Week One – Blasting the Abs

I am heading into my fourth round of Boot Camp.  This 21 day boot camp is focused on Abs…if you have read any of my earlier posts, you know that my one big issue with my abs is…I don’t have any.  Muscle that is.  None.  I have a gelatinous mass residing under my abdominal skin that for the most part conforms to whatever I wear.  It’s compliant that way…but not in the way that it can actually lift anything…like my legs if I’m laying on my back.  So when Jake started talking about Ab Blast like it was going to be some three week party, I started recognizing his penchant for sarcasm.

Since I have returned to boot camp after my six year, 40 pound hiatus, this has been the biggest boot camp I’ve seen.  It’s packed with women that are either returning after their own break or starting with Jake for the first time.  The energy is palpable – You can’t put that many women together at 5:30am, all jumping, running and lifting, and not feel a certain sense of awe at how different yet similar we all are.  It doesn’t matter what size – everyone has their own vision of where they want to be and they are all huffing, puffing and sweating to get there.  I’m impressed with us as a gender…we are strong, when we put our heart into something.

Most of the week has been similar to the past with a few more ab rotations added in.  I think Jake wanted everyone to come back for week 2 so he didn’t hit us too hard with week one.  This was truly a blessing since I ended up with a small bladder issue early in the week.  Antibiotics knocked it out but I have now confirmed that running, jump squats and anything that vibrates the bladder is not conducive to working out without a restroom if you have a UTI.  Unless of course, you wear depends.   Which I don’t.   Yet.

So onto my actual ab blast – I have had three C-sections so my abs have been sewn up three times horizontally and one additional time vertically when my abdominal muscles split.  My youngest had apparently watched “Alien” in vitro and was trying to rip through my abdominal wall rather than be delivered the traditional route.  What they thought was a tumor turned out to be his foot.  He hasn’t stopped surprising me yet.

That being said, I’m a total wimp when we do ab exercises.   I’ve gotten a bit better with the single leg crunches and this week, the leg lifts did not kill me on the first round.  The third round is another story.  I did two rounds this weekend just to try to get ahead.  We’ll see if it helps.  Now that everyone is an old pro after one week, I have a feeling that the kid gloves will come off…and I will most likely be unable to walk afterward.  This will all be worth it, however, if I go down a size or can actually see some kind of definition in my mid-section.  There has been no definition there since I was 24 – when I was pregnant with my first son.  This may be tied to the fact that I somehow thought I was delivering a litter.  I was eating for five.  And not five babies – five grown men that had been on a hunger strike.  I gained 75 pounds.  Try not to judge.  I was always an overachiever so when the MD said it was OK to gain a little weight to keep the baby healthy, I went to town.  He was healthy.  So in the end…I think I did my job!

So two more weeks of Ab Blast.  I’m staying hopeful.  As long as I work hard, I know I will have some results.  They may not be earth shattering but anything that gets my flabby abs to be even slightly less flabby, is worth the effort.  If you don’t hear from me again, I’m in the hospital with something ruptured..have a good week!

 

 

 

 

Round three – where are those abs, anyway?

It’s official – a day without exercise is a day that I wonder if my pants will still fit.  I can see how adding exercise to the daily routine can be stressful.  I seem to be more stressed when I don’t exercise so I need to either keep up the routine or get a prescription for Ativan.  I was out of town for two days last week and had promised myself that I would hit the gym in the hotel.  When I went to St. Louis a few months ago, I was religious about hitting the gym at 5am.  Two days in LA, and three full length mirrors in my hotel room (Three…seriously….THREE!!!!)..and I couldn’t bring myself to walk through the hotel in my workout clothes.  Argh!  Regression in my confidence!  No worries, however…I’ll be back to it Monday and back to feeling good about my progress.

Ahhh…but on to the fun part!  What I learned at boot camp over the past few weeks.  My favorite new Jakism?  “There’s no crying in exercise!”  Really?  You obviously weren’t standing next to me during the last ab rotation!  There was crying…moaning…and sounds that sounded like several women were in labor!   Or maybe that was just me…

We use the resistance bands daily.  They come in different colors to signify their resistance.  Yellow – Red – Blue – Purple with Purple being the most resistant.  I broke a yellow one doing arm raises recently – which means nothing.  Until you break a blue or purple – you have no street credit.  Last week I went from the blue bands to the purple bands for bicep curls- upping my game. Until of course…Jake upped his.  No longer 15 reps..lets go to 20.  I settled for doing some shade of teal with a combination of blue and purple.

