So... I've been busy, of course. But as I have read all the Hunger Games books and several other trashy or funny novels, I have caught up on Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead (WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!?!?!?!?), and there have been days when I have gotten through my ENTIRE news feed on Facebook, I think I could have jotted down a bit here or there.
The main issue with writing this blog is that it doesn't really have a theme. It's not like this is the place you get incredible recipes that are low-fat/ organic/ sustainable/ vegan but taste exactly like bacon on top of other pork products (Come to think of it, I would TOTALLY want that recipe). I don't have the technology/ambition to upload clever photos of my crafty goodness. I occasionally take pictures of costumes I design, but that's all work-y.
I had an idea today to do an experiment where I dress like a Muslim woman with a scarf on my head and whatnot for a month just as a social experiment... but I realized that all of my shirts show off too much cleavage (40G kinda cleavage), so the scarves would have to be REALLY big... plus I would live in fear that an actual Muslim woman would approach me and greet me. Although I know that the proper response to "Alsalam Alaikum" is "Wa' Alaikum Salaam," (because I've seen "Malcolm X" and "Aladdin"), I'm pretty sure I would freeze up worse than I do when I am greeted in the Mexican market and can't even manage to say "Gracias" without sounding like an utter tool.
I was also thinking about writing a blog about my journey to run a half marathon (no really). For anyone who doesn't know (and I'm pretty sure the 7 people that actually read this do), my dad is a race director for ultra-marathons. What that means is that he organizes a crap-ton of people who want to strap on some expensive shoes and run through the mountains for ungodly distances. He does three distances: 1/2 marathon (for fun!), a 50 miler, and a 100 miler. (There is much crying and non-traditional use of Vaseline on that last one.) I am the official cook for his races.
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| Nothing more flattering than wearing and apron over 5 layers of fleece! |
And while I can make a delicious vegan chili for 200 people (okay... maybe I SHOULD put recipes on this thing), I haven't really run since I was in 8th grade, and my dad can attest that I spent that entire 10k bitching and moaning and mostly walking. I am not a runner. (When people at the races ask me about me running, my "clever" response is always "I only run when chased, and I'm rarely chaste." A homonym. ha ha.) Cut to this last race I was working. I'm standing in my cook apron, taking a break from standing at the stove to stand not at the stove. I'm chatting with a few runners who good-naturedly start ribbing me about not running. A guy named Ethan really wants to know when I'm going to run one of my dad's races. I throw down the "chased/chaste joke" response, to no avail. I talk about my crappy back issues (did I mention 40G boobs?) and he is not fazed.
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| 40 G... as in, "G"od damn those are huge boobs! |
When I finally hide behind the fact that I have to cook, Ethan throws down for realsies. He says that if I run a race, he will cook in my place. He is backed up by several other runners egging me on. The whole thing goes back and forth in something akin to when I got talked into jumping off a bridge in high school (so, Mom, I guess you know my answer there...), and suddenly I have agreed to train to run my dad's 1/2 marathon. 13.2 miles doesn't sound like that much (to Marines, anyway), but my dad is evil incarnate, and his race is 6.1 miles straight up a mountain and then 6.1 miles back down it.
Which reminds me of the story of when I almost car-jacked at kayaker. You see, though I personally am a large, lazy person, I tend to have Sporty Spice friends. I don't know how this happens, but it is pretty true, especially since I moved to LA. I got talking once with a few of my good friends, Amber, Dominick, Amanda, and Chris, about how much I love camping. (Ya see, I go camping every Memorial Day weekend and cook for a crap-ton of people for 4 days. We call it camping, but it's about 30 feet to our car, I cook with an amazingly equipped kitchen that is literally 4 times the size of my kitchen at home, we sleep on a huge air mattress... in fact, the only thing that really qualifies it as camping is that the walls are made of fabric and you need a flashlight and shoes to go pee.) Well, these peeps who also like camping (the real kind, like the "you better fucking pack a shovel and toilet paper" kind) got me all excited about this camping spot on an island off the coast of Santa Barbara. It sounded pretty killer, actually. These were our best friends and hanging out for the weekend on a goddamn island? It's like "Cast Away" only with less volleyball and more beer. Sweet!
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| Amber and Dominick |
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| Amanda and Chris |
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| Us just full of delight that we are being ditched on this island with no flush toilets. |
The first night was lovely. Much laughter was had by all. We got silly on food and booze and passed out rather early from the energy expended from all the dragging and walking and setting up of my over-prepared campsite. The next morning is when it happened. That's when I realized that camping was for reals. We had a lovely breakfast and everyone decided to go on a hike that day to explore the island. I was suddenly face to face with the reality that camping on an island did not have built in entertainment, and "nature" was what we were there for. We put on our best hiking duds, grabbed three water bottles (like, the kind you get at a fast food restaurant or out of a vending machine... the little ones) total, and started up the path.
