Skiing:

I love the free feeling of whizzing down the mountain, stopping frequently for breaks and 100% controlling my speed. I'd say my ski level is stagnant compared to other years. Why try to get better at a dangerous sport at 40? Seems like not such a great idea, especially when I can just, like, have fun and look sort of like I know what I'm doing. Or at least look like I'm not a danger to others.

Altitude Sickness:

It appears that one person in our party might have some mild to moderate altitude sickness. It's better not to google this, but instead to consult a mountain medical professional. That's on the docket for today. Luckily, in the limited medical research I did do, professionals say that altitude sickness generally resolves in short order. We should be on the other side of this in no time.

Reading:

I've got two perfect vacation titles on the go. One is The Widow by Fiona Barton. I love a good psychological thriller, especially on vacay. In this one, there's this feeble woman named Jean who married a veritable asshole who may also be a criminal. The blurbs all tell me I'm in it with an unreliable narrator, so things could turn any second.

The second book is America's Next Reality Star by Laura Heffernan. It's about Jen. She's suddenly jobless, boyfriendless, and broke. Why not go on a reality television show about puzzles and problem-solving? As you can imagine, the pages are flying by here. Reality television has long been my kryptonite.

That's about it. I'm hoping the second of these three items resolves today. Don't you?

The time I tried to get back into shape and fell off the treadmill

The pros and cons of participating in a workplace-based fitness challenge

This has been a big week at work: my first formal observation, tons of meetings, preconferencing with the children (I have to do 30-minute conferences with each of my advisees and their families after speaking with all of their teachers), starting two new units, PLUS my commitment to Jillian Michaels and her shred.

On Tuesday, the counselor whose room is just right next door to mine expressed that she too was feeling overwhelmed. 

"I'm so tired," she sighed, "but it's Friday, so it's cool."

I laughed really hard at that.  I've been laughing hard about it for three days now, and it's still not Friday.

A couple of days ago, on the recommendation of a couple of friends, I purchased Jillian Michaels' 30-Day Shred DVD.

Jillian leads the workout with the help of two ripped pals, Natalie and Anita. Let me tell you, Jillian does not accept excuses.  She does not allow breaks.  Jillian says if I want results in 20 minutes, I have to PUSH.  She says, "Intensity people!"  She shows me Anita's abs and announces, "These don't come for free!"

I don't know why this motivates me, but it does.  I have now shredded three days in a row.  I'll let you know what happens.  Probably no one will recognize me once 30 days are up.

A while back during the A to Z blogging challenge, I said Mary and I were going to try Zumba. Ditch the workout, the Zumba website says, and join the party!

"Wait," said Rachel. "Is that like the Shakira dancing workout?"

"Yes!" I said.

"Mary's actually going to be good at that, and you're really NOT," she said.

I mean, how did she even know that?!

Anyway, at the first Zumba workout we tried, it didn't really matter that I couldn't shake it like Shakira because our teacher Mickey couldn't really either. He was a cool guy with shoulder-length hair and a thick mustache. We did some butt-waggling, but not a lot of choreography.

After each song, I looked to Mary for validation. "See?" I said. "I did that pretty well."

The next week, we decided to try a different teacher, who would maybe be a little dance-ier. Sure enough, I could tell I would have a much harder time from the very first song where complicated hip shaking and ball-changing was required. In fact, the only way I could even begin to follow Megan's routines ("Now diva walk!" "Now salsa!") was to stare directly at her ass for the entire hour.

I didn't realize I was doing it until halfway through, but I totally was. That's just how I Zumba.

We're really busy today because we have to get our house back in show-condition (it's for sale, remember), our stuff packed, and ourselves ready for a week in Florida beginning tomorrow.

So, we're really busy, but we were not too busy to get started with Wii Fit. Shef did the body test first. He failed the balance portion and got a Wii Fit age of 25, despite his healthy BMI of 14.5.

I went next. I also failed the balance portion of the test because I have no balance. Plus, Mac was distracting me. After the test, the Wii asked me if I sometimes fall down when I'm walking. I'm sorry to say, the answer to that question is YES. So, my Wii fit age was 39, despite my healthy BMI of 22.8. Wii wants me to lower my BMI by .8, so I said I would try. That's a 6.5-pound weight loss, most of which is probably accounted for by my annual holiday treat and bevvie bonanza.

Dan went last. He aced the balance test, not surprisingly. His BMI was healthy, but not as good as mine. Wii wants him to lose some amount of weight, but he says that amount will render him emaciated.

In the end, his Wii Fit age was 33, two years less than his actual age. My Wii Fit age was 39, 8 years more than my actual age. This is lame and unfair, given our fitness histories in the last 10 years. I vow to rectify this situation.