meg

Hi you guys! So after much hemming and hawing, I've decided that I am going to move over to tumblr.

You can find me at:

http://megamusings.tumblr.com/

I will cease to post any more new posts here on posterous. 

 I was bummed on Friday when I saw the workout was Death by Burpees. I knew throwing myself to the ground, doing a push-up, jumping back up onto my feet and jumping up would reak havoc on my sore back. So I let John go without me in the morning and I folded some laundry and got started on my workday early. John came home and let me know that the mobility portion of the WOD was really great and he thought we should go to the open gym around 4pm. I said sure thing, I definitely still wanted to work out and I knew that he wanted to work on kipping and handstands. When we got there around 4:30 Jess had me go through the mobility stuff and let me know that she'd start the clock for the burpees whenever I was ready. When I let her know that I was worried about my back, she told me I could go through them slowly so that the form is correct and then she asked to see one of my burpees. Eeek! It was pretty bad.

Jess worked with me through the squat, the kick out to the plank, then she had me do a knee pushup, back up to a plank, then attempt to jump wider out so that I actually land on my heels and jump up.  She had me modify it so that I would use a box since my squats are still a work in progress and to help me get to my flat feet when jumping back up. It took some thought when trying to get through the workout quickly, so I messed up a couple of times but was able to get 9 rounds with 9 burpees (so close to making 10 rounds!)

By time I finished it, it was almost time for the 5pm class to show up. John hadn't gotten too much done with his pull-ups, so we decided we'd stay to warm up with the class, kind of as a cool down for me and just for extra work for John. We couldn't help but to get sucked back into the WOD. Because I had just done death by burpees, I decided I'd do death by pull-ups. Unfortunatly, the box I set up to get on the bar distracted me a bit, so I felt like I couldn't kick back to get the full kip, combined with pretty dead arms from the burpees made my death by pull-ups end at 7 rounds. It was fun to watch John do the same WOD he had done at 6am and beat his score. 

So 2 WODs in an hour and a half probably makes me a little crazy, but it was fun and I'm happy that I got a good workout in on a Friday. 

I went to a sports massage therapist on Wednesday to have her take a look at my back and to get the muscles surronding my pain spot loosened up. I used to get massages on a regular basis in college so I know the drill. The last couple of massages I had at Urban Healing Arts were okay. Painful, (that's to be expected) but I felt pretty good afterwards. I had that masseuse work on different areas of my arms and back that were sore from running and crossfit, I wasn't injured at the time so I didn't have any big concerns. 

The masseuse I went to on Wednesday was to work specifically on my lower back pain and work out all the muscles around it. Surprisingly the pressure she put into her massage wasn't too hard, and I actually felt pretty relaxed save for a few incidents when she really hit the nerve of the injury. I was almost ready to fall asleep during the majority of the session, which I took as a good sign. What bothered me was that after the massage was over I felt like she didn't try to get me to come back. Is that weird? This happened to me after my second seccession at Urban Healing Arts too, there was no, "hey it would probably good to see you in x weeks" After showing me a stretch and telling me about what she thinks my back pain is stemming from (a strain potentially between some vertebre) the masseuse yesterday said to see what the doctor says when I see him. I inquired if I should come back to her, for maintance type of massages and she was like, "sure." Ummm, really? Do you not want my business?  Not only are you in a convenient location for me (less than a mile from my house) but your website says that you do what I want to implement into my routine (active isolate stretching and sports massage thereapy). It made me feel like she wasn't confident in her services or something, which makes me less confident in them. Sigh. I will be looking elsewhere for a more regular massuse I think. It makes me appreciate Jan, my massuse from college who would come to us and give us tips and care about us. wah, I miss Jan.

I do have to say, however, that the back massage did help loosen me up enough that I slept well and decided to go to CrossFit the next day. I know that I was supposed to be taking it easy, but I can't stop working out all together. I'm making sure not to do too much. I thought I'd be okay doing kettlebell swings, but upon warming up with them their was some serious discomfort and pain coming from my lower back so they were out for that WOD. I was surprised when the tuck jumps didn't hurt since I thought a lot of the pain was steming from hip movements, but I was able to do them fine and they were fun. Here's what my Thursday WOD was:

Handstand hold/walk practice

(10 minute time limit)

________________________________________________________

3 rounds of:

250m row

20 Pull-ups

15 Tuck jumps

Rest-1 minute

(complete 1 round then rest, repeat 2 more times)

SCORE: 13:39

 _____________________________________________

My handstands are getting better, I had two really good ones, one that I think I held for about 30 seconds. I love that we're really focusing on the skill of the month and following through with it. I hope to attempt some handstand push-ups on the wall (versus my regular adaptation from ontop of a box) in the future.

