cindy's world

Considering how exhausted I was yesterday, I was surprised that, as I yawned my way home late after work yesterday (I left an hour and a half later than I usually do, too), I managed to make it to jujitsu, and then when I was done there, I went to the gym. At the gym, I increased my treadmill running pace to 6mph, and did 30 minutes of hills on level 4. And then I hit the weights. It was not a good day to forget my gym towel. I was just wet during and afterwards. It was disgusting. I had to take a shower (I had my bath towel) afterwards even tho it was close to midnight when I got done, and the clothes I peeled off myself weighed probably a few pounds due to the sweat absorption. It was like, someone poured a gallon of salt on me, and I’m a snail. The small reward after the workout is that I caved and had an In-N-Out cheeseburger, animal-style. I’ve all but weeded fast food out of my life, and sodas as well, but I’ve always made an exception for In-N-Out in my head because their food is more natural and less processed than other fast food burger joints. However, the last time I had In-N-Out, it was stupidly 2 days before a gym weigh-in, and I bloated 6 lbs for the next 4-5 days and I refused to get weighed in for another week because of that.

Speaking of not drinking sodas, here’s an article about a study that links cola consumption to osteoperosis in women, courtesy James.

Today: gym at lunch and bellydancing. I’d made the commitment to my gym trainee about 45 minutes ago, and then the judge announces on the bench that if we’re not at a certain point in our trial, he’s going to keep going right into lunch to get it done. =P Oh well, we’ll both by gymming anyway, even if we’re not doing it at the same time. I’d called Dwaine yesterday to let him know about a Beverages and More sale, buy 1 bottle of wine, get the 2nd same bottle of wine for $0.05. He invited me to go wine-shopping with him today, and I’d agreed, not realizing it’s bellydancing Wednesday (the Monday holiday threw me off). Well, if we can make it back by 8 for my class, I won’t have to cancel on him.

By the way, did I mention it took me a full year to lose the stupid 10 lbs I gained last September/October? I still have to lose the 5 lbs I gained after February. Stupid metabolism. Stupid high school anorexia.

I woke up this morning feeling green. Not as in sick and nauseated, but as in unripe. I felt like a tart hard fruit not ready to be picked, not meant to face the world, but nevertheless was plucked prematurely out of bed.

I dreamt that I was doing jujitsu training in waist-deep pool water and suddenly on my left lower abdomen, I got a sharp almost-painful bloating feeling, like my left ovary just ballooned up or something. So I stopped, holding the offended area with my hands. I tried working out again and the feeling came back, so I stopped again, and I dreamt the blackbelt instructor came up to me to see what was wrong. He decided I needed to go to the emergency room, and was about to take me himself, but his girlfriend offered to take me instead. So we went back to my home, which was an apartment in the dream, to call 911 and pack some clothes. While there, I felt better so I decided to check up on my agenda. I must’ve sent the girlfriend home. My planner stated that I had a trip planned to fly to Northern Cal to hang out with friends, except it was Saturday in my dream, I’d forgotten about the trip, and presumed I’d missed my flight. I called my mother to ask if she knew when I was supposed to leave. She said I could still make it, the flight wasn’t until late. So I decided to pack some reading with me, since flipping through my planner I also discovered that I have a few novels due in a week or so as I am back in college. I was relieved to discover that I’d already read both novels before, one was an Asian American themed one, and the other was an American or British classic. I normally dream that I’m back in college and can’t find my classrooms, or I suddenly realize some huge project or reading I hadn’t done is due right that day, or that I was horribly behind in some complicated class like math because I’d failed to attend class all quarter and never cracked open the book and now the final is upon me and it’s too late to drop the class.

I’m exhausted. It’s not easy to be green.

Despite the fact that I ditch jujitsu like it’s an ex-boyfriend or a divorce case, last nite I missed my first belly dancing class. The parking lot was so full that I had to park on the street, and then I was concerned that the crappy Nissan Sentra parked in front of me was gonna back up into my new Zainoed car while I was in class. I, along with a bunch of other belly dancing students, opened the door to the regular room where class is hosted and were surprised by the sight of various occupied banquet tables with two little girls performing violins on a stage. There was no notice given to us that there’d be no class that day, and nothing posted on the doors. I caught Vanessa in the hallway, and we decided to go to the gym instead. Not to work out, oh no, but to sit in the steam room. Both our backs were bothering us.

We sat in the steam and rubbed Epsom salt on ourselves, hung out and chatted for almost an hour. Afterwards, we drove back to my house (where she’d left her car) and she got to visit with Dodo, who was plenty happy to see his prior roommate and catnip dispenser.

My back really is feeling better today, and Vanessa had written me an email earlier saying she finally got a great night’s sleep after the steam room. It reminds me that I haven’t pampered myself in awhile, not since I tightened the purse strings after the car purchase in order to get back to my original state of finances in 3 months. Maybe it’s time to book a massage appointment. (Last night, I also restored my finances by 50%, so I’m well within the 3 months I gave myself.) I’d forgotten the importance of the occasional stress-relieving luxury.

