zombie by day, vampire by night

now before you go running off to sharpen the stakes and/or clean the local grocery out of garlic allow me to explain. i've been experiencing sleeplessness or just all around poor sleep patterns of late. not much seems to be able to shut the neural activity off and my nights are full of tossing and turning. before its long its morning and i have to be up, only problem is that's when i am ready to sleep.

i am suffering and my training is affected as well.

i am really quite concerned about one of my friends, a very bad, very challenging situation continues to escalate. i am really not sure how much more my friend can take. even my friend is starting to feel well past the breaking point. when it gets dark like this my friend tends to cocoon and is very hard to reach. since i know how dark and desperate things are... i worry.

i had my mid-year review a couple days ago at work. suprisingly it went well, alot better than i expected. i basically was expecting as bad a review as last time. i have to admit the impending review contributed to my sleeplessness a bit as well.

today i called the placement agency i used when i was freelancing. i have to admit that i am truly not happy at work. i can't help but think that my decision to accept full-time employment there was a mistake. since most mistakes can be corrected, i am currently trying to explore my options before deciding upon my next step.

but the question is... will i sleep tonight?

to err is be human...

i am human, no really i am and i make mistakes... sometimes lots of them. i've made a couple recently and do you know what happens when i make a mistake? well i start agonizing over it, regretting it and wishing that i could undo it. but alas what is done is done, so without a delorean and a flux capacitor there is nothing i can do save learn from it and try not to do it again... and of course in my special case, sleep poorly.

i said something stupid to a friend yesterday. it was not meant in any sort of malicious way, i was trying to be funny i just didn't realize all of the implications behind my joke. i am sure she has probably forgotten about it which since it was offensive to her is good, i however will feel like an azz for some time.

on the weekend i sent a 'hey, hope your having a fantastic weekend and what do you think about this...', email to jennifer and last night i read on her members blog that things have been rough in her family since last week thursday. and again i wear the azz hat.

okay so we have covered my ability to err, what of my ability to forgive? well that is the other part of my recent bout of sleeplessness. can i trust someone who has let me down before? should i forgive and forget? and can i? i guess the answer is how would i feel if my friend from yesterday held my stupid comment against me??

can ya be too nice?

apparently the answer to this question is yes. and i for one find that odd. i have always believed that you put out in the universe what you hope to get back. so i tend to be nice, but some have told me that i am too nice. so what is the accepted level of 'niceness'?

if my friends have problems, need a friend or a shoulder to lean on i am there for them. well as long as they aren't crying. i don't do tears. hey... maybe i'm not that nice after all??

i do want to do something nice for my coach and his woman. i've recently heard from a fbb who had to change coaches mid show prep. considering how close the show date is, that's got to be rough. this trend as terrifying as it sounds in not that uncommon, particularly when one is being prepped by a competitive athlete. i spoke at length with another fbb who had a similar experience. she felt completely abandoned by her coach 8 weeks out from her first show. rather than get a new coach this fbb tried to gamely go it alone. doing all of the final prep herself.

i think she needs to applaud herself for her bravery and forgive herself for not 'coming in', in the shape she wanted to. as she was basically 'guessing' and going it alone she is a winner in spirit and internal fortitude.

my coach had a whole wack of sh!t going on in his life particularly in the final days before my show. but push to shove he was there for me. all my calls were answered or promptly returned and all my fears and/or concerns were addressed. his lady helped me alot as well. she was instrumental in my stage presentation. for my make up, stage colour, hair and oil she was there. i am sure i would have looked a royal mess without her.

i need them to know their efforts were appreciated. especially in light of my decision to 'offseason' under jennifer's guidance. i want to ensure my coach knows he is still my first choice and that come next year... i want the same people in my corner.

change will do you good?

todays marks the third new workout, that i have implemented since i've been working with jennifer. it is still too early to tell if things feel any different. the only concern i have is how long my knee's will be able to hold up. 10 years of falling out of the sky has taken there toll on my knee joints and some of the stuff that i need to do to bring about change is hard on the knee's.

i somehow managed to hurt myself tuesday and i had to get in to see my sports physiotherapist pretty quickly. that meant that wednesdays planned workout (chest/triceps/calves) had to be swapped with saturdays (back/biceps/calves). i am sure my poor back and hamstrings are wondering what the hell is going on. switching from the way i was training to this method happened over the course of a weekend. i had done my typical quad workout on the friday and my normal back workout on saturday. i was off sunday and started the new way monday with shoulders/hamstrings/abs. of course then i hurt myself and wednesday i was hitting my back again. oh well stuff happens like that, you just deal and move on.

yesterday was my second off day for the week and it was difficult to say the least. i was quite the bear. everything annoyed me i was angry, frustrated and i really wanted nothing more than to haul off and pound on someone. around midday i got the brilliant idea to go for a walk to 'cool off'. probably not my best decision. the elevator stopped on every floor on the way down. at the last stop 8 people got into an already occupied elevator, which of course set off my claustraphobia. as soon as the doors opened i wanted OUT but that group of 8 moved, 8 abreast and walked at the pace of congealed molasses. i practically exploded through the revolving doors in my haste to get out of the building. my walk was ineffective to make a long story short, the kilted dude who plays the bagpipes on the corner came this close to having to have his pipes surgically removed from his nether regions.