Whether it's humans just inferring that the animal is speaking english or a creative dub over the animals' lip smacks, I find a lot of animal speaking videos to be quite entertaining.

We often ask Sol if she wants to go "run around"

This went viral pretty quickly last week, it spread so quickly that I suspected it was a virus at first!

So the honeybadger doesn't actually "talk" but this is currently my favorite animal video. Honeybadger don't care, honeybadger don't give a shit.

   VS 

I've recently grown tired of my theme and the difficulty it takes to follow other people's blogs. Blogger, WordPress and Tumblr all make this easier and since I do 80% of my blogging sitting down in front of my computer instead of sending it via email to posterous, I'm seriously starting to consider hosting this blog elsewhere. Some of my favorite bloggers are on Tumblr, but then again I see how often it crashes and Posterous has yet to crash on me. Ugh. Decisions... 

I'm going to try out Tumblr since I've already had WordPress and Blogger accounts and haven't fallen in love with them. We'll see how this goes and I'll keep my 3 faithful readers in the know on what I decide to do :-)

I've been complaining about back pain since I did a bunch of deadlifts at 95# in Hawaii in April. See, my 5 rep max used to be 100# but then I did the CF Games 11.2 at that weight and was pretty successful; I thought I'd be fine with the 95# for the Diane workout. Problem is I wasn't dropping the bar at the top of the deadlift like I had for the games (Scott was watching me closely during that workout and suggested it). So the strain felt on my back lasted me for quite awhile. I finally started feeling some relief about 2 weeks ago. Then last Thursday I did that yoga routine and immediately felt the tinge of pain in my lower back again. Ugh. No big deal, I said to myself, I just need some more flexibility, and rolling out. I planned to book an appointment with a sports massage therapist near me that does Active Isolate Stretching along with trigger point therapy. 

Last night I went to bed complaining about my left hip, lower back and leg being sore. I woke up with some discomfort but wanted to get today's WOD in. I knew I'd have to modify it anyway due to the OH Squats that were on the docket, but I didn't know how badly my back would be hurting.

During the warm-up while doing some pretty successful squating I felt a sharp twinge shoot from my left hip to my back. Corey saw it happen and had me stop that rep, but I wanted to shake it out and continue. My next one didn't hurt so I went on. Emilee had asked about some lower back stretches during our mobility time and I followed the stretches that Corey was showing her and also tried to loosen up the area with a lacrosse ball. I thought I was ready to complete the WOD pain free.

Here's what the entire workout called for:

 “Coach Scott’s (33) and Max’s (29) Birthday WOD”

33 KB Snatches, #35/#26

then……..

3 rounds of:

11 OHS, #95/#65

11 V-ups

11 Squat Cleans, #95/#45

11 Overhead Lunges, #45/#25

11 Wall ball shots, #20/#12

11 Knees to Elbows

then………….

Row 33 calories

When I got to Knees to Elbows (which I can't actually get my knees to my elbows anyway) I had another really sharp pain hit just my back. Corey suggested that I try it on my hands instead, while that hurt less, the more effort I tried in order to make my knees get to my elbows the more my back would hurt. We finally settled on just doing sit-ups.

so my actual WOD was as follows:

 “Coach Scott’s (33) and Max’s (29) Birthday WOD”

33 KB Snatches, #10 weight 

then……..

3 rounds of:

11 OHS, PVC

11 V-ups

11 Squat Cleans, #45

11 Overhead Lunges, #15 (AND I DOCK MYSELF FOR MY FIRST ROUND, I tried with 25#s and I did 11 steps vs 11 on each side. 2nd round I did 15# and I'm pretty sure I hit 11 on each side, though I stupidly lost count)

11 Wall ball shots, #10

11 sit-ups

then………….

Row 33 calories

Score: 25:10

Not a great day, but a really hard workout, none the less. I wish I hadn't messed up on the OH lunges. I asked way too late for clarification. The second round I was pretty sure I had the first round done incorrectly. I should have done 11 more at that point to make it up. Urgh. 

John thinks I should take tomorrow off, and I think I might have to listen to him. I have an appointment at lunch time to see the sports massage therapist, luckily she's less than a mile from my house so it won't take up too much time and I can start my workday early when John gets up to go to CF so I'll have plenty of work done by time my appointment rolls around. Being injured sucks.

