Havin a Partay!! ... AND Broke the Workout Barrier!!

... with Cathe's Party Rockin Step 2 again just last Monday AND I broke my workout barrier by doing Low Max Step in it's entirety!!! Unheard of for me. You see I've always had challenges with stamina (left over chronic fatigue reminders) and actually rarely have completed a FULL Cathe DVD ever. Yes, I'm a cheater. Ha! So, you can imagine my shock and awe when I finished the complete Low Max workout last Wednesday which is a 70 minute high intensity low impact step workout with 7 combo's combined with 7 HIT blasts after every combo. I felt on top of the world! After the 4th combo/blast I kept psyching myself up with "come on, don't stop at your usual spot you can do another." And I did another and another and another! WooHoo!! I was a very sweaty proud mess at the end.

 

I decided to do a low impact step as my achilles were acting up a bit but still wanted to get in some much needed fun cardio and still keep my goal of building my cardio capacity. I love this workout because it's so much fun, the music is great and it's deceiving. The intensity sneaks up on you and by the 3rd combo/blast your huffing and puffing and feeling the quad burn. Cathe is a master at ramping the intensity up in her workouts and she didn't disappoint here. She uses alot of quad work in this to ramp the cardio up and go anaerobic on you. She even teeters after a blast because she just burnt out our legs big time. It's hilarious to witness because we all swear Cathe is made of steal. Lol!

A Party Rockin Step #2 P.S. ...

 

I recant my previous "Happy Thanksgiving ..." post where I said Party Rockin Step #2 wasn't as intense as her other blastier type step workouts. What was I thinking??!!@@ When I did it again last Monday for the second time, I realized how intense it was! And I did more combo's that time too. I actually liken it to her Intensity DVD but a more toned down, balanced, dancier version. If that makes any sense. I find this the PERFECT balance of dancier step/blasts/plyo to use for really ramping my cardio capacity. As it allows for just the right amount of mini recovery within the plyo moves and blasts.

Can't Wait For Party Rocking Step #1

I just previewed Party Rockin Step #1 and I can't wait!!! It's prancier, dancier, twirlier and more low impact than #2. Perfect for my naughty achilles. And has rockin techno music to boot. The jokes on me because when I bought it ~ it came as a package with Step #2 ~ I wasn't impressed by the choreography in the online preview. Really NOT impressed. I thought it looked cheesy, awkward and forced in it's complexity. Was-I-wrong. Upon previewing the whole dvd the other night I realized how much fun it is and how the moves go great with the funtastic techno music. Man, I LOVE workouts where it's challenging and FUN with a capital F. And Cathe hits the mark every time!!

... so practice, have FUN with a capital F, and all is coming.

Flex Train Choo Choo!!!

More like Woo Hoo!! Or Whoa Hoa!! Last night Cathe burnt my triceps and shoulder muscles with her new workout Flex Train. Ouch! Yah, that picture on her front cover says it all! She will burn your shoulders silly. And here I was trying to keep to my new workout schedule,

~ Nice huh! ~ but she burnt my triceps and shoulders so bad that the plan to do Ultimate Yogi's Strength was killed quick time. It was a night of rest for me. Travis' penchant for all those power chatarunga's would've took me out in no time flat. Travis and Cathe, you guy's kill me in a good way.

Flex Train

This dvd is one of Cathe's new one's and kind of a hybrid between a high rep workout with metabolic tendencies, shall we say. And it's low impact, great for those times when my knees or achilles get twingy. Also great when I want to top off with a full body weight day with added cardio mixed in at the end of the week after having done a heavy weight day earliery on. This will burn! I have to say these metabolic and high rep workouts are new to me as I tend towards heavy weight work and separate cardio work OR sometimes a circuit workout to top off my week. I find dedicated workouts more productive for me as my muscles don't respond to light weight lifting. And metabolic is notorious for using light weights as it's just trying to up the cardio factor and get a little anaerobic at best to burn fat longterm. But to see muscle growth effects, NOT ~ for me anyway. So I've always tended to view them as "time-wasters" and pooh-poohed them. However, done Cathe style, I seem to be enjoying them, surprisingly. And as long as I use them wisely to top off my week or every 2 weeks not replacing my heavy weight days then I'm golden.

