Look, I know this is old. But I want to punch this little girl. I'm hoping that by saying it publicly, I will hold myself accountable, and refrain from doing so. Although kicking a puppy might make me feel better.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Friday, January 28, 2011
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Call it Stilates!
I picked up yoga as a means of spiritual exploration. The sinewy limbs and improved digestion seem to be a welcome bonus, but they're definitely not the focus. Yoga for me, and as far as I can gather for others as well, is a peaceful break. I struggle in every class I attend not to let my ego get in the way. I'm constantly berating myself for comparing my skills to others', reminding myself that this is a journey. A humble practice. But then this girl, Tara Stiles, comes along and says it's not. She eschews ascribing to any particular philosophy of yoga, and ignores traditional sanskrit in describing poses and sequences. "Who made these rules?" she questions in the NYT article.
Okay, good question. But I hardly feel that the elders of yoga had intended it to be a means by which insecure 20-somethings shed their freshman 15 (finally). Her claim that yoga studios are elitist and unwelcoming seems redundant, since pretty much all of New York City (where her studio Strala is located) is elitist and unwelcoming. I would encourage her to attend a class at my favorite studio, Yoga Ah!, or any other studio in any other midwest city. Granted, there are people who look down their noses at newbies, but I've experienced that in knitting lessons. You're gonna find it everywhere. This is, perhaps, the most extreme of the protestant yoga philosophies. To say that it is only about health, weight, improved sexual function, and appearances strips yoga of it's essence: moving meditation. Yoga cautions against ego and self-promotion. There is no perfect pose; your breath is your mirror. My yoga instructor has joked that yoga was never designed to be a business; I'm assuming she's referring to the stereotypical flightiness and unmaterialistic nature of yogis. A lot of yogis I meet may have functioned well as Amish in another life.
To her credit, Ms. Stiles charges a fair price for her yoga classes. She used to teach classes for free out of her apartment. I've known many yoga teachers to do the same. However, they gain no revenue from book deals and product promotion. Not many of the instructors in Cincinnati model for American Apparel.
This is not to say she must be stopped. There are all kinds of adulterated yoga classes out there. But most of them at least adopt the om's and the contemplation as part of the practice. This is simply to say, perhaps she shouldn't call it "yoga." There are reasons Episcopalians don't call themselves Catholic. They ascribe to a different set of beliefs about Christianity and worship. An Episcopal Eucharist even looks very similar to a Catholic Mass, but it's labeled differently. The same should be said for Ms. Stiles' exercise regime. She has different beliefs about the essence of the practice, and therefore, should call it something else. It's fine! You're allowed to believe what you want about your practice. This is a free country, and we are blessed to have religious freedom. But if you're gonna start your own church, you can't call it Baptist just to get people to show up.
Okay, good question. But I hardly feel that the elders of yoga had intended it to be a means by which insecure 20-somethings shed their freshman 15 (finally). Her claim that yoga studios are elitist and unwelcoming seems redundant, since pretty much all of New York City (where her studio Strala is located) is elitist and unwelcoming. I would encourage her to attend a class at my favorite studio, Yoga Ah!, or any other studio in any other midwest city. Granted, there are people who look down their noses at newbies, but I've experienced that in knitting lessons. You're gonna find it everywhere. This is, perhaps, the most extreme of the protestant yoga philosophies. To say that it is only about health, weight, improved sexual function, and appearances strips yoga of it's essence: moving meditation. Yoga cautions against ego and self-promotion. There is no perfect pose; your breath is your mirror. My yoga instructor has joked that yoga was never designed to be a business; I'm assuming she's referring to the stereotypical flightiness and unmaterialistic nature of yogis. A lot of yogis I meet may have functioned well as Amish in another life.
To her credit, Ms. Stiles charges a fair price for her yoga classes. She used to teach classes for free out of her apartment. I've known many yoga teachers to do the same. However, they gain no revenue from book deals and product promotion. Not many of the instructors in Cincinnati model for American Apparel.
This is not to say she must be stopped. There are all kinds of adulterated yoga classes out there. But most of them at least adopt the om's and the contemplation as part of the practice. This is simply to say, perhaps she shouldn't call it "yoga." There are reasons Episcopalians don't call themselves Catholic. They ascribe to a different set of beliefs about Christianity and worship. An Episcopal Eucharist even looks very similar to a Catholic Mass, but it's labeled differently. The same should be said for Ms. Stiles' exercise regime. She has different beliefs about the essence of the practice, and therefore, should call it something else. It's fine! You're allowed to believe what you want about your practice. This is a free country, and we are blessed to have religious freedom. But if you're gonna start your own church, you can't call it Baptist just to get people to show up.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Inner monologue.
