I met one of my neighbors yesterday while I wearing a shirt with two unicorns humping on it. What a great way to make a first impression. I hope she didn’t run off and tell the rest of the neighborhood that delinquents have moved in. I would hate to have to toilet paper everyone’s porches to prove them right.

In other news, I have my stripper class today and I can’t even begin to find words for how sexy it will be. This morning I couldn’t find my razor so I didn’t shave my legs. yay for built in leg warmers! And the studio suggests you wear “sexy work out clothes” and not bring shoes as they will provide you with stilettos. Seeing as how I don’t even know what “sexy work out clothes” are, much less own any, I’m wearing gray capri workout pants and the previously mentioned humping unicorns shirt. I thought it would be appropriate. And maybe humping unicorns equals sexy? This will look amazing once I slip into a pair of four inch lucite heels. Fingers crossed that they have blinky lights in the heels!

Also, it’s time to hit you kind folks up for more money. The race is quickly approaching and we haven’t reached our goal yet. clicky clicky to save boobies.

I am trying to sign jparks and I up for a half marathon at the end of the summer and am viewing this as a chance to buckle down and workout a training plan. Jparks is viewing this as an event that he can totally walk, if not run, with little to no training. This morning when I got up for boot camp he was supposed to get up and run. Upon returning home I found him in the shower, which I took as a sign that maybe, maybe, he did as he said he would and started training.

“Hey, did you run this morning”

“Well, I had a dream that I sprinted a whole mile! That’s just as good as actually running.”

I think I’m totally going to kick his ass in this race.

Mary-Lynn once spoke of magic pants. Magic pants are ones that seem to fit perfectly no matter what shoes you wear, or if you put on a couple of pounds. Ones that you can wear out to your local bar or to the office. Ones you can always count on to boost your ego and make you feel incredible.

I used to have a pair of magic pants, but recently they were retired thanks to a hole in the bum area. No pants have stepped up to take their place, but one of my pairs of jeans have made it clear that they want to be the exact opposite of magic pants. They want to be evil, mean, cruel pants.

These jeans never fit. Never. No matter how much weight I lose or how toned I get, these jeans still give me the sexy muffin top look. I like to pull them out of the closet on days when I’m feeling skinny and have them deflate my ego. I can’t wear them with flats or with heels because the length is not right for either.

Basically these pants hate me, and mock me every chance they get. And yet I can’t get rid of them. I recently did a purge of my closet, getting rid of all the clothes that have gotten too big or just didn’t fit right. And, even knowing how much trouble these jeans cause, I decided to hang on to them.

The reason I can’t get rid of them is because tomorrow morning I start Boot Camp and I feel like this might finally help me win my battle against these jeans. These jeans will be the motivating factor helping me out of bed at 5:45 in the morning. The inspiration I need to go out and run and crunch and jump and pushup when other people are still snug in bed.

Well, those jeans and the fact that I need to wear a bathing suit in 24 days. That’s equally as motivating.

Because trapeze and trampoline were becoming routine and boring jparks and I signed up for some aerial acrobatics classes. (Have I mentioned that before? I don’t think so) I’ve taken about 5 classes and jparks has taken 3 and our strength has doubled since we started. These classes are much harder than any of the others because you are literally throwing your weight around. And, besides adding muscle at a scary fast rate, the fat has started to disappear pretty quickly too. Yay for less fat!

Last night I brought the camera with me hoping I could snag some good shots of jparks in his sexy pants. (He can’t wear regular workout pants for aerial. He should be in leggings, but that’s not going to happen, so he wears tight-ish sweatpants that he can pull up over his chest. They have been named his “sexy pants” by some of our fellow gym goers. And sexy they are.) I managed to get some great shots of jparks trying various tricks and getting them on his first time and he got shots of me trying tricks for the third or fourth time and barely being able to complete them. Bastard has brute strength and I don’t.

This first pose is called a bird’s nest:

Here’s my knee hang, which is so simple it almost seems like I’m cheating:

Here’s jparks doing a split on the silks. I can do this too, but someone was too busy running around whining about how much he hates aerial to take my picture:

And here’s me doing the hammock pose:

There are a ton more pictures here on my flickr account. Some are good, some are not, all are interesting and worth a laugh.

Also, the gym employees call us “the Newlyweds” as in Nick and Jessica. Should I be insulted? I’m hoping I’m Nick and jparks is Jessica, that’s the only thing that makes sense, right?

Lately I’ve been dreading going to trapeze. Dreading it enough that I think I’m going to not renew my card when this one runs out. Somewhere jparks just read that line and let out a “NOOOO!” all dramatic like.

See, I like trampoline and I like aerial acrobatics, but the trapeze is starting to wear on me. I like to improve in things and I’m not improving in it. Jparks says no one cares that I’m still kinda crappy (he was much nicer in his wording), but at each class I feel like my instructor is getting more and more pissed at me for remaining stagnant. Like I’ve decided to hold back my mad trapeze skillz just to piss her off. I’m not much for criticism, I can handle it if you sandwich it between two compliments, but since I suck she has nothing nice to say and it stings. And this is starting to make me dread going.

I know I can’t be the best at everything I try, but I like to think I can at least not totally suck. I was under the impression that if I put in the effort, I’ll excel at the task. And dammit, I’ve been putting in the effort. I do weights, I do cardio, I do crunches, I do squats, what more do I need to do? Where are the mad skillz? WHERE, I ask you.

So, really one of two things need to happen. Either I learn to be tough and take the instructors complaints about my lack of kicks or I say screw it, I’m going to have fun regardless of how well I swing and kick.