If I remember correctly, actually I should remember this correctly as she just about did in my shoulders. In fact, check out all the shoulder work in this preview alone! She started off with shoulder and I made the mistake on the first exercise when we picked up the 8lb weights, I thought I knew better than her and picked up 10's instead. Well, later on I was really sorry I did that! We went from one metabolic shoulder exercise to another to another to another. Waaaa! I was feeling it! I thought when is this ever going to stop!? Next time, I will obey Cathe's cues if I know best. Then we went to heavy back with 25lb, I did 20lb and then some light let's-burn-the-back work. We continued on with bicep, chest and triceps with legs sprinkled in. Then abs to close. I went heavier on the biceps and didn't do the pulses but did more traditional sets and reps. I have to be very careful not to do high reps or pulses for my biceps as I believe that type of lifting is too stressful for my bicep brachialis tendons. And I don't want to get tendonitis there again.

This was a great workout as it gave me a nice two for one ~ high rep and cardio conditioning. How can I go wrong. And I sweated nicely. The only thing that I fault is that you won't get a leg workout with this. Barely burnt the legs except for the last leg exercise where you WILL feel the burn. But there wasn't enough exercises and heavy enough to warrant it in any way close to a leg workout. All in all Cathe's Flex Train is a keeper!

... practice and all is coming.

Cathe, Kino and Travis!

The dynamic trio! ... I'm so proud of myself as I just did 3 workouts in a row since I've been back at work starting this past Monday, with my awesome go to trainers. I decided to print out a workout schedule and try really hard to focus and stick to it. I find that planning, printing and having my schedule in front of me at my desk is really helping me with my motivation and focus. I was finding that in my heart I want to do it. The heart drive is there BUT my physical, psychological motivation was lagging behind once the evening came around. This way, seeing my planned schedule and also knowing my days off is really helping me so far. But the true test is time over tension and consistency. So we'll see!

My Bakasana Ideal
(arms straight, knees higher)

My Bakasana Reality
(arms bent, knees lower, but getting there!)

I'm going to try and keep this short and sweet. Just an overview as I need to get to bed!

Travis Monday: 

On Monday I did my hearthrob, Travis', Ultimate Yogi Flexibility and snuck in a bakasana (arm balance) and jumpback to chatarunga. Weee! I felt stronger the second time around. Love the front splits in this one which he has you sit in forever! I'm practically groin down on one side. Yes! My hammies feel quite knackered the next day, but you know it's just stretchy growing pains — the Travis' leftover effect — pummelling my hammies to submissive openess. All's good.

Cathe Tuesday:

Then on Tuesday I did the awesome Cathe's XTrain All Out Low Impact HIIT. My achilles have been feeling a touch twingy lately from all that plyometric jumpy fun I've been having. Been icing diligently but thought what better time than this to try her dvd. Man, this got my heart rate up. It was funtastic.

She uses alot of low impact cardio moves that really hit the quads hard making it anaerobic too. Those quads burn!! There was floor work then step work and finally glide disc. I'm still having trouble with those discs. I can't quite keep my feet on them without them sliding off during the exercises. I'm trying to figure out what the magic trick is. But overall this was an amazingly fun, challenging, HIIT, quad quaking sweatfest without any impact that left my quads nice and sore the next day. I even felt the soreness in my vastus medialis muscle (the teardrop) muscle close to my knees. Nice! This is a muscle that's always been hard for me to engage properly yet is key to keeping my patellas stabilized. So, it's nice to know that all those vastus medialis leg extension machine exercises that I do at the gym is paying off.

Kino Wednesday:

And I topped it all off tonight with my favorite beautiful ashtangi yogini teacher, Kino's Primary dvd. Not that I don't have other fav yogi teacher's ~ we all know me and Travis ~ but sorry Travis I have some other loves too. lol!

With Kino's dvd, I love her pacing which is a bit quicker and her impressive non-stop dialogue of instructions. Some will love the chatter and some won't. I love it. It actually keeps me focused and in the zone. Also, if you really listen to what she's saying her directions are a phenomenal gold mine of tips, teaching and guidance into each posture. Literally a treasure chest of information. And I got to practice my jump backs and throughs. I will master you yet! Funny, the Travis set has helped give me more strength and stamina for the primary which is a nice bonus. I'm actually not surprised as I thought it might.

