Progress wise, body is feeling pretty decent, and my strength is going up considerably. So far I haven’t moderated my diet much, so i am not seeing a ton of outward body changes. But I feel like I am carrying my body better. I’ll probably have to seriously start considering what I want to do about what I eat soon.

In related news, I found I might not be fitting my bras right – lucky me, I need a smaller backsize and larger cup.  THAT should be easy to find. Maybe if I keep working out I can go UP a backsize again.

This has been a very travely, friendy, busy summer. Two new cons Convergence (only new to me), and Musecon, which is just shiny and new.  They are wildly different from eachother, but both of them are awesome. Musecon is so awesome that Xap has convinced me to be on the concom running the fiber programming and helping her as a co-second. More about Musecon later, it is so awesome that i could rhapsodize, and this was supposed to be a short update.

Dating someone new, outside of (me) being trepedatious about getting back in the saddle, it is going extreemly well. As far as i can tell, we are both disgusting to spend time with right now (insulin anyone?)- so I think we are doing *something* right.;) Sadly long distance again … but visits two weekends in a row make the distance a bit less traumatic, and maybe i’ll get to learn about skyping and that sexting stuff you hear about in the news these days.

Work going well, I am now officially a “Manager” senior staff type person. I even have a staff person. Whee!! Budgets and planning is a bit intimidting, but I am pleased that they trust me with it.

Lots of “reading” by audio book this year – seriously HOW did I miss reading American Gods? And in other news I LOVE my kindle.

Okay I think that is enough for a drive by update. More later – and I’ll try to get back responses back to old comments later today.

Still feel like I don’t quite have the right break out of exercises yet for circuits, but I am working on it. I have come to realize that I have to split up the ones I like in with the ones I like less, and then use them as an incentive – hey if you do those push-ups, then you get to do your lat pull-downs!! I like doing the lat pull downs – so far they are kind of easy no matter how high I have moved the weight – so they make me feel like I am strong.

Enough with the kvetching already … on to the update.

So far pretty good with maintaining regularity – in the sense that we are mostly keeping to the schedule of getting to the club 3-4 days per week. I originally started with a ton of classes, yoga, pilates etc. but my schedule got so crazy that I started missing classes and I was getting pouty so hopefully in a few weeks when life slows down again I’ll start making it back to the pilates class.

I have added swimming in, and WOW that is an awesome workout.  Most all of you probably don’t know that in my wee years I swam competitively (not saying I was Olympics bound or anything, but I trained and competed and didn’t completely suck.) So getting back in the pool was a bit humbling in how far my stamina had fallen (duh!) but also fairly rewarding in how fast it is improving.

Last reported I was kind of liking the treadmill – well, my body disagreed, and until i figure out why i am getting hip pain, the swimming gets me a nice cardio workout with much less hip pain and the bonus of a certain amount of muscley workout as well.

Bonus and mini-goal achieved – hurt much less after workouts, less tired after work outs and a check-in on the treadmill Monday showed me that what used to send my heart-rate soaring is now a nice warm up.

For those folks who ask – how is your diet going – I would like to reiterate I am NOT ON A DIET and am trying VERY HARD to not gauge progress by a number on the scale.

A bit more thinky stuff:

I have been doing a lot of reading at Stumptuous.com, and Noël Figart who both have  some very interesting things going on at their blogs; and I have been doing a bit of thinking on goals, long term hoped for results, what I’d like to see when I look in the mirror and how I’d like my body to function. I also did a bit of “hmmm, and what are my genetics like” thinking.

My parents are both VERY fit. They are both differently fit. My Mother is super tiny, she exercises a lot, frequently something that is aerobic/cario and a little fadish, and she is super duper careful about what she eats. My Dad has the bonus of being super tall, and while he used to be a marathon runner he now focuses a lot on weight lifting and while he pays attention to what he eats, it is in a completely different way (and i have to admit seems like it has more yummy).  The thing is, as my parents get older my Mother’s tinyness isn’t doing her a lot of favors, she is losing strength and having some issues that might have had less impact if she had a little more muscle supporting her.

blahblahblah TL;DR

Upshot is … With my parents examples’ in mind, armed with some knowledge from the intertubes, and hopefully with the help of the personal trainer I am seeing for the next two weeks, I hope to start weight training next week.

Some summer highlights:

Tomatoes from the garden are 200% better than tomatoes from the store. I might never eat them from the store again.

Almost everyday, in my head, I thank all my friends who helped me build my garden. So now I’ll do it outside my head: Thank you!!! So very much!!!

Took a photography class with Franklin Habit at Loopy Yarns, AWESOME!

Had a house concert for Sooj which many of you came to.

On new (added) meds for my ADD which has resulted in major sleep disturbance. Its hard to concentrate with so little sleep, so its hard to evaluate the meds.

Have dyed my hair funny colors and gotten my ears re-pierced. I think I am worrying about getting old.

Fallen in love with a new (for me) tv show, Friday Night Lights. I haven’t liked a show this much since Buffy. Insert days of squeeing here. GGood stories, stong women, great characters, and lots of pretty – boys and girls and scenery, yum yum yum . . . Okay I’ll stop now before I get too out of control.

Got Seanan McGuire’s new book. Just started reading it – enjoying it muchly.

Knitting is happening, lots of socks. Maybe pictures and possibly even a proto-pattern soon.

Want to make some earings – might need help with this.

My birthday is coming soon, I think I am closer to 40 than I’d like to be.

Scheduling craft and music days again, but not till 2010.

And I think that is probably enough for one post. Have to leave something for the next one!

Thank you Dell for not sucking.