We came to a big map/sign that showed all the trails on the island. Turned out that the tiny island wasn't quite as tiny as I'd imagined. Our options were: hike back to the beach where the dock for the ferry boat was (1 mile), hike up toward the side of the island that faced Santa Barbara and walk along the cliffs (2 miles- which I was secretly hoping for, but discouraged by, because it looked like a whole lotta up to get to the top of the cliffs), an out and back to the beach on the western side of the island (7 miles), and a hike that would take us around the circumference of the entire island (about 13 miles). Much to my horror, my evil, evil friends started getting excited about the idea of doing the circumference hike. Ho-ly shit. In proper "I totally get picked last for dodgeball" manner, I pleaded with them to observe the girth of my ass and take pity. The compromise was made that we would take the "short" hike and just do the 7 miles. Fuck. Me.
The hike started out brutal right from the first hundred yards. We had to go up this trail that sorta just cut straight up the side of this hill in front of us. I figured we'd get to the top of this hill and just walk across this imagined plateau from there... and there would be unicorns too. We got to the top of that hill and I suddenly realized that the whole fucking island was a hill... and we had only just begun to go up it.
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| It just kept... going... up. |
By the time I could actually see how goddamn UP this hike was, the rest of the group had already broken into the three couples (who somehow seemed to be paired up simply on how well they could scale a freaking mountain- I bet that isn't one of the questions on eHarmony!). It took a really really long time for me to drag my ass to the top of that mountain. And I stood at the top of the hill, my water bottle long since emptied, and I fought with the idiots in my brain. My mathematically inclined brain idiot said, "That was only 1.75 miles and it kicked your ass so hard you are now purple." And the brain idiot that secretly likes reading tabloid magazines and often succumbs to peer pressure said, "The rest of your friends are probably already at the beach on the other side and wondering where you are." And math idiot says, "If you continue walking and don't go back now, you will have to walk TWICE as far, AND it might seem like cake now because it's downhill to the beach on the other side... but you will have to walk UPHILL to get back to this point coming back." And the artsy fartsy brain idiot that loves travel based screen savers and is drawn to shiny things said, "I bet the beach on the other side is spectacular. Like The Blue Lagoon." And then I pictured Joe and me frolicking in the beautiful surf on a white sand beach and the math brain idiot got outvoted. So on we walked.
It didn't take that long to finish the rest of the hike to the Western beach. But by the time I got there, I LITERALLY thought I was going to die (and not like the "I literally just walked a million miles" kind of crap that 16 year olds seem to say these days). The weather was sunny and clear and in the mid 80s, and I had unfortunately dressed that day in 100 pounds of extra body weight.... and jeans... and we were all out of water.
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| Proof that I was delirious... Why the hell am I smiling? |
By the time we finally stepped off the path and onto the beach (which was, in fact, freaking gorgeous, by the way), I'm pretty sure I looked like the first wave of the zombie apocalypse. My friends, however, did not fear my random twitching and sweat-stained knee pits (Like, really? You can get sweaty on the back of your knees? Apparently.). They offered me a delightfully shaded tree stump to set myself on and much encouragement. And though I love my friends with all of my heart, I wanted to rip their faces off and shove them up a dolphin's butthole at that moment, as I was about to die and they were cooing about the majesty of this idyllic beach. I somehow dragged myself to the water's edge to try in some half-assed way to play in the surf as I had imagined on that mountaintop... only to discover that (oh yeah) it's still the fucking Pacific Ocean and the water is colder than a nun's vagina. Not like the cool, refreshing kind of water that just takes a minute to get used to but then is just lovely. No. We're talking like attempting to grab that last bottle of beer from the cooler after midnight at a 4th of July barbecue. It's just not worth it. So now 90% of me is shvitzing like a whore in synagogue, and from my ankles down I have hypothermia. Fuck.
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| Apparently boys don't have feeling in their skin area, because they totally went in the water and, like, hung out there. |
So I drag myself back to sit under a tree and watch my friends run around on the beach and flirt with each other and be all tampon commercial-y, and I slowly start to imagine my impending demise. Math brain idiot starts to gloat. "You see that 70 degree incline behind you? Yeah, jackass. You have to walk back UP that to get back to your tent." I look around and there is no blue emergency phone. There is beach. There is sand. There is a picnic table. (I guess for the bitches that are so twinked out that they also like to haul a wine and cheese basket on their goddamn 7 mile hike.) There is no shortcut home. And that is when I came to the inevitable conclusion that I was going to die right there under that tree. I'm pretty sure I muttered something ridiculous to Dominick at that point, because I vaguely recall him saying something about LifeFlight not being able to land on that beach. I think he walked away then... but I'm pretty sure I was hallucinating at that point (either that or the 5 others had gotten together earlier to work out the jazz choreography they were suddenly doing to entertain me). And as I sat there saying mental goodbyes to my friends and feeling exceedingly sorry for myself, two people in kayaks happened to come around the cliff and near the beach where I was sitting. And suddenly I found myself hatching a plan.
