ashtangini yoga history!

We left off with wrist pain and mysore practice. I started mysore practice with S at the tiny studio in Santa Monica. I also took a vinyasa class on Saturdays there, which is where I broke my big right toe. That was my first major yoga injury. Fucker still doesn't look quite right and has a weird pop every time I move it. So I went to the doctor for the wrist pain. Of course, it's tendonitis. And why do I have it? From the yoga! The doctor, of course, recommended that I stop the yoga. I laughed and said, 'I don't think so'. S and my other teacher M gave me all kinds of extra R&D to do and homeopathic/natural remedies to help it. I iced, I wore wrist braces, I even took Advil, which I really don't like taking (kidneys, people, kidneys!). There was a lot of work on 'waking up' the muscles of the back and shoulders to take some of the load off my poor wrists. Backwards perpendicular handstands against the wall (upper body is vertical and legs are parallel to the floor, feet on the wall). Then came the really fun injury.

It was a Friday morning in August 2006. Did my practice and then was doing my backbends, which at that time I did with my arms pushed up to the wall. And I felt something bad happen in the region of my lower back, but not enough to be an immediate problem. So I did my finishing (which I think made it worse, if you want to know the truth) and went home, showered, and went to work. Throughout the day the pain in my lower back got worse and worse and finally I went home at 3pm. Best position was lying on my back on the floor with my feet and legs propped up in a chair. I went to bed and at about 9pm (I was mostly asleep) had the first back spasm. Seriously, if this has never happened to you, it feels like you are paralyzed and may never walk again. It happened twice more during the night, even though I slept with a big floor pillow under my knees (I'm a stomach sleeper and HATE sleeping on my back; it was pure torture for a month). By Saturday all I could do was lie on my back in the aforementioned position. I missed a good friend's birthday party that night and on Sunday, barely able to get in my car (it's very low to the ground), I went to class. I limped in and S immediately began the rehab/restorative. And she did this (along with M) every day for two weeks before I left for New York. Let me tell you that low back injuries suck suck suck. I must have dealt with this off and on for about two months then spent the next 6 months not backbending and rehabbing my hips and lower back. What we came to discover is that I have flexible hamstrings (generally), tight quads and hips that outwardly rotate well (baddha konasana) but don't inwardly rotate very well at all (tiryang mukai blah blah blah). Feet and knees want to go out out out which is apparently bad. Plus my need to push myself led to a perfect storm and a nasty sacrum issue that I still struggle with to this very day.

After the back was rehabbed I practiced with Dominic Corigliano for several months since S left to go have her baby. That was pretty cool. If you've never taken a class from him, I highly recommend it. I made a lot of progress and steadily got stronger. S came back from maternity leave and I had to rotate between S, M and Dominic for a while due to job issues and such.

Then came the abscess. I'm not going to get into that story but suffice it to say that...you know where you put your foot in Janu Sirsasana B? That's where my abscess was. Yep. It required lancing then an additional outpatient surgery two months later and it still bothers me off and on (more on than off). I didn't practice Janu B for months. The second surgery happened two weeks before......

M and G had Chuck Miller and Maty Ezraty in for weeklong Mysore classes, Monday through Saturday last September. It was craaaaazy. The space holds not quite 40 mats, I believe? We were mat to mat (or, nose to ass, as A would say). It was definitely some of the best energy I've felt in a yoga class, for sure. I was two weeks off the minor surgery and I thought I wasn't going to be able to go at all. I was absolutely hysterical about missing it, there was MUCH drama. When the time came though, I was ok enough to practice at about 80-90% so I went. I'm so glad I did, it was amazing. I was certainly one of the most junior practitioners in the room but for once I didn't care. Maty is like a teeny tiny volleyball coach. She knew most of the people in the room and was shouting all the time, it was hilarious. Chuck is, well, in a word, intense. I didn't have very much interaction with them until the very last day. I had finished my practice and was doing my backbends and Chuck came over to me. He sat down next to me and said 'do I know you?'. I said no, told him my name and he proceeded to walk me through backbending for about 20 minutes or so. I was both honored and horrified. He talked about finding my feet and basically wouldn't let me out of bridge pose. The next day my legs were KILLING me. He is amazing, truly truly amazing. His eyes are SO intense. He finished up with me (or got tired of my lameness, whichever) and walked away, so I worked for a bit more on the backbending then I stood up to do my dropback preps against the wall. He calls out from across the room 'where are your feet? do you feel your feet?' YIKES! Now every time I backbend I hear Chuck's voice. Every single solitary time. Good times.....

A few weeks later I ended up here. In hell. Did I mention I hate Long Island? Yeah, I thought so.

