Elliptical

This whole fitness thing, is, of course, a modern luxury--and necessity. In the olden days, people did not have scales to weigh on or jeans to fit into. Of course, they didn't really need them, since they had to walk twenty miles uphill both ways to get drinking water (which is weird because water flows downhill), or if they were rich, to socialize while their servants fetched it. Still, if you were a rich introvert who lived next to the river, you could just loosen the belt on your tunic a little every year and thank God for your blessings, especially that photography hadn't been invented yet.

My fitness follows its own cycle, like this:

1. I notice that my jeans are not so comfy anymore. I realize I have two options: (a) exercise; (b) go shopping. Nothing is more painful than going shopping, so I decide to exercise.
2. I get up early one morning and do my strength-training workout. I am so together! I am strong and disciplined!
3. I spend the next four days moaning and unable to walk down stairs. I consider the possibility that there are things more painful than going shopping. I straggle through another couple of workouts.
4. The workouts become easier. I do reps between cooking a nutritious breakfast for my children and still am ready to start school on time. Everybody hates me, including me. My jeans start to fit better.
5. A major life crisis occurs, usually involving everyone puking simultaneously, or three out of four parental feet being injured. I drop exercising because I need that time to clean up puke. I eat whatever I can scavenge and I don't sleep well at all.
6. It takes several weeks to recover from the crisis, get the laundry put away, and get back on schedule.

At this point, return to step 1.

It's probably just as well, though, because if I kept going for too long, my jeans might be too big and I would have to go shopping anyway. (Of course, sooner or later clothes wear out, but I try to hide that fact from myself.)

Sixes and Sevens

I bought new shoes. Have I mentioned that I hate wearing tennis shoes all the time? At least now I'm wearing tennis shoes that aren't five years old and shredding chunks. And the new ones are a subdued gray/blue combination, which is as good as tennis shoes get. Apparently they don't make tennis shoes in earth tones. I also got new inserts with even more support in all the right places. The chiropractor says the foot is getting better, but it still hurts, just in different places. I hope he's right.

DOB's foot is not getting better. He has a ruptured tendon. We're still figuring out what to do about this, but one of the things has been selling his very beloved Camaro and replacing it with an extended cab truck with hand controls. That way, no matter what his foot is doing he'll be able to drive the family around and have room for a wheelchair in the back. We tried me driving the family around and discovered that it doesn't work very well. DOB is sad about the Camaro, but the kids like to dance and eat muffins in the back of the truck.

At long last, we have put up bookcases. His Majesty picked them up in conjunction with buying all the furniture for Bookworm's Seattle condo. Bookworm came over and helped assemble them. However, she prefers not to do stepladders, which left me at the top of the ladder, trying to find the studs in order to attach them to the wall. I tapped and drilled a hole where it sounded right. No stud. I moved an inch over to the left and tapped again. No stud. Then I got frustrated and started drilling a whole row of holes, each one inch apart. No studs.

Then I remembered that Bookworm had said studs were 16 inches apart, so I measured out from the corner. There was a stud right in between my first two holes. You can't see the holes from the ground.

After we got it all up and attached I decided we should have put the whole row of bookcases about 9 inches further to the left. Too late. Anyway, there are bookcases up now, and most of the books are on them--we still have some culling to do to fit the history and biographies on.

Toolboy had stomach surgery last week, and His Majesty had a knee replacement. They are both recovering pretty well, last I heard.

Organizing things puts me in a bad mood. (Well, not just organizing things. Organizing things by myself and then having to stop and fix dinner and interact with children puts me in a bad mood.) I was in a really bad mood by Saturday, so I cleaned the whole house. I usually clean when I'm crabby. Sometimes it makes me feel better, and if it doesn't, at least I can be crabby in a clean house.

Sand Dollars

Last weekend we went to the beach. Most of it came home with us.

There might still be some beach there, if you go look. Maybe they dump it out of the vacuum cleaners at the beach houses and recycle it. 

We did not bring all the seaweed home. Or all the dead crabs. Each sand dollar contained a dollar's worth of sand.

Some of us liked the surf. Others preferred to stay as far away from the waves as possible, preferably under a large and sturdy log.

Nobody got sunburned and we never got around to roasting marshmallows. We ate way too many cookies, though.

It was most fun. (Except for the speeding ticket. For going 40. That's just wrong.) Credits for the pictures go to other people, since as usual, I forgot my camera.