For my friends (READ: DIANNA) who get on my case about not posting regularly, I will have you know I've been very busy. No, not stalking my new kickboxing instructor. Although he is a sweet piece of eye candy I will not lie. I have new reason to go to kickboxing beyond imagining beating to a pulp the last guy I dated.
Where was I?
Beating to a pulp last guy I date, sweet kickboxing instructor eye candy, being busy. Right being busy.
So I've been very busy. Very very busy. Understanding google chrome and partying like a rockstar at the downtown Standard roof bar on a Tuesday night are very very taxing on little Rebs. But I've also been doing work. And no that was not well intentioned placement for my boss who may stumble across blonde memoirs. Fine, it was. But I've been doing writing too. Did you hear that Dianna? To get Dianna off my back (I love you) (like the sister I never wanted) I've put up some published articles I've written for work lately. You can read them if you want. Or not. If I were you, or my Mom, I wouldnt. She doesn't love me, never has. What's your reason?
Wow this post took an unexpected turn to the dark side.
http://swimnetwork.com/blogs/blog/20080418/usoc_chicago_media_summit_wrap_up-668.html
http://swimnetwork.com/blogs/blog/20080905/swim_star_teammates_find_fame_on_dry_land-1235.html
http://swimnetwork.com/blogs/blog/20080910/team_speedo_rings_nyse_opening_bell-1246.html
http://swimnetwork.com/blogs/blog/20080908/two_games_of_equal_splendor-1241.html
http://swimnetwork.com/blogs/blog/20080911/live_from_new_york__it_s_saturday_night_-1250.html
http://swimnetwork.com/blogs/blog/20080916/a_man_of_many_wigs-1260.html
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Monday, September 15, 2008
Tina Fey is a Better Salah Palin than Sarah Palin is a Sarah Palin
Lisa: Did you hear Sarah Palin had tanning beds installed in the governor's mansion?
Rebecca: I did not hear that.
Lisa: Great, now there's no way I'm going to convince you not to vote for her.
Rebecca: How about a compromise. Tina Fey for VP.
Lisa: Done.
Rebecca: I did not hear that.
Lisa: Great, now there's no way I'm going to convince you not to vote for her.
Rebecca: How about a compromise. Tina Fey for VP.
Lisa: Done.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Kickboxing Until I Kick the Bucket
My fascination in exercising has interesting roots.
At seven, and at eight, nine, and ten, I liked to swim the summer months away. When they'd come to a close, I'd beg my mother to continue. Discovering I wouldn't really let it go, she looked in to a year round program, to swim on a team, summer to summer and spring through fall.
I loved to swim because of it's other worldly nature to it. Water is a substance devoid of sound and chores, homework, and the domestic angst that plagued my childhood. It was a happy place, of innocent intentions where I could be as good, or as lazy as I wanted to be, where I was part of a team, but my success was internally bred. It was a source of focus and motivation, and an escape, when the dry land world was unforgiving. Success in swimming means medals and fast times, but success in swimming means more swimming. And more swimming means not a whole lot of anything else. A year short of college and a surgery to my shoulder later I hung up my Speedo to dry for the last time, and moved on.
Retired athletes all visit the same post sport issues - the what next, the change in body image, and a return to an unforgiving dry land world.
I kicked around doing something else, but I was never as good at anything as I was naturally suited for water. I got older and joined a gym with the masses to fit in to my 7 jeans. I spent years making up reasons why I was entirely too busy to go, until I realized it was time to grow up and take care of myself.
I've done spin and elliptical, rowing machines, weights and treadmills and pilates and yoga. Last week I started kickboxing.
I liked kickboxing, and for more reasons than imagining the battered face of last guy who broke up with me while punching and kicking toward the mirror. It was a lot of jumping around, but with that came coordination and choreography, which I'd somehow became really really bad at. I'd learn one move, and we'd be on to the next. I couldn't master right arm and left leg. I thought chewing gum and patting my head and tummy were next. There was a lot going on at once. I was surrounded by a lot of people not just more in shape than me, but with a lot more energy, as if that was possible. It was the best workout of my life, and I left the class half with the feeling I cant wait to do that again, and one half I think sometime before this class I decided I didn't love myself anymore to put myself through that pain. The two halves made one whole world of pain in parts of my back that made it entirely impossible to turn over in bed.