Just had an Arturo/Armani moment

2008-02-26T15:23:00.002-05:00

I actually know Owl! I ended up reading a smidge of her blog from being on Anna's. As I was reading I thought to myself, man, this sounds like someone I used to practice with. Little references, nothing big. So I read for a few more days and finally my curiosity got the better of me. I e-mailed her (risking looking like a crazy stalker chick) and said, hey, are you so and so and she was! We have a good friend in common and we both used to practice with the same teachers. We've never 'officially' met but each of us certainly knows who the other is. Boodiba is right, it's a small small small blogging world and it seems to get smaller every day!

How odd that I have to go online to make friends with people I see every day. I know I'm kind of shy but jeez!

Mangosteens

2008-02-26T10:12:00.002-05:00

I ate my mangosteen last night that Alfia gave me. Very interesting. If you ever get the chance to try one you should. Tough to get open though. I shared it with BF, he thought it was good too.

Yesterday was not a good day. I was given an offer on Friday by New Company and today they laid off 32 people, three of whom were in my group. Which only leaves me and the guy they promoted up from desktop support last week. So the senior engineer who doesn't yet know the environment and the guy with no server experience whatsoever. Scary. I had a major meltdown over it, but BF talked me down off the ledge. I envisioned myself having to start my search all over again and it was not a pretty vision. Most of all I saw my LA trip in April disintegrating before my very eyes. How sad is that, 32 people lose their jobs and all I can think about is not seeing my friends and missing out on the workshops with Petri. New Company was supposedly getting rid of the dead weight. The three people in my group were pretty useless. According to my boss they got terrible reviews this year and should have seen this coming. Does anyone ever see it coming? Supposedly we are getting another person in on Monday to help. The best part is the looks I've been getting from my co-workers up here on the third floor. Kind of like 'how come YOU'RE still here and THEY'RE gone????'. Super.

I think I still owe the last segment of the LI Ashtangini yoga history but that will have to wait for another day. There's lots of work to be done now that it's just me here. Sigh.

Called A in the hospital yesterday and he was in the middle of being discharged. He sounds great and he's home, which I'm sure is an immense comfort to him. I didn't talk to him long since he was leaving the hospital but I'll call him later today and post an update.

Practice in DC

2008-02-24T12:44:00.002-05:00

I'm here in chilly Baltimore visiting my new-mommy and soon-to-be-mommy friends. I drove the 45 minutes to DC this morning and arrived at the DC Shala at about 7:45am. I met Tova and Alfia there and we all practiced. It was LOVELY. Alfia is terribly sweet and generous. She gave both Tova and I a mangosteen. Very very sweet. She was behind me so I couldn't see much of her practice but I did see her lovely top of the head dropbacks. Just so everyone knows, Tova is GORGEOUS and has a beautiful practice. And she's so terribly sweet. Everyone there was very nice, including the teachers. A big change from my NY shala where people seem, well, not as friendly. The teacher there stopped me at kurmasana, which is fine. I did some backbends and finishing. He did wrestle with me in mari C so that was fun too. Theyu have a mirror in the room which I tried very hard to avoid looking at.....hate practicing with mirrors. Overall it was a nice experience and I'll probably be there again when I visit the friends and their babies!

I have more thoughts on practice in general, I had some insights this weekend so there will probably be more posting later tonight.

Day gets better

2008-02-22T13:45:00.003-05:00

New Company has officially made me an offer to be a full time employee. They've offered me my original (inflated, says BF) salary I had at evil company that went under. But part of it is in a sign-on bonus. That's great because I have some serious bill-paying to do, plus I owe BF a ton of money as he's been fronting me for the last month and a half. Plus, since BF also got his bonus last week, our trip to LA might actually be fun and not so 'budgeted'. We both really need a vacation after the stress of these two months (me jobless and him not smoking). They're even looking into starting my benefits right away. That would be great since individual benefits in NY are really expensive. The best part is that I'll be working from the city two days a week so I can practice at the Shala. Yay!!!!! Snow not seeming quite so bad now.

I still owe the rest of the yoga history. Maybe tonight.

Frigging Snow

2008-02-22T10:00:00.006-05:00

It snowed last night. A lot. I hate snow. Why did I move here???? Oh yeah.....Now I'm all stressed from the drive here so I'm drinking a gigantic diet pepsi. That's right. Whatever, I don't care. Driving in the snow scares the shit out of me. I hate it. And apparently they don't believe in salting the roads in Port Washington. Assholes. I hate this town. I hate Long Island. I hate New York. There, I feel better. Here are some pictures of the snow.

That's my tiny black car buried under the snow. Poor girl.