i sure hope this cranky behaviour doesn't continue

brand new battle plan

as i mentioned jennifer is helping me with my offseason program. as i feared her first order of business was to hack away at one of my training days. so i am now only training 4 days of the week. she suspects i might be a hard gainer and require more rest to grow. she also recommends that i nap on the weekends which i did successfully sunday and that put me into a bit of a pickle.

she also thinks i need more food to grow as well and has bumped up my daily caloric intake by heaps. getting it all in is tough. the nap that i attempted to take on sunday turned into a 5 hour sleep. i woke up 1 hour before my bedtime with four meals left to consume. needless to say i was up for hours!

today was my first training day. the split is different, the rep scheme is different and we will be introducing some new exercises as well. its going to take some getting used to as i suppose change generally does. jennifer likes to keep the workouts varied to shock the muscles and keep them guessing. i tend to be a creature of habit so constantly doing a new workout is going to be a challenge in and of itself. good thing i like challenge.

i learned during my last offseason that cottage cheese tasted very good when added to muscle milk strawberry protein powder. i learned last night however that it does not go with muscle milk's chocolate mint flavour. i don't really enjoy eating cottage cheese but until i get some new protein i guess i will be soldiering in the 1/2 cup at night.

the things we do for mass.

before i forget... again

an interesting thing happened this morning at the gym. i almost forgot about it in the excitement of setting a new squat personal best. first you have to understand that when i train i have the mp3 player on with the ear buds buried in my ear canals. i'm told there is a look of intensity on my face as well. so then why mid workout do i have people coming up to complain to me about the radio station?!!

some random member comes up between sets and starts squawkin about there being too much talk on the radio. now there was a guy who was actually working... well he would have been working, if he would remember to get out from behind the juice bar and i dunno clean something up or put something away! oops did i just type that?

anyway back to the random member, so i politely listen even though in my head i'm thinking "fool, why are you bothering me?". i can't remember all what he said at one point it was just lips flapping and then he said something to the effect that i "didn't have to go change the radio now." sometimes i wish we were allowed to strike rude and or stupid members.

wednesday morning my workout was also interrupted. that time by a female member who is a fan of my old training partner. she will often stop me to ask questions about what the old training partner is up to, so usually when i see her in they gym i try to play 'keep away'. i'm not trying to be mean, i just have a job to do. i patiently entertain all of her queries in the locker room. you would think she would tire of hearing me say "i dont know" and "i havent see her". so the next time i see my old training partner i am supposed to tell her to email this woman. that poor woman doesn't understand... i can't tell her to do anything, and i stopped trying a long time ago.

sometimes the only solution is to train somewhere else. last week saturday i went and trained at a gym that one of my friends from the board goes too. it was nice nobody complaining to me about the stereo, because somebody was on the step mill too long,...

speaking of step mills... what is wrong with you people. i got on that machine from hell a total of 4 times during contest prep, i prolly should have been on it more... but i hate that fawkin thing. why da fawk would ya go on it when ya weren't trying to get down to single digits in body fat? and further why the fawk would ya stay on it too long?? what are these people smokin!!!!

random thoughts

while at the gym this morning i happened to notice the new signage in the womens' bathroom. mediacom or somebody puts up lifestyle advertising at the gym and its changed from time to time. so i'm in a stall and i'm staring at this ad for summer's eve feminine wipes. not exactly the most entertaining of reading but there wasn't a whole lot of choice and i was a captive audience. i am also in the advertising field, so i couldn't help but scan the ad. it was the tag line at the end that really got me thinking 'enjoy being a woman'. okay i have one question... exactly what the hell is in those wipes!!

i took the bike into work yesterday and i have to admit that i don't feel as 'safe' at work as i once did. i walked into the building wearing a joe rocket motorcycle jacket, boots and i had a motorcycle helmet in my hand. the guy who is at the desk, who's job is building security, says to me "do you ride a motorcycle?". this is a multilevel office tower, there are countless people wandering in and out of this building all day. this guy is my last line of defence. i think i'm frightened.

its been a long time...

once again its come to my attention that i haven’t been keeping up with my updates. bad miche!

when we last left off i had told you that i was going to try some of jennifer abrams ideas during my offseason. well i have given her all the information she requires to get us going. she is going to see what manipulations we can make to my training to help bring up some of my lagging areas and she is also going to try to see if she can make some improvements in my posing. i will let you know how that goes. we start september 1st.

went ahead and popped my head even further out of my shell. posted up several, very tiny, colour pics from my shoot on my board. for the most part i’ve been told that i look beautiful and gorgeous and other odd choices like that. there was even a couple of posters who were most curious to figure out wether my hair was in braids or curls. for someone who is still dealing with the ‘smallness’ issue, all the comments about beauty and hair do not sit well with the athlete who lives within. i guess its because when they were asking to see the shots they assured me that they would tell me honestly if they could see a bber. since they aren’t mentioning it… i can only assume they can’t.

