Prajantr, Thoughts and Wanderings

I’ve been waiting to read the next installment in the Realms of the Blood by Anne Bishop since I finished the last book, The Shadow Queen.

We’re returning to Anne Bishop’s compelling fantasy realms where the Blood rule.  Queens are the hearts of the land and the caretakers of the people. Warlord Princes are the passionately violent and violently passionate guardians of the women in their lives. Warlords, Black Widow witches, Priestesses and other castes balance out this societal hierarchy in a detailed and complex structure.

Somehow Anne Bishop makes this world and all its complexity fascinating, enchanting and a touch erotic. There’s no tedium of details, no skimming of pages to get to the next major plot point. Oh no, when I read her work, I drink in every word and love every minute of it.

There’s some great continuation here of Cassidy and Gray’s story together. But a lot of this is written from Ranon’s point of view, and I really got to like him as a key character. Theran, and his behavior towards Cassidy as well as his decision to turn to someone else, reminded me a lot of my ex-husband. In fact, odd as it seemed, in the darkest parts of my depression over the last couple of days, this book helped me climb up out of it.

Besides, Anne Bishop has some very important characters in her books about the Blood. In her world, there are Scelties; and in my house, there is a Sheltie. Same pronunciation, same little brown and white dog.

I do have signed copies of Anne Bishop’s books and I hope to meet her someday. You never know, it might happen. In the meantime, I’m just very happy that she loves Scelties too.

Well. I survived the first week. In fact, I think I got through the first round of workouts pretty ok. Here’s what I thought about each work out:

• Day 1 Core Synergistics: OMG I can barely do some of these exercises and even on the ones I can do, only half of these reps.  Covered in sweat by the end and heart pounding.
• Day 2 CardioX: OMG I can’t keep up. That’s ok, just walk around when I can’t keep up. Keep moving. It’s bad if I go beyond target heart rate and kill myself anyway. (Note: Have a heart rate monitor. They’re cheap and important.)
• Day 3 Shoulders & Arms plus Ab Ripper: Two workouts? Oh for the love of carbs…Oh hey, I can do this. I can pretty much do every exercise. Wait. Nope. Ab Ripper workout. OMG I can barely do half these exercises and of those, barely half the reps.
• Day 4 Yoga: I’m stretching. I’m…Kaiser, get out of my face and quit knocking me over. I’m stretching. My heart rate is up and I’m stretching and balancing. Ugh. I only managed 30 min of the workout.
• Day 5: I’m a bad person and skipped my workout. There are no excuses.
• Day 6 Kenpo X: Hey, this is fun. Hey, I can do most of these. Woo! Still can’t do all the reps.I feel good at the end of this.
• Day 7 Rest day or X Stretch: Gotta go hoist rabbit cages, clean ‘em and do lots of other lifting around the house. Ugh.

The down side? I couldn’t do a lot of the exercises to begin with and had to just try my best. For those looking for something different but not used to hard core exercises, this probably isn’t for you. There’s some combination push up exercises and one handed support exercises that had me flopping around on the floor like a beached whale. Also, if you have a bad back, bad knees or bad shoulders…even a heel spur, I wouldn’t recommend starting with P90X. Maybe start with Power 90. You have to be very, very careful in these workouts because they are advanced exercises and it’s very easy to snap a joint too hard or pull a muscle.  Also, the instructor can get on your nerves, so if his personality grates on you, you may not like the program because you have to listen to him every day for 90 days.

That said, it’s a challenging workout. Every day of the week was different, which was fantastic. With other workouts, I usually get bored after the first week because the repetition drives me insane. This workout, I’m eager to hit the next week and do better in each of the workouts, aiming to accomplish every exercise and achieve more reps in each exercise.

Any results?

• already seeing better muscle definition
• not slimmer yet, but feeling good and remembering to keep abs engaged throughout the day
• feeling spunky
• been sore all week in that “hurts so good” kinda way
• lost a couple of pounds, probably in water weight since body fat % did not go down

Just to wrap up, I’ve been careful to eat shortly before a workout and have a protein drink right after my workout. Because I know I’m building new muscle, I need to make protein bioavailable, otherwise my body will take it from already existing musculature and I’ll be my own worst enemy. I’ve also been grazing throughout the day to keep my metabolism running and the only big meal I have is lunch. I’m not following the P90X nutrition plan, but I am controlling portions and making healthy food choices.

