Home, Office, Rehearsals AND Boot Camp

Hey Buddies - just a catch up bloggie thing. Been some busy weeks in the past few what with work, home, rehearsals, boot camp and a bit of bronchitis tossed in to boot!

Office: What can I say, I work for a great law firm with the focus on oil and gas and we stay pretty busy ... most of the time and with the price of oil/barrel these days - do we all know the price of oil today? If not, today it is right around $88.00/barrel and on its way up -- good in the aspect of what I do at work; but also impacts me at home in fuel costs -- so I’m always a bit mixed on my level of happiness when oil goes up!

Home: What can I say, it suffers :-) especially when I’m in rehearsals AND especially now that Neal is staying at home (with the five catties) some days when I get home, I’m really glad I am going to rehearsal :-) just say’in! However, my life is a bit easier mixing home with rehearsals - because Neal is at home and has started to offer “to do” ... which I didn’t push right at first because I wanted him to offer “to do” and me not just push it on him. So now, he is making grocery and supply runs. He is also real good at starting supper before I get home -- now I have to leave him explicit instructions, but he’s a good boy and can follow them -- woot!

Rehearsals: We’ve hit the stage and tonight is the first dress rehearsal - always an exciting time to move and dance in costume for the first time. Example: White Christmas in the dance for Blue Skies ... all things had been going well up to that point for me AND then all the sudden I found the skirt of the dress not only wrapped around my arm - holding my hand down - but it was also wrapped around my leg - holding my leg down ... needless to say, screwed up big time! But I learned where not to put my arm on that dance move - “ah dress rehearsals!” We add makeup and hair tomorrow night and then BOOM Weds, Thurs ... Opening! After rehearsing White Christmas for eight weeks (because of the dancing) a shortened rehearsal schedule of five weeks .. I hear everyone (including myself) saying, more or less “Holy Cow - its here!”

Boot Camp: Week 2 consisted of doing the same exercises we started out with and raising the repetitions - he also added a couple of new stations for us to accomplish. Week 3 he started mixing up the stations by taking some away and adding more cones or lowering the hurdles that we duck under -- one day we did mostly Yoga stretching and lunges *OUCH* ... sit ups appeared one day (and I was totally surprised to find I could do 15-20 sit ups at a time! AND I can now do 15 push ups, still “girl” style but my behinny is now staying in line with the rest of my body ... and I now can pull my arm up and make a fist and see a small bump starting to appear (and it feels firm too!) As a matter of fact, everything is feeling more firm, I actually am starting to “feel” thin -- then I look in the mirror :-)

I’ve also noticed that my clothing is starting to feel loose on the top -- of course! I say of course, because isn’t that always where it tones up first?! Neal and I have both lost right at 5 pounds in 3 weeks ... which is a good thing, I suspect we are both building muscle that burns more calories, so slowly but surely!

The start of Week 4 this morning, showed more changes using the weight bar, extending the cones and we stopped about half-way and he stretched us out with Yoga (I actually did a plank ... no freak’in way ... but I actually did them - incredible!) We then continued with the circuits - felt so good after being off for two days (well okay, sitting at the theatre and then running on stage -- wasn’t totally off ... no snickers a’cause I know I’m totally off most of the time!)

So, the goal this week is to stay healthy for opening night - always a challenge here in West Texas ... but today’s high is supposed to be 74-75F and tomorrow’s high 23F, with a low of 7-11F .. I just hope we get the moisture with it! BUT the most glorious thing I heard this morning was: “I’ll be here Weds, regardless of the weather.” (instructor’s mouth) ... soooo, you can believe we’ll be there too (I have 4 wheel drive!)

So not so much interesting ramblings this AM - but this too will change I’m sure, as my brain removes itself from rehearsal to performance mode, this weekend AND THEN, I also hope to get my Christmas forest down -- I’m now tired of looking at them!

Have a stellar day Buddies!