I feel like I need to make something perfectly clear here. I have never been in a kayak. The closest I have ever come to that is the Davy Crockett Explorer Canoes ride at Disneyland. And I somehow feel like the paddling strength of a boat with 30 people on it is not solely due to my brilliant oar work.
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| Oh yeah... I'm totally pulling the lion's share. |
I further need to state that friends of mine have kayaked and described kayak training to me to my abject terror. You have to do these "rolls" where the kayak is overturned and you- still strapped to the fucking thing- have to right yourself. Which is pretty much my greatest phobia- being trapped underwater. (Add sharks to that- which you probably could very easily do in this part of the ocean- and you have recreated my recurring nightmare since I was 7 and secretly watched "Jaws.") Pile on the fact that the water was pretty choppy and the kayakers (who I'm pretty sure had done this before) were struggling a bit AND the fact that I have the upper body strength of a "before" picture (I have NEVER successfully done a single pull-up in my life, even in middle school when we were doing all that physical fitness testing. Sorry to disappoint you, President H.W. Bush.).
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| Why did you have to be such a weakling on my watch? I can't take it anymore! |
Yeah, and did I mention that the water felt like I had fallen into the pond while ice skating? But I truly contemplated that I was going to "save" myself by... swimming out through freezing water... wrestling a plastic floating thing away from someone who I'm pretty sure owned a Bowflex... defend myself from the OTHER kayaker, who I'm sure at least had a Bally's membership... immediately teach myself how to operate same said floating thing... and then somehow navigate to the other side of the island where the boat landing was and then walk the mile down the (albeit flat) road back to the campsite and hope that the kayakers wouldn't recognize me as one of the 10 other campers staying on that island that weekend and come kick the shit out of me as I slept. My plan was foolproof!
However, by the time I got through planning it in my delirium, the kayakers had pretty much passed the little cove where I sat. And my ever so genius plan had to be tucked away for the next time I found myself in my own brain's Hunger Game scenario. (Let that be a lesson to any kayakers that might happen by me in the future... I could possibly flail in the water near you in a very upsetting way.) That's the point that I started crying in self pity. About 2 minutes into that is when I laid down and fell asleep.
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| If I died, at least Joe would still have a pillow. |
It is amazing how much optimism is contained in one little nap in the shade on a beautiful beach. When I woke up, I decided to live. My friends, clearly finished with their reindeer games, were ready to head back. I was completely aware that the trek back would NOT be all of us moving as one unit, and I waved them on as I begin to climb back up the mountain in literal 6 inch steps. I kept getting passed by other people on the trail. I'm pretty sure there was a moment I had to pull off the path to let an octogenarian in a sunhat power-walk past me. But the peer pressure brain idiot had been drowned in the bay, so I didn't give a rat's ass how slow I was. As our elevation increased, so did the sun. With no water at all, I was totally overheating. I rolled up my jeans as high as they would go and took off my shirt. Now these granola eaters out for a pleasure hike were coming across a sweat-drenched woman in awkward capris and a Frederick's of Hollywood bra with her shirt hanging out her back pocket and stomach skin whiter than Mitt Romney's ass. (I'm pretty sure that my belly thinks a "two piece" is something you order at KFC.)
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| I look like a groupie for Lynyrd Skynyrd. |
Then something weird happened... I saw the top of the hill in the distance.... and I started running.
What?!?
Yup. In my bra and rolled jeans and crappy shoes, I started running back along the trail. I have no goddamn clue what clicked or snapped in my brain at that moment, but I really wanted to run. And it felt kinda good. I got that runner's high thing my dad had told me about. My friends (who were WAY ahead because I had started out at a pace that would have been outdistanced by a nursing home resident with tennis balls on their walker) actually were very concerned about me. When they got back to the campsite, they started to fill water bottles to hike back toward me to help me down the mountain. And then here Joe and I come, fucking running down the trail toward them. What the hell?
We spent the rest of the time that weekend doing MUCH easier hikes (we spotted a fox on the 2 mile hike up to the cliffs!) and drinking a lot.
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| Seriously! |
I sometimes wonder if my fit friends ever were disappointed they weren't able to do the big 13 mile loop the next day. But I think they realized a bloated corpse would be hard to drag back to the boat... especially when they already had the pop-up tent to carry.
So that's the story of 7 miles hiking. And I have now somehow been convinced (fucking peer pressure brain idiot!) to RUN 13.2 miles in June of 2013. (They let me have until next year because they saw the panic in my face when they suggested that 2 1/2 months was plenty of time to train for a half marathon.)
I guess I should write about that then, huh?
Day 1:
Didn't exercise at all. The sum total of movement consisted of folding laundry, pushing a shopping cart, lifting a kid into a carseat, and bending over to pick stickers off the floor tiles where Baz had "decorated" them. My back is still in spasm from falling down the stairs last week. (Yeah, that happened.) I'm guessing the first month or two of "training" will consist of doing all the physical therapy exercises I was assigned when I first developed sciatica. Joy.
If you have read this far, I am amazed. Thanks.
