Updatey-do

Oops. Didn’t mean to drop off the radar there!

Writing Challenge Update:

Kinda tanked on that one. :-( 3K the first day. 1K the second day, every last word of which was forcibly chiseled out of my brain by a one-armed dwarf wielding a broken pick-axe. Basically, I couldn’t figure out the crisis/turning point. On Day 3, I worked at CB&TL with Tanya, who at the end of our session listened to me wail and came up with a partial solution. I wrote about 500 words that day, then not enough to count on Thursday and Friday. Bleah. I took the weekend off, did admin work on Monday, and wrote 500+ words last night.

Today? Must. Finish. Story. because it has to be mailed ASAP. I’m at CB&TL now. Wish me luck.

Fitness Update:

Much better success to report here! We basically hit our goals every day last week (except for abs/back work on one day), including getting up early on Saturday to hit the gym before we got on the road. Sunday was our off day (it’s a 6-day/week program), but I think rocking out to Styx counts as some exercise.

I felt mostly awful this past Monday, so we had an “Active Rest” day. The idea is that on day there’s no official cardio workout, you still try to fit a little extra cardio into your day: if you work in an office, get up once an hour to stretch and walk around; park at the far end of the parking lot; take the stairs instead of the elevator. That sort of thing. So we scrubbed and cleaned the upper part of the house, which included removing almost everything from the bathroom.

Ken reports that he’s lost 3 lbs. I seem to have gained 2. But I’m officially weighing myself/taking measurements only once a month, so I really don’t care. What’s important is that I feel so much better already. My hip doesn’t hurt at night, I’m more limber, I have more energy.

Everything Else Update:

Saturday we headed to Upland to spend some time with our friends Nanci and Lenny. We all went out to dinner at a British pub, and then Lenny went off to his evening job, and the rest of us enjoyed the music of up-and-coming band MeVsMe.

The next morning, we were up bright and early (hah) to head to the Fontana Raceway. Not because any of us have a whit of interest in NASCAR, but because Styx was playing a morning show there.

Oh, and one song was televised. :-) Look, Ma, I'm on TV!

We had lunch with a bunch of friends afterwards…or, sort of. Originally it was to be the four of us, and I requested The Old Spaghetti Factory, and everyone was amenable. Then it grew to nine of us, and three people didn’t want to go to TOSF, and I wanted to be accommodating. A local restaurant was chosen, which turned out to be a glorified Denny’s and was, unsurprisingly, packed on a Sunday at brunch/lunchtime. So in the end, we didn’t all get to sit together, which was the point of doing lunch together. (We were split into two booths.) The food was okay, but uninspiring. Sigh.

After that, we went to visit our friends Dianna and Ron and Eleanor, and had a lovely afternoon seeing their new house, chatting, having a yummy light supper of tabouli salad over spinach, hummus, pita, olives, baklava, and wine (the latter two items being our contributions). Eventually we were forced to tear ourselves away and get home and feed the cats, who were quite happy to have us do that.

Okay. To work now. Wish me progress!