So I cried.
Like the zen masters before me, I would conquer kickboxing class. I returned Thursday for kickboxing class PART TWO (insert Jean Claude accent for flare). After improperly warming up, and getting yelled at for doing just about everything wrong, the music two beats ahead of anything I was doing, a spinning room and a whole lot of sweat, I made this solemn vow. I will, if it's the very last thing I do, master kickboxing class. And look hot for my 20 year reunion.
At seven, and at eight, nine, and ten, I liked to swim the summer months away. When they'd come to a close, I'd beg my mother to continue. Discovering I wouldn't really let it go, she looked in to a year round program, to swim on a team, summer to summer and spring through fall.
I loved to swim because of it's other worldly nature to it. Water is a substance devoid of sound and chores, homework, and the domestic angst that plagued my childhood. It was a happy place, of innocent intentions where I could be as good, or as lazy as I wanted to be, where I was part of a team, but my success was internally bred. It was a source of focus and motivation, and an escape, when the dry land world was unforgiving. Success in swimming means medals and fast times, but success in swimming means more swimming. And more swimming means not a whole lot of anything else. A year short of college and a surgery to my shoulder later I hung up my Speedo to dry for the last time, and moved on.
Retired athletes all visit the same post sport issues - the what next, the change in body image, and a return to an unforgiving dry land world.
I kicked around doing something else, but I was never as good at anything as I was naturally suited for water. I got older and joined a gym with the masses to fit in to my 7 jeans. I spent years making up reasons why I was entirely too busy to go, until I realized it was time to grow up and take care of myself.
I've done spin and elliptical, rowing machines, weights and treadmills and pilates and yoga. Last week I started kickboxing.
I liked kickboxing, and for more reasons than imagining the battered face of last guy who broke up with me while punching and kicking toward the mirror. It was a lot of jumping around, but with that came coordination and choreography, which I'd somehow became really really bad at. I'd learn one move, and we'd be on to the next. I couldn't master right arm and left leg. I thought chewing gum and patting my head and tummy were next. There was a lot going on at once. I was surrounded by a lot of people not just more in shape than me, but with a lot more energy, as if that was possible. It was the best workout of my life, and I left the class half with the feeling I cant wait to do that again, and one half I think sometime before this class I decided I didn't love myself anymore to put myself through that pain. The two halves made one whole world of pain in parts of my back that made it entirely impossible to turn over in bed.
So I cried.
Like the zen masters before me, I would conquer kickboxing class. I returned Thursday for kickboxing class PART TWO (insert Jean Claude accent for flare). After improperly warming up, and getting yelled at for doing just about everything wrong, the music two beats ahead of anything I was doing, a spinning room and a whole lot of sweat, I made this solemn vow. I will, if it's the very last thing I do, master kickboxing class. And look hot for my 20 year reunion.
Friday, September 5, 2008
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Ah, touché, touché Mr. Senators
There are many things I’ve learned about adulthood.
1. The taxes and bills, are, quite simply, necessary tradeoffs for staying up as late as you want and wearing high heels.
2. Whether or not it’s a good idea, you can eat donuts for dinner, if it suits your fancy.
3. As much as they despise it, you can dance with your cats when you can’t sleep and there’s simply a song that moves you.
4. Above all, of the most consequential things I’ve learned about adulthood - the truth lies somewhere in between just about every extreme my parents taught me.
For the hippies that they were, my parents, they were very black and white people. Their paradigm binoculars saw very little color. I recall upon a trip to the mechanic.
“Rebecca you don’t have to bring your car in every week like your mother, but more than once every 5 years for an oil change would be nice.” (Insert adorable Israeli accent where applicable).
My mother sees her doctor every week, in sickness and in health. I don’t believe my father has been to one in his entire adult life.
