Unlikely motivation

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . May 2, 2011 . 3:01AM

As I came down the stairs, I could hear Sophie’s feet pad the floor as she “danced” in circles. She does this when she’s excited and it had been a more recent occurrence this week, more so than other weeks in the past because she’s had good reason to be happy. My dogs get plenty of exercise and trust me when I say that these little beasties jail-break my back fence on a regular basis. Sophie, in particular, is guilty of this, though, luckily, they confine their breaks to mainly the next-door neighbor’s backyard where they happily yap at the neighbor’s dog who barks mournfully back at them from his enclosed patio.

Lately, though, the weather has been nice and I have made the decision to be a more active person. As such, I have been making it a priority to find reasons to move my body. This benefits Sophie in that she sees me suit up in the sloppiest mom-gear you’ve ever seen, complete with ridiculous slouchy cap, push my headphones into my cell phone and slink out the door like I’m heading off to prison for the day.

Not Sophie, however. The minute I come day those stairs, it is on like Donkey Kong. So, this day, I could hear her start her own routine and I smiled.

I hit the bottom step and her little toenails began to click across the floor towards the door where her harness and leash hang. Water dribbled down my chin as I attempted to hydrate myself while not choking on the scent of the most obnoxious sunscreen ever and I watched her eyes dilate much the same way those of an addict do when they get a fix. Sophie jumped on the couch and begin to whine and do circles, which is her way of telling me, “C’mon, C’mon, let’s go.” As I placed her harness over her head, she gently lifted her paw through the harness on her own to hurry the process. I laughed and turned on the programs that I use on my cell phone that track my progress and give me tunes to listen to while I walk. During this short 15 seconds I thought her little head might explode as she pulled me towards the door. The other dogs looked at us with reproach.

We were met with a cloudy day as Sophie did her dancing circles down the steps to let me know how excited she was to be going on her walk. When I say she turned to me and smiled with a full set of teeth, I’m not exaggerating. She’s started doing this for the entire first two blocks of our walk until she starts to sweat and her tongue lolls out of her mouth and she realizes that walking is work. While I fiddled with my phone and walked uphill and downhill and all over the place, my dog did doggie things. She stared at the blue sky. She sniffed at birds who were bathing in puddles, but left them alone. She considered all forms of anything on the ground leftovers that she could potentially eat unless I caught her in time. This included worms, dead birds and bird poop. Other dogs were cheerfully greeted with a growl and then a playful yap and then promptly ignored. Squirrels, however…

Squirrels were to be chased with reckless abandon. By this I mean that squirrels were to be chased regardless of how hard I tugged and pulled on the leash and if that meant I fell on my backside because Sophie has twisted it around my body, then so be it. Squirrels were the enemy.

Also to be chased were men with their shirts off. Clearly, to dogs, this is a symbol of some form of aggression that will not stand. I had no idea this was the case until Sophie began to chase a half-clothed man and refused to stop until I almost fell into a street full of traffic and I screamed at her. This caused the half-clothed man to look at me like I was the one with the problem and to run even faster in the opposite direction. Sophie merely gave me her doggy grin and trotted back to me as if nothing happened.

Towards the end of our walk, we headed down the path toward home and Sophie cheerfully barked her recognition that we were near. This is the same dog that almost had a coronary that I wouldn’t take her on her walk quickly enough. As we edged toward our mailbox, she looked back at me and smiled her doggy smile. We were home and tomorrow would bring another walk.

There will always be squirrels out there that need to be taught a lesson.

Are you done with politics?

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . November 3, 2010 . 12:48AM

Tonight has been a night full of election coverage and, while I’ve spent hours upon hours watching I realized…I’m bored. What better time, then, to update my blog as well as focus on something that is relatively within my control and something else that people hate to hear about: exercise?

So, about a month ago, something in me just changed. I can’t describe it because one day it was different than it has been. Generally, I get into a fit about how I look and decide “this is it, I’ve had it” and decide to go to the gym. It works out for a couple of weeks and then I’m back to couch surfing for a bit. Last year, as well as the year before, I’d done really well and lost quite a bit of weight. Ultimately, I’ve been quite happy about my looks. October, though, is the month of self-reflection for me and has been for the last few years. I tend to hermit myself away, avoid contact with people and focus on what is going on with my immediate needs and those of the people in my household. It gives me time to grieve my losses, work on my schoolwork and decide what needs to be changed. It’s not easy on my friends, though, because I ultimately tend to close myself off from them. It’s not the best coping strategy and it only works for me because of my introverted nature.

During my “month of internal reflection” something changed inside of me. I was thinking about some of my long-term goals after graduation and realized that where I am is in no way conducive to where I want to be in a year and a half. I may be happy with my body and healthy, for the most part regardless of societal standards, but if I want to pick up the martial arts and the dance lessons and all those things that I have in my future, I need to make changes. Unfortunately, this “click” happened in the month of apathy. The month where I do nothing. The month where I’m essentially in hiding. What was I supposed to do?

