my brother from nyc sent me the coolest gift for my birthday. a "new york city" shirt like the one in the famous photo of john lennon. i will wear it as a tribute to a great city and a great man.

i know yoga is not about "accomplishments", still i am happy that i was able to, for the first time, complete a 3 consecutive series of a vinyasa (or flow) which involves downdog/chataranga danadasana/updog. i am happy because this, in a way, validates my vegetarian diet. i never have been able to do this sequence before, even when i ate meat, not to mention 3 sequences. while i recognize my increase in strength is not because of my diet, but because of my practice, obviously, even with extensive practice, if i was not getting adequate nutrition (esp. protein) i don't think i'd be able to make progress like this. subjectively, i think i feel better, but you never jnow, perhaps a sign of malnutrition is thinking you feel good, much like a sign of freezing to death is thinking you are warm. anyhow, it's good to have some objective evidence.

actual dialog between me and daughter, attempting to explain the use of caffeine

me: even adults shouldn't drink too much caffeine, because it makes you jittery
daughter: that explains a lot
me: (smart girl)

also, i think my oldest cat (the evil one) is starting to talk. this morning as i was going towards the door to the garage, i swear she was saying letMEOWt, letMEOWt. when i opened the door to the garage and she at first started to bolt outside, then seeing she couldn't get out cause the garage door was closed, gave a suprised "oh". then she moved to the other door (which, of course, takes her to the "other" outside) and started the whole letMEOWt business again. then when my wife let her in, she swore the cat said hellEOW!!!

it's been a kind of wacky morning...decided to defer skating and practiced yoga out on the deck (shirtless to give the ladies of the neighborhood a thrill (HA!)). then after i came in went for a brief skate, just to let my legs know they can't slack off. i went for a medium lengthed skate yesterday, but in extreme heat - so it took a lot out of me. also, it's been very windy last few days which makes it harder.

hope the rest of the day is as oddly interesting...

to describe my morning - imagine chris witty doing an adaptation of hamlet:

to skate or not to skate, that is the question.

this reminds me - i have to watch this again...


Which Trainspotting Character Are You?

dots seem to be dropping off my guest map - i'm guessing that once they get so old (the dots, not the people) they automatically drop off...just wanted you folks to know (if anyone noticed) that it wasn't me deleting people. if you want to re-sign - feel free!

please, someone, send me an email. i SWEAR my spam filter must be working in reverse - i.e. letting spam go thru and filtering out personal messages. either that or i have no friends.

first time skating since knee felt dodgy. took it kind of easy - wrapped it, now icing it and took ibupropen. did feel a slight groin pull though (quit snickering - act your age!) - i think it was due to being off skates for too long and not warming up right. seemed to only last a few laps - then better

despite the generosity of clif bars in making many free samples available at the jeep/outside festival, i am afraid i have to switch loyalties to kashi's go lean cookies and cream for my sports bar of choice. i could care less if these are good for you or not...these taste soooo good!!!

gee, my blog, hot or not ratings are creeping up. maybe i don't suck - or at least not to the degree previously indicated. if you haven't done so already, vote, sign my guestmap and tip your waitstaff. they work hard for the money, so ya better treat them right!

i am experiencing a twisted kind of pleasure watching austin powers 2, drinking beer, now listening to bbc6 (current song: sheryl crow's every day is a winding road), when i KNOW i should be working. blatantly disregarding responsibility is sooo much fun, i have no idea why i didn't pick up on it sooner....

mmmmm...mango ice cream...mmmmm

today's headline in my local newspaper: "Times are kind of tough.", Bush says.

wonder what tipped him off?

after nearly 20 yrs of software developments, then 1 semester teaching then 10 weeks developing software again, returning to school is a bit odd. this is a good transition week, meetings and such, cause i KNOW i am not ready today to return to class - i hope by next week i feel differently, and i bet when school starts and i get going, it'll be cool, but right now, it feels real odd and a bit overwhelming - almost worse than when i started in january...

i want a logo

when i see the cool logos that fluid pudding, pulp friction, techfluid, bus girl and others (sure i'm forgetting some - and i',m too lazy to create links, check out my rather cluttered link section if you want the urls), i have logo envy - so i want a logo to my site and even those cool little banners to use for links...so i might give it a shot. i have a new image host - so i can do that now (one of my blog resolutins i WAS serious about keeping). if anyone wants to email me an idea for a logo - i'd be much obliged. i'd have a contest - but i have nothing to offer...

i ran into a woman i went to high school with and had a nice long chat. we weren't really friends in high school - she was a nice girl and all, but she was a cheerleader and popular and me, well, i was neither, and painfully shy on top of that. i swear, i probably talked to her more today than in the 4 years of high school. it's funny now that we are all more mature, how barriers between people break down.

take a look at my new little graphic in the about me section.

knee doesn't feel all that bad today. perhaps it wasn't the yoga, but the weekend's high activity level, plus being cooped up in the car - or some combination of all the above - will play it by ear as far as skating again. i TOTALLY wanted to skate yesterday, but restrained myself. tonight i have a yoga class, but have some time mid afternoon where i could give it a go skating if i feel so inclined. on the other hand, another day of relative rest might be better still.