Of course, I could take the easy route and tell them I died in a freak trapeze practice accident and maybe my instructor shouldn’t have pushed me so hard to achieve perfection. Let the guilt of my death plaque them the way the guilt of my suck-yness plaques me.

Some days I pull up the admin screen to write a blog post and the words won’t come to me. It’s not that I don’t have things to say, because blabbing away is my special gift handed down from God upon my birth. It’s more that the words won’t come to me in any kind of entertaining way and the last thing I want to do is bore everyone with lackluster tales of my weekend.

So instead of that, I’m giving you a couple of random things.

First a picture of me bouncing on the trampoline. Check out my shirt, it has humping unicorns on it.

And second, a random thought I’ve been pondering:
Why are yellow shoes so popular this season?

I’ve got another couple of trampoline lessons coming up (assuming I don’t knock myself out in the first 5 minutes of class) and I’m a bit concerned about my lovely lady humps.

As I previously mentioned, I am not ready for a juggy audition and need to find a way to strap them down for fear that they’ll bounce into harm’s way. The sports bras I have aren’t doing the trick and, if I’m remembering correctly, they are max support ones.

So I’m turning to you dear friends for support (har har, get it?) and help. What do you suggest I use to keep the humps in check? Is there a miracle brand of sports bra I don’t know about? Is there a trick that’s well known to everyone but me? I’ve got to figure something out or else my trampoline career might be ending soon.

Growing up I was never the kid at the top of the monkey bars or climbing trees. This also means I was never the kid with skinned up knees or broken bones. And while some might think this means I had a sheltered childhood, I can say I honestly loved sitting inside my safe, warm house reading all 528 Babysitter Club Books.

And I have remained relatively injury free right up until this year. It started when, during one trapeze class, I fell into the net landing just slightly on my head. I sat up and told jparks “oh, that hurt my neck a little” but didn’t think anything of it. By the time we got home I could barely turn my head. By the time we went to bed I was in a lot of pain. The next day I went to the Urgent Care clinic where x-rays revealed that I needed some prescription strength Aleve and a heating pad. Three days later I was healed and able to look in both directions again.

Then, earlier this week, I jumped off the trapeze platform with my arms bent. The pull of my body weight jerked my arms straight and hurt my right shoulder. Again, I thought nothing of it, and took another swing. That swing hurt a bit more. But of course, I climbed back up to the platform for a third swing. After that I was done for the night and could barely lift my arm.

That last incident was only 3 days ago and somehow I’ve managed to hurt myself again. Tonight jparks and I had our first trampoline class (note to self: go buy a better bra. I am not ready for my Juggy audition) and during a timed jump off, I lost control and slammed my knee into my forehead. Not surprisingly this knocked me down and almost out. The good news is that the instructor said he didn’t know people could fold in half like that. The bad news is I am a moron.

I could reduce my risk of injury by not taking any more trapeze or trampoline classes, but I really like both of them. I think from here out I’ll just be more careful and maybe not trash talk as much. Did I mention that part? Each time I get hurt it’s right after I trash talk to Jason. Tonight I called him a pussy and then karma made me hit my head.

Maybe, before I learn anything else, I should learn to keep my mouth shut. Or maybe jparks should stop being a pussy.

I managed to survive another trapeze lesson with no accidents. But then today, while working, I fell down some stairs and hurt my wrist.

So let’s recap: flying through the air, 30 feet above the ground, while holding onto a thin bar, good. Walking down a flight of stairs slowly, while holding the handrail, bad.

And here is a video of jparks making his catch:

And you can find video of me falling into the net and some pictures of me flying through the air here

I had trapeze class yesterday and I survived! And I’ve even signed up for 9 more classes. Apparently, having the shit scared out of me is something I enjoy.

The woman that spoke to me when I made my reservation explained that by the end of the class I would be hanging from the trapeze by my knees. When she said by the end of class it seems she meant “by the first 5 minutes of class”. Seriously, you show up, they hoist you onto a low bar, and you hang from your knees. Then, a minute later, you climb up a ladder and are on a small platform grabbing the trapeze. Seconds after this, you’re jumping off the platform, flying through the air, and trying to get your legs onto the bar.

I was not successful the first two times. Finally, on my third swing I was able to get my legs over the bar and my hands free. The secret is that you really can’t think about how stupid or scary it is to jump off the platform (you have a safety wire on but it’s not very comforting when you’re high in the air on that platform). My head was swimming with fear, my palms so sweaty I kept having to chalk up, and my knees so weak I can’t remember how I climbed the ladder, but once I stopped thinking about it I was (kinda) okay.

Did I mention that when you’re on the platform, if you don’t jump when the instructor says “hep” he kinda gives you a gentle nudge (read as: a kick in the ass) and knocks you off the platform. Yeah, I was “nudged” every time it was my turn.

Having a hard time envisioning exactly what hanging from one’s knees looked like? As I mentioned jparks was not at this class to take pictures and the girl that I handed my camera to didn’t take very many or very good pictures. I searched you tube and found these videos of people taking classes at the gym I attend, but these are not videos of me. Next week jparks is taking the class with me and we’ll get some footage but until then you can check these out to see exactly what I was doing.

This video is of a catch, which I completed on my first try. I didn’t think I could do it, but I did and was very proud. And again, this is not me, just someone doing what I did.

Yesterday the class didn’t seem like much of a workout but today I can see I was wrong. I’m sore all across my back, in my abs, and my arms. But it’s a good sore. It’s a sore that says I’m proud that I overcame a fear and got a good workout at the same time.

Plus, I didn’t puke on anyone and that makes me proud too.