the family went to hawaii on the family cruise and now they are back. usually i’m incredibly lonely when i am home alone and usually i hate the lonliness. interestingly enough this time it wasn’t as bad. of course in true ma and pa form they started bickering almost immediately upon returning home. mom asked me to go buy her chinese food for dinner, dad assumed that he would eat some of that and that started the first war. then they would get into it when one or the other would start trying to recount some holiday adventure. the other one not telling the story would correct some minor detail and then the story telling would stop while they bicker incessantly over the minor detail to a story that wasn’t exactly holding my interest in the first place. so i would use that time to head to the silence and the sanctity of my room.

oh talked to my nutritionist about my poor sleep patterns. i’ve been having trouble establishing normal sleeping patterns. some of my friends were suggesting some sort of sleep aid. but my nutritionist knows me and my pattern on insomniac behaviour. he knows its stress related, he says the sleep aid would get me sleep, but would not fix the problem. he has given me some suggestions to help get to sleep and ive been able to get about 5 hours a night since ive been trying it.

sleep is good

a quick update

just another quick post to let you know i'm still here. i haven't collapsed in some overly dramatic depressed funk. in fact my mood is currently quite the opposite!!

as you know i've been feeling quite small and less and less like a bodybuilder. well my friends, my coach... they all tried to tell me that i was every bit the bodybuilder regardless of how i felt i looked. as much as i appreciated their efforts because i could not 'see' it for myself it offered me little comfort.

i knew i needed to take some form of action as my mood was likely not going to be good for me in the long run. well i posted my feelings on a natural bodybuilding board i've joined and i was encouraged to see that the way i was feeling was actually pretty common. i also sent an email to that natural female bodybuilder that i admire, jennifer abrams.

well as luck would have it jennifer was able to really put things into perspective for me. she recognized that my physique leans towards the ectomorphic-mesomorph, in comparison she is a mesomorphic-endomorph. basically she has a fuller more muscular look to her physique where as i tend to have a leaner muscular look. that is why it so hard for me to see myself as a bodybuilder. to further illustrate her point she sent me the url of ifbb pro debbie patton. debbie is, you guessed it, a endo-meso and one look at the pics in her gallery and i could so see the similarities. granted i am no where near the condition debbie is but we 'look' alike. debbie got her pro card by competiting through team universe which is the 'tested' npc show.

anyway jennifer suggested there may be other things i could do in my offseason to help me achieve that bodybuilder look that i seek. i talked it over with me coach and he is cool with me giving it a shot. so i am going to try and see what jennifer might do differently. i am pretty excited about this, change can be a good thing when it comes to physiques.

but just so we are clear. i am a rookie, i have only 1 show under my belt. i am confident i can get workouts emailed to me and i can do them properly and safely. but when it comes to show time... my coach and my nutritionist have to be people i can see. there will be no changes in the 'team' when it comes to show time next year.

todays thought

popular opinion is that i think too much... rather i think i feel too much. i would like to stop that. i would like to return to the jackie frost/ice princess persona i was in my youth. i wasn't anymore popular then than i am now... but sh*t didn't get to me then like it gets to me now.

short and sweet today folks.

yikes!!! and other things

so yesterday morning i am in the kitchen getting my meals organized for the day, much like i do every morning. my mother comes into the kitchen and she is in the mood to talk. we start off with the usual small talk and i happen to mention that i'm very tired, that i haven't been feeling well lately because i haven't been sleeping well.

well my mother comes back with 'my daughter needs some exercise'. now i know that she knows i train 5 days a week so i remind her of that and she says, 'my daughter needs a different kind of exercise'. at this point she has on this grin that frankly i found pretty freaking disturbing and she goes on to add 'that will put you to sleep'.

i had no real comeback for that, frankly i was well horribly uncomfortable and pretty freakin disturbed. exactly when did our relationship change? i don't want a 75 year old girlfriend. i was quite happy with the way things used to be, where we didn't talk about our sex lives... or lack thereof.

i lay the blame soley on the shoulders of dr. phil and oprah. i think i need therapy!!

onto something lighter. i was on my way to my car at the 5 level garage i park at close to work. there is an elevator and a couple of stairwells that you can use to get to your vehicle. well as i passed by the elevator i happened to notice a mo'nique sized woman wrestling with the doors of the elevator. the doors would not open nor close all the way. behind mo'nique were a couple other people and they were watching her push the doors whilst they discussed the fact that there were indeed stairwells. i should also add that mo'nique was not an elevator repair person but just someone who clearly had no intention of taking the stairs!

now maybe it's just me but that was not an elevator i had any intention of getting on, even if she had 'fixed it'. i went straight for the stairwell and started climbing. i think that said a LOT about how lazy we have become.

take the children for example. the instances of child onset diabetes is higher than it has ever been. the children are overweight and horrifically out of shape. generally the only muscle that receives regular exercise are the text messaging/gameboy fingers and what do the parents do? they buy these couch potatoes knapsacks on wheels and shoes with wheels in them!!

a couple days ago i saw a young girl rolling through the underground mall. she was pushing herself along on her scooter while her mother walked along. i shook my head.

not that it would ever happen, but if i had kids they would be like fawkin' marines in comparison to the mamby-pamby kids i see.

