Princess Ride

Oh man, last night's ride was so fun. It was exactly what I needed, when I needed it most. I'm going to teach that one again on Saturday...I kind of want to teach it tonight, but I don't want to wear it out before Saturday. Tonight, I think I'm going to do the deceptively hard interval ride to this playlist:


Hey Mama - Mat Kearney
Howlin' For You - The Black Keys
A Girl Like You - Edwyn Collins
Sexy & I Know It - (SR) - LMFAO
SexyBack - Justin Timberlake
Honky Tonk Badonkadonk - Trace Adkins
Cowboy Casanova - Carrie Underwood
Good Girls Go Bad (feat. Leighton Meester) - Cobra Starship
Barbara Streisand (Original Mix) - Duck Sauce
Black Betty - Ram Jam
Come Out and Play - The Offspring
I Will Love Again 2008 (Single)  - Baracuda
Jai Ho - A. R. Rahman Ft Nicole Scherzinger
Eminem & Royce Da 5 9 ft. Bruno Mars [Loydb-production.blogspot.com]

Deceptively hard

Too organized for my own good

Waiting for class to start, jotted down the ride. I'm so organized. This is thesame sheet I've sharpied in the last 3 workouts. Oops.

Still Trucking

So Monday night turned out to be a lot more work than I expected, and my back is still sore today. Not injury sore, just overuse sore. I'm ok with that. It makes me miss rock climbing like CRAZY, but that's ok. Maybe this time next year I'll be living in a tent in the Rockies. Who knows.

Tonight I'll most likely be doing the stupid thing again and hitting up the SJTP. Because, you know, I'm not already exhausted/sore/busy enough. Actually, the busy part is moot...I have to teach at 6:45, which means anything from about 4:30 until 6:00 is wasted time otherwise. Too short to drive home and get anything done, too long to feel good about napping. Argh.

I'm teaching tonight, tomorrow night, and Saturday. This weekend we had a lot of driving to do, so I started coming up with this ridiculous story line for my class that's basically a video game in spin format.

The story is standard: princess gets kidnapped, you are the knight in shining armor and need to rescue her. Along the way, you meet dragons, mountains, fire pits, ROUS's, and various other things of awfulness. Then at the end of each "quest", you have to defeat the boss to move on.

Like I said, ridiculous. But I need a little whimsy in my life right now, so that's what we're doing.

Anniversary Weekend: Returning to the Scene of the Crime

A year ago on Sunday, I was doing this:

There was also a lot of this:

And this:

I put a TON of work into our wedding, including making all the flowers:

And the programs (and invitations, etc):

The ceremony was at the cathedral in Burlington, VT (no pictures, it's ugly) and the reception was at Snow Farm Winery and Vineyard in South Hero, VT. It was PERFECT.

We had a photobooth, so our guest book rocked:

I also have fantastic friends and family, who made the whole night crazy fun:

 Guess what song.

 That poor horse.

 Can you tell we're related?

 And now they're related too (brother and sister in law)

 Seriously, it's like we're from different planets.

The ring bearer. Clearly, he's got the same contaminated gene pool.

It was a great day. Literally everything went as planned (as far as I'm told), minus the ring bearer ditching the rings with his dad before he walked down the aisle with his hand up yelling "no pictures please!" But that's just a great memory. :-)

Anyway, this weekend, we went back to South Hero and stayed at the Allenholm B&B. The Allens are the very definition of "salt of the earth" people. They're just adorable.

Saturday morning we had breakfast and then took a bike ride back out to the winery.

 We tried this year's wines and Nick told me we needed to come back again next year...that way we can get a bottle of wine made with grapes that were on the vine when we were getting married. Love that boy. :-)

 Saturday night we went out to dinner at the North Hero House, which was wonderful. We were underdressed, but everyone was super nice. The wine was on the house, since we were friends of Pam (the hostess of the B&B - she's really that wonderful of a person; anyone who associates with her is automatically assumed to be wonderful too).

 Apparently across the lake there is Nick's hometown. He says.