This is similar to moving up from the five pound weights to the eight pounds.  I’d like to be at the tens after another boot camp – a decision I will most likely regret on the next Ab round.  After three C-sections, my abs are definitely my weakest area.  (On a side note, if you are going to have multiple C-sections, you may want to ask your OB to trace a straight line in front of you.  From seeing my scars, that skill must be harder than it looks.)  I know that they will not get stronger until I spend some serious focused time there.  I also know that as a peri-menopausal woman, my abdomen loves to hold on to adipose tissue.  I know all these things…and would still rather work out my arms!  Or butt…or thighs…or that little muscle in my foot….intellect doesn’t always meet common sense.  I’m proof.

There are soooo many ways to do wall sits- hold five pound sand bags and do arm circles. Heft a kettle bell over head.  Hold a medicine ball between the knees.  I’m waiting for all of those to be joined together in some type of juggling routine while holding one foot in the air.  And trust me…some of these women could do it!  

So, as you can see…I’m still hooked.  I’ve heard that after doing something for over 21 days, it becomes a habit.  Again…not working out scares the heck out of me.  I never…ever….ever…want to go back to that first week again.  However…if you are reading this and have not been exercising and want to start?  Let me just say…the first week is totally worth it!   If you need help getting off the couch, give me a call.  I know thirty women and one guy that will welcome you in!  Have a great week, all!

 

Round two…and still running

I just finished my second round of boot camp.  10 weeks in – 16 pounds down.  My favorite moment so far was at work – having a younger woman tell me that she was admiring my arms.  Having anyone admire your arms when you’re over 50 is a confidence booster.  She started with “I don’t want you to think I’m weird or anything…”.    My response?   “No judgement …and how does my butt look?”

We learned a new exercise last week.  Single leg hip lifts with a twist – hold you weight on your hip while you lift.  It all went well until my abdomen starting eating the weights.  There is obviously some work still to do there!  I was fortunately able to dig them out before we started the next exercise.

And yet another exercise with the TRX – Hip drops.  Hold the handle on your head – while you face sideways.   The inside leg in front – now drop your hip.  You can guess how that went for me….grab the strap…no…only one… put your hand this way..no…the other way…now put it on your head – no…not like that…on your head…you only have one head…put it there….now drop your hip.   I’m assuming that Jake is medicated with some calming agent before he teaches me a new exercise.   Either that, or he highly medicates when he goes home.

Someone asked me the other day how the running was going.  I still sound like a dying asthmatic when I run, but no one seems to mind.  I’m still painfully slow.  Occasionally, the ball of my right foot gets inflamed and a bit painful.  I still don’t love it.  What I do love?  The results.    I’ll keep running now because stopping is downright frightening.  I know how I feel when I exercise and I know how I feel when I don’t.  I’ll keep exercising.  It feels better.

My other favorite thing right now?  I’m not in a race.  As long as I’m feeling good and slowly heading in the right direction, I’m ecstatic.  If I make a bad food choice one day, I move on the next.  No more flogging myself…no more setting dates or events that I’m losing weight for…no more feeling like a failure if I can’t fit into something.  I’ll get there – wherever there is.  I’m 30 pounds heavier than my wedding weight.  I’m OK with that right now.  10 weeks ago, I was 46 pounds heavier than my wedding weight….and that was closer to 50 pounds heavier than I ever want to be again.

I still love the comradery.  I still love that it’s not a competition unless you want it to be.  I still love that even the incredibly fit women will still comment that it’s hard some days.   I love that I see women of all ages working out, talking about their lives and encouraging each other with “wow…you look great!”.   It is very different from any experience that I’ve had in a traditional gym where I was surrounded by very fit naked women in the locker room.  It’s bad enough comparing your body to other women in yoga pants.  Take the clothes away and you can really start to question your attractiveness as a woman!  Fortunately, my husband’s vision is much like mine – in soft focus.  It covers up a wealth of stretch marks!

So….I have a standing date with 20 women and one guy every morning at 5:30 am.  Even on mornings when it’s hard to get up, I still push myself out the door.  If I have to be at work early, then I leave early, but I still go.  It feels foreign to not have at least one body part feel tight and sore.  If I start to falter, please take me back to this post: Disco Anyone?  It is enough to keep me on the straight and narrow!

