fitness – Groningen Rain

26 November 2020

Now Where Is My Turkey?

[Dutch Lock Down Day Two Hundred Fifty Two]

Thanksgiving is a national holiday celebrated on various dates in the United States, Canada, Brazil, Grenada, Saint Lucia, and Liberia, and the sub-national entities Leiden, Norfolk Island, and the inhabited territories of the United States. It began as a day of giving thanks and sacrifice for the blessing of the harvest and of the preceding year.

This year it’s celebrated today in the United States and Brazil and as a nod to it, I’m giving thanks for a few things today.

But first the news:

I do humbly give thanks for my patient, beautiful, supportive partner who listens to my troubles and encourages my experiments. And I’m so thankful for our three amazing minions who show us the beauty in patience and bring new definition to both literal and figurative support.

I am thankful for chocolate. Especially fancy bon bons from local chocolate / coffee / wine stores. In little boxes. With little bows. And tiny calories. If you eat them with your eyes shut.

I am so very thankful for effective hormone therapy, finally stabilising riotous and horrid perimenopause, bringing serenity and peace to my poor addled brain.

I am thankful for Dr. Kristin Neff who wrote Self Compassion, an extraordinary book that offers exercises and action plans for dealing with every emotionally debilitating struggle, be it parenting, weight loss, or any of the numerous trials of everyday living.

16 September 2020

Can’t Sleep The Clowns Will Eat Me

[Dutch Lock Down Day One Hundred Eighty Three]

Seriously, though, the sleep thing has been pretty miserable with rather high temperatures, but today the weather sobered up and got a bit more Autumn-like.

Sleep should be good tonight.

And 5am will be a little painful.

But welcome.

But first the news:

And also I’ve got a looming work deadline.

Want to see?

Cause this morning for the hacking stream, I totally just worked on the project.

Live.

11 September 2020

Obviously Still Figuring Out Five A.M.

[Dutch Lock Down Day One Hundred Seventy Eight]

Totally slept in this morning.

Totally know why.

Totally doing something about it.

But first the news:

The alarm went off between 0430 and 0500 and I didn’t consciously turn it off.

Dangerous, Leander.

Once you get used to turning off your alarm in your sleep, it’s hard to go back to actually waking up.

But, more importantly, I felt really DOWN this morning when I finally faced the day around 0630. And it wasn’t because I missed the earlier alarm clock, either.

I asked myself, “What’s wrong?”

8 August 2020

So We Bought A Pool

[Dutch Lock Down Day One Hundred Forty Six]

Photo by raquel raclette on Unsplash

It’s day three of a seven or eight or million day streak of 29-32 degree highs.

We have one airco unit.

It’s in the kids room.

We have a ton of fans going.

I’m in power saver mode.

But first the news:

There are a million things that I wanted to tackle this week while on vacation but as of Friday I just… stopped… doing things.

23 July 2020

Dutch Lock Down Day One Hundred Thirty

[Poor Old Left]

When I started dance, I took mostly ballet classes with a few modern, tap, flamenco, and jazz classes on the side. But ballet was six days a week Monday through Saturday and I was GOOD.

Then I went to undergrad at the University of Southern Mississippi and while I was still damn good at ballet, it became OBVIOUS how much I sucked at EVERYTHING ELSE.

While the program required ballet and modern, pretty much all other dance forms were optional including JAZZ.

And I SUCKED.

But first the news:

So why did I return to that jazz class year after year, semester after semester?

BECAUSE I SUCKED.

And the teacher was AMAZING.

She had a saying, everytime we did the second side and she knew it would suck – left is never as good as right – she’d lament, “Poor Old Left”

And we’d ATTACK it.