There’s very little moderation, very little balance, to my parents life and consequently, to their marriage.
It’s little surprise, they would create such a pact with one another.
I recall my first election as a newly minted adult. This guy in one of my classes asked me in the hallway which candidate I would vote for. I was a political science major, and in hindsight, given how much I now know, it wasn’t a completely crazy, completely unreasonable question. But I was shocked, I was appalled, and I most certainly was not going to answer that question. Ho hum. He was confused how he had offended me, and I didn’t see where he got off. I asked a panel of experts.
I asked my friends.
"Friends, where does this guy, and his failed pick up lines, get off asking me who I'm voting for." Ho Hum.
(Start tender moment music)
“Rebecca. Sweetheart. Love of our life. Politics, it’s one of those subjects, maybe you don’t bring up in job interviews and with your mother in law, but it doesn’t have to be a secret. Who told you that?”
I would investigate.
I eventually came to learn, my parents had a massive early marital feud over politics. It was the age of communism and Ronald Regan, and after a heated spat, they agreed to not discuss it anymore. One would reason that particular topic, for the rest of the night, perhaps until the election was over. But no, they decided, they would never speak of politics again. Case closed. End of story. They would no longer share who they would vote for. They wouldn’t discuss “the issues.”
Off limits like a ham on the Sabbath.
My parents voted often, but never together, and never did they share. They subsequently passed down to my sister and I a lesson, without the relevant marital spat background, you don't ever discuss your political views. Ever.
EVER.
Like a courtroom gavel ringing through chambers. Ever.
It was such a relief, I must reveal, to learn this was just another 'weird thing your parents do.' There are just so many.
This will now be presidential election number three I’ve been of voting age. My parents weren’t completely wrong, people get very worked up in pursuit of the little sticker at the end of the proverbial political rainbow. Up until this point, I believe I thought in order to hold my ground among the intense emotional appeal and political spin, I needed to decide early who would be “my guy” and in this year, “my gal.”
"This year, I'm just waiting it out. I'm not going to make a decision yet. I just want to read a lot, and watch the conventions, hear the debates, doing my own investigating, appreciate it. I really just, I mean, I don't know how to explain it, I..."
"You want to make your mind up for yourself?"
"YES."
"How novel."
My friends really are very gifted people.
My search for more political information has led abound, but with frequent ice cream breaks.
High heels or flats. Gucci or Pucci. Tote or clutch. Life is about choices. Decisions. Issues. But never any more so than picking a presidential election, and a lovely scooping of ice cream. Just never did I think those worlds would collide.
It would all unwind at a trip to Baskin Robbins.
Baskin Robbins has two special new ice cream flavors for the election, I see through the glass plating. "The Flavor of Change," the democratic pick, loaded with peanut brittle and toffee. An equally interesting one for the republican pick. Both had desirable features. Both undesirable. I asked for a sample of both. But was I ready to make a choice? Was I ready to settle? Was I ready to pick? No, No. No I was not. It was too much. What would one say about me. What about the other. I'm not ready to decide.
I picked chocolate peanut butter, because it said nothing more about me than I like chocolate and I like peanut butter, and they taste really quite delicious together in an ice cream on top of a sugar cone. I licked that ice cream quickly, as to not let it melt down that cone on the warm fleeting end of summer day. And I thought about the choice I get to make. The awesome ability to make that choice. About the so many people who are excited and passionate about taking care of other people via government in one fashion or another. Whether it be a well-spoke black man to be the first nominated candidate, or a weathered one with a female running mate.
And I thought only as I tasted my last taste of chocolatey peanut butter, ah, touche', touche' Mr. Senators.
1. The taxes and bills, are, quite simply, necessary tradeoffs for staying up as late as you want and wearing high heels.
2. Whether or not it’s a good idea, you can eat donuts for dinner, if it suits your fancy.
3. As much as they despise it, you can dance with your cats when you can’t sleep and there’s simply a song that moves you.
4. Above all, of the most consequential things I’ve learned about adulthood - the truth lies somewhere in between just about every extreme my parents taught me.
