does a body good

Okay, so I'm not talking about milk (although I did drink a London Fog tea latte today and it was good and if I could just smell like those, I would be happy).

I've been great at regularly exercising this year (yes, overall, this is pathetic, but the year's been good) but I have a very limited library of exercise videos to choose from. (I prefer to exercise at home, in the living room, for the most part, so I depend on videos). I mainly stick with my Winsor pilates tapes and dvds. I bought these after Poke told me about them about five years ago (holy crap on a stick, I can't believe it's been so long). I started the mat routines just before I got pregnant and then gave it up for different exercises throughout my pregnancy. About six weeks after Pic was born, I picked up again with the pilates. I've been doing them on and off ever since. I'm working hard to try to make this habit, to tell myself that, duh, exercise is a normal part of the day, just like brushing my teeth and not sleeping. I hate that I have to consciously make it a part of my day, but that's where I am.

Anyhow, I've been trolling through Goodwill and Savers for exercise videos to break up the monotony. Today, I dragged Cardo with me. I just wanted some cardio to go with the Winsor cardio videos I have. I love looking at the thrift stores because they have all of these wonderful videos like one I saw today: Breathercise. Oh, okay, that's what I've been doing wrong all this time, not breathing. Wait....

Anyhow (again), I got a couple of new videos that will probably be completely embarrassing to do, but oh well. I did see this exact Sweatin' to the Oldies, but Cardo absolutely vetoed that purchase. Just seeing it though, brought two things to mind: seventh grade PE when we actually used Richard Simmons's videos and the thought, 'Do Richard Simmons's workouts actually work?' I'm sure he gets a lot of flack just for being who he is*, but are his programs effective? I guess, as long as Cardo's around, I'll never know for myself.

Finally, that leads me to one more pointless story (I'm full of them, folks). Last semester, one of my students did a paper on Kimora Lee Simmons. I had no idea who she was, but apparently she's a model and a top executive for Phat Fashions. She was married to Russell Simmons. Throughout the paper, I kept replacing 'Russell' with 'Richard' and I kept thinking, 'Huh? Really? This seems like a strange match, Kimora and Richard, but okay.' Fortunately, I figured it out before I asked my student about it.




[I was trying to find something with better picture quality, but...ah, well.]

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* Sometimes, people are just mean. I figure, he's enthusiastic and he seems to care about people. If you don't have anything nice to say, perhaps think about taking Thumper's mom's advice.

i have no words...

Offensive commercials: It's Showdown Time!

from the mouth of the babe

Pic on the phone to Papi tonight:

"...and then we went to the park in the wagon! I hope we can get a wagon! With two seats! One for Baby K and one for me!"

It doesn't take much to make my child happy. Thanks Coach J!

just for fun...

I thought I'd begin the readings for two weeks from now instead of the readings for next week. Because I have time for this. So, I take back my 'yea for Foucault' statement and I'd like to replace it with a primal scream. Or, at least at big fat UGH!

I figure that if I don't sleep tonight and I don't sleep tomorrow night I might be able to make it. Oh, then I can't sleep Monday night because I've got to get through the reading for Tuesday (usually Wednesday, but this coming week, class has been rescheduled). Then, Wednesday? I say I go teach and then come home and sleep all the live-long day.

I think this is an example of regression, not growth. Suddenly, I'm a newbie at this stuff and I can't properly read a reading list (ha!).

glimpses

Okay, just a little bit of a list for now:

* I just walked outside because I'm losing my mind...and my books. I had to fetch a book from my car and when I opened my front door? Crap, snow. (No, not any actual crap, that's just a toned-down version of the thought that went through my head on seeing the snow.)

* I'm planning on being very open to hanging out il quest'estate (this summer). Anyone up for keeping me entertained? It's not difficult. Mainly, I like to walk places, take Pic to the park, that kind of thing. (And, hey, you might be able to sign up now for a lifetime membership as I have no plans for my life after the morning of May 18th when grades are due.)

