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.

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.

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,

I know. I said it. The dreaded word of my life. The nastiness that is exercise. I used to have a strong regimen, then it turned weak and then, when the breathing and chest issues occurred in June, everything stopped. Now, I have the all clear to start again, and the feelings I have about it are akin to the feelings a girl has when she has about 3 dime sized pimples on her face the day before prom: shock, fear and desperation.

The only way to make this work is to go ahead and do it when I wake up and get it over with before I lose my resolve and while I’m still half-asleep enough to forget I’m exercising. This leads to me looking outside and praying for rain while making bad jokes to my dog like, “Look Sophie, it’s gotta be hot outside. It’s going to be a hot walk! AHAHAHHA. A hot wok! What? That was funny.”

She didn’t think it was funny, either.

While I am not excited about these walks, my normally anti-walk dog, Sophie, has turned over a new leaf. She doesn’t know the word “walk” yet, but what has happened is a little precious and a lot mind blowing when you consider that this is the dog that sleeps 23 hours a day, happily. However, when she watches me pull out my sneakers, pull my hair into a ponytail and grab my mini-backpack she’s done for. It’s the mini-backpack that does it. She doesn’t know “walk” or what the ponytail is, but that backpack that I put my keys, bottle and phone in means we are going on a walk and that does it. She starts a high pitched squealing “eeeeeeeeeee,” begins to turn in circles and jumps from the floor to the bed to the floor again. Even if I don’t particularly want to walk, it’s hard to say no after that kind of dog applause.

I’ve learned a lot on my trips, even if there haven’t been many thus far.

Dogs refuse to pick a set leash hand. This is especially true if you use the other hand for anything. For me, I use my hand to carry my mp3 player and, now and then, a water bottle. The more I want to use the hand, the more she wants to switch hands.

Hot wok isn’t funny no matter how hard you try.

There are multiple and unmentionable things on the ground that your dog will want to eat that they should not eat. They will continue to try even if you yell at them.

Walking is not a solitary activity, even when you try to make it so. There will be people that ask you for directions because, though your stride is quick like a bunny, you “have a kind face.”

A stray dog will catch your attention and you will attempt to sway him with animal crackers like the witch in Hansel and Gretel only to get him home and have him run from real dog food. You realize that he was just stealing your dog’s walking treat and get crabby that even dogs have ulterior motives. At which time you will realize that the evil dog stole your precious dog’s animal crackers and you will spoil your dog with extra animal crackers.

You will realize that you are still a mom, even though your walks are your “you” time. When someone else’s child falls on his bike and looks around for a mom to soothe him, you will be there before he hits the ground to make sure he’s ok, check the boo-boo and ruffle his hair and tell him he’ll be alright. He will then stalk you with something akin to hero worship the rest of your walk until you get a little weirded out and tell him to have a nice bike ride in the hopes that no one things you are Hansel and Greteling him.

My dog loves me more. I’m making new friends. I’m no longer huffing and puffing.

This just might work.

Last week, I was on the phone with my trainer and he scolded me. This is becoming commonplace. I need a little scolding now and then because, quite frankly, I’m bad. I have horns. Don’t be surprised when I do bad things. I’m not good. So, yes, sometimes I get scolded.

The reason for the scolding this time was that I’d become comfortable with the evil, wretched treadmill and the *heavens open up and light shines down* amazing, wonderful, beautiful elliptical machine. I was alternating them and frankly, my dear, it wasn’t enough. I needed variety. [insert scolding and I told you's here]

My response was “Yeah, yeah, yeah but stairs scare me! When I climb the stairs at school I end them in the fetal position and rocking.”

My trainer, Mike, was not impressed, yelled some more, and told me to get my butt on the stairmaster.

Whatever.

So I have thrown in it the mix.

It’s going to kill me yet.

When I’m on the stairmaster, I don’t get the nice feelings or the high that I get on the elliptical or the numbing, dulling zone out of the treadmill. I get the tired legs and the “you’re going to die mwahahahahah” of the stairmaster. I admit: I want to give up. Here’s how I don’t: I make up elaborate fantasies and schemes as to what will happen if I can complete my 25 minute stairmaster rotation.

“If I can just get through the next 10 minutes I can have that condo in downtown Nashville that I want! Floor to ceiling windows, baby. Decorate it any way I want it and my drive to both work and school is down to 10 minutes. Boo-yah!”

