Skiing again

I worked on a Sunday, and so I was able to take yesterday, a Wednesday, off to go skiing!  I was excited to go during the week, when there would be fewer people on the slopes. I overslept (which I was really annoyed with myself for) and so I didn't get there until 11, and wasn't skiing until 11:30, but then I decided I had to let it go and enjoy myself.

I'm getting better at keeping my skis parallel a little bit of the time at least. I accidentally went down a little bit of a blue square, and things got pretty pizza wedge quite fast, so there's still plenty of room for improvement.

Initially I thought about staying after 4, when my ticket expired, but at 4 I was done. My thighs were killing me. I was thinking that I should buy skis, because then I could ski for a shorter time, since it wouldn't be so expensive. I was going to go to a ski shop, but then I remembered the inflatable stand up paddle board that I have, that I've used like 4 times, and I decided would try going to Play it Again Sports to trade it in and get skis. We'll see if I can get something as good as rentals for not too much money.

Geriatric Parkour

I tried geriatric (50+) parkour and I've found my next new thing! It was so fun. I was a little worried that they would have us jumping off bannisters or something, but it was quite tame. We started with some warm up that ended with the coolest stair exercises - you put your hands on the stairs and jumped your feet up to the step below your hands. The first time I tried I was like "no way" and had my hands two below, but on the second round I went for it, and I did it! It was so fun, and I felt so accomplished! You sort of look like a monkey, we can all aspire.

In addition, we learned that you want to balance on the ball of your foot, and that you bend your knees a lot. We jumped on the sides of tires and metal bars, and tried to stay there. Then we ran around and jumped on things. None of the jumping was more than a foot or so off the ground, but still  there was a balance element.

I convinced a friend of mine to go with me, but I'm not sure she will go back. Anyhow, the people there were super friendly and I think they could be a nice community. Win!

Fells Walk

I had all these ambitions about hiking today, but in the end I just wound up going for an hour walk in the fells. For a change I went to the sheepfold, and there was actually space. It wasn't that nice out. I walked to the bear hill tower and back, going on some side paths, and it turned out to be exactly one hour according to my fitbit.

My foot is much better, and I can wear any shoes, but I still can't climb, which is depressing. I've been reading this blog that says that 11-12 weeks is the magic time when people feel like they can do everything - I'm at a little over 8 weeks now. I hope it's going to get better. I'm planning to go skiing on Wednesday to make up for the missed climbing. In fact, today I went to a used sporting goods store to look at skis. It was seriously overwhelming, though, and I don't think they even had a lot. I may try to buy them at the end of the season at a ski shop. If I didn't have to shell out $40 for skis every time I went skiing, I would go more.

Tomorrow I'm signed up for a meet up to go to chinatown for dim sum and new year festivals. I haven't had real dim sum for way too long!

Play Steady class

I went back to bkbx for the first time since the foot surgery. Bad news is that my foot is not ready for climbing yet - not by a long shot. I put on my climbing shoe, and it was tight but OK. But then when I tried to put weight on my toe, it really hurt. I have to remind myself it's only been seven weeks since surgery. The blog that I've read says that 12 weeks ish seems to be the magic number, and it takes 6 mos to be 100%.  I climbed a couple of VB and V0's, and was happy to be back on the wall, but I don't think I'll be going to the climbing gym for a little bit.

The Play Steady class was so much fun, and really good exercise. We played quiddich, which involved holding a medicine ball and chasing people with the golden snitch around. We stood on sliding pads and pushed each other across the room. And we did that thing where you stand on one foot, each holding one end of a stick, and try to knock each other over. And, we did some break dancing kind of moves. Super fun!

There's a place near me that has Geriatric Parkour on Monday nights (50+). I might try it!

Skiing

Today was my first day skiing on new snow!  We had about 4 inches of snow last night, and it was so fun for skiing. Sadly, I wasn't the only one with the idea to go skiing, there were so many people on the mountain, it was pretty much full. I realized that I could hop on the lift with other people who waited in the (long) line, and so I rode up with a lot of people. Some I talked to, some I didn't, but I learned that there was a overflow parking about a mile away because there were so many people, and one woman who's been teaching skiing on the mountain for 6 years said she'd never seen it that busy. So, there's that.

But, despite the crowds and lines, I had a really good ski day!  I went down only green trails, and worked on going a little faster. I discovered that when I did go a little faster, I could do my turns with parallel skis better. Huh, who knew? So, I worked on that a lot.

I got up there and #1 realized that I forgot my helmet, so I had to rent one. Dope. And #2 realized that my toe might not bend into a ski boot. It did though. Skiing was totally fine. But it was soo hard to get the boot off! I still have a little healing to do.

Kickboxing

I had a really great vacation in Thailand and Myanmar, which I will tell you about in the previous posts :)  If only you could go back in time in real life in the same way as you can on the internet.  My foot really improved a lot during my vacation, I think in part because I did a lot of swimming. I loved snorkeling - it's swimming without the breathing problem. It was so fun to feel like I could swim, and feel strong and capable in the water. I need to practice swimming more.

I did my first real work out this past week, I did this boring and painful HIIT class where the instructor was really unfriendly, and the only reason that I knew what was going on was the woman next to me kept telling me. I don't think I'll go back there, though it was a good workout, and I kind of wanted to throw up at the end. On Friday, I decided that I should get some cardio in, and tried kickboxing!  I haven't really kicked/punched anything since I stopped doing Tae Kwon Do like 10 years ago, but a lot of it came back.  First, they require that you buy wrist wraps - there were so many cool colors, but in the end I decided to get the ones with cats on them. Because they have them. Crazy Cat Lady Boxing :)  Then, they loaned me smelly gloves. Yuck. Then, we did 8 three minute rounds, with a minute in between. Only, I thought it was 7 rounds, and was really unhappily surprised when there was an eighth. I had pretty much decided that I was going to throw up towards the end, and then the coach was like "7 minutes of abs!"  Despite this, it was a fun class, I plan to do it again!

I'm working from home now on Wednesdays - I had my first Wednesday this week. It was so nice to not have to drive all the way to work.  I got up a half hour later and still was at my desk before usual. We just hired a new Executive Director, I hope that I can keep working from home one day a week when she starts!  It was really nice.

Elliptical

Much as I hate the elliptical, I was quite pleased to get back to the elliptical today! Recovery from surgery has been coming along well, but slower than I would like. I got the bandage off a week ago, and the doctor spent about 30 seconds with me, saying that it looked good. I was like, but what do I do to take care of it, can I get it wet, should I stretch it, can I walk normal, when can I exercise again? As she was jogging out the door. She said I can get it wet, take it easy for another week, and otherwise I can do whatever I want. So, I decided that today I can exercise again. Fortunately there's someone with a blog on his Cheilectomy surgery, that has a lot of info that I've been going off of. This is why people pay attend to Dr. Google so much.

Anyhow, I did the elliptical for 30 minutes while watching Ellen. But Ellen wasn't there, so it was some guest host. It was not a good time. I can't wait to get back to more fun exercise!