In better news....I'm going to meet Cranky while I'm in Baltimore visiting friends. I decided I would check out the DC Shala while I'm there, I really can't afford any more practice time off. So I figured I'd drive to DC and practice at their shala. It's about an hour away but my friends go to church (for work, they are musicians) so I'd be all alone anyway. And Cranky said she was gonna be there!!!! Very exciting stuff indeed. Fellow blogger Alfia will be there also, it is her home shala so should be a fun morning!

I had BF take some pics of me with his fancy new camera while I was practicing last night. The only ones I could stomach posting were the UD pictures. Everything else shows my icky belly. Which does not seem to be getting any smaller, incidentally. UD doesn't look great but doesn't look terrible either. Still too much weight in the arms, for sure, but I'm finally getting to the point where I really feel like I might be able to 'find my feet', as Chuck would say. Also, clearly the armpits need to open up. I guess that's a shoulder thing? I'll have to ask M when I go to LA next. BF also assisted me with utthita hasta padangusthasana. He's learning that it's actually hard work being a yoga teacher, lol. And I'm learning that I need to make more of an effort to not let Teacher do all the work for me in certain poses. That's a lot of leg to hold up in that pose! BF took pics in trikonansana and ardha badha padmottanasana. I'm so incredibly screwed up in that pose, I probably shouldn't even be binding. The lotus hip is WAY higher than the standing leg. M would not approve. Perhaps I should go back to the daily hip openers. The camera is definitely a helpful tool to see what's working and what's not. Also helpful to get a good look at my belly, to stay motivated. Here they are. Please ignore the messy living room.

Doggies.....and Los Angeles

2008-02-21T13:49:00.004-05:00

Just for kicks, here is a picture of my 'boys'. Rocky is the Boston Terrier and Rufus is the Pug. How seriously cute are these dogs????

I'm bored at work, I don't want to do anything but browse online for hotel rooms in Santa Monica. That's right, it looks like I'm going to LA in the beginning of April. Petri will be there for a week, he's doing mysore classes then some workshops over the weekend of the 4th 5th and 6th at my dear friends' studio there. Normally I would either stay with M and G or my friend C but BF insists upon staying in a hotel. So trying to find cheap-ish hotel room close to the studio so I can walk in the morning. That way we'll be close to the beach, the pier and the promenade too. I missed Petri last time due to injury, it was such a bummer because I heard great things about him. Plus he's absolutely gorgeous in person, and that certainly doesn't hurt.

I suppose the second half of the LI Ashtangini yoga history is in order. Soooooo, I was practicing at Jivamukti and I heard (I don't remember how I heard) that Pattabhi was doing another 'world tour' and he was going to San Francisco. So I asked A if he wanted to join me in San Fran to check it out. Then they added a week in New York City so I signed up for only one day's led class. Once I signed up I realized I'd better try some Ashtanga just to see what I was in for. I took led classes for maybe a month or so at my current shala (this would be about two years ago). I flubbed through it ok and tried to at least learn the sequence so I didn't look like an idiot. Went to Pattabhi's led class, it was held somewhere in midtown, I don't remember exactly where. But it was definitely VERY cool. I was in the back where Saraswati and Sharath were. Sharath is gorgeous in person, his smile absolutely lights up the room. The experience was pretty amazing but I stuck with Jivamukti.

About a month later I stumbled across a job opportunity in LA so I took it and moved across the country in a matter of three weeks. Alas, no Jivamukti in LA (at least, not close to where I lived). Well, what's the next best thing to Jivamukti? Ashtanga, of course......I found this tiny studio in Santa Monica that was doing led half-primary classes in the evening and that's where I met one of my teachers, G, who is now also a dear friend along with his wife M. They are students of Chuck and Maty and they teach in a very different way than you would find out here in traditional New York City.

Shortly after I started the led classes G kept bugging me about trying Mysore style. Of course, I was like 'no way, that's not happening'. It was scary and I was afraid I'd make a fool of myself and everyone would laugh at me. Finally I gave in and went. 6:30am???? Jeez, could they make it any freaking earlier? I knew the sequence up through Navasana so that's what I practiced 3-4 times a week for the first few months. Along with FOUR extra hip openers before closing sequence to try to open my stubbornly stiff hips. Practice, even just through Navasana, was almost two hours. I was slow, weak, stiff and had no stamina. It seemed like everyone around me was so much more advanced than I was. But I kept hearing stories from everyone about all the stuff they struggled with so I kept at it.