Dear person-walking-on-the-treadmill-next-to-me-at-the-rec-center,
I don't care if you love the music in your headphones, don't sing it out loud. I do not share your love for Nikki Minaj. Please stop clapping and saying "yay" whenever your iPod plays a song you like. It's not magic (contrary to popular belief), and it's not catering to your needs. It uses an algorithm, and gets absolutely no emotional satisfaction from making you happy. Also, it's 6:00 am, and I only made it here out of the fear of killing/pooping myself at the half-marathon I'm running in four months, so SHUT THE HELL UP. If you have enough energy flap your arms around and talk to the person on the other side of me, you're not running fast enough.
Kindest Regards,
Hark
I don't care if you love the music in your headphones, don't sing it out loud. I do not share your love for Nikki Minaj. Please stop clapping and saying "yay" whenever your iPod plays a song you like. It's not magic (contrary to popular belief), and it's not catering to your needs. It uses an algorithm, and gets absolutely no emotional satisfaction from making you happy. Also, it's 6:00 am, and I only made it here out of the fear of killing/pooping myself at the half-marathon I'm running in four months, so SHUT THE HELL UP. If you have enough energy flap your arms around and talk to the person on the other side of me, you're not running fast enough.
Kindest Regards,
Hark
Thursday, January 13, 2011
A day in MY life...
In response to this pretentious bullshit about how delightfully scattered and busy Gwyneth Paltrow and her entitled frenemies are, I decided to post a day in my life.
I awake at 7:00 am after hitting the snooze button on the alarm clock I stole from a drag queen, put the shock collars on my dogs so they don't tear each others' carotid arteries out, and watch them shit on my porch; my little Princess Maybe doesn't dare get her freshly pedicured paws wet on the morning dew. I chuckle and think to myself, I sure hope Buster eats that poop off the porch so I don't have to pick it up later. I make my coffee in a 12-year-old coffee maker from Craigslist and toast in the toaster I took from my dead grandfather's house, and dash upstairs in my 3 bedroom, 1 bath tudor-style A frame abode. I brush my teeth and cover myself in baby powder, hoping my coworkers won't be able to tell that I haven't had time to shower in three days. LOL...boy, have I pulled the wool over their eyes.
This morning my car starts, which is just fabulous because I would love to get to work on time. My darling husband weaves in and out of traffic and narrowly misses the hobo who stumbles into the street after tripping over a pile of garbage. We politely wave to the republican protesting in front of the women's clinic, averting our eyes away from the pictures of aborted feti. After all, I still want to be able to enjoy my toast and strawberry jam!!!
Once at my desk, I rifle through e-mails, check messages, and get to work. I rush to the Teen Health Clinic to meet a 15-year-old study participant who is going there to get pregnancy test. Such anticipation; I can hardly wait to find out the results! Then I meet my boss to go downtown and read child abuse records for two hours. There just isn't enough time in the day sometimes! I get back to my office, and spend the rest of the day doing menial preparation tasks for an upcoming business trip to DC until my loving husband picks me up from work.
Tonight, I decided that I have trained too hard for the half-marathon the last couple of days, and since I can't bend my knees at a full 90 degree angle, I'll skip yoga practice. I didn't feel like queefing in front of a bunch of people tonight anyway. Mitchy-poo and I go out for dinner, since we have just been itching for a free evening to use our Groupon at Cactus Pear. We get loaded on a bunch of margaritas, and realize we don't have enough money left over for the actual dinner part of the evening. So we call my mom and have her come drive our drunk asses home, since we didn't have the foresight to assign a DD. I know, crazy right?! We spend the rest of the evening snuggled up in front of our space heater watching Monk, and then crawl into bed about 11:00. Fortunately, I remembered to take my Lexapro and Zoloft tonight, so I'll be able to get up and do it all over again tomorrow!
Kate's time-saving tips:
I awake at 7:00 am after hitting the snooze button on the alarm clock I stole from a drag queen, put the shock collars on my dogs so they don't tear each others' carotid arteries out, and watch them shit on my porch; my little Princess Maybe doesn't dare get her freshly pedicured paws wet on the morning dew. I chuckle and think to myself, I sure hope Buster eats that poop off the porch so I don't have to pick it up later. I make my coffee in a 12-year-old coffee maker from Craigslist and toast in the toaster I took from my dead grandfather's house, and dash upstairs in my 3 bedroom, 1 bath tudor-style A frame abode. I brush my teeth and cover myself in baby powder, hoping my coworkers won't be able to tell that I haven't had time to shower in three days. LOL...boy, have I pulled the wool over their eyes.