Hmmm, I don't think I was successful in keeping it short. Oh well!

So, it's been a good week so far and it's just past hump day! Now it's all down hill from here. Weeee!

... practice, schedule ~ do whatever works ~ and all is coming.

Ultimate Yogi Cardio ... Waaaa?!?!

O.M.Gerd!!! Travis, babe, you're killing me! Lor' give me strength! Or rather, if I keep this up, Travis & God WILL give me strength! ... That's the way I felt doing his amazing Cardio disc on his amazing 108 day odyssey, 12 disc yoga program. (Psst, I'm not really doing the 108 days, as I'd get super bored doing any program that long plus I need the cross-training, and he'd do in my already misaligned shoulders through no fault of his own. Just that too much chatarunga's does not make my shoulders too happy.) And I do love his Bryan Kest like rhyming (there's no doubt he was taught by him) which I find keeps me focused, trancelike and happy. And you need it through this one.

I loved Cardio! Maybe it's because I'm a closet adrenalin junkie. And this will give you your fix. No question about it. Now, this disc is not a misnomer. This is a one non stop, breathless, power vinyasa flow. There is NO rests in downdog except for the very first one in his version of sun salutation A. And from then on in it's all systems GO! Remember when I said in my last post about him, he'll make downdog feel like a resting posture? Well, you'll be begging for one now. He takes us through about 5 of his versions of sun sal A's before going into 5 of his versions of sun sal B's, which include 3 legged downdog, knee to nose, leg back up then through to high lunge. When you get back to chair pose in sun sal B you sit there and do a flow from arms up to chest to thigh with arms back then sitting back up with arms up. The first cycle you do one of these in chair then you do that same flow in high lunge on each side. Then you cycle back to chair doing the flow 2x in chair and 2x in high lunges and you go on until you complete 5 cycles. It looks benign upon previewing but man by the 2nd cycle your legs are starting to burn in chair pose and the burn gets hotter and hotter as you go along. And the breathe gets louder and louder. Remember there's NO breaks. THEN after the 5th sun sal B you then go through vinyasa's from side to side 10 times! Yeah, you heard me, 10 times! Well, Travis, my babe, lost me there. I only made it through 6 cycles before I raised the white flag. By that time, I was a breatheless, sweaty, sniffling, leg quivering mess. As a Cathlete once said "I think I almost drooled." But it was amazing and I glowed afterwards. So, nevermind that I finished early, I have faith that when Travis, my babe, is finished with me, I will be one strong iron warrior woman!!

... practice, drool, and all is coming.

Premix X49 ... Ya Right!

Yeah, that's right I tried, is the operative word, to do premix X49 on Cathe's new high intensity dvd X10 last Tuesday. Ya right who was I fooling! Delusion is the reason for optimism! ... This awsome dvd is actually 5 separate workouts that are only 10 minutes long, a misnomer as none of them are actually 10 minutes, more like 12 minutes to 17 minutes long, but when you add the warmup and cool down works out to around 25 to 30 minutes each. They were designed to be used as mini-blast-that-bootie-into-afterburn workouts that you can do when you're short on time or want to tack it on to a weight training or yoga day. Or you can use the premix section and do a number of the workouts all in one. All these ways are equally valid and this dvd was purposely designed for all these varied uses in mind. It includes 5 workouts: Step, Low Impact, Hi/Lo, Cardio Blast and Fat Burning Circuit.

So with that I thought I'd go all out and do the X49 premix. Now, I got to premise that the amazing Cathletes out there have been running forum threads that they did X77, the most powerful and cardio blasting of ALL 5 workouts strung together. Talk about ironman! Well, I have no inclination to go to nosebleed levels in the near or far future but I just thought why not try X49? It's just 3 sections, the step, low impact, cardio blast sections plus warmup and cool down. What can it hurt? Oh ya, it hurt! I could only get up to low impact and I was through. Done in! Caput! But come to think of it I only had one more section to go. So really not so bad, eh? So I'm still proud of myself and won't disturb my ego by comparing to the nosebleed Cathletes.