walkin' down memory lane

a friend was recently demonstrating her google 'prowess' and it inspired me to check what hits still existed from my skating days. well one of the first hits took me to the myspace page of one of the guys from the circuit, someone i haven't seen or thought of in years. well the skaters for the most part are still pretty connected so i was bouncing around alot from myspace to myspace. matt andrews, azikiwee, mike o, arlo, jess... it's almost like everyone is still out there.

i must admit i am not thinking about actively getting onto myspace. i would love to re-connect with some of the skaters and maybe even find some of the others who haven't gotten onto myspace yet either.

and finally i think the search for osama could be concluded quite quickly if my queen of the google friend fired up a browswer window!!!

back in the saddle...

first and foremost i am a bit behind in my posting and that fact was recently brought to my attention. i'm sorry.

since i've last been in here i've done my photo shoot. i was only able to get down to 137lbs. i may not have looked stage ready but i think i did look good enough to shoot. i had some detail, seperation and some ab detail so all in all... i did well.

so how'd it go? well in the continuing saga of miche livin' outside the box this ranks right up there. first there were the wardrobe changes tucked in amongst the rocks and trees. there were more instances of commando dress than i care to admit. then i was crawling over rocks or in the sand! All in all it was pretty fawkin' nutty.

the photographer showed my coach and i a few images that he shot. ok wow! on the screen were a few images of a woman with hair like mine, in a suit like mine. the difference between me and the woman on the camera? she looked like she could easily fit on the pages of musclemag, flex or ironman.

but the best part is i'm offseason!!! 25 weeks of available growth before my next 20 weeks of dieting. time to get huge!!

i think big things can happen this offseason. i'm calling for a 70lb db bench, 225lb bb bench, 250lb squat, 225lb stiff and a 60lb shoulder press!

time to get 'er done!!

friendship, is it in you?

i have a new definition of friend... courtesy of one of my bike forums.

pepper went down in west virginia, hurt badly and unable to ride. jupiter and some others were riding down in north carolina, but they could not be reached in time. word went out on the board that pepper needed help and addy and ts grabbed a trailer and headed for the canada-us border to bring her home.

i've met some really wonderful people on my bb journey. some i feel would 'grab a trailer' should i need them. my wish for all of you, is that regardless of what journey you are on, may you find friends who would grab a trailer and come get you!

here's hoping your brave new world is full of true friends. from what i've read the waters are full of those who aren't. sadly we both know that should you need it, i would not hesitate to grab a trailer for you. what's sad about that is that i think we also both know, that should the situation be reversed... i'd be on my own.

for the record pepper is now safely back home and resting as comfortably as her injuries allow.

balance

i slept last night!! i have been having a lot of trouble with that lately. i just haven't wanted to/needed to go to bed. and poor sleep spells trouble for a bber, be she on season or off.

i've been experimenting with a different mode of training and while i am going through that i am also dieting for my photoshoot. i can only imagine that those two variables collided with the activity of caribana (the annual cultural celebration of my island heritage), and it proved too much to bear. i could barely rise this morning to go to the gym to train. upon my return i HAD to sleep again. i still struggled to wake up from the nap but i had plans with a friend to go see miami vice.

i rode my bike out to her place. sadly it took longer than i thought and she did not have the correct start time for the movie. so in its stead we watched 'the devil wears prada'. i've seen ann hathaway play this role before... i guess she has found her niche. when 't' and i rolled up at the movie theatre we got more than a handful of looks. of course the fact that i was in full leathers didn't help much.

't' has not had the opportunity to see me in full-diet mode before so i am sure today was a bit of a shock. i was due for a meal partway through the movie and unbeknownst to 't' i came prepared. at the appropriate time i opened a pocket of my bike jacket and removed a plastic bag that held a ziplocked portioned meal. i proceeded to dine on chicken and green beans while popcorn snacking and soft drink slurping went on all around me. i then opened another pocket and pulled out an individual portion of crystal light which i poured into my water bottle. i gave it a shake and boom i had a tasty treat. 't' compared my jacket to a clown car from the circus, apparently she half expected a mini microwave to come out from somewhere. please... i rode an hour in full leathers with frozen food in my pocket... there was no need to cook my meal any further!!!

today starts the a.m and p.m bouts of cardio. tomorrow night, if i can get off of work in time, will be my first hip-hop class.

and because its been so long since i've left you a pretty picture... this one is from today. enjoy!

i still haven't found... what i'm looking for

i was in the kitchen a little while ago, cleaning off the foreman grill and i got to thinking. i started to wonder 'why am i here?' not in the literal sense, why was i in the kitchen at that particular point in time. the answer to that was quite obvious as evidenced by the lack of cooked chicken in the refrigerator.

i was wondering why i was or why i am. see part of me thinks that we are here for a reason. i can't really explain it but i've always felt like there was something that i am supposed to do. i know enough to know that i am not here to cure cancer, fix the whole in the ozone layer or promote world peace! you know if the responsiblity for any of that rested on these shoulders... well suffice it to say, it would be in all of your best interests to update your interplanetary passports!!!

i've been thinking again about how i don't really fit in anywhere. there was a family function today at my brother's place, he wanted me to go... but i just feel out of place when i'm around my family, as odd as that sounds. i don't fit in at work, that is for dayumm sure, they are a bunch of hard partying, fast living kind of folk. i can't really say that i fit in at the gym, nor do i feel i fit in with my friends.