Goals for next week:

• no skipping workouts, even though I’ll be away on business
• execute more, if not all, exercises

Changes happen in life. The BARCC provides community support for those whose lives have changed dramatically in an awful way. I’ve been there. And now, I’m going through a completely different kind of change. The last thing I want to do with this change is withdraw and focus on just me. So when my sister told me her sorority group was creating a team for this walk and invited me to join her, I decided it was a great idea on a lot of levels.

• There’s the fact that it’s a good cause.
• I feel awareness, education and prevention are very important.
• There’s also the fact that I get to spend the day with my sister for a good cause.
• Plus, we’re going walkies. The health aspect of that would probably delight our father.

In any case, I’m walking on April 11th with my sister and her sorority team for the Fifth Annual Walk for Change. I’ve made my donation already, but if anyone would like to contribute to the fundraising, feel free:

http://www.firstgiving.com/teamaxo

Sometimes, posting online is a whifty thing. It’s not so great an idea. On the other hand, for certain goals, it can be a huge incentive because you’ve made yourself VERY publicly accountable. Me? I think I’m partially insane.

Moving on.

So, I have now acquired the P90X workouts. I have the Calendar sitting in front of me and the workout schedules. It’s a 90 day program (13 weeks, just about) that will take me through three Phases. I’m faced with three types of workouts: Classic, Doubles and Lean.

???

A Google search pops up a few helpful blogs from other people who have or are currently on P90X. They were helpful enough that I decided to blog a little about my adventure in P90X too – for someone like me who might be trying it out and also because I had several people say to me, “Let me know what you think of that. I was interested.”  The detail to which I blog about my progress will depend on how good my progress is.

So the answer to the ??? moment:

• Classic — theoretically offers the best, balanced combination of strength training and cardio to build muscle and burn fat as you go.
• Doubles — as the name suggests, doubles up the daily workouts starting in Phase 2 (month 2). Yes, that’s two workouts a day, people.
• Lean — focuses more on cardio than the strength training to burn away the fat for those focused on slimming down.

My decision? We go Lean first. I’ve got a lot of soft, doughy ME to slim down. My goal is to slim and trim and the Lean workout seems to fit that. Plus, I didn’t go through the Power 90 predecessor to this workout so I might die, or at least come to serious harm, if I tried to do one of the other two straight out of the gate. I’ll likely build some muscle, which will in turn help me burn more calories, but the focus won’t be to bulk and become mountain o’ muscle.

When to start? Today. Right after this post. Because Guppy said there are no excuses and I agree with her.

The picture that we’ll use as my “before” photo – because I’m NOT taking one of those photos you see in the informercial, clad only in a sports bra and pants:

Before P90X

Note: I don’t look half bad. The main driver here is that I could look a LOT better. I want to look better. So I’m going with this until I like what I see in the mirror and I like how I feel.

I decided to have an adventure in cooking, since I was trapped in the house all weekend anyway. My adventure involved the use of most of my sourdough starter in a recipe for sourdough doughnuts. I picked the base for the recipe figuring that the longer rise time, the lighter my doughnuts would be. (That may or may not have been the correct assumption, but hey, it was my logic at the time.)

The first thing I encountered was that the recipe called for 2 whole cups of sourdough starter. That’s more than I’ve ever used for any recipe yet. I had to double my existing starter and let it proof all day just to have enough. At least my starter was active by the time I put together the dough.

The second thing I encountered was that there wasn’t nearly enough flour called for as compared to the wetness of the sourdough starter plus ingredients listed. I ended up adding flour incrementally until it stopped looking like batter and started holding together like dough. I stopped at an additional 2 cups of flour and my dough was still very soft and sticky. It was just barely holding together like dough.

Very experimental, here people.

The next step was to let it rise until it doubled. Considering the timing on it all and the fact that I’ve been keeping the house rather cool, I let it rise over night in a greased bowl covered with wax paper. This method works pretty ok for me and I figured I could finish the second half of the recipe steps in the morning when I’d actually want to eat doughnuts anyway. I left it in the oven to rise because the temperature holds fairly steady in there and the dogs can’t try to steal the dough overnight.

The last time Chelsea got a hold of dough, it was for scones, and she immediately took a puppy dump right in the middle of the floor. Eeeew. So no dough for puppies.

Next step was to turn the risen dough out onto 1/2 cup of floor and work it in, then pat the stuff out to a 1/2″ thickness and cut my doughnuts. Obviously, this was a lot more dough than I needed so I turned it out and then split off half to go into the freezer for the future. Label the dough if you do this people. I know I’ve got pizza dough in my freezer too and after a couple of weeks, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference without labels and pizza tastes down right weird if you make the crust out of doughnut dough, I’d imagine.

