Meet Ms. September

Ms. September's yoga pose for the month is the side plank. This is a one I need to do. The regular plank is something I do all the time. It's a great core exercise for runners. It would be really easy for me to add the side plank to my core workout.

Regular plank
Image from womensfitnessmag.com

As I was flipping through the calendar the other day I realized that the first name on the left side of the calendar was  the cat's name and not another name for the yoga pose. So I guess Maude is the cat name and not the pose. Since Maude is probably a girl name, she is indeed a "Ms." so I can correctly call her "Ms." September.

My apologies to Stallone and all the other male cats over the past year who I referred to as "Ms" when they were actually a "Mr."

Opps! Blonde moment. Oh well, at least I figured it out before January.

This is one reason why yoga may be dangerous for me. The instructor would say "side plank" and I would get all confused because I would be thinking, "Maude, you mean Maude?"

Reason two is I have no sense of balance. I'm always a little off balance. My best yoga poses are the ones where both feet are on the ground.

Seriously.

Happy July And A New Yoga Pose

This month Ms. July is doing the Supine Twist Variation yoga pose and looks very uncomfortable doing it if you ask me. This is one yoga pose I do almost everyday at the gym during the stretching/core part of my workout and I never even knew it had a name. I'm learning a lot about yoga from these yoga kitties. Mostly that the stretches I do have names.  I'm still not sure why this pose is named after a Rocky movie.

What it looks like in the human world...

Image from yogajournal.com

 Now it's your turn!

It's March 1 And You Know What That Means!

It's the beginning of a new month and time for a new yoga kitty pose!  Introducing Ms. Yoga Kitty March doing a cat cow pose variation.

This cat cow pose is good for lower back pain which I have been suffering from the past several months.  I should have been doing this pose, but who knew!  I'm learning a new yoga pose every month when I turn the calendar page.  I'll add this one to my regular routine for sure.  Ha!

Here's more on how to do it plus the variation that Ms. March is doing in the calendar shoot.  The above variation starts about about 3 minutes into the you tube video for you more advanced yoga folks.  I'm not included in that group so I think I'll stick with the basic cat cow pose for now.

Here are some cats who will not be doing any yoga poses.

Cadence:  Yoga pose?  You'll have to come get me first!  Dare you!

Phantom:  Don't even think of trying any of that yoga stuff on me.  I'll
destroy your laptop cord. Go ahead.  Try me!

Ed:  Yoga!  Here's what I think about yoga!

They don't like posing for the camera either.  They would never make it to calendar fame.  They are not flexible and they have no talent.

We love them anyway!

February Things- Mercedes Course, New Yoga Cat Position, Etc

It's hard to believe it's already February and now we are on a new cat yoga pose on the wall calendar.  Is that really a yoga pose?  Because I'm no yoga expert, but I don't think it's physically possible to do what Ms. February is doing in that picture.

Downward dog yoga pose is good for runners like me with tight calves.  It has really helped keep me from having chronic achilles pain.  No runner wants this.  Believe me!  

This is my finisher medal from last year's Mercedes Half Marathon.  We had a huge group turn out to run the course Sunday.  There was a little bit of a change in the course from last year, but just a tweak. Overall, I really like the course.  It isn't too hilly and it is all familiar to me.  The full marathon does two loops of the course.  I personally haven't done the full since they changed it to two loops, but it is probably better this way if you are trying to qualify for Boston Marathon.  The old course was much hillier than this one.

After the run, the race director had Dunkin Donuts and coffee for all the runners at Boutwell Auditorium.  That was a very nice surprise!  I don't have any pictures, but I can promise you I had some of each!  Eating healthier is wearing me down!

I do have pictures of the almond pillow cookies I bought for my dessert as I watched the Super Bowl Sunday night.  I am very disappointed the 49ers didn't win.  The cookies helped me drown my sorrows.     The Murph doesn't like to have these in the house and he told me to hide them so he won't eat them.  The only problem is he knew they were in the house and in a weak moment he asked me to get some for him.  Since these things are valuable and we don't have them around that often, I had to put my foot down.  

No way was I giving up any of these babies!  Later he thanked me for not giving in and letting him have a cookie.   One of us has to stay strong!  

Besides, I don't share cookies very well.

Is anybody running any marathons or half marathons this Spring?  I'm still looking for a marathon to run.

Happy New Year 2013!

I just wanted to do a really short blog post wishing everyone a very Happy New Year!  Last night the Murph and I spent our very first New Year's Eve as husband and wife at home in our pj's.  I had champagne and he had his usual assorted imported beer selection.  It was wonderful!

Today we hung our new 2013 calendars. This Yoga Cat one is my favorite.  I hope it inspires me to participate more in the dangerous sport of yoga.  Cats are much more flexible than triathletes though so we'll see...

I don't know how anyone can do that scorpion pose.  It must be trick photography!

Below is me in the cozy socks I wore for my private New Year's Eve celebration with the Murph.

And the Murph wore his plaid "leisure" pants and a t shirt.

Today we will have black eye peas with our dinner because that's what you're suppose to eat on New Year's Day for luck.   Fresh Market was out of the can peas on New Year's Eve.  I looked all over the store as the Murph was in the meat department.  The Murph saw me running all over the store and later told me I looked like I was in some kind of game show.  A game show where you had to see who could fill their shopping cart up the fastest.   I would win that game!  He had already noticed the assortment of items I had already added to the cart, including my favorite almond pillow cookies.

Since I couldn't find any black eye peas at Fresh Market, today after our late workout, we went to Publix where there were only 5 cans of black eye peas left in the entire store.  I got two of them.  I felt that I should get greens too but the Murph said we never eat them so why get them now.  I backed down and went over to the cashier with only my two cans of black eye peas.  She immediately said, "Well I guess you guys already have your greens then, huh?"  I looked at the Murph in panic.  I KNEW I should have grabbed a can of turnip greens or collard greens or something before we left.  The Murph laughed at me.  He said he's just not that superstitious, especially when it comes to produce.

I'm still not sure, but I'm hoping that the leeks he cooked with the pork roast tonight and the cabbage will be all the greens I need for luck or money or for whatever reason I'm suppose to be eating them.

I don't know why I'm suppose to eat them on New Years Day, but I just don't want to take any chances!

Hope you ate your black eye peas and greens today!

Yoga Kicked My Ass

It is a very windy day here at the coast so not a good beach day.  I lifted weights at the gym and then ran six miles outside and my legs felt better than they have all week.  Saturday they were extremely sore so I decided to try the yoga class at the gym and then a 30 minute swim instead of a run.   Overall, the yoga seemed good, not too bad, kind of easy.  I thought I would do terrible and have no balance at all and everybody would laugh at me, but I really did pretty good.  Near the end of class I was thinking, " Oh this is nothing.  Easy!  I've done ironman triathlons and races where I felt like throwing up at the end.  Blood and guts!  This yoga stuff is nothing with all this heavy breathing and these gay ballerina moves and all."  Big scoff!

Well....  I guess I got a little too cocky because near the end of class I noticed the toe on my left foot was really aching and the downward dog pose didn't seem so easy and fun anymore.  The next morning when I woke up I had soreness in areas of my body that I had never had soreness before (didn't even know you could get sore in those areas).  Even my fingers were sore!

The Murph has been laughing at me for two days and calling me a baby every time I complain.

"Oh, baby is cranky!  Baby needs a nap!  Cry baby....  boo hooo... "

You get the picture.

Yes,  I admit it.  Yoga kicked my triathlete ass!