There's a beautiful place in Washington called the Methow Valley, we visted back in January for our New Year's Trip. John and I were inspired by Sunset Magazine to figure out a way to make a trip back out there and to these really cool huts that were featured in the magazine back in December. His 30th birthday was the perfect excuse. With all the late snow, we weren't sure what the weather would hold for us but we crossed our fingers, gave a couple of calls to the ranger stations and headed out. With 13 friends along for the ride, we made the trip from Friday through Sunday of last weekend. We had an itinerary that included a iron chef style cook-off (using dutch ovens), a snowy hike, a dinner made by John and Me, and dogs allowed to free range the property. We added in a bonfire and some scotch beer made by the Dirty Librarian Brewery (home brew via Tobey and Forrest) and it was a great weekend! 

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celebrating-my-hubs-b-day-in-western-wa-ElHivwkvbmmyozziyktf.zip (540 KB)

I was exhausted Saturday evening so Sol and I went to bed around 9:30 while John and others stayed up to huddle around the campfire. The next morning we all got up and made our way out of the huts and attempted to have a quick breakfast at the Twisp River Pub. Unfortunatly service wasn't all that great for us both times we went (we stopped there for dinner on Friday and the waitress was probably the spaciest person I've ever met)! It's too bad because the food was actually pretty decent. Overall it was a really great weekend with wonderful friends. John felt lots of love celebrating his 30th.

I've been gone all weekend and was terribly busy with work on Friday, therefor unable to update about the yoga experience on Thursday night or Friday's workout. I thrive to be honest yet kind in my posts so I will keep my yoga update short. 

It.wasn't.very.good.

While I totally appreciate SWCF offering yoga classes to members as part of their membership, this particular class was less organized than I hoped. Just to give a few low-lights

• my back injury found a way to be stretched the wrong way and start hurting again
• the instructor did the routine with us instead of helping us
• the dog the instructor brought to the class was distracting

Even John didn't seem to be too pleased with this lesson and John is pretty good at letting little things roll off his back. So my yoga adventure at the box will most likely end with that first session. I'm still thinking about another place that may be better suited for me, updates on continued yoga practice to come.

Now onto the WODs

FRIDAY

Max KB Swings 60 seconds, #26
60 second rest
x 3

(29,28,31)

AMRAP 12 minutes
15 Air Squat
5 HSPU
15 KB SDLHP, #26

(5&1/3 rounds)

100 ABMAT Sit-ups (I did the sit-ups in 3:35!)
for time

TOTAL Score: 25:35

*complete WOD from top to bottom.  Rest as needed before next evolution

Comments: I'm a dummy!! I did 15 HSPUs on my first two rounds which slowed me down significantly, I think I could have gotten at least two more rounds in had I not made that mistake. Otherwise, this workout was awesome, made me sweat a lot.

MONDAY

Comments:

I got my first double under, then I did it three more times. That was awesome.

I got incredibly frustrated with the Squat Cleans, partially because my squating sucks and partially because I could not get the quick movement down. It came close to bringing me to tears. I can't stand being that bad at something. It didn't help that John's comment was "You're doing hang cleans" Thanks supportive hubby, how about you leave me alone now.

The 4x400 went well enough. I led the way through the first three and didn't have enough gas in the tank when Max pulled ahead of me in the last 200m. This was a true VO2 max. The one minute rest is no joke. I started out with a 71, and recorded and then erased the others so I don't have an accurate measurement on all of the intervals. I didn't mind coming in 2nd, I worked really hard and almost threw up. A Monday workout that sends me close to tears and vomit is one way to start the week.

The after CF nap when we got home was much needed, that may become a new routine.

When I was a little kid I was able to do a lot of things that are near impossible for me to do now. I used to love to swing on the monkey bars at the far end of the playground in elementary school, they were one of my favorite things on the playground ( I also loved the big red slide that Johnny Corrino fell off of which we were then banned from). I think when I was the ripe age of 7 I could do toes to bar really easily (I know I could swing my entire body up and throw my knees over the bar and hang). Now I can barely hang on the bar. It's so pathetic. 

I also used to be pretty flexible. I remember doing backbends with Emily and Laura in Emily's front yard. I maybe at one point was able to touch my toes. You know what I can't do now? Squat. Seriously. Yesterday's WOD was disasterous. Here's what was prescribed:

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YouTube is incredibly helpful when you want to learn some new things.Take dancing for instance. If you want to be taught how to dougie, you can find a video on there of the glee kids breaking it down. Super fun. But then there are people out there who are passionate and want to teach you things that you may be better off not learning. Take for instance this man: 

Rock out now! Imagine an entire group of kids doing this choreography, that might be kind of cute. But it's just weird and hil-ar-ious to see a grown man doing it.

Next up we have someone who lives and breathes hip hop.

 I have to ask you, what are you going to do when hip hop goes out?