Respecting Privacy

Today I posted on Facebook asking for immediate prayers for a family member. When I told my best friend about the situation, she also posted asking for prayers. Almost immediately, people started emailing and texting both of us to ask what was going on. Does it really matter? Do you really need to know? When someone asks for prayers, don't stop to ask why. Just pray.

Later, I posted about the death of my dear sister-in-law. This wasn't a plea for sympathy or cry for attention. It was a post to let people know about our family's loss and a request for prayers for healing and acceptance. Again, I started getting emails asking what happened. Some people even contacted my best friend to find out what happened.

Well, if I wanted you to know what happened, I would've posted it publicly on Facebook. All that matters is that she's gone, and I'm asking you to pray. Don't ask questions. Just pray. Pray for the man who lost his wife. Pray for the children who lost their mother. Pray for the family that lost a daughter/sister/aunt/sister-in-law/niece/granddaughter/daughter-in-law.

The point I'm trying to make in this post is to please respect the privacy of the family when a tragic event occurs. Give them a fucking minute to grieve. When they ask for prayers, pray. When we are ready to talk about what happened, we'll talk. Until then, don't ask questions. Just pray for healing.

Push-up Challenge - Day 8

For months, I have been saving the monthly workout calendars from Sisterhood of the Shrinking Jeans with intentions of using them. Each time, I print the calendar, hang it up, and walk right past it. I might remember a few days out of the month to complete the day's challenge, but not often.

This month, I decided that I'm going to commit to this month's Push-up Challenge:

This time, I didn't print the calendar. I scheduled each day's workout into the calendar on my phone so it's at my fingertips at any time of the day. I announced on Facebook that I was going to do this challenge, and challenged my friends to join me. Of my 488 friends, only two accepted the challenge.

My friend and boot camp instructor, Tina, decided to check in with each other on our push-ups. And guess what... we're doing it! One day I forgot to do them, but I made them up the next day and what should've been a rest day. 

Most days, I have been doing my push-ups at the countertop. One day I did wall push-ups, and last night, I did my last two sets on the ball (as pictured above).

On the first few days, I found sets of 2 and 3 to be way too easy so I combined them into one set. On Day 7, I had to start splitting it up into 2 sets. This morning, Tina and I got our push-ups done in boot camp. Not just 4 sets of 4, but 3 sets of 25! Ok, I admit that I didn't really do that many, but on the first set, I made it to 18 (I lost track of the other sets).

In boot camp, we did our push-ups on the floor, which has always been a challenge for me. This morning, I found them to to be easier, which means I am getting stronger.

Love Yourself

This is the first thing I saw when I turned on my computer this morning. That's something I've been working on.

September Workouts

I use the Map My Run app on my phone to log all of my workouts -- walks, boot camp, cardio. Everything. Every week, they email me a workout summary. On the first of each month, they send a summary of the previous month's workouts. Yesterday, I received my monthly summary email:

This doesn't seem like a bad total, but I know I can do better. I wish I had kept all of my previous monthly summaries so I could compare what I do now to what I was able to do before my knee injury.

For October, I am going to set my goal at 50 miles for the month. It's time to get off my butt and get moving again. This is the time of year that I love to walk. I enjoy the feeling of the cool air on my face as my body warms up from the workout.

With kids, it can be difficult to get my walks in, My oldest has a job now, and is also involved with drama club rehearsals so she's not there to watch the other two kids while I walk. For now, the weather is decent enough that I can make them walk with me.

As it gets cooler, I will have to find another way. I could go to the YMCA and use the treadmill, but I loathe walking on the treadmill. For one thing, I find it extremely BORING! For another, I am paranoid about falling on the treadmill. I saw it happen to a guy once while he was running. He got up and got back on, but I would probably break an arm or leg or something.

So 50 miles in October. That's my goal. I will get it done, one way or another.

Starting Over

Back in January, one of my Facebook friends posted about teaching her first boot camp class at the local YMCA. When I asked when the class was held, she told me 5:30 am on Monday and Wednesday. I thought, "Holy hell! I'll never be able to get out of bed that early!" Tina said, "Give me your digits, and I'll text you in the morning."

