It's official - I'm in love...

...with Bikram yoga and road trips.

The heat, the sweat, the sense of accomplishment when you have conquered another of the 26 poses...The challenge is so rewarding. It's also the perfect rainy season replacement for running.

I purchased another Groupon (gawd I love these discount sites/emails) for a 10 class punch card at Bikram Yoga Burien after I took a few weeks off when I ran out of classes from Bikram Yoga in West Seattle. Burien is pretty close to me so it's definitely more appealing than the deals I've seen for other places on the Eastside and in North Seattle - I don't want to have to shower at the studio and I can't imagine more than a 15 minute drive covered in drying sweat. The studio isn't as nice, but my instructor (Gary Smith) was super easy on the eyes and I plan to get back to going at least twice a week until I either find another deal nearby or save up the dough to buy a membership at one of the studios.

In other news, in nine days we are embarking on another trip down to Portland. Dubs has the day off so she will definitely be riding down with the Sailor and I and this time we've decided to book a room at the Ace Hotel instead of the Jupiter (though there is nothing wrong with the Jupiter.) I'm making a point on this trip to hit up the stripclubs and hook up with my cousins Mack & Ben who live in Vancouver and we'll also be meeting up with the Sailor's old navy buddy again.

It looks like this will probably be my last trip this year since my pregnant coworker is ready to pop at the end of December and I'm running a bit low on PTO, so we're gonna make it a good one.

Kenny Powers is my boyfriend.

I spent the Sunday after Thanksgiving watching the second season of Eastbound & Down while lounging around in my "Kenny Powers is my boyfriend" tee-shirt. It was pretty awesome.

I had inexplicably missed most of the second season and I just happened to flip over to a rerun when Sailor and I were at my place on Saturday. He insisted had heard of it but had never seen an episode so we let it roll and laughed our asses off for the next 30 minutes or so.

If you didn't know, Eastbound & Down is rife with profanity and heavy on the hilarity which means it's essentially right up this girl's f*cking alley. Enjoy some of the finer moments (probably NSFW, folks:)

Season 3 is slated to be the last, but I'm still looking forward to it immensely.

Things to be thankful for...

This year has had it's highs and lows but ultimately there are so many things that I can be thankful for today (and every day, like we all should be.)

*my health

*my brilliant friends who support me and challenge me

*my family

*living in this gorgeous city

*a handsome and quirky suitor

*a comfortable home

*a decent job

*Gizmo and Bread

*the internet which brings me gems like this:

Murmuration from Sophie Windsor Clive on Vimeo.

13 days.

It's been a pretty busy 13 days since I last posted here, kiddos.

After watching the Pacquiao/Marquez fight (something I thought I may never do, let alone enjoy) Sailor convinced me to go out dancing with our ex-coworker, his lovely wife and their friends that we had joined for the boxing match. Well, I shook my ass and he enjoyed his lemon drop.

I've recently given up most hard liquor and Sailor likes girly drinks, so trips to the bar are always amusing when I order a beer and he orders some kind of frou frou beverage - the man loves a mimosa.

The trip to Portland was fucking fantastic (though really freakin' cold.)

*The Jupiter was lovely. They have chalkboard paint on all the doors and after I spent a few minutes adding some of my personal "art"

Sailor added his own:

*HUMP! was great, if not better, for the second time and meeting up beforehand with my local friends Rylee and Adam was icing on the cake.

*I dropped my entire purse into a puddle during a "Chinese Fire Drill" and I am still wondering what dissolved into a pink powder in one of the pockets.

*We went to Voodoo Doughnuts Too and Fire on the Mountain TWICE (thanks to DP's old navy buddy Seth for introducing me to this WING HEAVEN.)

*We walked a lot and trekked our way through SE Portland and downtown; on our way back across the Burnside bridge I noticed a sign for a Dirt Nasty show that evening and proceeded to spend 5 minutes telling Sailor who he was before realizing he had been walking 10 feet in front of us the entire time.

*We didn't end up going to the strip club, but did end up capturing some pretty entertaining moments from our trip on his Super 8 camera app.

Before we even got home we were talking about another joint weekend excursion - this time we're thinking Vancouver, BC early in December...Still, I have a feeling I may be back to Portland for the weekend sometime very very soon.

Yay for pretentious foodie bullsh*t!

I always loved Ted Allen on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (remember that?) and this (satirical, for those of you who can't quite tell) piece from The Onion makes me like him even more.