i know so many people who know what they want to do, they know what they want to be, and it often seems like they know exactly how to get it. whereas yours truly is tryin' dis, dat and de udda ting... just trying to find my way.

i am a square peg... in a land of round holes.

so... why am i here?

the game??

my coach preaches bodybuilding is a hobby... and expensive hobby, treat it as such. make sure your well rounded, have friends and interests outside of bodybuilding to ensure you keep a level head.

you see there are piranahas and sharks in the bodybuilding waters. they prey on the weak and the desperate. they promise you more than they can deliver and when they have used you up, they cast you aside like trash and latch on to the next 'big' thing. i am fairly confident that i won't fall prey to the evil side of bodybuilding. i have no reason to believe that this sport will morph into a career, i have already done the 'professional' in an alternative sport thing and finally my coach, should i choose to lose my dayumm mind, will effectively and firmly apply his size 10 otomix to my azz and snap me back to reality.

another warrior has fallen in the professional bodybuilding ranks. chris cormier has been hospitalized for the past two months. he is currently re-learning how to walk! a training mishap has aggravated a previous injury and he ended up with an infected vertabrae in his spine. this can be a fatal injury. in an interview i read yesterday, he plans on coming back from this and intends to hit the stage in 2007.

i've decided to take the classes. my coach suggested previously that taking hip hop dance classes would improve my posing and stage performance. improvements in this area, i hope, could potentially lead to guest posing engagements. while i realize at this point that nobody would currently be inclined to pay me to pose... it is another nice sub-goal to work towards. i am a goal oriented person by nature. i like working towards a target lift, bodyfat percentage, placing, etc...

i like to keep myself from going crazy worrying about the end goal by leaping over smaller ones along the way.

to sleep, perchance to dream

first and foremost, although most of the 'planning and thinking' have been taken care of sleep still alludes me. i came home quite tired yesterday and as quickly as possible got myself into bed. i was in bed from 9:15pm and i finally gave up and got back up about an hour later. i sat down at the computer until 11pm and tried that sleeping thing again.

i know that eventually my body will get the sleep it needs, it is just frustrating waiting for it to do so.

last night i went to a dance school to check out a hip hop class. check out as in observe not take. i am contemplating taking classes as it would likely take my posing to 'the next level'. i would like to be one of those people who are known for exciting posing routines. hell... some of those folks can even pick up some extra cash guest posing. now that would be cool. not sure if that class was for me though, the pace seemed rather frantic... i also fear trying to keep up would have me shedding muscle mass by the millisecond.

decisions, decisions

scale is starting to move to the left again, which is good because we are on final approach to the photo shoot.

you think too much

i'm often accused of that. i can't say that they are wrong. but i do feel that thinking works for me. i do not tend to fly by the seat of my pants. i do tend to carefully consider the pro's and con's. i can tell you that even my bouts of apparent spontaniety have be carefully considered... in advance.

sometimes i decide on my actions quickly and sometimes it takes more time.

this time it took a while, it affected my sleep and i let it affect my mood. but i am happy to say that it worked. i've come up with a good working plan. i've reworked my training week. which should give me more effective use of my rest days. as much as i hate them... they are needed. i've reworked my training to focus more on adding the mass that we all know (or should know) that i need. and most importantly i have forgiven myself for what i consider to be a poor finish at my show.

onwards and upwards

p.s: all the shots are in from the photo shoot i did in ohio last march. he says he is definately going to publish one in the next issue of the magazine. things that make ya go hmmmm....

there is no off-switch

no posting... only thinking.

seeing is believing

so the dvd came in the mail, so i now have a souvenir from the show i did. i watched it as soon as i got home from work.

so what did i think?

i don't know what to think. it would have been nice to be able to look at the tape and jump up and down and scream that i was robbed. but i would be lying. i watched my routine a couple of times. i hadn't 'seen' me do it before, for whatever reason i stopped watching the 'rehearsal' footage the closer we got to the show, you know it really is hard to 'watch' yourself objectively.

i would have to say that i almost enjoyed it in spots. during my routine i clearly won the crowd over... guess that's why i got the best poser award.

next year i have to also win the judges over... i want to win my class... fawk it, i want the overall trophy too!!!!

the wheels in my head...

thinking, thinking and more thinking. it is all that i seem to be doing lately.

it's 47 weeks till my next show. that gives me 27 weeks of building and 20 weeks of dieting. the key to improving one's physique, and hopefully, one's placing is by making the most of the offseason. i've heard npcchicka say time and time again 'contests are won or lost in the offseason'.

so how to make the most of my offseason?

well first i have to take a good hard look at the package i brought to the stage last time. figure out where i was weak and chart a course to make myself stronger. now 27 weeks sounds like a lot of time but in the world of bbing its not that long... well it is if your dieting. the reality is, there is only so much that i can accomplish in that 27 weeks so i have to prioritize. i am currently trying to ask a few people for an honest opinion on what areas to focus on this offseason. my sense of 'self' is still horrifically distorted after the rigours of show prep. i still fail to see a bber when i look in the mirror and the more time i spend looking at my show pics the more disappointed i am in what i brought to the stage. clearly i am going to need an objective opinion to help me plot my course.

