To Do or Not to Do

Photo by Daniel Reche on Pexels.com

Yesterday I actually drove to downtown Lexington, Virginia all by myself. I parked in a nicely arranged parking lot with stairs at the end, and went for a walk. And then I climbed up one stair and back down and then two stairs and down and then THREE steps up and down.

Talk about self congratulatory pride! I felt like Rocky!

And then I walked on level ground for about 20 more minutes.

HURRAH!

Big Foot complained a bit but we managed to ignore all that. “I am woman. I am strong. I am invincible!”

Of course walking in a parking lot is not too exciting. There are certainly not many photo ops, but the sun was shining yesterday with a cool little nip in the air, and the traffic was nil, and I took my trusty cane for balance. That little parking lot is now my personal training track!

In the good old days around 1998 the goal was to walk 10,000 steps. But my pedometers don’t work anymore. I suspect it is because the goal is now low low low! What pedometer would be caught displaying 150 steps anyway?

So out with the pedometers.

Now the goal is just some time moving….. any time moving….. just moving.

Today I feel pressure to enter a blog post.

What about all that beneficial walking?

To do or not to do? That is the question.

Walking is more important really.

But blogging is a good excuse not to do what I set out to do yesterday.

I promise I will start walking again tomorrow.

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Winter Swim

No, I am not the type of person who wants to run into an icey sea for any reason.

However, I continue to miss swimming in a warmer pool of water.  BigFoot has also been crying out for a bit more exercise.

About BigFoot:

For any newcomers to my blog, please know that BigFoot is the nickname for a problematical left foot that swells off and on.  There were nine different diagnoses. The latest concensus is a combination of arthritis and a damaged nerve.

Submersion in water seems to help the swelling.  But mostly there is the proud reaction I get from simply sinking into the water and hanging on a noodle.  If I kick my feet I feel like I’m exercising!

I suppose you can tell I have begun to visit our community indoor pool – our local Aquatics Center.  What a joy!

I have been there one time and ready for the second visit this week!

It is a dome covered pool.  It is also the largest pool I have ever seen except on t.v. for the summer Olympics.  There are eight very long lanes and at the time I went, I had two of them all to myself.

I think those open two lanes are reserved for un-serious lap swimmers, who simply dog paddle on a noodle from end to end.

Wait a minute!  Isn’t EXERCISE really a subjective term?

In my case it means BigFoot is engaged in gentle kicking.

On Day One I even abandoned the noodle for short periods of real swinning.  Now that is EXERCISE –  right?

Like I said, “subjective.”

Now please stay tuned for more excitement after my Day Two visit this week.

 

 

 

 

 

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Let Us Do Our Exercises

I am a firm believer in exercise but tend to follow a more sedentary pursuit of happiness.

My gym is a recliner chair that encourages naps but requires repetitive ab crunches and push-ups to maneuver up and down for bathroom runs.

Is that enough exercise?  I wonder.

Probably not.

In an attempt to assuage guilt, I have added a challenging exercise routine.

Now do not laugh!

Did you know there are more than 50 muscles in the face?

I have been doing these new exercises for 2 whole days and swear I’m feeling the aches and pains of using all those unused muscles.

But the first step is to define problem areas whereby one is to put a mirror on a table and look down into it to determine what is sagging.

They didn’t say anything about the whole face sagging!

Eyes, cheeks, chin (double), wrinkles, upper face, middle face, between the eyes – all crinkly, wrinkly, sagging unused facial muscles!

Fortunately, I am lying face up in my recliner.

And fortunately, I can do the facial exercises in the privacy of the bathroom.

Anywhere else and  I am afraid Bill would collapse in laughter as I perform:

Exercise # 15 – Tensing the wings of my nose downward

Or

Exercise #19 – Snarling like a dog

Note the clipped pages of photos and instructions for all the different sagging areas.  Little did I know I would be clipping all the pages.

But I swear my face looks younger in just two days!  And a friend just said, “You look good in white.”  Surely she meant, “Did you get a face lift?”