I stayed in hiding with the exception of making some changes. I met with my trainer and we set up a plan. I have daily goals and most days I actually do them. My goal was to hit the gym seven days a week. I’m hitting it 4-5. I used to have trouble walking from the parking lot on campus to my building. I’m now doing either 45 minutes of cardio or weights and cardio every day (mostly).

I’ve noticed that I have some weird quirks. If you don’t wipe down your machine, I’m going to give you a nasty look until you notice how I’m looking at you; this is especially true if I’m the next person who needs that machine on my circuit. If the pulse meter isn’t working on a machine I’m going to be grumpy and need Lady Gaga. This is not optional. Slow songs will slow my pulse. Therefore, yes, I like to listen to Britney Spears while I workout and don’t think for one second I don’t know that the people around me are listening to her, too. If I can see a woman’s sports bra or it’s clear she’s showing off the goodies, I’m judging her. Same goes for the boys. There is no reason your clothes should ever be that tight. Let your body breathe.

Ultimately, my change in behavior and thinking is changing A.J.’s, too. He’s started to talk about better nutrition and taken to swimming and running more frequently. He was disappointed in chicken nuggets the other night and thought that he “should have had the grilled chicken.” He’s starting to make better choices and guzzling water like a hummer drinking down the gas. For a child who would live on McDonald’s if I allowed it, these changes are not small things. When I took Sophie on a walk yesterday (my day off of the gym), he wanted to come walk with us. When I noted that he couldn’t keep up, he was personally offended.

Next time, I’ll let him come.

There are little things that I’m noticing about myself that are changing, too, besides the easy weight loss. There is the pride when I do the small increases in weight/tension on my weights. The happiness when I don’t feel like I’m dying on the elliptical. The smiles when I realize that I’m going longer and longer without needing the water during my exercise routine. The disbelief when I note that I’ve listened to my Zune player through almost a whole song and not noted that my side hurts or I’m walking or anything beyond the lyrics to the song going through my head. Lastly, the exhilaration when I push through a particularly difficult weight routine (overhead press!) and those last 3 reps don’t overcome me. I overcome them.

I am thanking God every day for Panera, Chick-fil-a and Subway because they make eating healthfully easy. I stock up on them when I’m in a hurry and on my fruits to keep on hand at home and lots of salads and I am always good to go.

Mainly, though, the change that I’m seeing is that I’m focused on the future.

See you later, sad October. Here comes November. For all of us.

Dear Walmart

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . October 25, 2010 . 12:14AM

Dear Walmart,

Honestly, I rarely go to your store for a cornucopia of delightful reasons. The main reason being that when I go into the store I come out feeling musty and dusty and like I need to take a shower. While you may have a more varied selection than my preferred store, Target, I’ve noticed that some products look like someone has run them over with a Hummer and that they have been opened, sampled and then put back like I won’t notice that someone else has taken a huge bite out of the Doritos I plan to purchase. Consequently, I no longer purchase Doritos, but I will talk about that in a later post.

In any case, I frequent your store in two circumstances: when I’m in a city, like my hometown, that does not have a Target, or when the item I need is not one that Target, Best Buy or any other store in the whole world (the whole world being a 15-20 mile driving distance) sells. In this case, I was looking for a 16G Zune player. This was necessary being that I was overly zealous on the treadmill the other day and whacked my rhapsody player off the treadmill deck and sent it spiraling to the belt where it promptly went zinging to the back of the treadmill and skidded 5-feet across the gym floor. It inadvertently almost knocked a boy off the elliptical behind me because he was laughing so hard he couldn’t stay upright. I realized it was unusable when it popped open in my hand. After trying other rhapsody players from my beloved Target, I gave up.

Wal-mart online showed me a Zune player that was $30 less than Best Buy. By this time, I’m already crabby because I haven’t worked out in 24 hours and I am kind of wishing I’d pushed the boy off of the elliptical machine. I got to Wal-Mart and, lo and behold, they have the Zune in stock. For $30 more than they advertised online. This isn’t new. Wal-Mart frequently discounts their items on their online store and charges more for their items in-store. So, to get something that is IN STOCK, I get to pay $30? Pass. I’ll go to Best Buy where I get a clean store, great customer service, a Best Buy rewards system and can use my $5 certificate for my rewards and where that same player will count towards MORE rewards. Oh, and hey, where BEST BUY won’t UNDERCUT ITSELF online. I’ve heard stories about Wal-Mart doing this with various products and refusing to honor the prices in their stores. If I wanted to wait five days, I could get Amazon free shipping. Or, better yet, use Amazon.com and get prime shipping or one day shipping and pay $30 less than both Wal-Mart & Best Buy.

What I know is this: I won’t be using Wal-Mart. And their policy of not meeting their own prices? Bull. This isn’t a franchise. This is a corporation. All the money goes to the same place. Enough is enough. I walked out today even though I really wanted that player and I had spent time, gas and money going there.

Places that continue to give me good service, Target, Best Buy, Amazon, the little stores around here? They’ll continue to get my cash. Keep up the good work, Wal-Mart. You make it easy not to give you my money.

Sincerely,