Sculpin

By the way, those days on my schedule marked “rest”? What that’s been meaning for the last few weeks has been, “hang around complaining that I am too sore to walk.” Holy crap.

In other body news, I’m getting tantalizingly close to being able to do a front split. It’s nice to do something I’m pretty good at, after sweating over my little 35-pound seated row.

There I am in the free weight room, my own wimpy ditzy plump feminine self, and I’m surrounded by extremely large and serious-looking men, the nearest of whom are giving me some mighty funny looks. They’re all lifting huge weights, and there I am struggling with three- or five-pound dumbbells. (Goddamn shoulders.) It’s awkward as hell. I wanted to do free weights, and I had good reason for it, but now I feel like a dork, a wimp, a loser; I feel like I’m letting down Team Girl by being so weak and easily injured. And while I’ll be damned if that’ll chase me out of the weight room, still, I’m not having a good time. So I finish my sets, and I sigh to myself, and I put the weights back on the rack in their correct spots. Suddenly I notice that all the guys who were giving me the stinkeye have relaxed. Ha! So that’s what it was about! They weren’t defending the sanctum of sweaty masculinity; they just didn’t trust the obvious newbie to pick up after herself.

Coming out of the weight room, I got a sort of pleading look from one six-foot-huge heap o’ musculature. I think he wants me to come back and bring my friends.

The other day I picked up a sample tube in Whole Foods. Quoth the package,

Nordic Naturals
Cod Liver Oil
Great orange taste!

I haven’t yet been brave enough to find out whether it does in fact have a great orange taste. I doubt it.

Update: I braved it. My report: hey, it’s not that ba– eeiiiiaaauuuuueeeeggghhhhhhaaghhhhh!!! gak gak gak gak arrghhh gak gak eggghhhhh gak feh aggh!

I’ve finally gotten my schedule worked out for the next several weeks, balancing my workouts with rest days as best I can:

Sunday: weight training
Monday: rest
Tuesday: yoga
Wednesday: weight training
Thursday: rest
Friday: Pilates and (usually) myofascial release massage
Saturday: rest

I’m pushing my edge these days to the best of my ability. As I told Cithra, “It’s like college, but for the body.” Some of those rest days are perhaps a little more active than they should be, but I usually try not to be stupid. (Hacking apart the dug-up sword ferns with a splitting maul may have been stupid, okay.)

And it all started with my first Gimp Yoga class a couple of years ago, and some good advice from an ND who knew what she was talking about. I really am flabbergasted at how far I’ve come. A couple of years ago I couldn’t even make the short bus trip to Lake City and back without becoming wholly exhausted and staying that way for a day and a half. Now I can take the bus, work out at the gym, and come back; while I may sleep for several hours afterwards, and have some grogginess, I’m pretty much fine eight hours later. Rock on.

My organizing mental concept for the last few months has turned out to be the positive feedback cycle. Here’s to getting the positive feedback cycle moving in the right direction — having the energy to do the things that give me more energy, at least to a point.

I’ve decided to follow the lead of my esteemed colleague in happy tomato-ranching bumship at I’m Mad And I Eat and clean out my freezer this month. Because, wow, have we ever run out of room.

As I pawed through the freezer today, I thought, “Who knows what lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows… But does he know what lurks in this freezer?” We’ve got some weird stuff in there. Most of it I can identify, but only most. I am chastened to see how much meat is in there. Folks, we hardly ever cook meat around here. (“Well, there you go, then,” some of you are saying.) And when we do, it’s usually because we’ve just gotten some “whey tastier” sausage from the Samish Bay Cheese people at the farmers’ market. I just don’t generally care for meat if it isn’t ground or minced or finely sliced. It’s a texture thing with me. Yecch.

I’m easing into this project of indoor ice fishing. Today’s spelunk lunch, frozen items starred: fava beans* and shiitake mushrooms* sauteed in olive oil and a little butter with garlic and a bit of sherry, served over whole-wheat noodles. And for dinner, I’m making a curry with potatoes, peas*, and cilantro*.

In fact, I wound up making rather more curry than I meant to. Well, I guess I can freeze the– arrrgh! No!

Gary mentioned that it’s World Poetry Day. I keep stumbling across Rilke references this month, so here’s something by Rilke, translated by Robert Bly:

You see, I want a lot.
Perhaps I want everything:
the darkness that comes with every infinite fall
and the shivering blaze of every step up.

So many live on and want nothing,
And are raised to the rank of prince
by the slippery ease of their light judgments.

But what you love to see are faces
that do work and feel thirst.

You love most of all those who need you
As they need a crowbar or a hoe.

You have not grown old, and it is not too late
To dive into your increasing depths
where life calmly gives out its own secret.

It’s been a couple of days’ worth of firsts for me. Yesterday I made my very first cake from scratch, plus frosting. (Yellow cake with strawberry buttercream frosting out of The Cake Bible, and it’s outlandishly tasty, if I do say so myself. With a dozen egg yolks and about a pound and a half of butter, it ought to be!) This morning I had my first session with the personal trainer, which went very well. And tonight I had my first taste of brussels sprouts.

Garlic Roasted Brussels Sprouts
(tip o’ the pixel to Bunnyfoot)

1/2 lb. brussels sprouts
2 teaspoons olive oil, very approximately
2 cloves garlic, chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Wash the brussels sprouts. Remove any yellow leaves, and slice off the sprouts’ bases if they look unappetizingly dry or fibrous. Halve the sprouts.

Toss the brussels sprouts with the olive oil and roast in a 400 degree oven for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and add garlic and salt. Roast for about another five minutes.

I had to roast my sprouts longer than I expected — they were a bit large — but they didn’t develop that unholy sulfur odor even with an extra five minutes in the oven. They were pretty damn good, in fact. Of course, I’d probably eat an old tire if it were roasted with olive oil, garlic, and salt. (Pepper’s optional.)

It’s still Pi Day, barely, and in honor of pi, I’ll point out this lovely and enormous mosaic based on pi in a Toronto subway station. It’s by Arlene Stamp; her first degree was in mathematics, and she taught high school math for a few years before going for her BFA and postgrad work in painting.

Thanks for the good wishes, folks. I’m very much on the mend.

I see a naturopath as my primary care provider — she’s close by, she’s smart, she has experience with CFIDS, she has a good relationship with a conventional doctor, and besides, most of what a PCP does for me is refer me to specialists and give me my annual exam. (And she’s really close by; I don’t drive.) But I am a bit suspicious, as woo-woo chicks go, and I’ve known some people whose naturopaths told them crazy whacked-out nonsensical things. So unless I’ve seen respectable studies indicating otherwise, I always assume the naturopathic stuff isn’t going to work worth a damn. And I am consistently surprised to find that it does. I should know better by this time.

On Tuesday, I was sure I’d be on the horn yelling, “Get me antibiotics! Forget this hippie shit! Get me real drugs!” by Friday. But today, after several weeks of mad coughing and sinus discomfort and various gory details, I’m pretty much fine. Tired, pretty sore in the ribs, still clearing my throat a fair bit, but basically fine. Once again, I’m astonished.

After coughing for weeks and weeks, I finally went to the doctor. Diagnosis: sinus infection.

My goodness, I’m sore. Sure, we all get sore from coughing, but I’ve been bracing myself against the cough, and now even my hamstrings are sore. That’s just wrong.

So I am not exactly my normal bubbly self (Yes, bubbly. What?) and writing hasn’t really been my thing these last few weeks. Coughing and grumbling and waiting for spring have been my thing.