I Need a Pause Button

seriously! How is it already Thursday night? This vacation week is flying by WAY, WAY too fast.

I started this morning off like I have the last five -- waking up without my alarm, around 7:45 or so, with a snoring Cosmo curled in a ball up against me. I walked the pups and then came back to clean out my work e-mail while guzzling my precious Via and fending off the dogs from taking bites of my yogurt/berry concoction.





When I could stand it no more, I booked upstairs to wake up PhillyGuy. I was antsy. I wanted to hit the gym. He was still sleeping. So, I bustled around. Put away laundry. Started another load. Folded other laundry. Put that away.

Eventually, he dragged his butt out of bed and we hit the gym for some Core Synergistics with Mr. Horton.

I really enjoy Core Synergistics. As I've mentioned before, it's the type of workout where it's very, VERY easy to just go through the motions and get nothing at all out of it. But if you really focus on what you're doing, flex what should be flexed and work what should be worked, you'll be dripping with sweat. Just like I was when we were done.

It's workouts like these where I really start to notice my progress. Prison cell pushups, for example.



(Clearly that's not me. Nor is it PhillyGuy. This is just someone who's really good at banging out prison cell pushups.)

When I first did Core Synergistics, I could do three or so before I had to stop doing the pushup in the middle. Now, I can do about six full sets without cutting out any pushups. I also jump up in the air between them, but I'm pretty sure that doesn't affect anything.

A truly amazing part of this video is the all-star "cast." There's kiss-ass Dreya Weber, Adam the Cyborg, and my personal favorite, "Pam the Blam."



Tony and Blam in Plyo. Couldn't find a core synergistics picture. Couldn't find ANY pictures of Adam, which blows my mind. I need to figure out how to get a screenshot. Anyway.

Tony's nickname for her is Blam. I assumed, from the beginning, that it must be short for "Black Pam." Obviously. I mentioned this to PhillyGuy this morning while we were huffing and puffing.

"I figure in the test group, there were two Pams -- one black and one white. So Tony nicknamed them Blam and Wham."

He didn't necessarily jump on board with my theory. Apparently, he's right -- according to Pam the Blam herself, in this interview on Fitbomb, Tony just spontaneously and randomly started calling her "Blam" during filming. So lame -- so uninteresting!

(by the way, one of the first things I did after picking up P90X was googling "P90X blog." And Fitbomb was one of the first ones I found. He is flippin' hilarious -- even if you're not a P90X-er, you've GOT to read.)

We took advantage of the gorgeous weather today and got hoagies at Sarcone's. I took the pups to the dog park, and now they're comatose. Cannot believe my vacation is already so close to being over -- this week has absolutely FLOWN and it's been really, really relaxing. Definitely wish I had a pause button to stretch this out even further. I need to do this every year!

Philly Foodie Meetup!

Delayed post numero dos!

Last Tuesday, Sabrina of RhodeyGirlTests.com and Leslie of AndHerLittleDogToo.com were fabulous enough to organize a meetup of Philly bloggers and readers.

You've probably seen everyone else's recaps, so I'll make this brief -- but I had an absolute blast meeting everyone, putting names to faces (or, well, faces to blogs) and making new friends!

We met up at Garces Trading Company, Jose Garces' newest restaurant. PhillyGuy and I are rabid Food Network fans, and I was delighted to see Garces become the newest Iron Chef.



I wasn't sure what to expect with Garces Trading Company, but I loved it. It reminded me a lot of DiBruno's at 18th and Market...if only DiBruno's had table service and (gasp!) its own wine shop.





(Sorry for the blurry pics -- I'm working with a point & shoot here!)

Our table shared a chef's selection of cheeses. The blue, paired with the lavendar honey and a thin slice of apple, was pretty much enough to make me die and go to heaven right there.



I followed that up with the lamp chops, which came prepared medium rare and paired perfectly with the glass of red wine Sabrina was kind enough to share:



I'd definitely head back for dinner with PhillyGuy, and would probably try the pizza next time -- several girls ordered that, and it looked unreal. Pretty basic, with a thin crust and simple ingredients -- it was a real toss-up between the pizza and the lamb for me, but I was happy with my choice.

All in all, it was a really great night -- I am ridiculously happy about the idea of a Philly blogging/fitness/foodie community. It was fantastic to hang out with people who share my biggest interests, and I cannot wait to do it again.

