So a PT school candidate and her husband walk into a Chili's...

...and her phone beeps and it's an email and holycrapIgotacceptedatUCDenverareyoufreakingkiddingmeit'sonlybeentwodaysandtheyalreadyacceptedme!!!!

More tomorrow. Tonight I enjoy the bliss.

Rocky Mountain Hello

Just a quickie to say I survived interviews and I think they went well. I'll know in 2 weeks exactly *how* well they went. :-) Today, I'm off to cause a road hazard by driving while drooling over the mountains.

Refining Life Goals

In the past few days I've been talking to folks at the gym (mostly the managers, but also a couple of the members) about where I'm heading professionally and where I'd like to be in 5 years. The goals that have sort of surfaced from the primordial ooze of this whole "go back to school" thing have me really excited. I know that sounds weird...duh, they're my ideas about my future, so why wouldn't I be excited, right? The thing is, the way they come about is not by me thinking explicitly "I want to do x, y, and z" but rather by me seeing a situation I like and mulling over what I could do to make that situation part of my every day life.

Source

What I'm coming to realize is that what's important to me is the delta...I really don't have a lot of interest in refining range of motion in elite athletes. I really do have a lot of interest in helping trauma patients learn to walk again. I have zero interest in working with kids, but I have a lot of interest in working with older folks or mentally challenged adults.

I've also come to realize that my ideal situation would allow me to provide rehabilitative care for patients, probably in either inpatient or a skilled nursing facility, and then turn around and provide personal training services for those patients to sort of extend their journey from just "becoming functional" to "becoming fit" or progressing beyond the minimum.

In particular, I've recently been inspired by a friend who's been dealing with cancer, whose outlet has been exercise. It seems to me (and I have no actual basis for this, just speculation) that there are at least a few people who would find a structured exercise regimen, modified to accommodate any limitations brought on by their conditions, soothing, particularly in the face of a potentially terminal condition. It also seems like training with the right trainer (and by that I mean someone with whom you connect, not just someone who kicks your butt) would be a source of therapy for the individual as well. It could also be a relief for loved ones who may be learning to live with someone who's suddenly home all the time because they're not quite well enough to work, but aren't quite sick enough to sit still. Actually, I wonder if group ex for families living in places like the Ronald McDonald house is a thing? It seems like it'd be therapeutic for everyone to get their sweat on and get out of their heads for an hour a day/week, but maybe that's just me. It's maybe a very specific group of people, but I think providing that kind of physical and emotional support in a fitness environment really appeals to me.

I have no idea if that kind of setting/opportunity exists, or if it'd have to be something that I set up on my own (work by day at a hospital or SNF and by night have my own personal training business at a local gym or something). For now though, it's the goal in the back of my mind that's going to keep me getting up before the sun to intern at the gym, studying hard to pass exams, and reading up on joint structure and function just for the fun of it.

Quick Playlist Post

Not much to say today. Work is haywire as usual and I'm a little out of it anyway. I had a whole whiney post written in my head about how my hands and feet have blisters all over them (thanks, climbing and circle runs, respectively), but without gross pictures (it hurts more than it looks like...my hands are so pink!!) it fell flat before it even made it to the keyboard.

Anyway.

Tonight's playlist is the result of looking for upbeat love songs that could tell a story and only managing to find songs about slutty women and one-night stands. Go figure. I know there are more love songs out there, but they're not in my current circulation. I'm mostly inspired by Drive By by Train and Ass Back Home (which is more romantic than the title implies) by Gym Class Heros. I have an idea of what I want to do with them, but it's not happening this week. Maybe next week.