Celebrity Chef Ted Allen Cooks His Favorite Pretentious Foodie Bullshit Meal

Is that rude?

I am slightly dreading tonight's bikram class. I'm back with my original instructor who seems to be slightly more hardcore than the one I've gotten used to, OR she was just trying to make a point with one of the girls in my class who (in my opinion) was being a bit rude.

From what I've seen so far, pacing is a pretty important aspect of bikram and in almost every pose this chick (who actually seemed quite adept at the poses) was coming out of the posture about 5 seconds before our teacher told us to "change," which is the signal to the students to slowly come out of the current pose. By the end of the session I was convinced that the instructor was holding the poses longer than usual just to make a point. Also, though I understand posture is important this girl was incessantly staring at herself in the side mirrors while the rest of us were diligently focused on the front mirrors as you're typically told to do at least a few times throughout a class.

Focus is key and you're definitely supposed to only be paying attention to yourself and your own practice but I found myself incredibly distracted by this student's behavior. I got the distinct feeling that she had either been practicing for a while or had taken the bikram teacher training, but I still think that the instructor is essentially the boss and you should do your best to stay with the rest of the class.

Am I being overly judgmental or was she not following the typical bikram etiquette? Either way, I'm praying she isn't in my class again this evening.

womp womp

Another fantastic weekend, but sadly I got so wrapped up in pet-sitting and HUMP! 7 I completely blew my "post everyday" goal for the month. Oops.

HUMP! was amazing (recap here with SPOILERS;) so incredibly good that when we met up afterward I immediately convinced Sailor that he should go see it with me while we're in Portland. And I got the "I got HUMPED" tshirt. Had to.

This weekend I also fell in love. Every time I went over to take care of my friend's kitties, sweet little (5 pounds!) thing Honky would jump into my lap after she got done eating and purr her little heart out until I had to leave. I'm completely smitten. Today my be my last day taking care of her, but a little piece of Honky will always be in my heart.

The Black Keys can do no wrong.

In a little over a month the new The Black Keys album El Camino will be out (December 6th!) and if this new single is any indication, I'll be loving it as hard as all the rest.

"There's a lot to be said here..."

A friend was recently recounting a dream they had and I found myself almost immediately inspired by the striking portrait it painted of two people on seemingly opposite sides of a situation; in the dream's case, a high school basketball court. The desire to turn his one sentence narrative into a full blown short story was immediately awakened and when he strongly suggested I pitch it to him with the intention to make it a short film my mind was again drawn back to the psychic reading that I had so many years ago (part one, part two, part 3, part 4, part 5.) Near the end of my reading (part 5 if you don't want to slog through the whole thing) she encouraged me to pursue writing and most specifically - penning plays.

At once, I started working on a rough draft and after I arrived home I spent the next few available hours before my bikram class continuing to flesh it out. Within 24 hours I had a solid story line to present to my pal and the Madre (who had helped me through a few ideas.) It's going to have to take a backseat over the next few days as I start pet-sitting my friend's cats this evening, but I have an intriguing tingle that tells me this could be quite an entertaining project.

Watch out, Portland.

In less than 3 weeks, my longtime friend Sailor and I will be descending upon the famed Jupiter Hotel for an extended weekend and what is sure to be plenty of debauchery. I've been needing a mini vacation (and definitely owe some friends a visit,) he wanted a chance to catch up with an old Navy buddy in Oregon and my bff Dubs is always looking for a ride south to see her dude so we actually managed to coordinate an upcoming trip to lovely Portland. I'm really not sure I could have better roadtrip partners.

I'm freakin' thrilled to be going to the land of Stumptown Coffee, Voodoo Doughnut, and strip clubs with booze and no "4 foot rule" (I'm coming for you, Union Jacks.)

NaBloPoMo begins!

As November commences you should see my posts increase in frequency (and most likely brevity) as NaBloPoMo kicks off (that's National Blog Posting Month for those of you who aren't big into the "blog scene.") Essentially the main goal is to publish a post every single day for the entire month, following a daily prompt if you find yourself stuck for ideas.

I started with a pretty solid block last year but was thwarted around day 13 by illness, Red Dead Redemption and my Deadwood addiction.

Gratefully, this year I can see I'm in a much better place all around - mentally, physically, spiritually (the version/definition of the concept that is completely unrelated to any of that organized religion...um..."stuff") and thanks to the wonderful world of technology I'm pretty sure I can blog from my Android phone (which may prove really useful for some travel plans I have coming up.)