one of the women in the gym this morning was congratulating me on my placing. she then asked where was the picture of trophy presentation. i told her that it was at home. she then said that it should be blown up and placed on the wall in the gym and that she had already spoken to my coach/boss about it. he assured her that he was 'working on it'. i think i died a little inside when she told me that.

last night my mother wanted to talk about my old training partner and what had become of her. she wanted to know if we were still friends or if she 'dropped me'. i told my mother that i was dropped and i could be wrong but it seemed like she got some sort of twisted pleasure out of that. sometimes it feels to me, like my folks revel in my failures. i can only imagine, especially seeing as they hate the sport, how much my family would enjoy hearing about the show. most people can't understand why i say i finished last in lieu of saying i finished 2nd... but trust me, thats exactly how my family would look at it.

training by myself continues. i expect to continue to train by myself... just as well i guess ive got lots of sh*t to do before feb 26, 2007

master of illusion

last night i had to run a couple errands before i called it a night. i had to get the dvd back to the video store and my truck needed some liquid gold.

as i pull up to the pump i happen to glance at the driver of the vehicle behind me. there was a man calmly sitting behind the wheel of an suv, what struck me as unusual was that said man was sitting there entirely in 'white-face'. i fought the urge to do a triple-take, i wanted to pull up to the pump not wrap my truck around it. so after i park i look back, courtesy of my rear view mirror and buddy is now dancing in his ride. i glance at his vanity place... would ya believe 'A MIME'? i kid you not.

he gives me one of those exaggerated mime winks and i smiled back. i leaned against my truck, closed my eyes and started filling the tank. there were two reasons for closing my eyes, first i was tired and was trying to squeeze in a quick nap and two i was ferverently praying that my tank would miraculously fill for under $20. my pump mate, if you will, was not outside his vehicle completing the pay at the pumps process. two kids walked by from the nearby tim's and one of them almost walked into the other when he caught sight of the mime.

next thing i knew mr mime and his mime-mobile were right behind me. it seems that he recognized me, said he saw me in an elevator downtown. since he got the intersection right i had to believe him, i know i get tunnel-visioned at times but i would like to think that i would have noticed riding up in an elevator with a mime. so then buddy-boy starts to tell me about his 'other' business, he does human statue work for parties and corporate events. it would appear that 'they' really like using bbers as human statues and would i be interested.

okay now you all probably care to know what i said to him, but to be honest i was having a little party in my head because he called me a bber! i lift like a bber, i eat like a bber but i guess i don't always look like a bber. sure people can tell i train, that i am serious about it, but rarely do they know enough to call me a bber. so that made my night.

now that i think of it... what was a mime doing actually putting gas into his tank? should he not have 'mimed' it?

since mime's are all about 'seeing' what isn't really there... does it really count that he saw me as a bber?

when mother nature strikes back!

as you know, i have been aiming to spend as much time as i possibly can logging time and distance on my bike. well trying to get any quality riding time in was a decided challenge this past weekend. on the weather menu was written rain and thunderstorm activity. rain is one thing, but thunder is quite another when your hovering over a 400 lb lightening rod.

sunday morning gave me the break that i needed and i took it. i rode the bike in to the gym as i was rounding out my shift one of the members mentioned that it was raining again. well it went from kind of spitting to a downpour in seconds. unfortunately i still had a client to train. suffice it to say i was a drowned rat when i got home.

but it cleared up again soon after so i had to take the bike out again. my parents have some friends that frequently do the big park bbq throughout the summer. i rode over to that but rather than belly up to the bbq i started to get antsy. i gave speed racer a call and she was into it. so i ditched the folks at the bbq and met up with speed racer for a ride.

so there we are happily tooling down the road when we come across a flock of seagulls, (no, not the 80's band members with the crazy hair), chilling on the grass. i can only imagine that the hindle 'music' coming from my aftermarket pipe startled the birds because as we got closer, they got airborne. it was no big deal and so when we came upon some more birds a short time later i don't think either speed racer or i expected it to be any different.

as we rode up, the hindle 'symphony' was in full effect which i can only assume startled the gulls. these birds were none to pleased about being disturbed. much like the other flock of gulls they took to the air, but rather than fly up, or even away from the source of the disturbance they chose to fly straight for it. suddenly i was ducking into my windscreen to avoid gull flight patterns. i can happily say i escaped the 'attack' without injury. speed racer however, was not as lucky... guess you could say she scared the sh*t outta the gull that hit her.

yeah... literally!

aiming for clarity

today i want to talk about my opinion on the drug use in my sport. it's no secret that i do not use and it's also no secret that i'd rather not have people think i do use. i can't help but wonder if that gives people the impression that i might be more intolerant than i am? so i am going to clarify it for you... here we go.

first and foremost i am a fan of the sport of bbing. the professional bbers of the IFBB are by no means natural and yet many of them are my favourites and many have physiques that i admire.

secondly, i do not consider users to be lazy or cheaters. the simple reality is that you can take a whole azz cheek full of this and that but if you don't do your work in the gym, don't eat properly or rest adequately your never going to get anywhere.

