Be warned...this does not mean it's going to be a good post, simply that it will be long enough to make people glad that I did not post more often this past month. So, don't say I never did anything for you.

So, a couple of things...apparently I am not quite as hip as I once was (or once believed myself to be) I should have learned this valuable lesson when I was working as a graduate teaching assistant and during a seminar I was teaching tried to (smoothly) slip in "Fi'ty (Fiddy?) Cent"as I showed overheads of a tattooed and gun shot scarred rapper in an effort to help them understand biases and preconceived notions. I thought this would make my students realize that I was young and cool and they could relate to me...instead they sat there looking at me like I had just told them that I had purchased the most awesome pair of acid wash jeans and neon leg warmers over the weekend.  

I bring this up because I had never heard of the term "nuclear wedgie" (or at least I thought I hadn't) until seeing that a search on google had brought somebody to my journal. I forgot to look and see WHY this search led to my journal before I posted the last entry and when I got around to it, I realized that it was because Wil had posted something about it in a comment a while back. And then I saw mention of it in a Maxim magazine earlier this week and realized it was just another term used by people much hipper (more hip?) than myself. Still don't know what it means but I'm okay with that. Besides, I'm not sure I want to be cool if it means understanding what "nuclear wedgie" means and being able to say "Fiddy" (Fi'ty?). I'll stick to my acid wash jeans and my Milli Vanilli thanks.      

So, I have made no secret of the fact that I am slightly (haha) clumsy and often find ways to injure myself that nobody else could possibly dream up. I even hurt myself in my sleep apparently and often wake up bleeding or with scratches all over my face. As much as I would like to blame it on B or on the dogs, I have accepted the fact that this is just me. B sleeps too soundly to be much help in determining just how I am injuring myself so, short of setting up a camera to record myself sleeping (ack), I have no other way to solve that mystery. Anyway, the point is, never mind waiting to happen...at many times throughout my day and night, I am an accident happening.

What is very interesting about this whole phenomenon is that, it in the one place I go almost every day where I would be considered to be at most risk of injury, I am surprisingly graceful and agile. While I am at the gym, I often see people dropping weights, forgetting to hold the stack down while they change the weight on the machines, causing the bars to come crashing down on their heads, falling off the treadmill, rolling right off the evil ball whilst trying to perform crunches and just generally finding a multitude of ways to injure themselves. Me? I am a machine. Other than the fact that, due to shin splints, I often hobble off the treadmill after my run, unable to walk until I swallow a ton of Advil, I glide through the gym and through my routines like someone who was born with normal balance and cooperating limbs. And my work is paying off. Since Christmas, every article of clothing I own has become too large for me and I am leaner and stronger than I've been since...well, ever. I've never been what anyone would call overweight but I would definitely say that until a couple months ago, I was soft. 

About a week ago, I was feeling a little sore in my upper chest. (that would be ABOVE the actual chest) When I pressed my fingers there I could feel something that felt suspiciously like hard lumps. Being the levelheaded individual that I am, I immediately ran to B saying "Oh my God, feel these lumps...what if it's cancer??????" "Um, Beverly" my very patient husband replied, "Those cancerous lumps? Those would be MUSCLES"  Oh, right, I knew that. Muscles...of course.  I am not sure why I somehow managed to make it through my first days at the gym without causing myself grievious injury but I did. And now, I think it's one of the only places I am truly safe from myself. I think the work I have been doing to strengthen my core has been helping too...I only fell down the stairs once this week - surely a record for me - and only down one flight too!!