Anyway, here's this week's list:


Ohio (Come Back to Texas) - Bowling For Soup
Drive By  -  Train
Centerfold (Apres Ski Mix)  -  Captain Jack
SOS  -  Rihanna
I Know You Want Me  -  (Calle Ocho) Pitbull
Wind It Up  -  Kat Deluna
Dirty Dancer (Feat. Usher)  -  Enrique Iglesias
Boys of Summer  -  DJ Sammy
My First Kiss (feat. Ke$ha)  -  3OH!3
A Girl Like You  -  Edwyn Collins
Ass Back Home (feat. Neon Hitch)  -  Gym Class Heroes
Candyman  -  Christina Aguilera
Naked and Famous  -  Presidents Of The U.S.A./Presidents of the United States of America

I'm probably not going to play that last one, not because it's wildly inappropriate (it's not, it's just funny), but because I'm saving up some of these gems for another 90s ride. I'll probably put Carrie Newcomer on the anchor spot instead. 

The ride is going to be deceptively simple intervals again. You know the one, 10 seconds hard, 50 easy, 20 hard, 40 easy, etc etc. I wish 100 seconds were easier to count on a hands clock. At this point in my week though, I'm not sure I can handle that kind of higher math while working out. 

Maybe I'll make tonight the world's first ever sleep n spin class. 

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On a more uplifting note, I passed the Star 3 exam earlier this week, so now I'm an "elite" instructor who's put in a lot of hours and given Mad Dogg a lot of money. Go me.

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This weekend I get to go to CO for my interview at UCD. I absolutely adore the school and location. I'm actually bracing myself for heartbreak because I know I'm going to love it out there.

However, Denver has some pretty awful breed specific legislation against pitbulls, which translate to "if you so much as drive through our county with a pit in your car, we'll kill it and arrest you." So they probably aren't going to throw a parade for our little derp machine.

A real menace, that one.

So unfortunately, there's already a pretty major strike against the school. I'm going to check around with shelters in the area and see where would be safe for us to have her though, in case they offer me lots of money (ha!) or something, but barring a financial miracle and a safe place to let the dumb one roam free, it's not looking good. Boo, Denver. Boo.

The weekend's not totally lost though - I get to see my baby brother, who I haven't seen in over a year!

On that note, back to work and such. Who's riding with me tonight? 

Fess Up Friday, Or: Why it took me 18+ years to appreciate swimming pools

When I was about 10, we went to visit my grandparents in California. The magical thing about visiting them (aside from the pogs, warmth in December, and the general awesomeness that comes with visiting your grandparents, especially at Christmas when you live in a foreign country that's not Canada or Mexico) was their TV. When I was about 10, we lived in Norway, and as far as I knew we only got 2 channels in English: CNN and the Cartoon Network. In retrospect, this was pretty convenient, so I don't know if it was something my parents somehow finagled/convinced us of, or if that was legit. But for argument's sake, let's say we only got 2 English-speaking channels and only one was interesting at the time.

Visiting the grandparents was like a wonderland of overstimulation, available 24 hours a day, with the press of a button (or like 20, depending on how well you knew the remote). The problem is, there were also shows that, rightfully so, I'd never been exposed to until my parents weren't paying attention to what I was watching. (And in their defense, I waited until they weren't paying attention to watch them - sorry Mom.)

And so we have the back story on why I saw Jaws (even worse, just the last bit where the shark pulls the guy off the boat and eats him) at the tender age of 10.


 NOPE.

Between that and Rescue 911, where a girl got her hair stuck in the drain at the bottom of the pool...

NOPE NOPE NOPE

...pools were just about the worst place in the world to me.

The worst part is that I don't think I ever told my mom that, so shortly after that fateful trip to Cali, she put me on the local swim team. The pool at this particular place got super deep at one end, which had me convinced that Jaws lived there and was just waiting for me to slow down long enough to get eaten.

The irony, then, is that I ended up swimming faster so my coach thought I was pretty good...so I got to swim more. It was a vicious cycle...swim more, terrified longer, swim faster, look better, swim more, repeat.

They put me in a meet one weekend, in a pool that was only 3 feet deep and in a lane with no drains in it. I'm fairly certain I came in last and was never invited to compete again. I think they all thought I choked, but really...I just wasn't properly motivated.

screw you, shark. Screw you. 