i understand that if you want to get to a professional level in the IFBB there are choices that have to be made. i don't claim to understand use if your not trying to turn IFBB pro but to each his own... i suspect. i don't claim to know very much about drug use, but i know that what i do know scares me.

do i think that i am 'better' because i chose to be natural? no, it's merely a different means to the same end. what is interesting to me, is that i am still naive enough to be suprised when i realize who is not natural. i said this yesterday for the the first time and frankly i find it somewhat ironic but...

it's not cool to be clean

now understand this, the path i'm on in no way, shape or form means that i am any less serious about bb and my goals within the sport. it's just for me, as ice cube so eloquently puts in 'you can do it'

life ain't a track meet (no)
it's a marathon

and i'm just trying to make it to the finish line.

things that make me go... hmmmm

yesterday i went over to tim's to grab a coffee. as i crossed the busy downtown intersection i happened to notice a man trying to earn a few bucks with a squeegee. now seeing 'squeegee kids' downtown is not out of the ordinary, in fact it's quite common. but what made this sighting odd was that the man in question was wearing a two-way communication device. i can honestly say i did not realize that these people, who i had previously thought were homeless, were quite so organized. i mentioned it to a friend who told me that she often sees them with cell phones as well. okay so you don't have a home but you have a motorola razor???... hmmmmm

we had a couple freelancers in the studio yesterday helping out. one of them was sitting next to me and eventually she noticed my 48 can cooler bag sitting on the desk. "hey", she asked, "is that your lunch?" to keep it simple i answered that it was. she then noted that i must take nutrition pretty seriously and guessed that i probably bodybuild (finally somebody who didn't think i looked like a figure chick). her next question took me a bit off guard though. "so whats in there?", she asked. in my defence, i have a huge project on the go and not a whole lot of time to produce it, so mayhaps my response was a bit more succinct than necessary but it was the truth. "food"... hmmmmm

one of the other artists has been keeping me abreast of his workouts. he recently found his way back to the gym and was telling me how he had hit the treadmill 4 times this week. he then mentioned something about 'getting back into lifting', when one of the other women responded with shock "you lift???!!!". i almost fell off my chair. the guy in question was hurt, he kept assuring her that he did indeed lift. one minute he was over by her desk lifting his shirt sleeves to show her his arms. then he was over at my desk to show me a tricep that still maintained a hint of what was.

english isn't her first language, she gamely tried to explain her query all the while grinding his ego into a fine powder under her boots. "well i didn't know,... i mean you just don't look like you lift,... to me". tears are streaming down my face and buddy is giving me whatfor. he felt that i should have said something to back him up or at the very least, not be so dayummm amused. well all he has told me about is the frequency and duration that he has been on the treadmill. well guess what sweetheart, getting on the treadmill is not lifting... it's flippin cardio. however, something tells me he is going to be pounding the iron for real this weekend... hmmmmm

then and now

as i sit here over my second serving of spinach today i am reminded of a conversation i recently had with a friend. she had gone to see my athletic therapist about an injury and during the session they somehow got onto the topic of me. my friend was horrified to learn that at one time i had less than stellar nutritional habits. it's not her fault really, she didn't know me back when phrases like; 'i'll have a quarter pounder with cheese, medium fries and a coke' or 'can i get a small, pepperoni, ground beef, hot banana peppers with fresh garlic?' regularly fell out of my mouth.

but that was how it was over 6 years ago, my athletic therapist remembers when i used to come in for appointments armed with a large bag of nibs, or enough sour charm lollipops with gumball centers, for the both of us.

i have changed, i am constantly evolving, the blame rests solely on this sport that consumes me. i know that i can no longer eat that way and achieve the physique that i want. jennifer abrams is a national level competitor in the u.s., she has the kind of natural physique i strive to achieve. she recently competed this past weekend at the nyc team universe, it is a natural show wherein a amateur competitor can earn their pro status. jennifer and i are about the same height and she just competed at 150 lbs!!! hopefully in another 9 years or so i too will be able to step on stage at 150 lbs.

i think i'm going to need more spinach.

the awakening

there was something about that last post. it inspired me in some way, it brought with it a need to find another creative outlet. i can not remember the last time i legitimately had a need to express any real creativity. what about work, you might ask? well if there was any activity likely to suck any and all creative energy from me, it would be computer graphics. so here is the new challenge, i have the desire to be creative and the need to find another avenue in which to channel it. the only remaining question are how and where? to quote shakespeare "ay, there's the rub" (therein lies the rub)

i currently sit 5 lbs out from where i want to be for my photoshoot. the earliest date that we can do it, according to the photographer, is another 3 weeks away. i am re-adjusting the carb cycling... with 5 lbs to go it is too soon for that.

well my friends the gym she beckons. on the new schedule it is chest day and today im feeling like incline db's, hard and heavy... of course. we got work to do.