I initially thought the warm up would be boring as I don't particularly like floor cardio warmups, preferring step. But the music was so amazing that I forgot all about my funny preferences and really got into it. In fact, I got an earworm of the song in my dreams it was that good. Haha! Actually Cathe outdid herself in this dvd and really chose amazing music for all the workouts. Especially notable was the low impact section that played a revved up version of Aerosmith's Walk This Way. It was a blast and just pushes you to keep going. Speaking of keep going, I thought I was going to die with the step portion. I knew from previewing it I was going in deep and felt it was the hardest workout of the 5 and let me preface this by saying that all of them are hard. And I'm not the only one that feels that, the Cathletes do too. Ha! And the reason it is, is because she starts right off without a by or leave into fast feet shuffles into jump ropes into power 15's with NO breaks at all which she cycles over and over until she moves onto long hop turns etc. Holy nap Batman, when can I breathe! I had to do my forced breaks to breathe. lol! But I made it through and soldiered onto the metabolic section after the step and then onto the low impact segment where I called it a day. And proceeded to have a nap later on. That workout deserved a nap, darn it!

... practice and nap and all is coming.

Oh My Poor DOMS!

I.am.sore.with.DOMS.all.over.my.body.from.tip.to.stern! I was very good and rested on Wednesday then on Thursday did Burn Set Bi's, Shoulders and Ab's that Cathe was so nice to put as bonus workouts on her XTrain dvd's so you don't even have to get her Burn Set dvd if you don't want to. Though you still have to flip from dvd to dvd to get at them. Details, details. Then yesterday was heavy weight work at the gym and I did back, legs, chest and triceps. And I'm so proud of myself as I'm now at 105lb on both the leg extension machine and the squat rack. Yeah! I think I'll go to 110lb for plie squats next week. However with those two heavy weight days in a row I am SORE! I haven't been this sore all over in ages and no amount of whey protein with added BCAA's is putting a dent in it. Ha! My shoulders ache, my chest aches, my lats aches, by ab's burn, my biceps ache, my inner thighs ache! The only muscles that don't yelp at me yet are my triceps and quads BUT they may just be biding their good old time only to bite me in the butt tomorrow. They don't call it delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) for nothing. But I digress ...

Cathe's XTrain Burn Set Bi's and Shoulder's 

XTrain Burn Sets is one of Cathe's newer dvds which I did for the very first time on Thursday. I actually don't have the dvd but she's so amazingly generous that she added them as bonus workouts on her other XTrain dvd's so I did her Burn Set Bi's added as bonus on her Cardio Leg Blast dvd ~ the full workout no less, no short changing here. And Burn Set Shoulder's added as bonus on her All Out Low Impact HIIT dvd. And I think it's now going to be one of my favourite heavy weight dvd workouts. It's exactly the way I like to work with weights as I like to go heavy. And this way allows for that along with the rest periods in between sets.

 

 

How she does it is for each muscle group we do 3 different exercises plus a burn set to really burn and work the muscle to submission. This allows for really good gains. For each exercise we do 2 sets with a goal of 10 reps so you should go as heavy as you can for 10 reps. Then you do the third set to failure. On the failure set you shouldn't have your weight too light that you could go past 15 reps and too heavy that you can't go past 5 reps. Then after those 3 exercises you do the burn set finisher. It was awesome and I new my muscles were worked and I'd be feeling it the next day. I liked the exercise choices she used for biceps and shoulders, they are the one's I find the most effective and that don't strain my tendons. Like incline bench biceps curls my tendons HATE and I won't do. And she didn't do them. Yes! And she didn't do the front close grip close to the body barbell raises for the shoulders that my scapula muscles despise. Thank goodness it's not a popular exercise anymore anyways. I did cheat and skip a set in the biceps and shoulders as I need to be careful with my bicep tendons and I needed to work up to this dvd. lol! Awesome and effective. Cathe did it again!

... practice and all is coming.

A Truly Green Green Smoothie

Finally my truly green green smoothie...