* There are only about eighty-three more hours until my head implodes. (I'll try for imploding and not exploding...less mess for others later.) Then, it'll have to reinflate (it'll be something like Judge Doom in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?) because about a month later, I'll have to go through the process all over again (times three). Yippi-chi.

involuntary self-reflection*

[again, typed elsewhere, transported here]

is it horrible of me that i cannot wait until pic is in school full-time? is it so awfully bad that i am so selfish that i am craving this time because then i will be able to focus so much more on my own work? on my own studies? on my own self?

yes? i decided to have a kid when i did and now i need to deal with (suffer?) the consequences?

you’re entirely right (she said to the voice in her head). however, i just don’t care. if i had all this to do over again, i’d cry and cry. i’m not a person who wishes she had things to do over again, and this doesn’t mean that i think that every little bit of my life is generically perfect, but i’m where i want to be. when i finished crying, i’d do this all the same again. (so, powers that be, if you’re thinking to give someone another chance at things and you’re thinking to get into the tricky, tricky business of time travel, give that chance to someone else, please.)

the decision to have a kid when we did was largely mine. okay, so i would have liked to possibly have waited until i had actually graduated with my ba, but, hey, we didn’t and it worked out. i love being young enough to not be as worn out as i imagine i will be fifteen years from now (geez, if i’m tired now, i can’t even imagine my level of exhaustion fifteen years from now). cardo is somewhat older than me (more than a year, less than a decade) and this is something that i constantly take into account. i wanted him to also be able to be a young parent and he seemed to want this too. (i have no idea if this is in any way better than being an older parent. i can imagine the benefits of both, but i, obviously can’t argue for both having only experienced the one.) also, i’m still (and forever) a grad student. this has been both freaking fantastic and freaking sucktastic. i have so much more time to be with pic than i would have if i had a forty-plus-hour-a-week job to go to (as cardo does). at the same time, i have so much more time with pic than i would have if i had a forty-plus-hour-a-week job to go to.

i have seen so much of her growth in the last four years and that has been great. i’ve been able to take her to the library almost every week, at least once a week, for the past several years. when the weather’s nice enough, i’m able to take her to the park almost every day. i have the time to read her multiple books a day (on top of doing all of my own reading, much of it aloud…this child has been exposed to literacy in a major way). i can lay down on the floor and play ‘ladies’ with pic. i have spent more time with pic than anyone else has.

i have spent more time with pic than anyone else has. yes, i understand that i have this repetition thing going on here. that’s intentional. stick with me. when i have twenty-some or forty-some student papers to respond to, 200 pages of a book to read, four scholarly articles to read, a course to design, laundry to get done, dishes to wash (and on and on, for all time), i have a four-year-old who wants me to read several books to her, who wants me to take her to the library/park/thrift store, who wants me to stop and play ‘ladies’ with her. this child has learned to spend a lot of time playing alone. she’s awesome at entertaining herself. she reads, draws, plays with magnets, completely unpacks her toy bins, tries on several different outfits, ecc. when i’m trying to work at home, though, are the times when i most feel that i’m sucking at everything. the apartment is never quite clean. my mind is never quite wholly focused on either pic or my work. my ‘work’ even consists both of being a teacher and being a student. i’m not able to compartmentalize my identities, bringing one out to be in control when i need her. should i even be concerned about that? i think so. i’m not all ‘yea for multitasking!’ although i’ve been doing it for most of my life. i'd love to me more in-the-moment. bring on the zen.

cardo doesn’t quite understand how this is tearing me apart and that is partly my very own fault. i don’t ask him (or anyone) for help often enough. i have occasionally tried to explain just how different our situations are. he gets to go to work fifty-some hours a week (isn’t he the lucky-duck) and get his work done there without someone constantly demanding that he turn his focus away from work. he goes to work and doesn’t have to worry that the apartment must still be cleaned, ecc. this does not mean that he doesn’t bring his work home but it is a very different thing to go to work, to leave the home and get oh-so-much of your work done elsewhere than to have to juggle work at home and a home and a preschooler.

so, because i’m needing to read many articles on/by foucault and i’m needing to revise several of my own papers and i’m needing to create discussion notes for a variety of texts and i’m needing to implode, i’ll wrap up rather quickly here: i cannot wait until pic is in school full-time so that i can go somewhere that isn’t home for several hours five days a week, many weeks of the year and get my own work done.

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* the title is from class discussion and, no, i don't remember how exactly it came up. it just seemed funny to me.

yea for the panopticon

How 'this is not my life...or is it?' is the fact that I just silently praised the powers that be that I am studying Michel Foucault for next week? Seriously? Had you told me a decade ago that I would feel a wave of relief wash through my body on seeing Foucault's name on the reading list...well, I would have said 'Fucalt [because I would have no idea how to pronounce it]? Who's that?' This does not mean that I'm an expert on good old Michel, but it does mean that I have studied him before which is more than I can say for most of the reading I've done for this particular class.

So, yea Foucault!

Does this count as some kind of growth on my part? (The theme for April's NaBloPoMo is Growing (Up).) Probably not, right? It probably just shows my exhaustion, my brain overload. Ah, well...