Have a great week, everyone!

 

I Don’t Know How That Happened!

My youngest son is a nurse.  This fact brings me a great deal of pride…not only because I feel that he is following in my footsteps but also because I feel that I somehow knew that this would happen at some point.  That point came after we refurbished our bathroom.  Why we felt the need to do this is yet another story that involves raising boys…and why you should never leave them unattended for the weekend.  As you can see – I have years of writing material.  But back to the bathroom…

We were very happy with our new bathroom.  It had a beautiful pedestal sink…a deep soaking tub…and a beautiful sliding shower door that was a welcome replacement to our musty shower curtain.  I know that shower curtains can be washed…or better yet…replaced.  We just never seemed to get around to that.  I was ecstatic to behold the clear safety glass that would keep the water contained and off our new tile.   I believe I was able to “behold” this for all of two weeks.  This was before some sort of act of God..nature…or another frontal lobe faux pas.

I was at work when I received the call from Matt.  “Mom – the shower door broke..!”  My heart took a leap…or it may have been more my stomach.  Are you kidding?  Already?  I hoped that it was something small – like those little pit marks that you can get filled in your car windshield.  How I though a random rock would have hit the door…I don’t know.  “Hmmm….what do you mean…It broke?”  And of course – the answer comes.  “It fell off the track and burst into a thousand pieces.”  “Where were you when this happened?”  “In the shower” was the reply that made me think….hmmm…this could be bad.  I don’t know about you…but I typically shower without clothes.  Matt was describing a situation in which a thousand pieces of safety glass had just fallen on him…while he was unclothed and in a slippery, wet shower.  At that point, I decided focusing on the  fact that we just replaced that door would not win me any mother of the year award.

“Are you hurt?” thinking that if anything had been dismembered, he would probably not be so calm…I hoped.  He has a pretty high pain tolerance.  This was proven when the MD could not get him numb prior to stitching a gash on his leg…that he received 2 hours prior to my mother’s memorial service…by hitting a parked car on his bike.  Again…another story.

He responded, “I’m a little cut up but I’m ok.  I have to go to basketball practice.  I just didn’t want you to see it before I got home.  I don’t have time to clean it up.”  I assured him that I would clean up, naively assuming that it was a bunch of glass with some superficial blood drops.   I set off for home to ensure that I got there before a few of my family members.  Some of my gang do not do blood well.

I walked in the house and was not prepared for what I saw.  Blood…EVERYWHERE!  Bloody handprints on the hallway walls.  Bloody footprints on the hallway tile.  Blood on the thousand shards of safety glass.  OH MY LORD!  This was “a little cut up?”  Did he lose an appendage?  I started to look for one.  I mean – he could text with one hand.  Did something else get cut off and he didn’t want to tell me that he would not be providing any grandchildren?  There was blood throughout the house…even on the box of bandages!  And there were bandaid wrappers strewn on the floor.  I started to picture how he had wrapped an arterial bleed in a Curad.

At this point, I decided that it would be best to go to his Basketball practice and take him to the hospital.  How much blood can a person lose before they pass out?  Did he get to basketball practice?  Will I find him on the side of the road?  Did he even have his license with him?  Is he now a John Doe?  It’s amazing how your thoughts can go from sane to apocalyptic chaos in a matter of minutes.  I pulled up to the school and bolted into the gym.

He was there…running sprints…with about 30 bandages on him.  Not passed out…nothing apparently…missing.  He was fine.  Numerous cuts…but all superficial.  Turns out – he’s quite the bleeder.  He will never have a stroke since apparently…his blood does not clot.  I pulled him off and examined him just to make sure that nothing required stitches.  Nope…nothing.  Now I was able to focus again on the door.

“Ok…tell me the truth.  How did this happen?”  His reply?  “I don’t know how it happened.  It just…sort of…fell off.”   For no reason…it fell off.  Sound fishy to you?  I delved deeper.  “Did you slam it?”  “No Mom…honest….I don’t know how it happened.  It just fell.”  Now typically, I get the truth about ten years after the fact.  This one is about due.  I’m looking forward to hearing about it.

We never did replace the door.  We just brought back the shower curtain…a new one.  Not the musty one.  Although…I haven’t checked in a while.  We still have half a glass door.  Apparently, whatever “act of God” knocked the first one off has never been repeated.  I leave it there as a reminder that God protects fools and children…and has special care for those that are both!