On Sunday we went back to the church where it all started, but no one was there, so we had to take one of these shots to prove we were there.

So that was the weekend. Very low key, but it was just what we needed. A year later, I'm still crazy about him, and he doesn't seem to be regretting his choice either. :-P

Repeat Customers

Monday evening once again found me wishfully thinking that maybe no one would show up for my class and I could go home and get some sleep. I didn't fall asleep til nearly 3 am on Sunday night, so yesterday I was just beat.

AND THEN!!

2 people showed up. One, a repeat from last week.

A repeat! She came back for more! She liked my class enough last week to come back! We actually spent a while after class bonding and talking about how far she should push herself each week to make sure she can walk the next day.

The other girl is the most badass regular I know. I've taken a few classes with her (ok more than a few) and in every class, whatever move we're doing, she's in the back making it harder. She ALWAYS pushes herself, which I love. She usually takes the 5:30 class, but last night she skipped that one so she could come to mine instead! If it wouldn't have been awkward (and gross, I was pretty sweaty at that point), I would have hugged her!

Anyway, it was a fun class, even with just the 3 of us. This is what we ended up doing:

---

Circuit 1: 
Upper body: Bicep curls
Lower body: Dumbbell side lunge
Combo: curl as you come up out of lunge
Balance: Side leg lift & hold w/resistance band
repeat for other side


Circuit 2: 
All w/balance ball and body bar!
Upper body: Shoulder raises (straight out in front)
Lower body: Squats
Combo: Squats w/shoulder raises (keep arms up whole time)
Balance: Tree pose (no balance ball)


Circuit 3: 
Upper body: Tricep extensions
Lower body: keeping stable foot in the same place, lunge forward, side, back, then squat. repeat.
Combo: Raise arms as you come out of squats
Balance: Twist & touch


Abs: 


Superman plank 60 seconds on balance ball
Medicine ball ab twist
Russian Twists

---

Each of those circuits we went through 3 times: 8 reps first, then 16, then 24. It sucked. I'm not sure I love this format, but you gotta keep pushing buttons to know what works, right?

The really funny thing is when we got done with the last set and started to put stuff away to do abs, the girl who came last week was like "wait...aren't we going to do that really goofy thing that hurt but works?" I said, "You mean the alligator?" "Yeah!" So I gave her a surprised look and said sure, why not! So we did the alligator. That might be my signature move, who knows. :-P

In other news, have I mentioned how excited I am for this coming weekend? My folks are coming into town, and they're BOTH going to come to my spin class on Saturday morning! Even my dad!

(You thought I was done with the gratuitous wedding pictures, didn't you? You haven't even seen me in a dress yet!)
Naturally, my mom, resident badass, will also be there.

Stay tuned for the weekend recap.

Oh Hey There

Didn't realize it'd been since Wednesday that I last posted. Oops. My bad.

Since I don't have my camera with me, I'll wait to report on the weekend (it was great) except to say that we rode about 10.7 miles on Saturday, partly due to getting lost. Also, I accidentally left Nick in my dust when he had something caught in his pedal at the exact moment I decided I wanted to sprint down a long, straight, paved road. Oops. Love you honey! My bad!

Today is week 2 of my strength class, and I have exactly no idea what I'm doing tonight. Probably should have put something together. Oops. I'm going to start putting Tone It Up videos on in the background while I work, to get inspiration. Maybe we'll even use some actual equipment tonight, w00t!

Spin on Wednesday was ok, but everyone seemed really tired. I can't blame them - of the 5 that came, 4 had done Leanne's class right before, and it was brutal.

In other spin news, I'm teaching on Saturday. Big whoop, I know. Except that this Saturday is special...this Saturday, my parents will be visiting, and it'll be my dad's first spin class EVER! No pressure, right? I'm still trying to find the perfect profile to run for it.

For now, I'm off to put stuff together for tonight.

Simple Jack Triple Play: Pwned

I did it. I survived the SJTP. It was no laughing matter. In fact, I sweat so much, this happened:

I sweat the color right out of my new sports bra. Go me.