This morning my car starts, which is just fabulous because I would love to get to work on time. My darling husband weaves in and out of traffic and narrowly misses the hobo who stumbles into the street after tripping over a pile of garbage. We politely wave to the republican protesting in front of the women's clinic, averting our eyes away from the pictures of aborted feti. After all, I still want to be able to enjoy my toast and strawberry jam!!!
Once at my desk, I rifle through e-mails, check messages, and get to work. I rush to the Teen Health Clinic to meet a 15-year-old study participant who is going there to get pregnancy test. Such anticipation; I can hardly wait to find out the results! Then I meet my boss to go downtown and read child abuse records for two hours. There just isn't enough time in the day sometimes! I get back to my office, and spend the rest of the day doing menial preparation tasks for an upcoming business trip to DC until my loving husband picks me up from work.
Tonight, I decided that I have trained too hard for the half-marathon the last couple of days, and since I can't bend my knees at a full 90 degree angle, I'll skip yoga practice. I didn't feel like queefing in front of a bunch of people tonight anyway. Mitchy-poo and I go out for dinner, since we have just been itching for a free evening to use our Groupon at Cactus Pear. We get loaded on a bunch of margaritas, and realize we don't have enough money left over for the actual dinner part of the evening. So we call my mom and have her come drive our drunk asses home, since we didn't have the foresight to assign a DD. I know, crazy right?! We spend the rest of the evening snuggled up in front of our space heater watching Monk, and then crawl into bed about 11:00. Fortunately, I remembered to take my Lexapro and Zoloft tonight, so I'll be able to get up and do it all over again tomorrow!
Kate's time-saving tips:
- Poop and brush your teeth at the same time. You can spit between your legs, unless your sink is crammed up against your toilet like mine is.
- Make sure you're too broke to buy a TV; what a time-waster!
- Don't work two jobs if you can avoid it.
- Make your husband cook his own damn dinner.
- Having a roof over my head.
- Having food in my belly.
- Having a husband who doesn't hit me.
- Having higher education.
- Having shoes.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
The price of vanity
AAAAAAAAAGH.
I drink a lot of coffee, tea, and red wine. I'm also vain and don't want my teeth to look like this:
But I'm not willing to give up the Three Sisters. NOOOOOOOOo no no no no. The only thing that keeps me from punching my coworkers in the morning is coffee, and the only thing that keeps me from crying myself to sleep at night is wine. Plus it's cheaper than therapy and benzodiazepines.
Anyway, I decided I needed to whiten my teeth a little, and bought me some of those chemical-ly plastic strips at the drug store. Totally in conflict with my hippie-ness, I know, but who says hippies have to have butter teefs? So I put these things on my teeth last night for 30 minutes, and this morning, I can't even open my mouth when outdoors. The light winter wind hitting my dentes feels like my dental pulp is fully exposed to the elements. And might I point out, that with the wind chill it feels like 15 degrees F outside? Oh lord, and then I made the mistake of biting into an apple. NEVER AGAIN. I think I'm just gonna try to get famous so I can afford veneers.
But I'm not willing to give up the Three Sisters. NOOOOOOOOo no no no no. The only thing that keeps me from punching my coworkers in the morning is coffee, and the only thing that keeps me from crying myself to sleep at night is wine. Plus it's cheaper than therapy and benzodiazepines.Anyway, I decided I needed to whiten my teeth a little, and bought me some of those chemical-ly plastic strips at the drug store. Totally in conflict with my hippie-ness, I know, but who says hippies have to have butter teefs? So I put these things on my teeth last night for 30 minutes, and this morning, I can't even open my mouth when outdoors. The light winter wind hitting my dentes feels like my dental pulp is fully exposed to the elements. And might I point out, that with the wind chill it feels like 15 degrees F outside? Oh lord, and then I made the mistake of biting into an apple. NEVER AGAIN. I think I'm just gonna try to get famous so I can afford veneers.
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
The Bin of Doom
I married a brown food man. He was raised on potatoes and refried beans. The only vegetable my mother-in-law ever has in her house is usually a jar of onion powder. When they heard I was a vegetarian, they assumed I could still eat chicken, since that's obviously not meat. And when I explained that vegetarianism excludes all animals, including foul and fish, she bought me egg substitute and soy milk. She learned quickly not to interfere with my relationship with cheese.
So in an attempt to regulate my husband's bowel movements and keep him from gettin' the scurvy, I signed us up for a produce delivery program. Every other week, the vegetable fairy leaves a green plastic tub full of seasonal, organic, and local (when possible) fruits and vegetables on our front porch. And every other week, I am overcome with the panic that accompanies cooking and consuming everything in the bin before it goes bad. When I see that thing on my porch, I feel like I'm being grounded to the kitchen for the next four days. The feeling of superiority one gets from being a seasonal locavore does nothing to soothe the cracked knuckles from too much handwashing, sore back from standing for hours at a time, and headaches from the smoke alarm that likes to remind me I'm boiling water. And despite my own strange garden of misfit flora and fauna, some weeks, I am unable to identify several things in my bin, particularly the root vegetables.