PhillyGuy and I spent this weekend up at his parents' house visiting with family. As always, we packed our gym clothes with the intention of doing our scheduled P90X workouts. And, as always, things just didn't work out that way. Friday night was yoga night -- but we didn't even eat dinner until 8pm, and at 9, headed over to his grandparents' to hang out. So, he asked me to hold off and do yoga with him when he got back from golfing with his dad. Except their tee time was at 8:30ish -- which is, no joke, a good two hours later than it usually is. And when they rolled in around 12:45, people had started to arrive for that afternoon's "picnic." I was a little cheesed, since I'd spent the morning reading trashy magazines and could have been doing precious yoga...but, whatever.

So, when we got home last night around 6:15, I was itching to work out. By the time we unloaded the car, walked the pups, and all that jazz, it was close to 7:30, and PhillyGuy decided he needed to hang out at home and get some work done. Peace out, brother -- I hauled my butt right to the gym, where I rocked out some Core Synergistics solo. Our new gym has an aerobics studio-style workout room, with wood floors and a full wall of mirrors, which was the perfect location for my various banana-superman rolls, pushup variations, and overall contortions.

Except for Dreya rolls.



That guy can do Dreya rolls. I can't. They are WAY harder than they look. I get stuck on my ass.

Oh well. One of these days.

Quick & Dirty

AHHHHH.

I want to write a real entry! PhillyGuy and I went to our local farmer's market/weekly food stands on Saturday and I took pictures and everything...and I just have NOT found the time to even upload the pics, let alone post about it.

My boss is out this week -- I really thought I'd have a nice easy week. Nope. Instead, not only did she leave me with MORE than enough work to keep me occupied, I'm left to handle all of the day to day stuff that comes up. Like this stupid closing on this stupid deal that JUST WON'T END.

It's my fifth week of P90X, but due to some scheduling issues, PhillyGuy and I repeated Week 3. So this week is our "Week 4," which is a "recovery" week. What that means is a break from most of the weight-bearing or intense lifting exercises, and replacing that with two days of yoga, two days of "Core Synergistics," and two days of "StretchX."

Last night, I could not WAIT for yoga. I headed home, walked the pups, and by about 7:15, was settling in with my mat and the windows open to the beautiful night. The first 45 minutes was tough, as always, but I'm really seeing some improvements -- I can hold Crane for longer (um, which means about 5 seconds at a time instead of 3-4, but believe me, that's something) and I got up into Warrior 3 on each of my legs without too much struggle. Trust me, it still ain't pretty, but that's OK -- I'm definitely improving.

However, that last 45 minutes -- which is my favorite part! -- really started to drag. I got bored. I started wondering how the dogs were doing downstairs. I started thinking about what I was going to wear to tonight's Philly Foodie/Blogger Meetup. I had to fight with myself not to turn off the DVD when I still had 25 minutes left. BUT...I didn't turn it off. I didn't pick an outfit or go visit my dogs. I finished the workout and still felt refreshed and happy at the end -- maybe not quite AS refreshed and happy as usual, but I'm glad I did it.

The length of the YogaX DVD is a common criticism I've seen in P90X reviews. The four times I've done the workout before, I never had an issue with length -- I felt every second of that first 45 minutes, while my legs burned and my body shook and I tried like hell to keep myself in poses. But the last 45 minutes always flew by. We'll see if I'm back to "normal" with my second pass through it this week.

This morning, I did Core Synergistics. Fancy name for -- surprise, surprise -- a lot of very core-centric exercises. Not that much direct ab work, but lots of planks/chaturanga variations, pushup variations, and hollow-hold type exercises that force you to roll around on the floor. My personal jury is still out on this one -- this is going to be another routine I head to the gym for. It involves a lot of dumbbell work that you can't substitute bands for. I'll try it with better weights later this week.

The other thing with Core Synergistics is that it's one of those workouts where it's VERY easy to just go through the motions and "phone it in." If you're not concentrating 100% on flexing what needs to be flexed and working what needs to be worked, you'll find yourself with your butt floating in the air, not really breaking a sweat, and generally wasting your time. There are better ways to waste an hour -- like on my couch watching the Kardashians, not rolling around on my guest room floor. Not to worry -- Tony is constantly barking at you to "DON'T JUST KIND OF DO IT!"

So, that's the quick n' dirty on the first third of Week 4 of P90X. Monday we take our progress pictures/measurements/etc -- that will be great motivation to stay on track while we're up at my inlaws this weekend.

So pumped for tonight -- this will be my first blogger meetup! I feel so legit now :)