“If I can just get through the next 20 minutes, the minute I step off this stairmaster, a swarthy pirate named Hugh Jackman is going to come out the bathroom, growl, “MMM, I always liked ‘em chubby” and throw me over his shoulder while I meekly say, “Help. I’m being abducted.” Then he will buy me my condo in Nashville.”

Wait. What were we talking about? Oh, the stairmaster. See? That’s how I get through it. Man, I love me a pirate.

You haven’t conquered me yet, stairmaster. Hugh and I are going to get through this. We always do.

Before Thanksgiving, I had the opportunity, NAY, the privilege of being up around 5am. The reasons why are unimportant, but, needless to say, I’d rather stay up all night than get up at that time and my thought was that I’d rather run laps over hot coals than get up at that time in the near future ever again.

Anyway, I was driving at the unholy hour and it was foggy and colder than a chicken nugget in a freezer in the South Pole and I thought to myself, “Self, what kind of person would subject him or herself to this weather and this hour on purpose?” And then I saw you running and it came to me.

A crazy person.

A crazy person does this.

So, I salute you devoted runner. You take it to a whole new level. I appreciate your dedication to getting your buff on when even icecicles wouldn’t go outside. I’m sure your muscles appreciate thawing out in -1000 degree temperature and waking up at 4:30am to “get in the morning run.”

Yep.

You enjoy that.

I’m just going to go back to bed.

Sincerely,

Do any of you remember Ally McBeal? Ally was a 20-something lawyer who had a vivid imagination and quite a few eccentricities and quirks. Her character made me feel better about myself. Her male counterpart, J.D. on Scrubs, also had the fantasies he would visit when he was uncomfortable or needed a break from reality for a bit. It’s a great coping mechanism and a sign of adaptability.

Or, at least that’s what I choose to tell myself.

When I’m on the treadmill, I dance in my head. In a club. With some of you. And we shake that thing. Every now and then, I get so into it, I forget where I am. It happened to me tonight at the gym for a brief second. You were shaking your thing and for a half second, I shook mine while I power-walked on that treadmill.

And the man on the elliptical behind me laughed.

What I want to know is how many times I’m doing this that I don’t catch? And what was he doing watching my thing? Pervert.

My YMCA card had dust on it, so I blew that sucker off and decided to get back to business. Over the weekend, I’d managed to get ‘er done (yes, I just said it-go on and disown me), but after the car fiasco, I knew there wouldn’t be time to workout. My fitness guru and very good friend, Mike, has been yoda-ing me in this go-round and he’d cautioned that I needed a recovery day for my body. So, I decided that a nice, leisurely walk with Reagan would do the trick.

I don’t play favorites with walking the dogs, it’s just that Sophie tuckers out after a block and Molly is so busy sniffing and marking territory that I’d never get anywhere if I took them. Reagan is built Ford-tough. She has tiny legs and some serious muscle in that little weiner dog body of hers. She went with me today for 35 minutes without complaint. We did have some adventures, though.

-We attacked every crunchy leaf in the vicinity of our walk. As the trees are letting them drop like crazy, this amounted to some serious attacks.

-A school bus full of children waved at us.

-Reagan whined at the school bus full of children because she knows that the school bus might mean AJ is there.

-When the bus went past with no AJ, she pouted, moped, and refused to jump on crunchy leaves until I was ahead of her crunchy leaf ratio 10:1.

-We went around a park and found a small stream that I didn’t know existed.

-A car drove past us with a little dog in it that so desperately wanted to make Reagan it’s “friend” that it almost jumped out the window. I watched as it slowly drove past with the dog hanging out the window and the owner laughing so hard he almost let go of the little dog.

-We saw some beautiful fall foliage.

-A LOOSE doberman came running after Reagan. Apparently my horns came out because I yelled at it “NO!” and “YOU GO HOME YOU VERY BAD DOG!” and it literally turned and ran with its tail between it’s legs. Wussy. I must have a fierce angry face. Don’t mess with anything I believe belongs to me. I will ruin you. I don’t care if you have teeth that can tear me apart. I look really mean when I’m mad. And if I see it again I will have no problem calling animal control and letting those people pay to get that dog back. Leash laws are there for a reason.

-Reagan gave me the biggest, happiest face when she saw the front yard. Dogs can grin, you know? We both got our fitness on.