For the hippies that they were, my parents, they were very black and white people. Their paradigm binoculars saw very little color. I recall upon a trip to the mechanic.
“Rebecca you don’t have to bring your car in every week like your mother, but more than once every 5 years for an oil change would be nice.” (Insert adorable Israeli accent where applicable).
My mother sees her doctor every week, in sickness and in health. I don’t believe my father has been to one in his entire adult life.
There’s very little moderation, very little balance, to my parents life and consequently, to their marriage.
It’s little surprise, they would create such a pact with one another.
I recall my first election as a newly minted adult. This guy in one of my classes asked me in the hallway which candidate I would vote for. I was a political science major, and in hindsight, given how much I now know, it wasn’t a completely crazy, completely unreasonable question. But I was shocked, I was appalled, and I most certainly was not going to answer that question. Ho hum. He was confused how he had offended me, and I didn’t see where he got off. I asked a panel of experts.
I asked my friends.
"Friends, where does this guy, and his failed pick up lines, get off asking me who I'm voting for." Ho Hum.
(Start tender moment music)
“Rebecca. Sweetheart. Love of our life. Politics, it’s one of those subjects, maybe you don’t bring up in job interviews and with your mother in law, but it doesn’t have to be a secret. Who told you that?”
I would investigate.
I eventually came to learn, my parents had a massive early marital feud over politics. It was the age of communism and Ronald Regan, and after a heated spat, they agreed to not discuss it anymore. One would reason that particular topic, for the rest of the night, perhaps until the election was over. But no, they decided, they would never speak of politics again. Case closed. End of story. They would no longer share who they would vote for. They wouldn’t discuss “the issues.”
Off limits like a ham on the Sabbath.
My parents voted often, but never together, and never did they share. They subsequently passed down to my sister and I a lesson, without the relevant marital spat background, you don't ever discuss your political views. Ever.
EVER.
Like a courtroom gavel ringing through chambers. Ever.
It was such a relief, I must reveal, to learn this was just another 'weird thing your parents do.' There are just so many.
This will now be presidential election number three I’ve been of voting age. My parents weren’t completely wrong, people get very worked up in pursuit of the little sticker at the end of the proverbial political rainbow. Up until this point, I believe I thought in order to hold my ground among the intense emotional appeal and political spin, I needed to decide early who would be “my guy” and in this year, “my gal.”
"This year, I'm just waiting it out. I'm not going to make a decision yet. I just want to read a lot, and watch the conventions, hear the debates, doing my own investigating, appreciate it. I really just, I mean, I don't know how to explain it, I..."
"You want to make your mind up for yourself?"
"YES."
"How novel."
My friends really are very gifted people.
My search for more political information has led abound, but with frequent ice cream breaks.
High heels or flats. Gucci or Pucci. Tote or clutch. Life is about choices. Decisions. Issues. But never any more so than picking a presidential election, and a lovely scooping of ice cream. Just never did I think those worlds would collide.
It would all unwind at a trip to Baskin Robbins.
Baskin Robbins has two special new ice cream flavors for the election, I see through the glass plating. "The Flavor of Change," the democratic pick, loaded with peanut brittle and toffee. An equally interesting one for the republican pick. Both had desirable features. Both undesirable. I asked for a sample of both. But was I ready to make a choice? Was I ready to settle? Was I ready to pick? No, No. No I was not. It was too much. What would one say about me. What about the other. I'm not ready to decide.
I picked chocolate peanut butter, because it said nothing more about me than I like chocolate and I like peanut butter, and they taste really quite delicious together in an ice cream on top of a sugar cone. I licked that ice cream quickly, as to not let it melt down that cone on the warm fleeting end of summer day. And I thought about the choice I get to make. The awesome ability to make that choice. About the so many people who are excited and passionate about taking care of other people via government in one fashion or another. Whether it be a well-spoke black man to be the first nominated candidate, or a weathered one with a female running mate.
And I thought only as I tasted my last taste of chocolatey peanut butter, ah, touche', touche' Mr. Senators.
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