Today at the pool there were 4 firemen doing laps two lanes over from me. One asked me at the end how far I had swum, and looked impressed. I guess my belly can be misleading, but honestly, swimming is the only exercise I can really enjoy at all now. I get lazy to try to get in any yoga positions that are still considered safe, and I start having false labor contractions if I walk at a speed or long enough to actually get exercise.
I was able to swim 2000 yds today which is the longest I've done in a long time. It's amazing what real rest can do for you-- now that we're off for the Christmas break and I'm not working and I can take naps whenever I want, I find that I'm not completely exhausted at the end of the day. It's amazing! So today I had a lot of energy in the pool-- I think maybe I wanted to prove to myself that I've "still got it." But I'll probably be too tired to move tonight.
Hopefully I can find energy to go tomorrow and Friday because working out once hard doesn't really do much at all for anything.
Well here it is the first official day of the Christmas vacation. I don't have to go back to work until Jan 4, so it will be almost 3 weeks off in the end. It will be nice, because lately I've really been feeling the fatigue of the last trimester, and since India seems to dance on my intestines, I still get nauseous (how the heck do you spell that?), so it's nice to be able to take it easy.
This will be a boring entry; I just wanted to update since it had been awhile. Lately all the silly worrying I seem to do so much, like crying about the fact that I hadn't gotten my Christmas cards out, has been replaced by a general absentmindness. It's like it feels good to make a conscious decision to not do too much.
Man it's cold outside! And all these little West U kids run around the neighborhood in short sleeves and without shoes, and if they happen to have shoes on, they have no socks and/or are wearing the infamous "crugs." I guess that's appropriate if inside your house the heater has been on full blast all day and so your perspective is different in mine-- our home is much more "natural" when it comes to contact with the outside.
I just took a walk. I have to say my pregnant waddle is infrequent and inconsistent at this point. I find myself doing it when I'm tired, or just sort of in the mood to do the pregnant thang.
I wanted to share another idea I had. I was guiltily enjoying a gossip magazine (People? OK? In Touch? I can't remember which) one day that my mother had indulged me with, when I thought how cool it would be if we could have magazines that showed pictures and comments about our friends' lives. Not like inappropriate. But like--
Hey, there's Capri riding with the kids to school on their bikes. Watch out for all those Atascocita SUVs!
There's Melissa dropping Christian off at school. The San Antonio business woman now.
There's Alex leaving a jewelry appointment in downtown Austin-- with a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie in hand!
You could see friends from high school that you haven't seen in forever-- see how they look now, how they dress on a daily basis, where they work and what they do.
There's Vanessa in the swimming pool with her pregnant belly and mascara all over her face. Is that swim cap too small?
To be able to see my childhood, high school, college, and "adulthood" friends that I'm hardly or never able to see anymore in each weekly issue of this magazine would be divine; I'd be a regular subscriber man for sure. Forget Brangolina and the Reese/Ryan breakup and all that.
A yoga teacher once told the class I was attending that when you got into bound poses-- where your torso is twisted up or arms around your back or etc-- that was when you were able to get rid of toxins. Then later on, he was explaining how to get into a pose and said, "If you want to go bound...." I thought it would be a really cool bumper sticker for a yoga studio or something. "Go bound" Like a secret code for yogis.
A few years ago I had my great idea for if we ever moved to Spain to open up a yoga studio and call it "Yoga para Anglofonos" (Yoga for English-speakers)-- When I was working over there with those British teachers, they would talk about going to a yoga class and not being able to understand the Spanish. In Valencia there are colonies of British, Swedes, and Germans, so I think the idea has a chance. It could also be for Spanish people wanting to learn English (I guess focusing on body part and directional vocabulary).
So anyway, I haven't been able to find any "hard evidence" of this going bound-toxins stuff. But evidently the word Yoga is derived from a Sanskrit word meaning to bind, join, attach, and yoke-- speaking of concentrating one's attention, discipling the intellect the mind the will the emotions, and being in union with God.
Well Pepito hit a new stage in swimming tonight. We randomly decided to pull out some little fins (for the feet- I always get the lingo confused with paddles that go on the hands), or his "froggy shoes" to entertain him in the water. He was then able to basically swim alone from one of us to the other, without us pushing him at all. He now needs to learn how to take breaths, which I hope can happen without too much coughing and swallowing water...
This blog wasn't supposed to be a "mommy blog" but I guess he is quite entertaining. Monday I have my next "body talk" appointment-- so then maybe we can start a conversation on alternative medicine. go to bodytalk to know more
The ivillage website says that India is a "3 syllable girl's name." I usually find meanings like "colonial British name" or "name for the country". Honestly, I was hoping for something somewhere more intriguing than that for my daughter. But I still love the name. A friend from India told me once that the country was named for the Indus River, or at least I think that's what I remember.
She moves a lot now after I eat. It feels like she flips around inside me. Yesterday she was kicking my sister's hand.Indus River
Well tomorrow is Thanksgiving. We are all getting ready with food preparations and trying to prepare our appetites with things like healthier eating and exercise but it is always harder than it seems because at least for me, you get into that holiday vibe and you end up saying yes to the whole macadamia nut white chocolate chip cookie after lunch when you usually never have dessert and then you say another yes the next morning to the piece of cake for breakfast. So, who knows what the doctor will say next week when I go to my next OB appointment on Monday. Last month after I had gained poquito-- he says something about my "little" weight gain (if they say something, is it really because you've gained a "little" weight??), when in previous months I had gained a huge amount and he didn't say anything so I don't freaking know. I try not to worry about it because I don't want my daughter to end up with an eating disorder just because I was paranoid about physical changes during my pregnancy. I'll take a walk now and leave the cooking to my mother and try to burn some calories.
Everyone almost seems to complain that we don't have that much to cook for Thanksgiving since we're going to my uncle's house so everybody brings a dish. I think it's a testament to societies, socialism, community networks, etc-- because with just a little bit of work, we can all enjoy a wonderful meal together. Well, it's less cooking work for those of us attending. The hosts will have a lot of work with preparation and take down in their house but you know what I mean. But it almost seems like since it's the holidays, we have to be in emergency cooking mode rushing around working really hard for 2-3 days cooking and cooking and cooking and if it's not like that then it's not Thanksgiving. My sister and I agreed that that kind of work in the kitchen makes the whole meal completely unappealing in the end. I get that way sometimes just having made a regular dinner. I think cooking is a "hobby" for people until they do it every day-- even for lunch if you take food from home and don't eat out. Yes it is better for you and beautiful in a way to preserve the tradition of eating homeade food from home, but I always think of what my father in law said once with so much wisdom "La cocina en si es esclavizante" (The kitchen alone is 'enslaving' (is that a word?)).
Speaking of slave work in the kitchen, I think I'll go see if my mom needs help.