I think you might consider staying tuned for my month of amateur porn, amateur vet-teching, roadtrips, strippers, and going away parties.

St. Vincent & sand = NO FAIL

My raw "pasta" dinner was mostly successful, I suppose, though it wasn't quite enough and we ended up at Proletariat Pizza picking up half of their amazing Ham & Egg pie (my second visit that week AND the same exact pizza...lordy.) It was seriously indulgent enough to work in perfect harmony with the cheesecake and chocolate cake Sailor brought for dessert from Bakery Noveau (I have to say he's got pretty good taste.)

As I julienned the big pile of veggies we chatted, made plans for a joint roadtrip and he introduced me to the charming music of St. Vincent (he definitely has a knack for being able to suggest the perfect tunes for his friends.) After dinner and a bottle of wine to wash it down we headed to Alki in the middle of the night and proceeded to enjoy the bottle of port DP had stashed in his car while running around on the beach in the cold like a couple of foolish teenagers. If you haven't peed in the Puget Sound before then you're most assuredly missing out. When I awoke Sunday afternoon to my pile of sandy clothes and salt-crusted shoes, I couldn't help but grin and giggle. I have a feeling that by the time he goes back to LA I'm going to have half a dozen more stories of our antics and possibly half a functioning liver.

"Oh look, more sand!" - Sailor

Hello Halloween FAIL(?)

So, even after weeks of months of planning my possible costume for this weekend I actually ended up with no real plans to go "out" but instead of being upset, I'm a bit amused.

Technically, I did get invited out and of course there are half a dozen costume-y parties I could attend; I'm actually not really feeling it. Instead, I'll be having my friend Sailor over for dinner again - a gent who is apparently "not big on that dress up shit" and curious enough about a raw "pasta" recipe that I've been wanting to try out to pass up on an invitation to both of us from our old coworker to terrorize the bars downtown with him and his wife.

Though part of me feels that I technically "failed" at one of my favorite holidays, the other part is pretty confident that it'll be a lovely weekend even if I don't end up getting out into the costumed craziness that is sure to ensue tonight. It's been pretty freakin' dreary out and a night at home with a good meal, bottle of wine and interesting company isn't sounding too shabby at all.

In other news, this week has been delightful. I got to meet my pet-sitting wards Thursday night before Bikram and I have to admit that Honky and Orville are two sweet, adorable cats who I will be more than happy to take care of while my friends go out of town, despite the fact that Honky requires IV fluids every other day. I got a chance to try my hand at administering the fluids that same night and it really didn't freak me out as much as I had thought it might.

I also got in 2 Bikram classes in with no savasanas (another small class guilted me into pushing myself harder) AND The Madre found out her auditioning classes payed off when she got the part of Helga ten Dorp in a local production of the play "Deathtrap" - I'm so darn proud.

SAD.

It's not even really winter yet and it seems many I know lately are already fighting SAD (seasonal affective disorder) or just finding themselves depressed in general.

Whether it's due to the weather or not so ideal circumstances that may be happening for you lately, fellow blogger and awesome cartoonist Allie of Hyberbole and a Half makes it clear you're not alone (and will probably extract a least a giggle out of you) with her most recent post "Adventures in Depression."

"You're so fucking special."

There were 3 people including me in my Bikram class on Tuesday night.

I guess the 8:30 PM start time is a bit of a stretch for some, but I find myself looking forward to slipping into the studio 15 minutes early and allowing time to relish the heat and savasana before I put my body through it's paces. Afterwards I have just enough time to go home and shower, grab a snack and slide into bed with my book for a while before I drop off to sleep.

I really have a spectacularly cozy bed so that last part of the evening when my clean skin and buzzing muscle is cradled by soft sheets and the light pressure of my warm duvet it feels completely luscious. It's become a ritual that I would probably find hard to put aside for an earlier class, though clearly late sessions are not for everyone.

That being said, I am actually considering trying the 6:30 class tonight because I keep exchanging glances with a hot tattooed dude that always seems to be coming out of class as I'm going in...But, I digress.

With 3 students in class you basically guarantee you're going to get personal attention; alternatively, you feel like a total lazy schmo if you consider savasana (or what I like to call "laying the fuck down") so I made it through my first entire class without a single non sequence savasana. My teacher also boasted that I was on my 11th or 12th class when it was in fact my 6th, so I ended up feeling pretty darn special by the time I shuffled out of the studio.