During my senior year in college, I dated John Schmidt. An aunt of mine recently handed me a picture of John and me from some Thanksgiving at another aunt's house. Cracked me up. I'll need to scan it in and post it. I have my big 80's hairstyle.

Sometime during that said senior year, I began studying for the GRE. I knew my math skills were fine so I didn't study that section. And I didn't even realize there was an analytic section of the GRE, so didn't bother studying for that part either. No, I spent most of my studying time memorizing vocabulary words.

After a while, I asked John to help me with my studying. Basically, from the study book, I asked him to quiz me on the words. He started at the top and asked me for definitions of words on the list.

Twenty minutes into this quizzing, I became incredibly frustrated. I had already spent weeks studying these words, and I was getting maybe 10% of them right. What the hell had I been doing? I was going to completely fail this GRE in a few weeks, because I didn't know anything! Whaa!

After seeing my frustration, John explained to me he had been picking out the hard words and ignoring all the easy ones he figured I knew. So, rather than knowing 10% of the words, I actually knew more like 70% of the words. I'm pretty sure I punched him at that point and told him to give me something I could do.

Yesterday was very much like that at the trainers. I was working on upperbody exercises, and she kept putting the weights so heavy I could do maybe 2 or three reps. I'd make it through these initial reps, then be able to do nothing. I'd struggle and strain and exert, and not budge the weights one bit. After the third set of one of these, I dropped the bar, adjusted the weights down and just barely finished the set with the lighter weights.

I kept thinking to myself, "Geez, woman, give me something I can do."

If only barely.

Bah. Been having a very difficult time with the UPA. A lot of negative energy being thrown my way, and it's getting more and more difficult to deflect it or manage to keep my head up.

Among this swirl, Joshua sent me a message:

I know that it can be a pain but my SCs are loving the visibility of the new
system.  It should help them get all of their stuff done.  Basically sweetness
and great job again.  The people are excited.

So, even though the ED of the UPA is unable to appreciate the work I do, the people who matter, the members and the vast army of ultimate volunteers that make up the organization, those who truly love this sport, they appreciate what I've done.

And Joshua made me cry.

So, there's only so long you can put on a pair of pants, realize they're a little tight and think, "Huh. Dryer must have shrunk them," even though you know they were line dried.

There's only so many times you can look at the scale go up another pound and think, "Well, I'm still two pounds lighter than my husband."

Only so many times you can look in the mirror and think, "Huh, look at that. All that sitting really does have an effect on my width."

And only so many times you can think, "Hey, I'm still a size 6. Sorta. Maybe."

After having it on my to-do list for over six months, I joined a gym yesterday. But not just any gym, oh no. Go on, ask me how I heard of this gym. Go on.

"So, how did you hear about us?"

"The back of a bathroom stall in Santa Cruz."

"Yeah, everybody says that. It's the only advertising we've ever done. Either that, or word of mouth."

I've never had a personal fitness trainer before. Not a regular one, anyway. G didn't count because he was the instructor of a class. It just so happened that only Kris and I were in the class, as all the other people (kids!) dropped out. The only ones I've had were the one or two trainers in passing ("What? Pay you $50/$75/$100 a hour? No thanks.").

However, I've since realized that I need someone to help me push myself. G was great. Lisa was awesome. Spending the money keeps me going to the workouts ("I'm not missing this, I spent $100 on this person!"), but the time with the trainer also means that, yes, I can and do push myself. Someone yelling at me to "go go go!," well, darnit, I'm "go, go, go!"ing.

So, let's see how this goes.

October?

October?!?

The next episode of Battlestar Galactica won't show until next October?

Gah! I have to wait until October. Dang it, Mike! What have you gotten me into? Another show I like and now have to wait until OCTOBER before I see the next episode.

Worse, it's another television show to watch. Why do I even have a television? Watching television is the brainless, thought-free, vegetative way to drift aimlessly through life watching made up people living their made up lives while you just pitter away your own.

Another show to watch. Bah.

Okay, this is annoying me. This is annoying me beyond belief. Not only is this annoying me that much, but it's starting to make my life less fun. So, I'm going to open my mouth. I'm going to break the rules I hate breaking, and say a whole bunch of negative stuff about someone.

Sandie Hammerly is, as near as I can tell, an incompetent manager who has thus far succeeded at the UPA because of the UPA's staff's love of the sport they govern. She is negative (nearly obsessively so - the person crossing the street in front of her is walking slowly just to piss her off, no kidding, she said this). She is clueless (rather than contacting the person doing a job for help with that person's replacement, she contacts the person's coworker for help). She is unable to communicate with people without accusing them (see the negative part). She is a bad manager (rather than discussing issues with an employee, she complains to the other employees, then fires the original employee by bringing up every little thing said employee did wrong since he began employment).

It's to the point I can't stand any message from her any longer. She has nearly killed any joy of the sport for me.

Decided to hide this post from anonymous readers, so I can say what I really feel.

Sandie Hammerly is a fucking psycho bitch. May she rot in hell.