I am SO well-rested from yesterday, I’m not even sleepy right now! Oh no, what’ll I do? I guess I’ll lie there until the boredom makes me pass out.

I am gonna bring up today/yesterday the next time my mom or Mr. W criticizes me for having irregular unhealthy sleep patterns.

I was in a general state of poopedness yesterday, immediately upon waking. I didn’t work out at lunch because I’d planned to go to jujitsu after work. That didn’t happen. I ate dinner after work, then fell asleep for almost 6 hours. I laid there awhile and realized I was wide awake and feeling guilty for not having exercised, so I changed and went to the gym. I hit the treadmill at a few minutes past midnight and did 70 minutes of cardio between that and the elliptical trainer. It was my first run since the half-marathon, and I didn’t want to push my healing toes. I got home about 1:30 in the morning and took a shower.

That was a very bachelorette night, very collegiate days, to miss a scheduled class but go to the gym so late. I hadn’t done that in awhile, but as I stood in the shower, I thought about how much I enjoyed that I could do that. I never thought I would be 30 and be this, uh, timeline irresponsible, but then again, I’d always thought I’d be married with kids at 30. For a mom to sneak out and go to the gym in the wee hours of the evening is probably rare. Speaking of this, who does that? Cuz there were more than just a few other people at the gym the same time I was. Some seemed older than me (mostly men), whereas others looked about my age or a bit younger. Are these all unmarried people with no kids, too? Are these college students who don’t sleep at night but don’t get up till noon, like I and my friends were? Are we at the verge of a different time/generation, in which it’s more common to be single longer (i.e. not married right out of high school or college), or divorced, or childless/custody-less, and we therefore have the luxury of living somewhat irresponsibly such as doing our own thing at night instead of sleeping and preparing for work the next day? Is this even a “luxury?” Maybe it’s sour grapes for the fact that we have not achieved the standard dream of home/spouse/2.5 kids/white-picket-fence/dog in the yard…yet.

After the half-marathon on Sunday morning, I overheard a guy telling his friend, as he looked at his heart monitor watch thingie, “I burned 1650 calories.” I thought, knowing my stubborn body, I probably burned 16. When Vicky finished, she checked her monitor, and announced, “I burned 18[something] calories!” So I figured I must’ve lost something after running for 2.5 hours. So this morning I got on the scale. No change in pounds, no change on body fat percentage. Argh! Stupid stubborn body fat! To all the teenagers out there: DO NOT GET ANOREXIC. It is SO not worth it when your body doesn’t respond to ANYTHING.

Me: *trying to cram out some last minute divorce cases before leaving for the day* Is there something ironic or inappropriate about divorcing people right before the weekend I run a half-marathon at Disneyland?
Mr. W: No, because these people will be overjoyed to get their divorce papers in the mail and they’ll wave them around and say, “Yay! I’M going to DISNEYLAND!”

How sad. I bet these people would’ve never thought that when they were getting married. Well, not the women, anyway. The men were probably forced onto the altar at gunpoint (or expecting baby-point).

Which reminds me. During warmups at jujitsu on Tuesday, the instructor asked Creepy Guy, “So what’d you do over the weekend? You got married?” Creepy Guy (who can’t even get a girl to go out w/him) responded with “Psh, I wish.” I instantly felt a “what a weirdo!” expression come over my face and looked around the mat to see who else thought Creepy Guy was a total moron for wishing he were married. Simultaneously, my instructor was responding, “No ya don’t.” And then I thought, “How sad is this? The institution of marriage is TOTALLY bastardized in my generation. No one thinks marriage is a good thing anymore. It’s more of a sacrifice you make when you don’t want to lose someone.”

Yesterday was the first “Los Angeles” Angels vs. Chicago White Socks game in the series. Because the game was on Sept. 11, the stadium paused for a minute of silence for our people in memoriam, as the advertising banners turned off. The screens flashed the American flag with the words “We will never forget.” Orange County Sheriff’s Dept.’s bugle squad performed in the beginning, and some uniformed military men marched out on the pitcher’s mound and were honored. In front of me was a navy officer in uniform, complete with the little white cap. Mr. W’s brother said, “It’d just be perfect if he started eating a box of Cracker Jacks.” They were indeed selling Cracker Jacks. I was shaking my head at how disrespectful that comment was, until Mr. W said, “Yeah, and a little dog ran up to him,” and I had to burst out laughing. The guy got so much free stuff for being there in uniform. People came by to take photos of him with his little girl on his lap, to shake his hand, to give his little girl souvenir baseballs and other little doodads. “I never learned to milk the uniform like that,” Mr. W, who was a Marine, observed. I don’t think he was milking the uniform as much as honoring the country on Sept. 11 by going to the great American pastime in uniform. BTW, there were a couple of people there with a large handmade sign that read, “AUSTRALIA REMEMBERS AMERICA’S HEROES OF 9-11-01.” That’s really nice. I don’t know that the average American would go to Australia and hold a sign for them in the same respect.