Ahhhh!  Managing a healthy lifestyle is the way to immortality.

I wonder if  I can do these facial exercises in the recliner!

Note:

The book is The Five Minute Facial Workout, by Catherine Pez

 

 

 

 

 

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Exercise, Camaraderie and Smiles

There is a dance that is new to me and maybe to you too.  It is a dance that is “as old as the hills.”

My good friend, Amy, who is always trying new things, filled me in on this enchanting activity that is good clean fun, great exercise, and a place to meet friends and smile.

 Have you ever heard of Contra Dancing?

Well, one site describes it like this: “If Swing Dancing and Square Dancing met in a bar, you’d get Contra.”

• It is similar to square dancing but not the same.
• It is considered a social dance that you can attend without a partner, but is danced in pairs.
• It is danced in long lines and couples progress up and down the lines dancing with each other and other couples in the line.
• There is a caller who teaches the sequence of figures before the music starts.
• The music can be Irish, Scottish, old-time, or French Canadian folk tunes.
• It is impossible not to smile at the music.
• The fiddle is the core instrument, but can also feature the guitar, banjo, bass and mandolin.

 Contra is a folk dance with mixed origins from English country, Scottish,  and French dance styles in the 17^th century and African influence from Appalachia.  Sometimes described as New England folk dance or Appalachian folk dance, Contra Dances can be found around the world as well as in most US states.

Check out Contra Dancing in your state or community.  Guaranteed to make you smile!

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The Weight of a Hula Hoop

Ever hear of a weighted hula hoop?  This one has the addition of 3 pounds!  Each grandgirl tried it once and that was the end of hula hooping.

I never learned to hold up a “weight-less” version so they all had my adoring admiration.

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Sneaking Back Into Cyberspace

Hallelujah!

Our Christmas tree is up, decorated, and the outside wreaths alit for holiday cheer in our Virginia country world.  Twinkling lights, red bows and a second tree on the deck complete the picture.

It’s definitely looking alot like Christmas around here.

And could this little posting mean I am back to blogging?

The wish is always to re-connect but that nagging urge waxes and wans like the moon.

I am still doing physical therapy for the dragging left leg with up and down results and high hopes for a sudden healing.  Exercise sessions that look like child’s play (including walking over a cone obstacle course on a leash) leave a body physically exhausted.

But each day I surf around the blogging world  for 15 minutes to see what all of you are doing and try to comment here and there.

Sitting too long is a no-no, but surfing around forbidden territory feels grand and I relish the stolen moments online.   What fun to be slinking into off-limits cyberspace!

But, today, with fearless abandon I am dropping in for more than a moment to say,  “Merry Christmas to all and to all a good  night!”

 

 

 

 

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Pedometers for Dummies

The final indignity that has opted me out of modern gadgetry was an old reliable pedometer that finally ran out of batteries .

And of course, no one could figure out how to open the battery box.

Maybe it was frozen in shock at how few steps I walked in the last five years.

I mourned that little pedometer and somehow knew a substitute would require a Masters’ Degree in Programming and hours of frustration to get up and running walking.

Forced to buy a new pedometer- three or four new ones  to be exact- they all challenged my intelligence.

It’s not that I’m not intelligent.  I used to be considered a bright child.

But that was in the good old days when life was simple.  There were no huge technological innovations calculated to make things easier.

Life was easy enough with Off and On switches you might have to get up for.

But I am ranting.

Even after hours of reading and re-reading I could not decipher the directions to all the new pedometers stacking up in a secret hiding place reserved for storing complicated gadgets.

Asking for help, as you may know, is humiliating.

But trying one last time, I ordered a supposedly SIMPLE  PEDOMETER that “is operational right out of the box!”

Really?

I could hardly contain my excitement when it came – a simple little drop-in-your-pocket pedometer with great big Easy Read Numbers and a little pull-tag.

I pulled the tag (according to the directions) and it was ready to go!  No intelligence required!