Had to let the doughnuts rise to double again. Depending on how warm your household is, this could take a while. Quick tip – warm up your oven for maybe a minute, just so it gets a couple degrees warmer than room temperature (maybe 78-80F). Let the doughnuts (or any dough) rise in there. I even put a little ramekin of water in there to maintain humidity.

After they’ve risen, heat up the oil. I use a fryer because it’s just easier for me. Course, this means I had to fry doughnuts just a couple at a time. Fry the risen side down first, and flip only once. Remove and cool on a rack. I dipped mine in a mixture of powdered sugar and cinnamon because I happen to like that taste. You could do a glaze but I was lazy this time.

All done. Supposedly, these reheat well and keep for a couple of days of enjoyment. I’ll let you know.

Recipe for Sourdough Doughnuts:

Ingredients:
2 cups starter
1 cup lukewarm milk
1 1/2 C flour
2 eggs
1/4 cup oil
1/4 cup sugar
1 t salt
1/2 t soda
1/2 cup flour
2 cup flour
1/2 cup flour

Directions:
Mix starter, milk and 1 1/2 cup flour until smooth. Add eggs and oil and beat well.

In a separate, small bowl, blend sugar, salt, soda and 1/2 cup flour. Mix well into dough.

Turn out onto 2 cup flour and knead lightly until most of flour is worked in (dough is soft.) Place in greased bowl and turn to grease too. Cover with wax paper and let rise until doubled.

Then turn onto 1/2 C flour on board. Pat to 1/2″ thick. Cut and put on well floured sheet and let rise until doubled. (Don’t cover these!)

Fry only a couple at a time in hot fat and fry raised side (top) first, turning only once. Drain.

Optional: toss in powdered sugar and cinnamon or nutmeg OR dip in glaze

I had my doubts last night when it was 9pm and there was still no snow in my area. Foolish me. When it started to fall, it came down hard and by the time the pooches and I did the last check of the house, there were several inches blanketing the world beyond our doors.

This morning, the pooches were dancing and crossing their little puppy legs, dying to get out there and do their business. So sorry that mommy slept in to 7am! Ok, so I let them out and brought the camera to capture the two of them plunging into the perfect whiteness.

Kaiser makes note that it is STILL snowing outside.

He also makes note that he looks damned impressive, all black and tan against the the pristine white back drop. Dino and Doodles a couple of yards over don’t look nearly as sharp out in their backyard. (The dogs in question are huge lab and even bigger Great Dane, respectively. They come to visit Kaiser and Chelsea occasionally. Neighborhood has a mere 4ft fence limitation. Even Chelsea can conquer a 4 ft fence.)

And of course, Kaiser has to prove that he is fast, even belly-deep in snow:

Of course, if Kaiser is belly-deep in snow, what do you think Chelsea is doing?

She’s a smart girl, my Chelsea, with wisdom that comes with being the oldest dog in the house. She watched Kaiser mess around in the snow for a bit. She hung out where the snow was shallow under the protection of the house overhang.

She thinks Kaiser is a bit foolish, but she uses the trail he broke to wander into the yard and do her business.

But don’t get me wrong. Chelsea loves the snow too. She just prefers it under foot and not up to her ears.

And she does like the taste of snow. She likes to shove her muzzle in it and come out with a snowflake frosted face.

Both pooches came in happy and submitted to being towelled down gracefully. They are now napping while I brew up some spiked hot chocolate. You know, the real kind made with milk and not hot water, rich with dark chocolate shavings and not just cocoa powder.

It’s a fantastic day to stay snugged up inside the house.

Yes, yes – the informercial for P90X is designed to attract people. But honestly, it’s a good informercial. I am tempted, so it has done it’s job.

But really, what do you think? Should I give it a go?

Pros:

• Now is a great time to commit to something like the P90X program. It’s a good time to take action and make a big change in my life. Goodness knows I’ve been griping about my fitness level for a long time.
• It is portable. Since I travel a lot, this is very convenient. Most hotels do have fitness centers, but they generally suck and/or have creepy strangers in there that make me feel uncomfortable. So mostly, I won’t go to hotel fitness centers.
• It is hard core. I enjoy the low impact workouts for their benefits and the mental/emotional peace they provide. To really effect a change in my physique, I need heavy duty to challenge me in addition to that.

Cons:

• I already have a gym membership. I’d like to keep going there at least twice a week, if only for the classes and the pool. I also like several types of equipment they have that give me a workout I can’t do at home.
• I already do a pretty good job of working out at home and have a couple of fitness dvds and whatnot that supplement my workouts. Do I really need another one?

I am undecided. It is tempting, for sure.