Overall, my walk today was simply breathtaking. It helped remind me why fall is my favorite season. I hope that all of you are spending some time outside just enjoying the scents and beauty of this time of year. I want to take a second and thank Mike, one more time, for the time and effort he has been putting into me. My friendships mean a lot to me and he’s holding me accountable this time and it is what I needed. I’m one of those needy, hard to be friends with people because sarcasm is my defense mechanism, so it really is hard to put up with me on a regular basis. I’m also sensitive, so I take things the wrong way a lot. To be “in charge” of anything I’m doing, especially when I’m such a type-A, has got to be a pain in the butt, so thank you, again.

It didn’t start that way. It started just fine, well, as fine as a day can start when I’m on a 4 day caffeine induced headache can start. However, I’ve been getting my fitness on and eating well and I was convinced I could get rid of the headache with some really fantastic endorphins. The ones that the elliptical gave me on Saturday were…superb to the say the least.

So, AJ and I headed to the Y and left the sickly Leon at home to face his chest congestion. AJ loves to go the Y and swim while I work out and I like having the company while I drive. We were almost there when I saw joggers going past. As I turned into the Y, I made sure that I made a wide arc to give them plenty of room. I know what it’s like to be on the side of the road and have cars so close that I can feel their heat. I was not rewarded for my good thoughts this time, though, as there was a huge area of pothole/uneven pavement with jagged edges that had my name on it.

It took out both of my right tires and I swerved to avoid rolling down the small hill. When I swerved, I must have bent the rim of one of the tires. When my heartbeat got back to normal, AJ and I got out of the car and hiked up to the Y. We had Leon on his way and roadside assistance coming with the tow truck, so there was nothing to do but go work out. The other option was sit in my car and stew about it. Honestly, I’d rather listen to my mp3 player and work off the calories.

This still hasn’t hit the part where my day was bad. I can handle things like that. As long as I have some semblance of control, I do fine. However, an hour later, the tow truck had not arrived and the place to replace the tires was only open a little while longer. During that time period, Leon’s car battery died. As he was about to lose his shhhh, a gorgeous man was flagged over to help us jump start the car. Of course, this happened after I’d worked out and I. was. stank. Figures.

An hour and a half later, the tow truck finally showed and offered to take my car to their shop and fix the tires. Ok. That worked for me. I hadn’t eaten and was about to Hulk Smash someone, so we grabbed food and went on our way. When we got there, they let me know that the rim was bent, and the two tires punctured beyond repair and they couldn’t fix my car that night, so it would be the next day before they could help us.

Yep. No good very bad day. If you want to contribute to my new tires, you know where the donate button is.

At least it wasn’t as bad as this guy, who drove his car into the flower bed at my office building and knocked down the office sign.

We live in a nice, safe neighborhood that is filled with well-manicured lawns and well-designed sidewalks. Daily, Duder, Weiner and Pea lose their noodles over people who walk or ride bicycles past the house because the area invites us to get out and move. I have a membership to a local place, but the beauty of the weather, when it hasn’t been raining, has beckoned me to get out and move. Well, that and the dogs are eating us out of house and home and I’m afraid that they won’t be able to get up the steps if they don’t exercise soon. I’m not kidding. Weiner could pass for a Sumo-dog and Pea is getting close to Shamu proportions.

So, I ordered them some harnesses because they are adept at getting out of collars, especially Pea who is like Houdini. For the record, I like Puppia harnesses and I don’t get paid anything to endorse them. They are comfortable and they keep my dogs safe. That’s what matters to me.

What I’ve been doing is taking the dogs around the neighborhood several times. They are so good! They don’t do their business on anyone’s yard and they walk at a brisk pace, which keeps me on track. Pea is good for a couple of trips around, which is good for her little legs. However, this is where Weiner isn’t just good: She SHINES. She’s like a miniature Energizer Bunny. She will go around the block as many times as you’ll take her. She’ll walk quickly and be a good dog. There is no sniffing for a sweet spot. She’s all business. We’re here to walk.

I wondered how effective our walks were as exercise. I go for about 45 minutes. Thanks to a book I’m reading, I was pointed to a website, CalorieControl.org, that tells me exactly how effective my walks are and I was blown away. I’m not going to tell you how many calories I burn while taking care of my dogs, but it was a lot. How many calories are you burning every day? Was it more or less than you thought? This is a great resource and I’m glad to have found it.

My dogs are just glad to get out of the house.