But where were the instructions to program calories burned, body mass indexes, breaths per minute, miles consumed, muscle contractions, levels of perspiration, or all that other irrelevant stuff?  Not there.  What a relief!

All I ever wanted to know was STEPS!

And, although I hardly believe it, this little gadget ONLY REGISTERS STEPS!

No need to purchase another 550 page book on Pedometers for Dummies (I wonder if there really is such a book)!  I already have Computers for Dummies, Windows 10 for Dummies, and Office for Dummies, plus a few more.

“By golly,” as they used to say in the good old days, when I was intelligent,  “Someone has figured out how to regress to simpler times.”  Kudos to the inventor of this precious little Steps Only Pedometer!

And  now maybe I can fool the world into thinking I have a Master’s Degree in Programming.

Why can’t everything else be this easy?

Why do I always have to pull out the directions for my self cleaning oven?

Shouldn’t I just be able to hit “Clean??

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Random Randoms – Week Ending May 20, 2016

 

Cloudy Skies and Virtual Clouds

Early in the week the son was still here and managed to finally convert me to the virtual Virtues of the Cloud. What used to be that fluffy thing in the sky is now an imaginary cloud that holds all the information about you and your life.  And all you have to do is a technological rain dance to retrieve things!

Now I can find a fuzzy picture taken four years ago of a street sign reading “Road May Flood”.  

I thought of that photo because it was raining when Corky arrived and raining when he left.

It rains for two days at a time here now in Virginia.  And if you need to mow you had better do it on the third day.

Dashing in the Dashlane

dashlane logo

My myriad of passwords (a million or so) are now retained in that ethereal CLOUD too.  Dashlane miraculously  signs into Amazon (and those million other places) for me.  Woosh and I’m in!

The result? If I forget the Magical Master Password to get into Dashlane I won’t remember any of my million other passwords.  That almost happened last night.  Talk about PANIC!

Ten Minutes at the YMCA

The week’s major feature was a return trip to the YMCA after a seven month absence dealing with BigFoot. The Big/NowLittle Foot is still  sporadically sending pain notices via Plantar Fasciitis to the heel, clear reminders to pay attention or else!   This  stop at the “Y” was therefore a gentle new try for ten short minutes on the NuStep thing (no dashing or crunching, moaning or groaning – a short practically nothing workout for legs and arms).

And what joy and divine energy were generated in those ten minutes at the gym!  And the foot stayed happy along with the rest of me!

Personal Pride and a Personal Trainer

photo from http://weightliftingacademy.com

Give me ten minutes of ego driven personal pride and I was back to the YMCA today for a  one hour session with a personal trainer.

Justin’s task was to re-introduce me to the YMCA’s torture chamber equipment.  And now that I am steeped in knowledge about Range of Motion numbers, weights, and repetition goals, I am fully prepared for a full return to the world of fitness.  Hurrahhhhh!

All I need is a “Range of Motivation” motivator or a viable plan for commitment.  Hahahahahhhha!

Too Tall for Comfort

A new patio/deck umbrella arrived (purchased online from a place logged onto by Dashlane!).

The umbrella is the right color and advertised as “wind resistant” (no mention of rain protection) but it is practically perfect.  The only problem is it’s a push up/non-crank style and is too tall for me to raise and lower.  Ever ready to accommodate all obstacles, I volunteered to keep a footstool handy.  But falling off the footstool in an effort to raise an umbrella did not make much sense.  Packing the thing up to return to sender also seems formidable.

Bill, to the rescue, says he can cut the pole back by six inches!  Would that it be true since we will not be able to return the umbrella with a hacked pole (not hacked in the sense of breaking into a computer mind you – hacked in the sense of sawing and pounding on a metal pole  – O.K.,”forgedda about it!)

Such are the perils of buying online.   You have to think of everything and be sure to enter detailed specifications.

Sold on Selfies

Finally, though I haven’t told Bill or Corky yet, I bought a $4.98 Selfie Stick!  I am so excited about this and hoping the distance between the camera and my face will make for passable pictures (hopefully slightly blurred).