Banana Berry Spinach Spirulina Smoothie

I have a tendency to make berry smoothies with blueberries and blackberries that always come out dark. So this time I decided to make a delectably delicious banana, strawberry, raspberry, spinach and spirulina green smoothie — that's a mouthful! — that tastes divine and gives that wondrous green colour instead of the muted dark sludge colour that doesn't look so appetizing in pictures but is none-the-less divine in taste.

This is another one of my yummie anti-aging smoothies that I always have in the mornings. I just mix up the fruit and the various powders in it to create the different flavours.

Spirulina My Super-Duper-Food

I suffer from low iron stores. Or should I say used to suffer from low iron stores. My doc told me I can get good iron from kale but to remember to add vitamin C to it in order to absorb the iron. I went a step further and researched and found out that Spirulina, a blue green algae superfood, has a super high iron, protein and vitamin A content. It has 93 times more iron than steak, 2.5 times more beta carotene than carrots, 2 times more protein than ground beef and 8 times more chlorophyll than spinach! It packs a wallop! So with just adding that to my smoothie every morning — which by the way you don't taste with all the other fruits your adding — along with sodium ascorbate vitamin C powder, I went from an iron store of 9 (below 10 is BAD) to a whopping 30! I have never been 30 in my life and I used to eat alot of protein. I even have my Dad taking it now.

My favourite brands are Nu-Greens Spirulina that I get at my favourite local health food store. They have THE best prices in the city. And Pure Hawaiian Spirulina Pacifica by Nutrex in a dark glass bottle that I get from iherb.com, an amazing, great price, great shipping online store. Would you believe that Nutrex Spirulina lasted me 3.5 years and was as fresh as the day I got it. When I first got it a had a health crisis and couldn't take anything, no supplements, no superfoods for 3 years. So it went in the cupboard for all that time. When I finally took it out I couldn't bear to throw it away before trying it as it smelled and looked as fresh as when I bought it. Well surprise, surprise it was! And I was able to use it up. You can't say that about many health foods. Lol!

• Baby spinach
• 4 Baby carrots
• 1/8 Slice of avocado (for creamy smoothness)
• Frozen bananas, strawberries, raspberries
• Spirulina
• Goji berries (more beta-carotene then carrots, high in zeaxanthin for eye health, health tonic)
• Maca (hormone balancing, energizing, libido boosting, fertility boosting to menopause calming miracle food. lol!)
• Ground flax and chia (great source of omega-3's and fibre)
• Sodium ascorbate Vitamin C (to absorb the iron, immune boosting, no more colds, or viral conjunctivitis! Yeah! It also alkalizes you and is perfect for gout sufferers! Another yeah!)
• Protein powder (I use unsweetened plain whey, can use plant based)
• Milk or unsweetened almond milk

Simply put all ingredients in a blender (LOVE my Nutribullet! Tip: for Canadians, Canadian Tire has great prices.) and blend until smooth and creamy. Only takes about 20 seconds or less in my Nutribullet. If you feel inspired and want to go for that yummy chewy goodness garnish with some more goji berries, fresh fruit, oats, pumpkin and sunflower seeds, dried blueberries, currents, etc. The sky's the limit.

Sip or spoon and enjoy the breakfast of champions!

Kitty Bloopers

Did you just garnish
me Mommy? I seem to
have a third eye.

I wanna!

Why thank you Mommy 
you shouldn't have!

Feeling for Spring — Ah Spring Rolls

Spring rolls are so light and refreshing and they're so healthy too. Great way to kick off a clean eating and clean those arteries plan especially when you let a few too many indulging binges set in. It's time to regroup and recorrect. I already did a nice stretchy yoga practice the other day to stretch those arteries — Dr. Oz says elastic arteries are very good for you and yoga is the best way to get there — so now, what better way to blast them clean with a clean eating plant based diet. Besides, it makes me feel like spring even though we're heading into ol' man winter again. ;) 

Ingredients

• orange peppers (go wild and choose whatever colours you like)

• alfalfa sprouts (go wild again and choose whatever sprouts float your boat)

• baby spinach or mixed greens

• shredded carrot slaw

• rice paper

• hummus (I have a red pepper version here)

• protein of choice (quinoa, fish, shrimp, chicken, etc. I used chicken.)