I think it was really cool and fun and funny to hang out with the people we went to the game with. But as far as the game itself went, I still don’t think baseball is a great spectator sport for me, and that’s not just because we lost (unless you’re a Chicago fan, in which case you won), or because there were only 5 runs scored total in the game, or because the first run was scored in the 4th inning and before that (and after, actually), we couldn’t keep a man on base. I found myself people-watching more than ball-watching. The loud tattooed guys to my left kept whooping at some blond girls whenever the girls would stand up and cheer. The large young lady in front and to my right kept eating throughout the game and dropping food on her stomach, sandwiches, nachos, pretzels, cheese drowning everything. (I had to take a cameraphone pic of her and send it to college roommie Diana, who received it ironically while she was at the gym.) The uniformed officer in front of me with his little girl on his lap with the identical profiles, gray eyes and sandy brown haircolor, made me wonder whether his Asian wife had any genetic input at all. I guess I could’ve eaten junk food and drank beer, which was what everyone around me was doing, but my response whenever someone would ask if I wanted something was “Bikini…2 months…can’t.”

Driving home after the game, I touched base with James who said he was on his way to the gym in Brea. I seriously considered going to work out, too, but changed my mind because it was almost 10:30p, I already hit the gym at lunch yesterday, I have 3 hours of jujitsu after work today, and I can’t afford to be sore for my half marathon run on Sunday. *biting fingernails*

Last year at this time:

This photo is the large background wallpaper of my work computer, so I have to stare at it every day and kick myself for not looking that way now. I have to be in a bikini in Hawaii in 2 months, man.

Every morning when I walk from the parking structure toward the courthouse, the sun is behind me and I see my shadow in front of me. I always admire that shadow. I’m hot stretched out! So all I have to do now to look that good is to grow another 4 feet in height. *sigh*

For now, more workouts at the gym. Did 40 mins of elliptical hill at the gym today at lunch.

Yesterday evening, I went to A Snail’s Pace and returned my running shoes. No hassle, they made the return very easy. I’m undecided as to buying new running shoes before the Disneyland half-marathon next month, or to just suck it up and run in my old shoes. I’m not sure if I can break in new shoes (assuming I can find a good fit that doesn’t hurt me when I run) in 2 weeks, anyhow.

Speaking of the half-marathon, I went to the 24 Hour Fitness near A Snail’s Pace after I returned my shoes and did a 45 minute run (w/2 minute cool-down afterwards) on the treadmill. It was so incredibly painful. My stomach hurt, I got a pain in my right side mid-run, and my breathing wasn’t comfortable. True, the last run I did was last Saturday, but come on, it was only a 4.3 mile run. I am actually pretty worried about running 14 miles in a couple of weeks now. A treadmill, come on! It doesn’t get easier than that. Except on a treadmill with a built-in fan. That 24 Hour Fitness didn’t have those.

Speaking of that 24 Hour Fitness, James had wanted to meet my new car, and he works out at that 24 Hour Fitness, and since I was gonna be in the area, we compromised and I went to that gym to work out and he went there earlier than he normally works out to meet up with me. I walked in the door at 7p, and geez, there was not one treadmill open! And I believe all the elliptical trainers were taken up. I know he’d explained that he hits the gym at 11p to avoid the crowd, but I had no idea that by crowd, he meant the entire population of Brea, Fullerton and Yorba Linda panting and sweating together in 1500 square feet. James showed up at a little past 8p, after my run, and I apologized for making him come to the gym this early. I hadn’t seen him since ’99, and I’m glad he recognized me, cuz I wouldn’t have recognized him.

In typical Cindy fashion, I threw a bunch of ab and leg exercises at him to throw off his normal abs/leg day routine and to fine-tune his results, and he was game to trying out the new stuff. It was fun working out with James. My coworker gym trainee, altho she’s doing very well and she’s incredibly motivated, is a beginning gymmer so I’ve slacked off a lot on my own stuff when I train her. With James, we got to hit a bit more of the hard-core stuff and I worked up a really good sweat. We left the gym at almost 9:30p. Wow, at the gym from 7-9:30. It’s like the old me back.

After our workout, I gave him a ride in my new car back to his car, and he was jealous of my back-up camera. Heh, heh. It’s not like there’s a lot of stuff for him to be jealous of, considering I dropped him off by his silver Mercedes AMG roadster that was so shiny it blinded me in the dark night. “Zaino,” he explained. Yeah, I’m gonna need to get me some of that.

Oh yeah. After I left the gym I went home and decided to make some spaghetti with organic vodka sauce. I was feeling really good about the work-out and happy with the fact that I’d just run, AND I’d just recently dropped back down into the previous 10s in my weight. So my bad-ass self was gonna have some carbs to balance my long-ass workout. Except I could not get the sauce jar open. I turned turning the cap with one hand, then the other, then I sat on the ground, held the jar between my knees, struggled with the lid with both hands, then held the jar between my feet so I could apply pressure a different way as I tried to turn the lid. No luck. Don’t think the irony was lost on me that I am, in reality, still just a weak little girl. I had to pass on the vodka sauce and I had my spaghetti with a marinara instead. Next thing you know I’ll be looking for a man to trap a spider for me. =P