Now, I told you that story to tell you this story. (Name the comedian)

I went swimming on Friday. Short, slow, and just enough to get the blood flowing and the rage out of my system for the day. It was wonderful.

However, now that I'm looking at pictures of sharks and drains, I may never go back.

Anyone know a good therapist?

Word of the Day Wednesday

Today's word is hostile.

For some reason (maybe it's the reddit blackout, I dunno), everyone seems SUPER angry today. Normally I would be joining in on the fuss, but lately I've somehow managed to master the fine art of apathetic integrity. (Translation: I'll work hard to do what I need to get done, but I'm done getting all angsty about things beyond my control that prevent me from doing my job.)

So to that end, tonight's mix is a little grunge rocky, a little poppy, and totally fun.


Dog Days Are Over - Florence + The Machine
Natural Blues  -  Moby
La Grange  -  ZZ Top
Mondo '77  -  Film Dialogue
Dressed To Kill  -  A New Found Glory
We Found Love -  (feat. Calvin Harris) Rihanna
Leave It All Behind (UK Radio Edit)- September
Howlin' For You  -  The Black Keys
My Hero  -  Foo Fighters
* Plowed  -  Sponge
Are You Gonna Be My Girl  -  JET
Tobacco Island -  Flogging Molly
Dance, Dance  -  Fall Out Boy
Blackout  -  Breathe Carolina
(If You Are Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To  -  Weezer
Sexy & I Know It - (SR) LMFAO
If I Had You  -   Lambert
Papi (www.DenFlow.Net)  -  Jennifer Lopez
Machinehead  -  Bush
Walk  -  Foo Fighters
Here's To The Night  -  Eve 6
Standing Outside A Broken Phone Booth With Money In My Hand  -  Primitive Radio Gods
Mad World  -  Donnie Darko

*ride starts here


The profile is simple...we're going up a hill. A really big one. I may even bring in some markers to draw on the mirror, but it's going to look vaguely like this:

4 segments of high resistance with 3 segments of "pedal fast to get your momentum up" resistance. The 3 shallow parts will be recovery for newbies and "less hard" for the vets. The hard parts will be the same number of minutes as the level of awful - so the first part will be 6 minutes long, etc. The easy parts will be 2 minutes each. Total working part of the ride is therefore 36 minutes - practically a gimme ride, right? :-) I'll throw in some pickups and gear ups as we go too, I'm sure.

A little explanation on why this playlist is longer than usual, with a few more "mild" songs preloaded to the front...

We got new bikes!! Last Friday, every bike in the EHSC network got upgraded to one of these beauties:

I'm expecting to spend a while helping folks verify setups, so I'm going to have music playing while I run around and do that, but officially start class at 7 instead of 6:45 like usual. It'll go until 7:45 though, to make sure we all get our workout in.

And sorry to cut this short, but the pup needs her shots before I can run off and hang out with my best good friend this weekend, so I'm off to be a responsible pet owner. w00t.

Dance with Me

Man oh man, strength class tonight is going to be fun.

I just got Jackie Warner's 30 Day Fast Start in the mail last night, so it's been in the background at work for inspiration. Her pyramid (more like a ladder, but who's counting) method is going to be FUN. Basically, you take 2 exercises and alternate between them starting with 1 rep of each then building up to 10 of each.

Pure gold.

I'm also making us waltz tonight. I'll see if I can get a picture of this somehow (I don't have my camera with me, so it may be tricky). Basically, we have these resistance bands that go around your legs. At about shoulder width, you can feel resistance a little. I'm going to have us do a little box step with that band around our ankles, making sure that the "feet together" part is really just shoulder width.

And because you don't waltz with your arms at your sides, we're going to hold out light weights as if we were actually dancing with someone else (left out front and up a little, right out to the side, then reverse when we do the box step backwards...can't be lop-sided!)

Google images never fails to impress. 

And back to work for me.