A Weight Off My Shoulders

There is something very freeing about knowing that all your laundry is clean. You know that no matter what life throws at you, at least you will be wearing clean sox.

Ahhh.

Feel the Burn

I started to work with my trainer again. There were a number of reasons to go back to him some of them being boredom with my work outs, bathing suite season, and also I just missed talking to the guy. The trainer and I get along well and I usually enjoy talking to him. Of course, there is the fact that I do pay him so he has to at least seem nice to me, but that is another story.

When I showed up at the gym on Wednesday I expected this work out to be like most of the others since I started working with him again; cadio, back strengthening, and stretching. I bopped into his office after my warm up and said hi.

“Today we’re going to box.” He informed me. Trainer is a former boxer and is semi-fanatical about it. I usually see him at the gym boxing or doing boxing training, and while he is a nice he looks like a mad-man while he is boxing. This should have been a clue of what was to come.

“We’ll start by reviewing the basic” he told me as we stood in front of the wall length mirror, me starring and following his motions (looking a lot more dorky and less coordinated then he did) as we jabbed, uppercut, and the rest of the boxing moves I didn’t remember about twenty seconds after we did them.

“Left upper cut then a right jab” he was yelling at me. “You aren’t following through, every time you are weak with your follow though I’m adding another five seconds! Keep moving!” Once I was drenched is sweat from our sparring he told me “Ok, now lunges down and back with punches in between.” No casual conversation, no smile, he was serious and bordering on mean. Once back from my lunges I was instructed with 20 pushups with the gloves on then another two minutes of sparring followed by wall sits.

I sat on the wall, legs shaking, dripping with sweat unable to fulfill my time limit. “You give up too easily, you aren’t even trying!” he started to tell me. This was the first time that he had been negative and also started to be the cliché trainer. I was beginning to have a flash back from high school when I was on the swim team and the coach would push us hard.

The strange thing is I was getting really pumped and into my workout. I was slightly disappointed when the hour was over and we were stretching. The thing I like most about working out is improving what I’m doing. I already want to go back to the gym and put on the smelly boxing gloves and work it out on a punching bag.

Maybe next time I won’t have to worry about mean Trainer and will be able to finish my wall squats.

Another Saturday Night

Steve and I haven’t had a Saturday night off together in a long time so when it happened this Saturday night we decided to make the most of it and go out. My Boston Best friend (BBF) really wanted to go she a band that she had really liked in college and was here playing downtown. So this is how we found ourselves standing outside of Fanuiel Hall in the semi-chilly spring air waiting to get into to a packed bar while BBF assured us “this band rocks!”

“Um, what kind of band is?” Steve asked.

“They are a cover band,” she replied and could probably see Steve making a face at this answerer. “But their really really really good.” She reassured us again.

Once in the bar we were surrounded by people most likely in their early 20’s. Girls were wearing dresses that were multicolored and a little premature for the spring weather, the guys were all wearing stripped button up shirts. I felt like we looked out of place. It seemed that between Steve, BBF, and myself we had raised the median age of the place up a few years.

“Try not to think about the age difference and start getting drunk” was BBF’s recommendation. So Steve and I followed with gusto. A few drinks in the band started to play and they did rock (or at least it seemed like they did).

We swayed to the music, we sang along, and before we knew it the lights in the bar came on. We wondered our way out of the bar into the night with all the college kids to start to compete for a taxi cab home.

Nature!

Spring has sprung in Boston and so this weekend I spent a lot of time in my backyard cleaning up fallen debris from winter and trying to till the soil to plant a garden. It turned out not to be as much work at I thought. It was a lot of digging and playing in the dirt (which Moose loved) and a trip to the store to buy seeds. I ended up with a lot more seeds then I had room for plants so I adopted my dad’s style of gardening. Meaning I ended up throwing the extra seeds in the dirt just to see if anything would grow randomly.

Hopefully in a few months from now we will be eating fresh lettuce, zucchini, corn and, beans. I’m not expecting much to grow but even if I grow one plant it will be more than I had last year.



If this daffodil that I planted last fall is any indication of things to come then maybe I will have some luck.

A Soup For You

Taking a page from Michael’s book I thought I would post a recipe that I was particularly proud of. I love when I make vegetarian food and Steve likes it too so I was really happy when this worked out. Ladies and gentlemen, Taco Soup:

-2 14 oz. cans of beans-it doesn’t matter what type of beans as long as it’s two different types. I used black and kidney beans. (I also rinsed them to get rid of extra sodium).

-1 28 oz. can of diced tomatoes- I got the tomatoes that also had jalapeños in them and it gave the soup some extra spice. Steve felt the jalapeños made it too hot, I thought it made it awsome.

-1/2 cup of diced onion.

-2 tbs. of taco seasoning (yes, the little envelops at the store of “Ortega” taco seasoning).

-3 tbs. of cilantro

-2 cups of water-I used broth because I like using broth in stuff.

Put all this in a pot and bring to a boil, turn down heat and simmer for half and hour. Spoon some out into a bowel and enjoy with cheese and sour cream with crushed tortilla chips on top. I also added ½ cup of frozen corn but that is mostly because I wanted to get rid of my frozen corn.

This soup took me about 45 min. to make and most of that time was spent on the couch watching the Simpsons and stirring during the commercial break. You will not be sorry if you make this.

Spring

There is just something about the first nice day of spring that makes everything better. I remember someone one once saying that when the weather gets nice people seem to be extra friendly, like they are so glad after a winter of shutting themselves in their house they finally get to see new faces and are happy about it. Moose and I took full advantage of today by sitting on our front porch and reading (me) or sleeping (Moose).

I know it’s not going to be long lasting but I’m out to enjoy as much of today as I can.

The Beginning Of The End

I never was afraid of old age. I felt with age would come responsibility and cool things like owning a house, having a family and a dog, and having things settled in your life. With age come togetherness, I always thought. Old age was something that is going to happen a long time from now was another belief that I had. I actually welcomed the thought of being a little old lady with grey hair and a porch to sit on while I sipped tea and swung back and forth in a large chair swing suspended from the ceiling. I would have kids in the neighborhood come by and eat gram crackers at my house as we talked about whatever they want and I would listen and be loving towards them. That was my idea of old age, a long time from now.

Well, old age apparently decided it was time to start chipping away at my life. As I was brushing my hair this morning a short kinky hair that stood straight up on the top of head caught my attention in the light. “Huhh, that’s one blond hair” I thought. For some reason or another I felt that this particular hair warranted further inspection so I plucked it and brought it down to eye level. There staring up at me from between two fingers was the first grey hair I have every grown. For whatever reason that particular follicle decided it was tired for being young and gave up making pigment but kept growing one unholy piece of hair. My body has begun the slow spiral into old age.

This is my first sign of old age and where am I? I’m living with my boyfriend in a rented apartment in the middle of Boston. No house, no dog, no togetherness. I’m lucky if I see Steve more then two nights a week before one of us passes out from exhaustion. Yet my body has marched on in time without me. For the first time, I’m afraid of getting old