There are few things in my routine life grosser than having to man-handle sweaty men. There’s a relatively new guy in my jujitsu class who a blackbelt I was next to in line speculated led “mostly a sedentary life” and therefore has no stamina, coordination or core strength (stability). This guy was so wet that he left puddles on the mat after he landed during take-downs. Some take-downs tonight required my having to put my open hand on his cheek and hair to push his head around and down. I’d be wiping and wiping my hands on my gi afterwards and still be unsuccessful in drying them off.

The instructor again approached me about competing. After my refusal for this summer’s competition, he’d passed the torch to another girl. Now he walked over and put some slight pressure in getting me to compete for next year. “You look good, you fall well, I think you could do really well out there,” he said. I was still hesitant, but really, it’s been a long time since I brought home a medal or trophy of any sort. I really oughta do it.

In bellydancing last night, our instructor put in a DVD of professional dancers, so that we could see what we’re working toward. Murmurs arose from the students recognizing certain moves, such as the famed Figure Eight and what our instructor calls a hip M&M. Apparently shimmying — very important in bellydancing. I guess I gotta figure that one out, then. Some of the girls were excited at seeing the DVD. What I primarily got out of it is, Gawd, I need liposuction.

I’ve been down about my body these last few days. I’d like to think I’m just bloated from the 4 slices of Domino’s Pizza I had Tuesday night after having cut excess sodium and all fast food out of my diet for almost a year. But what it really is, is probably age-related weight gain. *Sigh* When people talk of regrets they have in life, I tend to think I don’t really have any. Sure, there were some horrid, evil things that have happened to me, but some good always came out of having to live through those experiences. Now, however, I find I do have a regret. I wish I’d known more about the human body and nutrition in high school to have not been anorexic. Starving myself didn’t make me skinny. I was average-sized. And now, due to the metabolism I screwed up in my teens, my body stores fat as easily as others pee, and burns fat as reluctantly as gas station CEOs are willing to give up their current $10 billion profit margin. (Did you guys hear about that? They’re gouging us for gas claiming oil costs are higher so they have to raise their prices; in the last quarter they’ve raised prices 12%, and their profits went up 12%, which means their costs have stayed the same. Their profit this last quarter was over $10 billion dollars. I was upset watching this on the news this morning.) I basically have no control over my fat rolls. They come and go completely on their own volition. In the past I’ve woken up to find that a lot of fat seemingly dissolved, but most of the time they’ve come back without a change in my eating or exercise patterns. Working out like mad brings no response from my body. It is so frustrating to have no control over my fat and I can only imagine that people look at me, tsk, and speculate why and how I’ve let myself go.