In my first boot camp class, I struggled to keep up, but I kept at it and made it through. The next day, I was so sore that it hurt to walk, it hurt to stand up, it hurt to sit down, it hurt to do almost anything. But I kept going, and I got mad at myself if I overslept and missed it. After a few weeks, I could feel positive changes in my body!

In April, my knee started hurting. I've had trouble with it for years, but I must have done something to strain it. I woke up one morning to find it stiff and swollen. I babied it where I could and kept going to boot camp. A few weeks later, I hurt it again in boot camp, and a few days later, I could hardly walk on it. Well, that put an end to boot camp for awhile.

So I saw my doctor who prescribed a brace, sent me for x-rays and an MRI (hope I never have to do that again!), and referred me to an orthopedist. The orthopedist just gave me a cortisone shot, and told me to come back if it keeps giving me problems.

Since then, I've only made it to boot camp sporadically, but I've decided I need to start getting there again. This week, I've been leaving my phone in the living room to charge so when the alarm goes off in the morning, I have to get out of bed to turn it off. I'm still dragging but when I get out of bed, and I've been late getting to boot camp, but at least I get there.

This morning as I joined in with the rest of the class, I had to pause to catch my breath. I thought to myself, "It's like I'm starting all over again." I'm back to day one of boot camp where I was struggling to keep up with the rest of the class and having to stop to catch my breath. I hate that feeling. I want to be strong. I want to be healthy. I want to rebuild my endurance. The one good thing is that I can still use an eight pound weight instead of going back down to five pounds. I think I may even be ready for ten pounders soon!

From now on, I'm going to keep going to boot camp so I don't have to keep starting over!

I think Walmart is stalking me...

I've had someone stalk me IN Walmart before, but now I'm pretty sure that Walmart is actually the one who is stalking me. I am a frequent browser at Walmart.com. I rarely purchase any of the items that I browse. Often, I just want to see what options are available, or I compare prices to other stores.

Every time I visit Walmart's website, I get an email with "product recommendations", and those products are always related to the item I was browsing for. Usually, it's within a day or so of my browsing. I'm pretty sure they must be stalking me.

This morning I browsed for a memory card for my camcorder. Less than two hours later, I received these product recommendations:

Yes, they must be stalking me. That's the only reasonable explanation.

Why Barbie is a Horrible Roommate

You might think that Barbie would be a pretty cool roommate. She doesn't eat anything, and she doesn't take up a lot of space. All of her belongings are crammed into one box in the living room.
Well, let me tell you that she is a horrible roommate.

1. She leaves her clothes and shoes scattered everywhere. After you step on a Barbie shoe a few thousand times, it kind of starts to piss you off. I finally got fed up one day and told her, "If you don't start picking up your shoes, I'm going to start throwing them out." Do you think she listened? Hell no! Do you think I felt guilty when one of her shoes got sucked up in the vacuum? HELL NO!!
2. She doesn't pay anything for rent or utilities. If she can afford a Corvette and a Dream House, you'd think she could kick in a little money for taking up space in my living room.
3. She has her boyfriend, Ken, over all the time. I swear he never leaves.
4. The other day, I caught her and Ken in a compromising position -- right in the middle of my living room!!

Check out the tattoo on her thigh.

As Devlin Warren once said, only a trollop would allow a man to kiss her before they are formally engaged. I think she's a downright whore.

They were still at it the next morning. Ken was getting a little boob action.

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The Mississippi Squirrel in Illinois

Not the actual squirrel

Today when I got home from work, I pulled in the driveway, as usual. Absentmindedly, I started to walk around the front of my van to go inside when I heard a commotion ahead of me. When I looked up, I saw a squirrel on one of my patio chairs. He was frantically trying to climb away, but seemed immobilized. I jumped back and yelled, "Oh my God!" (I may have said "Holy Shit!" I don't remember exactly.)