Root vegetables are the trolls of the vegetable kingdom. They're generally misshapen and dirty, having shunned sunlight, clinging to the underworld with veiny tentacles. So when I opened my bin last week and discovered something that looked like a character from Pan's Labyrinth, I could only think that perhaps I'm meant feed it my blood and keep it under my bed so I can conceive a child.
Having no desire to conceive children at this time, I decided instead to cover it in cream and cheese, and bake it until it no longer resembled a creepy puppet in a scary movie. It was only after several failed soups and casseroles (beet soup, boiled brussel sprouts, parsnip casserole, etc.) that I learned I could edit my bin. Looks like next week we're getting a bin full of kiwi.
So in an attempt to regulate my husband's bowel movements and keep him from gettin' the scurvy, I signed us up for a produce delivery program. Every other week, the vegetable fairy leaves a green plastic tub full of seasonal, organic, and local (when possible) fruits and vegetables on our front porch. And every other week, I am overcome with the panic that accompanies cooking and consuming everything in the bin before it goes bad. When I see that thing on my porch, I feel like I'm being grounded to the kitchen for the next four days. The feeling of superiority one gets from being a seasonal locavore does nothing to soothe the cracked knuckles from too much handwashing, sore back from standing for hours at a time, and headaches from the smoke alarm that likes to remind me I'm boiling water. And despite my own strange garden of misfit flora and fauna, some weeks, I am unable to identify several things in my bin, particularly the root vegetables.
Root vegetables are the trolls of the vegetable kingdom. They're generally misshapen and dirty, having shunned sunlight, clinging to the underworld with veiny tentacles. So when I opened my bin last week and discovered something that looked like a character from Pan's Labyrinth, I could only think that perhaps I'm meant feed it my blood and keep it under my bed so I can conceive a child.
Having no desire to conceive children at this time, I decided instead to cover it in cream and cheese, and bake it until it no longer resembled a creepy puppet in a scary movie. It was only after several failed soups and casseroles (beet soup, boiled brussel sprouts, parsnip casserole, etc.) that I learned I could edit my bin. Looks like next week we're getting a bin full of kiwi.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
because I'm self-deprecating and impressionable
Having already failed miserably at one of my resolutions (I have not gone to bed on time once yet), and potentially failing at two others (I have yet to cook dinner at home, and have already purchased two meals at the hospital), I've decided to add another resolution to my list to hopefully increase my success rate.
I'm going to run a half marathon in May. Someone else said they were going to do it, so why the hell not? Forget the fact that I have monster bunions and can barely run between airport terminals without needing an inhaler, I'm going to run 13.1 miles, dammit. In a row. On the same day.
Training begins Monday with a breezy 4 mile run. YAY.
I'm going to run a half marathon in May. Someone else said they were going to do it, so why the hell not? Forget the fact that I have monster bunions and can barely run between airport terminals without needing an inhaler, I'm going to run 13.1 miles, dammit. In a row. On the same day.
Training begins Monday with a breezy 4 mile run. YAY.
Monday, January 3, 2011
New Year's Tentative Commitments
I'm not making resolutions this year, just tentative commitments. As cult leader Sri Chinmoy says, blah blah blah, something, lower your expectations. So here they are:
1. Pay a full tithing. Always.
I slack at this sometimes. I look at it as a spiritual practice, putting trust in God that I'll be able to pay my bills. But I think it's also a practice in simplicity, since I won't be able to buy as much crap while giving away 10% of my income.
2. Go to yoga at least twice a week.
Just because I don't want to be a fat ass anymore.
3. Be in bed by 10:30 every week night.
Unless I have a gig. Or unless there's something good on TV. Or unless a friend is in town, and I need to go have drinks with him or her. Or unless I have band practice. Or unless I'm reading a really good book...
4. Cook dinner at home at least twice a week.
I know that doesn't sound like a lot, but seriously, I only cook for two people, and my husband eats like a tiny waify bird, so if I make one box of macaroni and cheese it lasts us like, four days. Still, somehow, I find this difficult enough that I had to add it to the list of commitments.
5. Only buy lunch in the cafeteria once a week.
I'm optimistic that leftovers from #4 will help me achieve this one.
6. Stop being such a bitch.
I feel feelings. Lots of them. I also have a hard time mediating the relationship between these feelings and my mouth. Soooooo...here's to shutting the hell up.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)