High hopes!

I'm in my third week of seeing Melody (personal trainer) every Monday and Thursday. Last Monday, my 2nd time with kettlebells, we stopped before the last exercise because I was feeling nauseous and light-headed. My vision got all weird and blurry too. It was rather trippy. Since then I've tried to make sure I get some food at least an hour before sessions.

Last Thursday I used sandbags! Melody likes training with the sandbags because they're non-rigid, like a lot of the things we have to carry in life. How often do you have to lift dumbbell-shaped objects on a regular basis? Sandbags, on the other hand, are floppy and their weight shifts so you need to get a good grip on them - like bags of groceries or little kids. This is good because my grip sucks. It was also very satisfying to be able to just drop the sandbag after each exercise. One of the last exercises Melody had me do was a pushup where I was propped up on the sandbags and after pushing myself up I had to lift a small sandbag with one hand. I was soooo weak, she had to switch out the sandbag for a small kettlebell. Even then, I could barely do a few.

I think that was a big indicator of how weak my chest muscles and my core are so Monday this week, she had me do a few pushup-like exercises. One was with 2 barbells laid parallel, where I did a pushup with my hands rested on each barbell. By having my hands on the barbells, I had to work harder at making sure the barbells didn't roll around each time I went up & down. Then I had to do an exercise where I leaned with both hands on a barbell, rolling it out, and then rolling it back. It's difficult because you have to go as low as you can, but be able to stop at the right point so you can roll yourself back up. Then there were situps while holding up a barbell. The most fun was the last exercise with the balance trainer (like an exercise ball cut in half, with a flat base that it rests on) where I hop on with one foot, switch feet, and then hop off the other side.

I can really feel it in my abs after Monday's workout, which is great! I love feeling sore after workouts because that indicates to me that I put effort into exercising. It may hurt, but it hurts SO good. I feel so optimistic about my body now, like I know I can finally lose weight and get fit. The other day I was thinking about taking up a form of martial arts. I've always wanted to do that, but there were a lot of things that held me back. I'm not into contact sports. My brother and my cousins did judo, and that's full on body contact with all the throws and grabs. I didn't have enough self confidence to pursue it because I was afraid I wouldn't be any good at it. The thought of competitions and sparring scared the shit out of me - what if I fail, screw up, or get my ass whooped? How would I be able to think quick enough and respond fast enough to spar with someone?

I think I would much prefer weapon fighting. I always wanted to learn archery (but not of the modern high-tech sort). Sword fighting would be awesome too (but not fencing, and probably not kendo). I'm also interested in staff fighting...I learned a little when I was in junior high actually. It wasn't real fighting, unfortunately. Because my dad knows the Chinese opera crowd, he knew this lady who was opening up a chinese opera/dance school. This lady gave me lessons in certain Chinese opera techniques - which can include acrobatics and choreographed fighting. I learned how to hold my hands in the position that ladies in Chinese opera do, how you're supposed to move gracefully and position your arms in a graceful way, how to maintain all of that while you walk/run in these quick, graceful little steps.

I also learned how to twirl a staff. I could twirl one staff, two staves (one in each hand at the same time), I could twirl one around switching between hands, and I also learned this method of twirling where you hold the staff closer to one end so the uneven weight balance helps you spin it around. The best part was the choreographed staff fighting routine we learned. "We" consisted of me and this other girl who was the daughter of one of the ladies who sang Chinese opera with my dad. We would attack, block, do sweeps, jump, spin around, it was awesome! Well, that sounds more crazy than it actually was...I don't think we were so energetic, but still...there was potential. :D

I wish I could find some place to learn weapon fighting, but I think you need to learn basic martial arts first.

No on Prop 8

The latest polls are discouraging. I donated $100 to Equality for All today. NO on Prop 8!

Kettlebells

I used kettlebells for the first time yesterday. It took a little bit a coordination effort, but they're pretty fun! Haha, I say that now but I know I'm going to complain about them eventually. I used the 18 lb. weights and mostly swung them around. My forearm is majorly sore today, and I can feel my thighs a bit, but I just tell myself this is nothing compared to that first day of Track & Field practice in my high school freshman year. Now, that was killer. Next session will be Monday at the gym. I feel like I should do some running on my non-training days but so far I've been preoccupied with other things - Tuesday night was knitting night, Wednesday night was dinner with my parents. Perhaps this weekend? It would be good to do something since I don't particularly feel like completely changing my diet right now.

In other news, Lawrence bought me shoes off of Zappos. We finally went to DSW last night to return these 2 shoes I bought that turned out to not fit me. I got store credit for them but we couldn't find anything decent to buy because I've got wide hobbit feet. At home, he wanted me to look at Zappos for shoes but apparently my taste sucks. He decided on this one and promptly ordered it. We'll see how it turns out.

After that I kind of wanted to get cool earrings. I looked for stuff on etsy today. I haven't found something that I really wanted, but I did find some very interesting looking pieces. I'll post them when I get home.

Personal Trainer

A week ago I decided I would suck up the cost and hire a personal trainer. Sarah, who is Lawrence's boss' girlfriend, hired a personal trainer about a month ago and he says that he has definitely noticed a difference. I should have done this 2 months ago, hell probably in January when I saw flyers for personal trainers left in our building's gym. Better late than never, and maybe in a month I'll be able to see enough of a difference to look decently good for Caroline's wedding.