 

 

 

 

 

Week six…Stamina, Strength, and….still Wheezing

On May 23rd, I wrote about joining a boot camp called LDB- Little Black Dress put on by Jake Glaze.   I expected to maintain enough stamina to finish the six weeks and get a jump start on working out with my never-ending supply of work out videos at home.  I expected to commit to 6 weeks of getting up at 4:30am to get to the park at 5:30am.  I expected to be an outsider to a bunch of amazon women who had rock hard abs and would look at me in disdain for what my lack of discipline has done to my body.  I expected that I would survive.  I did not expect….to thrive.

 

 

 

 

 

I have not weighed in yet this week or had my final measurements taken.  Oddly enough, that’s not much of a concern for me.  We have had huge victories in the group.  One woman lost 16 pound of fat and gained two pounds of muscle – Go Berni!  We have had women get into clothes that they have kept in the back of the closet for years – Go Becky! At last count, I had lost five pounds of fat and gained one pound of muscle. What I gained more…was a bit of self-acceptance.  My husband once told me that if I ever disappeared, he would have to enlist in a police sketch artist since he has very few current pics of me. I’m OK with that – I look better in two dimensional art.

So…this is the end, and the beginning.  I am enlisting in Jake’s help along with about 25 female “boot-campers” to keep me on the straight and narrow.  While maybe it’s not the road to salvation, it is the road to avoiding heart attacks and strokes – all which will provide God much more time to work on my stubborn and obstinate heart.  I need that.  He knows.  So do I.  If you have any doubts, click here.

So what did I learn from the past six weeks?  I had to look at the past four entries to do a composite.

• If you harass a man enough about his time keeping skills, he will hand you his phone….once…and only to show you that you can’t keep time yourself.  You will then politely just guess at the half time since you don’t want to reveal again that you cannot count backwards.
• You can do anything for 40 seconds and most things for 60 seconds.  Except TRX-pullups.  They have their own rules.  You can also use this piece of equipment in so many ways, that you will feel like an idiot each time you learn a new exercise.  More than once, I had to have someone physically put me in the right position…only to say…”Oh…under my ARMS!   I thought when you said arms, you were actually talking about my …hmmm …..neck.
• Time goes faster when you close your eyes.  Just don’t try that when you’re running – some people don’t pick up after their dogs.
• If someone unrelated to the camp goes down in the park, and as a nurse, you don’t feel comfortable leaving them down on the ground, you can trust Jake to come help you pick him up.  Actually, he will just pick them up himself while you stand by helpless until he says…”maybe you could give him his walker.  You know…since me holding him indefinitely is not really part of the plan.”
• I did not die from doing planks.  I now do them every day.  I’m at sixty seconds with the plan of adding 30 seconds this week.  If I don’t show up to the next boot camp, I was wrong.  I did die.
• If you lift weights daily, eventually your five pound weights will feel like baby weights.  You will keep bringing them however, because the ten pound weights scare the heck out of you.
• Wall sits can be done a variety of ways – with a medicine ball between your legs while lifting a kettle bell above your head. You will not drop either…because while all of the women are completely encouraging, you will be continually reminded that some can continue to carry on conversations while doing this exercise – and you don’t want to interrupt a good story by dropping a heavy object on your head.
• I thought that some medicine balls were just more bouncy than others.  Not true…some women are just more bouncy than others…and stronger…so…much…stronger.
• You can find a wealth of exercises on Pinterest.  You will most likely spend about 60 minutes of research for every 2 minutes of actual exercise.  Kind of like me with exercise videos – great to watch while commenting – “Wow…how do they do that?”  This is all done, obviously, while sitting on the couch.
• If you start moving your arms…your feet WILL follow!
• If it hurts, you are probably doing it right.  If the only thing that hurts is your mouth…Jake has expressed that he apologizes…that he did not provide harder exercises….something he can change for tomorrow.
• A fitbit does make you work harder.  I love the party on my arm when I hit 10,000 steps.  Next week, I will test Rebecca’s theory that it will make me appreciate running because of the calorie difference.  I still wheeze and am sooooooooo slow.  Ladies – continue to tell me “you can do it…keep running”…or in one case – put your hand on my back and say “come-on, sister”.   No offense ever taken and I need to push harder.  You are all my heroes.
• You will have good days and bad days.  Part of the victory is just getting out of bed. Nothing changes when you stay in bed. Except maybe your fat content.  And your butt….it definitely gets bigger.  I can attest to that after the last two years.   This is my motivating picture to get on track.  I would like to be image number two.  Number one looks uncomfortable and very constipated.
• If you really want to work-out, and are not good at motivating yourself, I’m a firm believer that we all work harder when someone is yelling at us…in a supportive and encouraging manner.  It’s a hard mix to find.  I stumbled on it.  If you want to join, hit up Jake at https://glazefitness.com/.  You can come as you are…I’m sans make-up and any reasonable hair style. There is no one to impress.  Only you…and a bunch of women doing the same thing.
• Week one….can you find me?  Please don’t let my husband use this picture if I ever disappear.  Direct him to the sketch artist instead!
• Happy 4th of July!

