Justification for a Personal Trainer

We have an eliptical trainer. It's a pretty nice one, similar to the ones at the gym, or at least similar to the ones that were at the gym the last time I actually set foot in one. That would be about eight years ago. We purchased the machine to replace my gym membership, figuring that the law of convenience would prompt me to exercise a little more. And I did. For a while.

Then the kids came along, my schedule was no longer, I was too tired, yadda yadda yadda, and so I haven't been as diligent as originally planned.

Today, however, I felt motivated enough to dig out part of my neglected coolmax wardrobe, and hop back on that machine with the goal of not feeling so decrepit upon getting out of bed each morning.

Perhaps I had managed to convince myself that I haven't been quite as lazy as I actually have been, because I had a major shock when I pulled up my I.D. on the eliptical's computer for the purpose of updating the information. It showed my age as 34. I'm currently 38.

That last break was a doozie! At least my recorded weight from 4 years ago is higher than my current one! Imagine how much lower it would be if I hadn't spent the past four years sitting on the couch with a bag of chips!

Sew What?

Sewing is not a strong suit in my family. My mom has shared with me her story about how she failed sewing class in grade school when the skirt that she was working on ended up being a bag. Her sewing career has only gone downhill from there. For as far back as I can remember, my mom's 'sewing kit' consisted of a 3"x6" box containing about ten spools of thread, some of which have been around for over 20 years due to lack of use. Naturally I make fun of her for this.

Moving right along to my own sewing career, I took family studies in grade 9 as a means of improving my domestic goddess abilities. After all, I wasn't learning anything about the subject at home. In that class, while working on my own "Camp Beverly Hills" sweatshirt, I managed to surge one of the sleeves onto the neck, rendering my creation fit for dusting furniture. The best part was that in order to receive a full grade on the project, we were required to wear our finished garments to school for an entire day. Fun times, I tell ya!

Last week-end, we hired a babysitter, who had it in her mind that she was going to repair the holes in the couch cushions in our playroom. This woman is actually the lady who cleans our house once a week, and who I know to be very competent in all domestic areas. We came home to find that she had not tackled the cushions because she had forgotten to bring along any sewing needles. To my dismay, she had actually set about the house looking for a needle to use. I would have been especially upset if she had managed to fine one.

My sewing kit is in the drawer of my bedside table. Yeah, THAT drawer. There are things in that drawer that I don't necessarily want the babysitter finding. You'd think that these personal items would be the reason for my concern, but I had a more pressing embarrassment on my mind. Had she gone through the drawer and managed to find my 'sewing kit', she would have discovered that it consists of a plastic Ziploc baggie with about three spools of thread in it that I bought at K-Mart, which hasn't operated in Canada for over ten years!

Waking Up on the Right Side of the Bed

When his son was four or five, my former colleague used to wake himself up at 4:45 every morning such that he could be alert and ready for his son's energy by the time the boy got up every morning. "You're fucking crazy!" was all I could say at the time from my childless, single, sleep-until-11-on-the-week-ends frame of mind.

Now that I have kids of my own, I still think he was off his rocker, but I have at least had a glimpse into his way of thinking as of this week.

Pumpkin's school bus schedule was changed such that her pick-up time is now 13 minutes earlier than before. This doesn't sound like much, but since I was already cutting it short for time prior to this change, I decided to do something that I hadn't done since I became a stay at home mom. I set my alarm for an early wake up.

After I got myself all spiffed up for the day, I headed over to Pumpkin's room to wake her up. This was a nice change. Usually she wakes me up by slamming herself on my bed while screaming "MOMMY!" Truthfully, being woken up this way always puts me in a foul mood, coupled with resentment, and strong desire to lock Pumpkin in a broom closet. By being the one to wake her up, it was like I had the upper hand! She couldn't get to me the way she usually does. Right up until the time she shuffled onto the bus, I was uncharacteristically calm and not aggravated.

I started thinking of my former colleague, and how his extreme early wake up probably gave him time to have a coffee and read the paper in peace, and actually started to consider it. Imagine how calm I could be if I used that opportunity! Then I quickly calculated that he set his alarm a whole two hours earlier than I had just done, and I went back to questioning his sanity.

Knowing myself quite well, not only will I never wake myself up more than 20 minutes ahead of Pumpkin, I'll probably continue to let her wake me up on non-school days, forcing us both to endure my morning grumpies.

Creature of Bad Habits

I have a basket on my kitchen counter that I use to throw recyclables into, which I then dump into the main recycling bin whenever the basket gets too full. In theory. Sometimes I keep piling stuff into it, or onto it rather, when the basket is clearly overflowing with papers and containers.

Just to the left of the basket on my counter, I store important items that I need to file, shred, sign, or do something with. As you can imagine, sometimes the overflow from the recycling basket and the 'important items' pile occasionally merge to form one large mess.

Last month, this pre-filing system of mine allowed me to throw out a pack of gift cards. Just yesterday, I realized that I must have thrown out a stack of photographs. Despite my two examples of stupidity above, I seem to be continuing to file important items right next to the recycling.

I guess I'm holding out on change so I can throw out my income tax forms or maybe a winning lottery ticket.

You Know You're Not in the 1950's When...

I make no secret of the fact that I don't prepare wonderful, home cooked meals every day. I take a lot of short cuts, and often don't get all the food groups represented. On the days when I manage to make something worthy of bragging about, I actually do brag, as if it was some sort of out of the ordinary accomplishment.

I also make no secret of the fact that I don't keep my house particularly clean and organized. I rely far to much on the cleaning lady, who really doesn't come often enough to exempt me from vacuuming up dog hair tumbleweeds, or disinfecting the numerous places within the house that creep me out on a daily basis.

I actually feel a little bad that although I am privileged enough to be a SAHM, I don't manage to maintain the house and cook meals as well as well as some of my predecessors. Not bad enough to actually do something about it, but bad enough to talk about it every now and again.

A while back, I was discussing this issue with a successful, career-oriented friend of mine. "I'm a pretty good mom,", I explained, "but I really suck at the housewife part of this job."

"Well there's certainly NO shame in THAT!", she replied with conviction.

I love this day and age.