Directions

Start by putting very warm water into a large frying pan. Soak and roll one rice paper at a time. Place the rice paper in the water and soak for about 30 seconds to a minute until pliable. Gently place on a cutting board and place your ingrediants in the bottom third of the paper lengthwise. Fold over one end and roll halfway then fold the sides and complete the roll. Continue doing this one at a time. To serve put a dollop of hummus or as I do go wild with the hummus on every bite. Yum! 

If you don't plan on eating them right away wrap them individually in saranwrap or wax paper and store. 

Sore Muscles, Sore Eyes ... but Beautiful Vision

Everything is sore from sore muscles to sore eye. lol! I do love sore muscles as I know I did some crazay effective workouts. Like yesterday's amazing Xtrain Cardio Leg Blast by Cathe which made my quads and hamstrings sore and the day before Travis' Ultimate Yogi Flexibility which darn well did in my butt, hamstrings and shoulders. So, I've got DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) setting in nicely now. Yowza! With that a rest day was in order today. And to top it all off my left eye began feeling achy when doing some minor grocery shopping in my neighbourhood. Today was the first day I went out with my eyes fully undressed from the protective sunglasses the doc gave me. And my eyes felt the wonky vision full on in broad beautiful daylight. My eyes are so miss matched blurry that the walking around trying to focus through the brilliant haze proved a little too much too soon. Thank goodness I wasn't out too long and still managed to enjoy the fall sunlight. I even took this beautiful vision of a picture above on the way home which made me almost and I say almost love fall! lol! But I digress ...

Xtrain Cardio Leg Blast by Cathe

 

 

I did Cathe's amazing Cardio Leg Bast for the first time yesterday. I had this disc for a while but had to shelve it until my knees grew stronger. So, now I'm enjoying some good ol jumping cardio. It reminds me of my ballet days doing all the beautiful jumping floor work. I felt so light, lithe and strong back then and it makes me feel the same now, so exhilerating being finally able to do it again.

This is a great cardio and moderately heavy weight leg circuit workout with 12 rounds of about one minute plyometric cardio blast (HIT) with one moderate weighted leg work for about a maximum 16 reps which you repeat 12 times. The first 6 rounds are done off the step and the next 6 rounds are done on. No exercises are repeated so it's really fun. At first I used slightly lighter weights than Cathe and crew wanting to play it safe with my knees but then realized if I wanted to feel any burn with just 16 reps I needed to match or go heavier with the weights. So when I hit the round where we did plie squats — my legs are strong for this — I went with my 50lb barbell than their lighter pound dumbbells. I also added some extra pulse squats to the squat section to feel more burn and instead of doing their side lunges after that set — my knees do NOT like side lunge motions — I did pop squats interspersed with jump ropes. I found this more effective for my quads following quad style plyos with weighted quad work. It employs the quad muscles in a way that forces the quads to get strong very fast. Also, I noticed that, especially with the jumps on the step, I bend my knees more than the crew does. I think my ballet training has alot to do with this. This technique creates a softer, quieter, more controlled landing and also takes the impact into the quad and calf muscles more than the knees. Thus protecting the joints while building powerful, more explosive lean legs. I did have to take some extra breathes here and there but all in all I was able to keep up nicely and ALMOST completed the workout. I got to round 11 and quit. Naughty girl! I didn't realize there was only one more to go!

The music was great and keeps you going when it gets hard and was one of the reasons I was able to even get to round 11 and also I love step work. Cathe's a pro at using amazingly hip music and crescendoing it at just the right moments to keep you fired up and getting that extra wind to take you to the next level. Really amazing! (Can you tell music is very important to me for workouts. It actually will make or break what would be a very good workout for me. Cathe is a genius for this most of the time. The one time she derailed was when she did her amazing STS heavy weight periodization program where for me the music did NOT work.)

I forgot to do the bonus Burn Set Bi's at the end. But was probably wise that I forgot. As I'm feeling the sore today and don't need anymore added to it. That's another wonderful thing about Cathe is she's so generous (Amy Bento does the same too) she always adds premixes to all her dvds and sometimes adds bonus workouts from her other dvds in the set. Which she really went all out on with her Xtrain set. Kudos Cathe!