Week Five and Feeling Fit

 

First, I have to apologize for skipping week Four.  It was not because I was so sore that my fingers wouldn’t work (although sitting has been issue at different points!)  My beloved father decided to have play time with our beloved dog.  It was a great time…until Dad’s hand ended up in Dexter’s mouth.  Let me stress, this was not a dog bite.  Dexter looked just as surprised as my Dad as if to say “Dude…get your hand out of my mouth…dogs get shot for that!”

Dad ended up with a 2 cm gash in his hand.  Again…not a bite.  No corresponding teeth marks – more like a dog scrape.  Can you sense my paranoia?  I love the dog.  I love my father.  I would like to keep them both for another ten years.  From this gash, Dad ended up with cellulitis moving up his arm.   Please also don’t judge my nursing skills.  He left two days after the “incident” and went to Valencia to visit my cousins. Thankfully, my cousin convinced him to go the Urgent Care.  He had dinner plans…it took quite a bit to convince him that choosing between dinner and keeping a limb shouldn’t require this level of persuasion.  He ended up in the hospital for two days. Thus…my distraction from my writing.  He is doing well and the dog keeps his distance.

So…the last two weeks have been eventful.  I am no longer sore everywhere.  Just sore in whatever muscles Jake happens to target each day.  I’ve given up on some areas.  Sore is the new norm.  But it’s a good sore.  Kind of like…It’s hot…but it’s a dry heat.  (Although I always thought…seriously…does it being dry really make it better?).

I also have accepted running.  If I have to leave early to teach, I will run as my last station.  It makes me feel less wimpy.  I’m still asthmatic and slow, but with the increase muscle mass, I feel more like a rhino running than a hippo.  I ordered a fitbit.  Rebecca has assured me that I will love running after I see the difference on the days that we don’t run.  I trust her.  She can throw a medicine ball hard enough to make it bounce.  I tried it.  It’s like a super power.

If you read my previous posts, you also know about the baby ‘possum. While Jake does not recognize small furry creatures of any sort as being used as an excuse to stop moving, I thought I’d let you make your own decision.  Our ‘possum posed for a pic.  Be assured that I ran all the way to my bag and back twice to get this.  If anything, he influenced me to move faster.  The possum..not Jake.

Jake doesn’t need to be a small, furry tree dweller to get us moving faster.  He does it through his daily “Jakeisms”.  Some of my recent favorites:

“I thought it was Turbo Tuesday but I guess it is Talking Tuesday”

“Start moving your arms…maybe your feet will follow!”

“Build a better Booty…”

and when asked…Has the TRX ever broken?  “I have a story for that  but I’ll tell you after you get done”.

Some of my favorites from the women..

While battling yet another bug…”Kelly puts off Pheromones!”

“Hey – look – you hated running and your in the first group now!” (This was obviously because I started the warm up five minutes early but I loved the encouragement!)

I need to take a recorder with me…I spend half of the time laughing at something only to have my dementia take over when I start to write!

What I can tell you is…I’m hooked.  I love the feeling that I’m getting healthier.  I love the fact that even when I’m working late, I still feel motivated to drag my half-awake butt out of bed to drive to the park.  I’ve missed one day in the past five weeks.   My insomnia was killing me…I had to choose between being awake for boot camp or calling in sick to work.  I’ve called in sick about five times in my entire life.  I don’t go down easy.