blog resolutions

a. post less frequently. do not worry, loyal readers - i am not planning a sabbatical or anything - but perhaps more of attention to quality as opposed to quantity - for example, consider this post - completely superfluous - and dilutes attention from my other, brilliant, posts...
b. less template fiddling. ok, i think i learned my lesson here. i will change less frequently and will be more careful, as after all, no one comes here for cutting edge web-design. i'm not really sure why anyone comes here, but i am sure it's not for that.
c. find a hosting service, so i can include images, other pages, etc...should be obvious....
d. keep to a minimum: usage of sanskrit (in fact, the whole multiple language thing), ® and ™ symbols, footnotes (all cute the first dozen or so times...) also references to lance armstrong and sheryl crow - hmmm, what will i write about
e. fewer (no?) blogs about blogging - hmm, now i am blogging ABOUT blogs about blogging - so we've gone to a new level...
f. try not to blogging to the point of shirking responsibities - for example - say i had a meeting today at 1:30PM (easier to imagine than you might think) and it's 1:13PM. in the future i will head right to the meeting and not pathetically try to extend an entry with a few more bon mots...
g. remember to get Kristín's name right. Stína's as well.

i promise to follow these resolutions religiously....starting tomorrow....

knee pain. perhaps too agressive in virasana, but it didn't feel bad at the time. merde. i don't think it's an injury injury¹, but hurts a lot - and i have a couple of inline skating races forthcoming 8/21 and 9/8 and possibly a trail run later in september...wanted to get some hard skating this week, but will have to play it by ear -perhaps a rest day today or maybe some restoratives²...

school about to start and i'm not ready³. a good quality i have is to be able to avoid feeling overwhelmed by becoming very focused - i.e. identifying what i need to do TODAY and disregarding everything else. too much of that can make you too short-sighted and you can miss some long term things you need to address - but in general, this mode usually works pretty well for me and avoids the feeling of being overwhelmed by the enormity of tasks i face...

¹ have you ever noticed that you can alter the meaning of almost any word by repeating it...i.e. it was hot, but not hot hot. i was drunk, but not drunk drunk. i got up early, but not early early....

² restoratives are restful yoga poses

³ so what am i doing, prepping for class - uh, no, blogging, of course - have to take advantage of school's high bandwidth

the other thing the weekend was notable for is that i redeemed myself on the rock wall. i had climbed one to the top - about 3 years back - while i still ate meat. i tried earlier this year and was horrible - a bit of an embarassment - barely got off the ground - the harness was cutting me awkwardly, etc...i even thought perhaps without meat i had lost strength (despite much other evidence to the contrary). yesterday made it nearly to the top and it wasn't a strength issue - i couldn't see any good place to grab next - the next logical place was too low - prob ideal for a shorter person, but i'm pretty tall, so i couldn't pull myself up! anyhow, i was happy without summiting; it was still a moral victory!!!

i just got back from the the jeep world/outside festival in detroit. it really was a great weekend - feel a bit tired

first of all, michigan's roads are horrible. i thought ohio's were bad, but the bumps, cracks and potholes were ridiculous. there was a lot of road construction - hope it helps...

so you don't think i am an ohioan bashing michigan, the dte energy music theater is great - much better than our equivalent blosson music center

a feature of the festival was the chance to try out different outdoor activities like kayaking/scuba diving in a small pool, mountain biking over a pre-fab course, etc... if you were really into those activities, you prob wouldn't think it a big deal, but for a novice like me, it was an opportunity to get my feet (and other things wet) - and was a blast!!! he festival allows you to get some pointers from world class athletes.
here is some sample dialog:
kayak guy.:put your hands on the kayak and lift yourself up
me:(putting hands on kayak and lifting myself up slightly)
kg: good, that's what you do it you flip it and need to get out
me:(crikey)

there were also some demostrations of stunt bike riding and aerial skiing - a lot of fun - crazy what folks do and amazing they get paid for it...

there were a bunch of bands on a main stage and secondary stage prior to the headliners- too many to remember all the names - but there was one that stood out - i believe his name was remy shands - another, the gabe dixon band or something like it was good as well...

there was a band there called o.a.r. - kind of dmb/rusted root kind of thing - i never heard them before, but seemed a crowd pleaser. must be a college band or something - bunch of college age kids seemed to know all the words and in a rare moment of a venue being good sports - allowed all of o.a.r's fans from the cheap seats to come up front. ok, but could heed archie bell and the drell's advice to tighten up - were kind of rambling - musically and lyrically

train's set was pretty good, though it says something about train (or perhaps me) that the highlights for me were a couple of classic rock covers - zeppelin's ramble on and aerosmith's dream on

sheryl crow's set was very good - all the hits - very fast paced, high energy throughout and very good throughout - she also included a couple of classic rock covers - the who - can't explain and the closer led zep's rock and roll - i'm a big fan, but she was even better than expected.

we met a nice family - couple and 2 teenaged daughters - they were so sweet - mom packed snacks - even offered me cheez-wiz on crackers - i was so genuinely moved by their sweetness i accepted without even considering what all must be in cheez-wiz in terms of animal by-products - some may disagree - but i think being a good sport sometimes has to take precedence. i gave them some of my peanuts and one of the girls only ate the shells! btw - on a side note - since when do rock shows start on time - there was a schedule and it was followed meticulously - even to sheryl leaving the stage precisely at 11:00 - the times, they are a changin' eh, bob...

it was a bit of a challenge getting enough vegetarian fare there - but between pretzels, cheese pizza we smuggled in from lunch and an endless supply of clif bars (i took so many samples, i owe them a plug - visit their home page and buy copious amounts of clif bars - i think now they are the official sports bar of spacemonk^® )

a fashion note: the ever lovely ms. crow was resplendent in star and stripe spangled pants. i always thought she looked great, but for the first time, felt like saluting!

before and after all the fun, caught a few good infomercials including a classic from ronco, a new favorite, miracle blades and perhaps the next tae bo, zumba

only regrets - no time to try to hotel pool or the business center (and reset the home page to a certain blog...)

on to yoga and rejuvenation!!!