For a moment, I stood and stared at the squirrel, wondering what to do. The squirrel seemed to have his leg caught between the legs of my patio chairs that were stacked up, and wasn't able to get free. I finally turned and walked around the back of the van and headed for the front door.

As I walked towards the front door, I called my mom,who was inside my house, and told her to send one of the kids to unlock the front door. She sounded puzzled as she said "okay" so I told her I would explain when I got inside.

When I got in the door, I said, "The Mississippi Squirrel is out back." I explained how the squirrel was stuck, and I had no idea what to do. Mom suggested that I call animal control. I called City Hall and explained that I had a squirrel stuck between the patio chairs on my carport. She asked, "It's stuck between your chairs?" So I explained that the chairs were stacked together, and the squirrel seemed to be stuck between them. She then took my name, address and phone number and said she would get in touch with the animal control officer.

In the meantime, I kept looking out the back window to see if the squirrel was still there. I noticed it hadn't moved in awhile so I thought that it may be dead. I went out the front door and walked around to the back to check on it. I made some noise as I got close to it, and it didn't move, but I could see that it was still breathing.

After a bit, I decided to order pizza for supper. When I was leaving to go pick it up, I decided that since the squirrel hadn't moved when I went out earlier, I would take a chance on going out the back door and walk around the back of the van since I would have to walk right past it to walk around the front.

Well, when I opened the back door, the squirrel spazzed out. I figured he'd settle down as soon as I was out of sight. As I walked around the back of the van, I heard something crash into the pile of leaves under the patio chairs. My two younger kids are standing at the back door, with the screen open, yelling that the squirrel got free and was injured. I hurried to get in the van and get the door shut before the squirrel managed to get in the van with me.

The kids were still standing there holding the screen door partway open so I called the house from my cell phone and told them to shut the damn door before the squirrel got in the house.

As I backed out of the driveway, I saw the squirrel trying to crawl across the carport, dragging it's hind legs. I figure he probably broke his back when he fell and paralyzed his back legs.

After I picked up the pizza, I came home to find the animal control officer in the backyard trying to catch the squirrel. She had an old cat litter box that had been sitting on the carport and a piece of cardboard. She was putting the box on top of it, and then trying to scoop it up with the cardboard, but the squirrel kept getting away.

I went over to help, and we were finally able to catch it by scooping it up with a shovel. She then held it by it's tail to get it into the kennel, but then it was grabbing the kennel gate with it's front paws when she tried to put it into the kennel. Finally, we got the squirrel in the cage. She explained that it would probably be euthanized in the morning since he seemed to be hurt pretty badly.

After animal control left, I carried the pizza in the house to find Christa, my 6 year old, sitting at the table crying about the squirrel being hurt. I explained that the squirrel would be put to sleep in the morning, and it wouldn't suffer anymore. I thought she knew what "put to sleep" meant, but she asked, "And then it will get better?" Not wanting to explain what was really going to happen, I just said yes. That made her happy.

I only wish I had taken some pictures to post with this story. The squirrel pictured above is one that was sunning itself on the roof eave at work. No, it's not dead. 

And if you think this story is funny, wait until you hear the one about the mouse in my bath tub, but that's a story for another blog. :-)

I Have the Power

When I saw this picture posted on Facebook this morning, it really struck me. 

I have struggled with my weight my most of my life. I have always had the power to lose weight -- to eat right and exercise. I didn't know how to use that power, but I am learning. I am learning to track my calories, both in and out. I am learning to exercise and to build muscle. By learning to use my power, my power has become stronger. 

We all have the power to make changes in our lives, whether you want to lose weight, find a new job or end a bad relationship. You have the power. You just have to learn to use it. 

Welcome to My Blog!

For the last few weeks, I've had an idea to start a blog. I plan to cover a number of topics such as parenting, cooking, fitness, dieting, dating, dating websites -- basically anything involved in the life of a single mom.

After a few weeks of mulling it over, I discussed the idea with my best friend, who is always my biggest cheerleader. I told her the title and topics I had in mind, and she said, "GO FOR IT!!"

Now, you are currently reading my first blog entry. Thank you for visiting, and I hope you enjoy my future posts.