Change of Plans

Change of plans for tonight. I'm going to use one of my Strength playlists because it's a constant 128 bpm throughout the whole 60 minutes. We'll warm up for 5 minutes, then get down to business. The cadence will stay the same throughout the whole workout, but the intensity will change. Each block will have 5 parts:

Comfortable	Pushing it	Uncomfortable	As Heavy as Possible	Recovery
4	3	2	1	2
3	4	1	2	2
2	1	4	3	2
1	2	3	4	2

The numbers are the number of minutes for each part of each block. Now that I'm looking at it, that adds up to 48 minutes, which is too long. Maybe I'll take out the Comfortable part and make it look like this instead:

Pushing it	Uncomfortable	As Heavy as Possible	Recovery
4	3	2	2
2	4	3	2
3	2	4	2

That's 33 minutes, plus 10 minutes of warmup/cooldown and the inevitable 5 minutes that gets spent on transitioning from one class to the next, I think this'll do. I wish I could teach 60 minute classes. Maybe I'll see if they're up for a 60 minute class instead.

In other news, I forgot to mention...I went and told the local CrossFit gym I'd show up for a free WOD on Friday morning. I won't lie, I'm nervous about it. Excited, but nervous. Mostly because I'm afraid I'll get hooked and won't have the time or money to spend on it right now. Anyone out there tried CrossFit? Thoughts?

Friday Yet?

So Monday went well! I had 3 people in class, including Deb, who was a sweetie and stayed for moral support. We went through all 4 circuits, and I even made them do the Alligator. Once. They were not fans, so the second time around we did side shuffles back and forth. Suffice it to say, my inner thighs are in a little pain today. My butt's not happy either.

But alas, last night I decided to give my knee a break (it's been complaining lately) so tonight is the Simple Jack Triple Play. FIT at 4:45, Strength at 5:45, and Spin at 6:45. I may throw up. Or I may come out awesome. Who knows.

Tonight's profile is going to be the same as Sunday's for spin, because I liked that profile and am ok with repeating it. I just need a new playlist...which may be a problem since I don't have my iPod cord with me. Guess who's shopping at lunch!

It's all madness with Mall Madness!

And now, because I can't remember a single one of the witty, inspiring, or entertaining things I had planned on writing, here's more gratuitous pictures of me being pretty last year:

 Rehearsal walk

 I'm demanding, what do you want?

 I'd slept less than 3 hours the night before and had been up since 3 am...this was probably 1030 AM. Don't judge the bags.

 My beautiful sister in law helping me out.

 Making sure Dad's lint-free.

"What do you mean "how many donuts did I have for breakfast"?? Just zip the damn thing up!"

Playlist, Workout, and Gratuitous Pictures

First up, here's yesterday's playlist:


Spaceman The Killers - Spaceman CDM
Howlin' For You - The Black Keys
What Kind of Love Are You On - Aerosmith
(If You Are Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To - Weezer
Daylight - Matt & Kim
In The Dark - Dev
Sail - Awolnation
This Is Your Life - Switchfoot
Move Like Jagger - Maroon 5 Feat. Christina Aguilera
You Make Me Feel - Cobra Starship (feat. Sabi)
United State of Pop 2008 (Viva La Pop) - DJ Earworm
Till The World Ends Britney Spears
Afrojack Ft. Eva Simons - Take Over
Brothers in arms Master - Gregorian Chant

I enjoyed it. 