I still enjoy all the women.  We have several doing the Gladiator Rock’n’Run today.  Again…super heroes.  I was hoping to go watch but we ended up with other plans this morning.  I did the ROC race at one point…it’s like Gladiator meets Toon Town – not even close to the same thing.

The women continue to encourage each other at 5:30am.  That in itself is pretty amazing.  I never feel judged with my slow, asthmatic running or the fact that I typically have to be shown how to do a new exercise.  We’ve established that I can’t figure out how to put something under my arms, so something like “lay on your back with one knee bent and one leg extended.  Hold a weight over your head.  Pull your leg and bring the weight up while you crunch” is pretty much like German to me.  It seemed like a pretty easy exercise until Jake came and pointed out that I was skipping the “crunch”.  OH…..Ok….now it hurts.  I must be doing it right then!

Thank you ladies that assured me that I did actually have the kettle bell in the correct hand on Friday while we were doing one legged dead lifts.  “Which leg?”  “What arm?”  “Is this right?”  “Wait…let me turn in the direction you are…are you sure?”  I’m sure it strikes fear into some hearts that I am teaching future nurses if I can’t tell my left from my right.  Fortunately, when passing meds, the mouth is dead center.

One more week to go.  Well…and then the rest of the year.  I stopped coming before.  Coming back was torture.  I’m motivated to stick with it purely to avoid having the pain of re-starting again.  I’ll let you know how next week goes.  I will miss our Little Black Dress celebration as I’ll be in a conference but I will look forward to seeing pics of everyone else.  I’m not quite dress ready yet, anyway.  I need to lose 30 pounds to get into my black dress…Here is a pic of it.  I’ll get there…slow and steady…and never looking back.

 

 

 

 

Week 3 -Muscling through the Midpoint

Week 3 – I’m halfway through the Little Black Dress Challenge.  Three weeks down…three weeks to go.  I didn’t weigh in this week yet so no news to report there.  I do feel better and while I still feel asthmatic and panty while I run, I do have a newfound respect for what my body can do.  I CAN do a wall sit with a weight between my legs for 40 seconds – and I even got to hold the timer this go around since Jake has felt my lack of trust in his timekeeping skills!  What I cannot do, apparently, is count down from five seconds..just as  Zoolander can only turn left, I can only count up.  5…6…7…crap..that’s not right…TIME!

This could be tied to my inability to listen to directions when dealing with the TRX.  Put the straps under your arms..no…under your arms…see where your arms are?  Go under…Hmmmm…let me show you.   What can I say….I’m a visual learner.

I have also been surprised at how many random thoughts hit my head while I’m exercising.  While doing overhead slams with the medicine ball, I was oddly struck with how similar the medicine ball is with Wilson the volleyball from Castaway.  Throw Wilson down…pick Wilson up…throw Wilson down…pick Wilson up…At least I didn’t have to watch Wilson wash away to sea…Nope, he was right there waiting for me each go around – ready to be lifted and slammed again…I think Wilson must have been smarter.

I did have some trouble with my back this week after picking up a box of books from work.  Oddly enough, I can thrust a variety of weights over my head at a park, and can protect my lower back, but when I’m faced with a box of books, all sense and reason goes out the window.  I am also unable to get out of bed, apparently.  After adapting a few exercises and still working out all week without complicating my injury, I further irritated my back yesterday by…sitting up in bed.  It’s true.  I can lift weights but cannot sit…it is an advanced skill.

Realizing that part  of the fun in Boot Camp is listening to everyone’s moans, groans and comments, I felt the need to add in some of the direction and inspiration we’ve been giving this week –

• Nothing changes when you stay in bed.  Things only change when you get OUT of bed!
• There are soooo many ways to do wall sits!
• Hey…Wildlife ladies…it’s just a squirrel – get back to work.  Oh it’s a possum?  That changes everything…not.
• Go…start…begin…what do you ladies understand at 6am?
• There are those that can do…those that can’t do…and those that are questionable.  And none of you are in the last two categories!  AT LEAST  TRY THEM!
• Remember when you said you wanted to work out your core?
• No pressure but someone is waiting for those…
• Please feel free to run ALL the way to your mat…
• and my personal favorite in response to an Audible “Oh God” when he announced our doing  burpees…”Who took the Lord’s name in vain?”

Life is good.  I’m feeling less stressed and stronger.  Little black dress or Big black dress…I’m glad I got out of bed this week!