How surprising it is to actually come up with a list of Randoms when I always think there is nothing to say.

And now I am wishing you (and me) pleasant randoms for the week to come.

 

 

 

 

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Random Ramblings in Virginia

Photo from www,weightliftingacademy.com

Some of my favorite bloggers are consistent about posting the events of the week and I can never come up with anything much to write about.  Here’s another try though, since this week was fairly busy.

I hit the gym on Monday!

I know that conjures up images of treadmills and weight lifting, but can we please count “Chair Yoga?”  What is Chair Yoga?  Well, it’s yoga done mostly sitting or holding onto a chair.  I know that makes me sound on the decrepit side, but it’s a beginning for final recuperation of the BigFoot.

I have forgotten Tuesday;

except I think we had dinner at the Pink Cadillac with good friends.  The rest of the day was spent elevating the BigFoot to recuperate from the gym.

Midweek featured a monthly outing with my friend, Norma,

only this time our outing was in town (Lexington, Virginia).    We stopped at Southern Girls, a wonderful decorating and design shop that makes me want to trash everything in the house and start over.

We also stopped by The Stitchin Post to pick up some yarn!  I am a novice crochet-er even though I have been crochet-ing since early childhood.  Never really learned to read patterns, but finally found one that yields “curly scarves” that everyone seems to like.  My dental hygienist (Chancee – isn’t that a beautiful name?) said she would like to have one of those curly scarves so she will have it when I go for teeth cleaning in April.

Today I hit the gym again but skipped the barbells of course.

And that my friends, constitutes a pretty full week – at least for this old country gal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Warning Signs of Aging

From: http://www.hauteliving.com

When I was young and wrinkle free (never mind care free), I thought the first sign of aging would be a gray hair followed by a wrinkle.  I also believed the old hag image could be avoided by eating and sleeping right and using all the miracle creams advertised on television and in magazines.

Hope is a many splendored thing, but the truth is harder to take.

Over time, there were signals that healthy living and preening were not quite succeeding:

1. Police-people began to look like children. I wondered why little kids were assigned for protection.
2. My doctor was the same age as my son!  He is still the same age as my son but now they both look middle aged while I still feel 18. (?)  Who can explain this?  Note:  I didn’t say I LOOK 18!
3. Then a nice young man at the supermarket began saying, “Yes Maam.”  Was he talking to ME? REALLY?  Should I call him “Son?”
4. Then another nice young man somewhere opened a door for me.  Hasn’t he heard that chivalry is already dead?  YOUNG women open their own doors. I CAN OPEN MY OWN DOOR – THANK YOU!
5. Oh NO!  the first gray hair came and went (ouch!) but suddenly there were waaaay too many.
6. The first wrinkle was a frown line.  Oh well, that could be blocked out with photo slight of hand.  You will never see a wrinkle in my selfies!  Ha!  I got THAT down pat.
7. In airports,  people seem to think I am lost or confused.  “Do you need help?” they ask.  Hmmmmm.  It’s odd but I usually do.
8. Magazine ads stop giving beauty hints when they get to the “Over ___” category
9. Salespeople exclaim, “Oh, my grandmother bought one of those and she just LOVES it.”
10. The AARP card has some real advantages – like free coffee – even if  I don’t even have to show the card.
11. My grandgirls look the same age as I think I look until I look in the mirror.  I am considering hanging black shrouds over mirrors!

 Perhaps there is a vitamin to ward off the old hag image.  Only I know how many weird vitamin supplements are taking up space in my kitchen cabinet(s) and they are all secretly labeled “Hope dashed.  Store for later discard.”

Yes, hope is a many splendored thing, and I am still in favor of eating right, sleeping right, and exercising for energy and good looks.

I have been duly warned by the experts however, that with healthful living and of course, the most expensive beauty products, I will look 20 years younger and live long enough to enjoy 15 minutes more a day drooling in my soup.

 

 

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