Next, here's today's workout, I think:


NEED: heavy (bicep) weights, light (shoulder) weights, medium (tricep) weights

Circuit 1:
Upper body: Bicep curls
Lower body: Dumbbell side lunge
Combo: curl as you come up out of lunge
Cardio: quick feet
Balance: Side leg lift & hold
repeat for other side

Circuit 2:
Upper body: side punch w/weights
Lower body: forward lunges (one side per circuit - stable foot is the one that stays static)
Combo: lunge & twist
Cardio: scissor kick
Balance: Warrior III on stable foot
Switch to other foot for second time through circuit.
Circuit 3:
Upper body: Shoulder raises (straight out in front)
Lower body: Squats
Combo: Squats w/shoulder raises (keep arms up whole time)
Cardio: Alligator crawl
Balance: Tree pose Circuit 4:
Upper body: Tricep extensions
Lower body: keeping stable foot in the same place, lunge forward, side, back, then squat. repeat.
Combo: Raise arms as you come out of squats
Cardio: High knees or shuttle run w/weights
Balance:

Abs:

Superman plank 60 seconds
Bicycles.
Alternating hand to toe plank twisty thing
Medicine ball ab twist

A bunch of the moves came from the Tough Mudder workout plan, so that's fun. I know, it's not that different from the last workout I posted, but I'm simply not creative enough to come up with something new right now. For now. But I think I'm going to start making one night a week my DVD workout night, so I can try different workouts and incorporate them into my routines. Because, you know, I have a lot of free nights. Sigh.

This week also starts all the Fall TV stuff, so Tuesday nights are going to be my Biggest Loser nights again. I'm thinking my workout week will look like this:

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Double: Deb's FIT, my Strength Train	Triple: Spin, Pilates, run/walk to Biggest Loser	Double (with triple option): Theresa's FIT (optional), Leanne's Strength, my spin	DVD/Kinect night	Rest	Spin, strength (optional) or rest	Rest or spin

HTML Tables

So that's that. We'll see if I follow through with any or all of that.

In other other news, this time last year, I was putting the final touches on our wedding! Sunday is our one year anniversary! That means I get to post gratuitous pictures of us being cute, right? Right!

I'm not awkward at ALL! 

Nope, I'm freaking adorable.

Especially in black and white.

I'll save the wedding pics for later. These pics are all courtesy of the fabulous Margaret Michael.

Sunday and Such

No big news, just checking in. I taught this morning, it was fun. I did a "block reverse pyramid" profile that someone had suggested on pedal-on.com. Basically it looks like this:

4 minutes seated climb	4 minutes standing climb	4 minutes alternating seated and standing, every 30 seconds	4 minutes rider's choice hill
4 minutes seated climb	4 minutes standing climb	4 minutes alternating seated and standing, every 15 seconds
4 minutes seated climb	4 minutes standing climb

The first set of blocks I had them on a moderate (6 or 7 out of 10) hill. Second a little heavier (7 or 8) and third the heaviest they thought they could sustain for 4 minutes in each position. Halfway through I had them check to make sure they were on a heavy/light enough hill and adjust accordingly if not. Between blocks I gave them 1-2 minutes of rest, depending on how haggard they were looking. :-) The playlist was pretty good too, but I don't have my ipod plugged in and I'm too lazy to find the cord right now. I'll post it tomorrow.

Yup, lazy.

Tomorrow is my first Strength class. I'm not sure that any of the members know it's happening, so I'm not sure I'm going to have anyone show up. We'll see. I'll post the workout I'm doing tomorrow, tomorrow. I have every intention of going to Deb's class before teaching mine too, so there's just no way I can fail...right?

Click that picture. Do it.

On a related note, hubs and I saw Top Gun on the big screen on Thursday night...for free! Our local gimmicky theater is playing 25 year old movies every Thursday, and that was the first one. October's lineup is older than that, but it's got some goodies...The Shining, Exorcist, etc. But I digress. They've basically hooked up a Blu-Ray player to the big screen and might not have filled the staff in on how to use it. So for the first 5 minutes of the movie, it was Top Gun Karaoke since the words were displayed at the bottom of the screen...complete with the intro "Kenny Loggins singing:" It was magical.

This is fun:
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/movies/galleries/top_gun_where_are_they_now/top_gun_where_are_they_now.html

Anyway, I should get back to that lab report I've been avoiding. Nick's taking the paint off the window I'm looking out, which has been distracting and comical, but he's almost done so...I guess I have no more excuses.