Lawrence helped me look on Yelp, and the girl we found sounded really good - Melody Schoenfeld (her Yelp reviews). I went in on Sunday morning for an assessment, where I let her know what I wanted to work on and where she gauged where my weak areas were. She has a pack of kitties at her house (squee!). The toughest thing she had me do was to see how many pushups I could do. She's also got a ridiculous sense of humor and I collapsed after she made me laugh so much I couldn't lift myself back up. She's a sharp lady, and I could tell her mind moves very quickly - she talks fast. After the assessment I scheduled my first session with her for the next day, Monday. Luckily I had the day off because it was a holiday so I had the entire day to lounge around and get myself mentally ready to get my butt kicked.

My first session with Melody was at the gym. It's actually a kickboxing gym, but they have a weight training room that she uses for her training sessions. She recommended I start with half hour sessions because people have a difficult time lasting the entire hour, especially at the first session. I didn't realize how true that would be (sometimes I get a "toughing it out" complex whereI have to do things the hard way to show I can tough it out). She took out a cord and looped it over the top of the Smith machine so the two ends dangled near the ground. At each end were handles. These weight training exercises were much more involved than just lifting weights. They were like, full body weight training but with no weights involved - just gravity and my own body weight. Making the exercise more easy or difficult depended on the angle at which I lean to do the exercise, making it quite easy to adjust the difficulty.

Each exercise was 15 reps if I could make it, and 10 if I absolutely couldn't and man...after 20 minutes I was light headed and feeling ready to throw up! At the end, we had a few minutes left and Melody helped me work out a few kinks in my back. It felt very nice and by the time I left, I felt both tired and energized. Thursday, I'm going back to her house for more!

Edit: The soreness has started to kick in. I may not be able to move by this time tomorrow...luckily knitting only takes wrist motion. I may do some stretches tonight for damage control. I want to be able to get to work tomorrow.

Butternut Squash Risotto and Bailey's Irish Cream Truffles

Last week I really felt like cooking. I think it was when Lawrence and I went with Ally to the Italian restaurant, Lago, at the Promenade in Santa Monica. They have a dish called "Risotto di Zucca e Capesante," which is risotto with butternut squash with seared scallops and a balsamic glaze.

I wanted to make a butternut squash risotto dish so I Googled it and found this: Butternut Squash Risotto.

With guests coming on Sunday (Lawrence's cousins), I also wanted to make a small dessert item for them. I decided on Bailey's Irish Cream Truffles because I had made them several years ago with the Shoujo Club girls at Berkeley.

I spent Saturday afternoon cooking...and it actually turned out fairly well! Lawrence only had a spoonful but he said it was only "okay." :( I packed some for his lunch on Monday and when he came home he said that it was surprisingly good! I guess he didn't get a good taste the first time, but when he sat down and ate it he was able to enjoy it.

The truffles turned out okay even though I totally screwed up. It was only after I put the truffle ganache in the fridge to harden that I realized I forgot to put in the Bailey's. I was following the truffle recipe on Cooking for Engineers, but that was just a normal truffle recipe. I added cinnamon to the cocoa powder and powdered sugar used to coat the truffles so they would have some additional flavor.

The texture of the risotto after being in the fridge for a few days reminds me of a Chinese dish that I think is literally translated as "vegetable rice". It's been so long since I've had it but I think it had some leafy sort of vegetable mixed with glutinous rice and chunks of yam. I'll have to ask my mom about it. Yesterday night I bought some baby bok choy to add to the risotto leftovers so that there's more veggie content and to break up the thick texture so it won't be so buttery and heavy.

Korean BBQ

This weekend we went to not 1, but 2 new Korean BBQ places! The first one we went to on Friday night was Park's BBQ. We went there with Ally and ordered 3 plates of beef...the Kobe beef, the Galbi, and the Bulgogi. It was expensive, but delicious meat. They gave nice side dishes [banchan] too, Ally loved the several types of kimchee, and Lawrence enjoyed the raw crabs. We had to wait a while, but it was not overly smoky. They didn't have all-you-can-eat, and the waitress cooked the meat on your grill for you. The portions were pretty good. We didn't get overly stuffed which is a nice change.

Sunday night we went with Phillip to Soot Bull Guirim II. The wait wasn't too long, but the place was smoky as hell! I think it was a combination of their vents not working and the cooking generating massive amounts of smoke, because at Park's we didn't have nearly as much smoke coming off the grill. I liked the style of Korean BBQ there better - they give you salad and rice paper there. In addition to the bean paste, they also gave a spicy sauce. The combination of bbq meat with seasoned lettuce, bean paste, spicy sauce, the sesame oil/salt dip, grilled slices of garlic, all wrapped up in a sheet of rice paper...was so good! The food is all-you-can-eat. You get to order 1 meat per person at a time. They were pretty good about asking us what we wanted as soon as we finished off our plates of meat. After the initial large plateful, the portions got a little smaller. We joked about it but agreed that it was a good idea. We didn't get overly stuffed here either, even for being an AYCE bbq place.

Inner Turmoil

I feel so conflicted. There are so many things happening at once!

First, I find out I have to give up my cat. Then, I decide to hire a personal trainer to get my butt in shape. Finally, there's a chocolate fair this weekend that I'm excited about!

I hope Xin takes Muffin. I don't think my parents will, and if she goes to a stranger I'll never see her again. :(