From the beginning, I had trouble with my wrists. They ached after practice and it got worse and worse. I was doing vinyasas and sun salutations with my knees dropped to the floor for MONTHS. It got so bad that I couldn't turn doorknobs and I was sleeping with wrist braces on both wrists to keep from bending them in weird ways while I slept. I put arnica cream on them, iced them, everything you could possibly think of. That was probably my first real Ashtanga lesson......some things come very slowly and there may be some pain involved in getting there. Eventually, almost a year later, I got strong enough that I was no longer taking the strain of the sun salutations and vinyasas in my wrists.

That's enough of that, more injuries to come......and a practice-altering workshop with Chuck and Maty last October......

Very very tired

2008-02-20T14:35:00.002-05:00

The second part of the LI Ashtangini yoga history is going to have to wait. I'm so unbelievably tired. The BF had a lot of trouble sleeping last night. At one point he sat straight up in bed and made this awful sound like he was going to throw up. He ran downstairs to the bathroom and waited a while but never did barf. This was at about 11:30pm, and of course I had already been in bed for over two hours as I had every intention of practicing on the moon day. He finally came back to bed and proceeded to toss and turn for HOURS. Finally he fell asleep at about 4am but then he started SNORING so I grabbed my pillow and went downstairs to sleep on the couch for a couple of hours. Needless to say, no practice today. It also looks like I won't be making it to the shala this week at all. I haven't worked anything out with the bosses at New Company and I'll be in Baltimore this weekend visiting two of my friends, one of whom just had her second baby and one of whom is about 7 months pregnant with her first. I'm thinking about paying a visit on Sunday morning to a shala I found online in DC but that's almost an hour from where they live. We'll see how that goes.

I started my cleanse/detox/whatever you want to call it. Basically I'm taking these supplements to do a liver/blood/lymphatic/colon cleanse. In addition to that I gave up caffeine, refined sugar and meat this week. Next week I'll probably do vegan and give up dairy in addition to the above. I'm really hoping this will help me with my awful digestive issues as well as get rid of the blubber that accumulated in January. This not sleeping thing with BF is not helping my detox at all! I told him I was going to sleep in the guest room tonight.

Update on my friend A, he's doing very well, out of surgery, still in CICU. He should be moved to a regular hospital room tomorrow or Friday. Yay! Thanks to everyone who sent their good wishes.

A history of LI Ashtangini yoga, part one

2008-02-18T19:59:00.002-05:00

Since I can't think of anything to post today, I think I'll go for that yoga history thing I mentioned yesterday. When A and I were still 'just friends' he used to bug me all the time about trying yoga. Of course, I was like 'whatever, that's some weird California thing you do'. By the time I was 30 or 31 I had gained a lot of weight. I've never been an athletic person. I was the little girl with her nose in a book while all the other kids were outside running around or riding bikes. I played the clarinet. As a matter of fact, I went to a very large music school in the south and I have a Bachelor's degree in clarinet performance. My idea of exercise was taking a flight or two of stairs at work (ok, it still is but that's a different issue). I'm already a 'big' person, I'm 5'9" and not thin by nature. So by the time I was about 31 I weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of 210 lbs. and was a size 18. Somehow I managed to lose most of the weight (took maybe 6-8 months) and get down to a 12, I don't remember how, but I'm sure it involved switching to diet soda from regular among other things. Finally I decided to try this yoga thing that A kept yammering on and on about. I signed up for a month-long beginners series at Be Yoga (before it was acquired by YogaWorks, blech). It was hard but I liked it. I had finally found something that could stop that constant yammering in my head. So I kept going back to Be Yoga, eventually getting up the nerve to move up to level 1/2 (that was a huge step for me). At that point, maybe 5 months later or so) I went to LA to visit A and we ended up dating for a while (sort of, it was long distance) and he took me to a vinyasa class at Maha. NOW I had finally found something that worked but they didn't have anything like that at Be. Maha has great flow classes, awesome music, it's VERY 'Southern California' yoga. About a month later he came to NY for a visit and he took me to Jivamukti. I fell in love. It was HARD and I got sweaty and worked and it was great. I abandoned Be for Jivamukti and was there three or four times a week. There was a ton of stuff I was too weak to do (UD, the endless sun salutations) but I didn't care. It was fun and the music was great and it was the first time that any kind of physical activity didn't turn me off. I stuck with it. Until Pattabhi Jois came to town......and that's enough history for today.

Practice was good today but I'm really sore from going all out two days in a row (I'm such a wimp) so tomorrow's home practice will probably be mellow. Very nice fingertip grabs on marichasana c again today, and I managed to stick them even after Teacher got up and walked away. Three nice backbends again today and the dropback preps against the wall are getting better too. On the third one I *think* I almost saw the floor. No word yet on A, still need to call the west coast and see how he's doing, however, I appreciate everyone's good wishes.