Introvert

It's not that I don't want to work out, but today I really just don't feel like teaching. I just don't want to be the center of attention. I know it's ironic to write that on a blog (since the point is to make people read things that are probably only important to me), but there's just this weird feeling lurking under the surface today. I'm anxious for no real reason, and I don't like being in front of a crowd (especially one I see regularly) when that happens. In moods like this I like to wander off by myself and just let my subconscious sort it out for me. Sort of like in Bag of Bones when he talks about "movers in the attic". I swear that's a quote, and I Googled it just now...the only thing that came up was this post from my other blog, which I wrote almost exactly a year ago. Weird. 

Found it: 

When I left the restaurant, I didn't go home but tramped over half of the damned town, the section 

of newspaper with the partly completed crossword puzzle in it clamped under one arm. I walked

until I was chilled in spite of the warming temperatures. I didn't think about anything, and yet I 

thought about everything. It was a special kind of thinking, the sort I'd always done when I was

getting close to writing a book, and although I hadn't thought that way in years, I fell into it easily

and naturally, as if I had never been away.

    It's  like some guys with a big truck have pulled up in your driveway and are moving things into 

your basement. I can't explain it any better than that. You can't see what these things are because 

they're all wrapped up in padded quilts, but you don't need to see them. It's furniture, everything

you need to make your house a home, make it just right, just the way you wanted it.

    When the guys have hopped back into their truck and driven away, you go down to the basement 

and walk around (the way I went walking around Derry that late morning, slopping up hill and

down dale in my old galoshes), touching a padded curve here, a padded angle there. Is this one a 

sofa? Is that' one a dresser? It doesn't matter. Everything is here, the movers didn't forget a thing, 

and although you'll have to get it all upstairs yourself (straining your poor old back in the process, 

more often than not), that's okay. The important thing is that the delivery was complete.

So not an attic, oops. 

Anyway. I think the major cause of this is anxiety. I still feel like the new kid in school with this group, and that makes me anxious. Not sure why, since I hold their fates in my hands, but whatever. I'm lame like that. This is what I feel like doing, every Wednesday: 

This is the shirt I need though: 

How do you cope with social anxiety? 

Go To Gal

So earlier today I was hemming and hawwing about how I kind of want to just go home and work on some homework and quilts tonight, and maybe I'd skip the gym except that Deb is teaching tonight and I love Deb's class, so maybe I'll go but I'm feeling really lazy...

Then Tony, the 6:30 spin guy emailed asking for a sub. I loved last week's ride so much I wanted to teach it again anyway, so I said yes and figured I'd just double the fun (go to FIT then spin) but leave FIT a little early.

Then, just now, Deb emailed saying she's super sick and needs coverage as well.

So suddenly, I'm teaching back to back classes on a night I was thinking about skipping all together.

Ha ha Universe, you're a riot.

So, if you're in the area and in the mood, come watch me flail around at FIT tonight. :-) 

Fess Up Friday

Rose started it, I'm following it.

I thought of this confession on Wednesday in strength class, when I realized what I was doing. I arrived slightly late to class, so I ended up in the back. I realized about halfway through that I'd spent the last 30 minutes checking out every other woman's butt.

Not in a creepy "dat ass" kind of way but more in a "wow, she really put the time in on that one" kind of way.

Now that I've probably flagged myself to HR for looking up "gym butt" repeatedly, I should probably knock that off.

---

On a completely unrelated note, apparently they now have pushup...underwear? I didn't know we were trying to add a cup size to our butts. That may change my workout routine - I'm already a double D in that area.

Hand Dominance

Quick favor to ask all you followers out there.

Clasp your hands together. Which thumb is on top? What's your dominant hand? Leave the results in a comment (and for those of you who are FB friends, please only reply if you haven't responded to the question on FB).

Thanks!!

Biology, Physics, a Classy Boat, and Girl Scouts

So I got my LabPaqs in the mail. The biology one is not screwing around.

Those beads are the "chromosome kit". There are razor blades under the scissors in the leather thingy. I also have a microscope (not pictured) that I spent a good half hour yelling at Nick to fix so I could "see science". Sometimes, I'm 5.