... so practice, get nice and sore, and all is coming.

Love and Butterflys ...

Yes, love and butterflys! Because I'm in love with Travis Eliot and his Ultimate Yogi DVD set AND I woke up with butterflys in my tummy, unfortunately not from him but from the queeziness of the blurry wonkiness of very slow healing PRK monovision. Yuck!! ... After I finally ate my breaky my tummy settled down and my brain began accepting the two toned blur of vision. I have a very narrow range of up close vision, basically my face has to be up close to the screen to see anything. Lol! And everything else is a lopsided blur fiasco. I forgot that because I'm getting BOTH eyes done that I won't have the other eye to compensate and take over for me as in my two last lasers. So I miscalculated on the adaptation and how long my healing would be to best corrected vision. And also forgot about adapting to monovision AND PRK being much more slow healing to best corrected than LASIK. Oh well live and learn as they say!

My right eye was corrected to see far but my doc has to overshoot the correction to see close up at first for it to heal to far vision where then I won't see up close anymore in that eye. And he corrected the left eye (the eye that's been corrected twice before and was the one I was seeing out of for 3 years AND is my non dominant eye that was trained and forced to be dominant, so my right eye is now lazy!) for up close vision and is still a blur up close and lets NOT speak about far vision as it will NEVER see for far. So right now my left eye is doing NADA and my right see's with a narrow span up close but is continually SLOWLY changing to far vision. So, I'm cross-eyed right now. AND on top of that now my right eye is my lazy eye when it used to be my dominant eye. So later on I may have to wear a pirate patch on my left eye when not reading — "aye, aye, matey!" — to get my right eye to accept monovision and become dominant again for far vision. Many people become nauseous at first before their brains adapt to monovision and fuses their sight together. So it's not a walk in the park unfortunately, it's a real bugger actually. But so far so good I've only got a couple of queezy sessions but my eyes do tire easily when doing things like switching my summer winter clothes, which took me all afternoon, proved too much for me eyes. Yes, it took me this late in the season to do it. I'm such a slacker! But thank goodness I can workout, doctor sanctioned (as I didn't have lasik flap surgery)! My saving grace! As I don't need my eyes to focus too much. Yeah! And as long as I keep the sweat out of my eyes I'm good to go. So, no yoga studio's for me, sorry Mysore, as I sweat way too darn much in my shala for it to be safe for my eyes. But anyway I digress...

My Love, Travis Eliot

So, lets get on to more important things like my love, Travis, the babe, who made the most wonderful challenging intense upper body and lower body focused 12 dvd yoga practice set. He actually left my legs a-quivering!! That's how much he affects me! Yesterday after getting over the queeziness and other sundries I did his Flexibility dvd (they don't have that video available so I've included Cross Training instead) coupled with the seated of Power Yoga for Happiness in order to keep up with my pickup jump backs and throughs. I just did the standing of Flexibility and it was a strong intense practice lots of his version of sun sals to get you warmed up then he did lots of stretching postures, forward folds, standing splits, intense side stretch pose, deep lunge warriors, seated front splits with lots of chatarunga vinyasa's interspersed to keep the heat and sweat going to maintain limberness. He also included his famous yogi pushups which Cathe likes to call tricep pushups to round things out. It's such a sweet well choreographed balanced practice reminiscent of the wonderful Brian Kest (he trained under him and it shows in his teaching philosophy and his cute rhyming) but with, I think, even better flows. And even though some people don't like his mannerisms I do like when he drags out "down doooooooooog." It somehow changes my perspective of downdog to a resting posture. And believe me, with Travis' strenuous yet effective flows, downdog will suddenly feel VERY restful indeed. lol! The only things missing, is I wish my love, Travis, would have fairy dust sprinkled in some arm balances and jump throughs/backs. I think with his challenging style he could've gone all the way. I mean why stop there? Maybe with Penultimate Yogi II I'll get my wish. In any case it was a fabulous practice and I have DOMS all over my backside and hamstrings to prove it. Well done, Travis my love, well done!

... practice and all is coming.