That skull and crossbones means death. Death, people!

And then there's my physics kit. This week's lab involves a straw and a protractor, to  estimate the height of a building using right triangles. I feel like I'm girl scouts again, but paying $1200 for my tryit.

Finally, this classymobile has been up for sale on my way to work for a few weeks now. It just screams "drink cheap beer and have people passed out with sharpie on their faces laying all over me!" to me. It's $800. I feel like the memories would make the ROI pretty quick, but the hangovers might last longer than I'd want. But seriously, if I were in college, this would be on top of my car right now.

Cannot Wait to Get My Spin On

Yup yup yup, cannot wait for tonight's class. If anyone in there tries to bring me down, I'm gonna crank the music up and stick my fingers in my ears until they knock it off. Then I'll crank up their resistance.

Here's the playlist:



The Likes of You Again - Flogging Molly
I Want You To Want Me (Live) - Cheap Trick
Fat Bottomed Girls - Queen
Rain on Your Parade - Duffy
Beer - Reel Big Fish
What The Hell - Avril Lavigne
Ballroom Blitz - Misfits
Everybody & Ray Speak No Americano - (Yolanda Be Cool & DCUP vs. Backstreet Boys vs. Ray Charles vs. Phantom of the Opera vs. Benny Benassi) Mashup-Germany vs. Faroff
The Boys Of Summer - The Ataris
Set Fire to the Rain (House Remix) - Capt Kirk
Party on the Floor (Capital FM Summertime Ball Mashup) - DJ Earworm
Thnks Fr Th Mmrs - Fall Out Boy
Dressed To Kill - A New Found Glory
Io (This Time Around) - Helen Stellar

That first song is the song Flogging Molly played to open every concert of theirs that I went to see in college. Listening to it makes me want to mosh, just a little. Ok, a lot. My roommate and I met the band after a concert in Idaho once (I caught the drummer's stick!) and they recognized us as the chicks who kept starting the pits. Turns out Idahoans are too polite to shove girls, so it was harder than it sounds. Nimue, I miss you! :-D 

Anyway, I'm thinking I'm going to go full retard and hit FIT before spin again tonight, so I'm off. 

Strength Loops

Last Wednesday was a tribute to the fact that my subconscious mind knows that my conscious mind is a complete and utter spaz. I got this playlist put together and was psyched about it, so I decided to burn it to a disc to rock out in my car. I never do that. I went to the gym, went to Strength before spin, then went to set up to teach and realized...my iPod was on my desk. At work. 20 minutes away.

Fortunately, my subconscious knew this would happen, so the CD was in my car and saved the day. Hooray for small miracles.

Today's profile isn't done yet, and I haven't even started the playlist. It's likely it's going to be another rock/metal mix, since as I mentioned in the last post, work has been a little...frustrating. I don't really want to get into it on here, but suffice it to say that daily workouts have become a matter of survival rather than a luxury.

---

After letting this sit in Chrome for a couple hours, I found a profile I'm SUPER excited about on pedal-on.com:

This is one of those drills that starts off making the class think it's going to be easy, but the end they'll think differently & look forward to the recovery!
1:00 Intervals of Hard/Moderate; on the "Hard" they're to increase the cadence.
HARD :10 > Moderate :50
HARD :15 > Moderate :45
HARD :20 > Moderate :40
HARD :25 > Moderate :35
HARD :30 > Moderate :30
HARD :35 > Moderate :25
HARD :40 > Moderate :20
HARD :45 > Moderate :15
HARD :50 > Moderate :10
Next song must be a nice long recovery

I'm going to do a 5 minute warm up, then run through that 3 or 4 times with a 2 minute recovery at the end. I think I'll ask the class ahead of time if they mind going over time by 8 minutes or so, and if they don't mind then I'll run through it 4 times. Now, the playlist! 

Any song suggestions? It's cold, wet, and nasty out here. What kind of music does that make you want to hear?