~the miche-ine~

oddly enough...

oddly enough the hardest thing,in my opinion, about show prep is not the diet, or the training while exhausted depleted and deprived, nor is it the endless hours of cardio. the hardest thing is what do you do next.

this journey, that i am on, is an awakening if you will. the need to make myself understand why natural bbers are the size that they are. well i think i have learned something new. i knew that it had to do with spending more time dieting and competing than growing. but what i didn't understand was why. i think i get it now.

you spend somewhere in the neighbourhood of 16-20 weeks focused on this one day. and assuming all goes well that day in question arrives and it is bigger than you imagined. but then like the day before it and the day before that... it goes. and then what? you wake up the next morning with a realization that you are no longer x number of days out, you don't have to be in the gym training... i'm sure you get the idea.

so what brought on this sudden burst of melancholy? you know that friend of mine, who won all of those shows saturday? well she was talking about that very feeling this morning in her online journal. she remembered that i mentioned it when i was post-show and i guess at the time she thought i was being particularily strange. but she woke up this morning and got the dubious pleasure of feeling it for herself. her coach posted that post-contest blues are quite common.

what has been getting me through this phase is focusing on what is to come and what i feel i have to do. to bring that bigger, better, undeniable package to the stage next year. i changed around my training week today. i've had the same training days for a while now. but i am going to move some of the days around. prioritize some of my lagging body parts and get some more size on me.

also having the photoshoot to focus on has given me yet another date. i guess i am one of those goal oriented people who just needs to keep some sort of finish line in sight.

speaking of photoshoots, i got in touch with a guy who took some shots of me at the arnold last march. he sent me a copy of one of them today and i was shocked. i blew that picture up as large as i could because i was convinced my bicep had to have been photoshopped. i couldn't find any signs of tampering so i guess that was my arm. holy crap! i think that is the first time i've ever had that kind of reaction to my pics. that's not to say that i am not looking forward to building bigger shoulders, larger biceps and more formidable triceps. but what it means is for right now, today... i am content.

i got in some decent quality riding this past weekend. my bike has a lot of bike friends and she seems to be making more and more friends as the season continues. here is a pic from 3 weeks ago, taken before my first ride through the forks of the credit. beside it a picture taken yesterday when i went out ride with my friend and her new v-star.

phase two

i am now into phase two of my recovery from the nutritional free-fall. basically i have re-introduced the carb rotation that i used for much of my contest prep. the mission, and i do accept it, is to return as close as humanly possible to my contest condition for the shoot.

in other news, as i start to plan my offseason, my charge into the 2007 season i have made this initial decision. it is my intention to take my posing to another level. people who are known for masterful posing routines can, when they are truly lucky, make a little bit of cash doing guest posing. since i tend to like dreaming in HD colour. instead of aiming to just always take the best posing trophy, i'm going to aim just a little bit higher instead. after all i'm still searching for my true calling. the only way to find it, is by the process of elimination.

i am also very excited to report that my friend from delaware had to rent a freakin' u-haul trailer to get all her hardware home. her event was two shows combined in one venue. so she won the middleweight class and the overall in the first show and then won the middleweight and overall in the second show. my girl is going home with 4 trophies!!! i am one of the people who knows how hard she worked for this, as i said before with our shows so close together we went through our preps together. the sc's of the bb board that i am on, have all done really well this competitive season. a lot of top place finishes, overall wins and so forth. i think it is a really good environment for me to be in and hopefully next year i can be hauling in the hardware myself.

planning my course

my ego took a major hit yesterday. one of the reporters who covered my show said that my competitor 'handily won the heavyweight class'. now people keep trying to tell me to take that opinion with a grain of salt. although that is good advice, when you get right down to it as hard as i try to play otherwise... i am human.

so for the next 11 months and change i will be thinking about that comment and using it to fuel my workouts so that i bring a bigger, better, undeniable package to the stage in 2007.

in 4 days i have made great strides in recovering from my post-show nutritional free-fall. at this point im still enjoying an offseason diet but ive cleaned up all the crap. the dough from the pizza, the cookies and the bread from the burgers have all reeked havoc on my mid-section. i do know that bread products tend to bloat you, but what i can't remember is, how long it takes to undo the 'damage'. the goal for the photoshoot is to get my condition back as close as possible to my show condition. i have a little over two weeks and i still haven't re-introduced my show-prep diet.

my friend in delaware has her show this weekend. i talked to her for a while on the phone last night, her spirits are good. i saw her pics on the board yesterday, wow... she has done her homework, she is sliced and diced. i told her that i expect a phone call asap to tell me how she did. i can't imagine anyone else will that conditioned on stage... but the reality is, you just never know. either way i am very proud of all she has accomplished. i have often said that its a shame that we don't live closer to each other. we would make awesome training partners.

speaking of training partners, my coach has yet to make his return to the gym so i've been on my own. since my legs are still shot from mondays workout i am going to have to train chest tomorrow in lieu of hammys. it would be nice to have someone around to spot me, should i need it. its not like there aren't people there that i could ask to spot me, but not everyone knows how to spot and not everyone knows how to spot me.

some people like getting a 'lift off', some prefer you keep your hands on them as they lift. i however prefer a hands off technique. i want my spotter to stand behind me paying attention, obviously, but with no contact at all. now if i am about to be crushed by the weight by all means get in there and help me. but if i've got it... keep your hands to yourself!

before a set with a new spotter i will tell them how many reps i am going for, that i will lift it up by myself and to only touch me if i look like i'm about to 'wear the bar'. they always say 'sure, no problem' and on the lift i can feel their hands on my elbows pushing up. grrrr! "i didn't help you", they say "i just gave you a little lift off... you had it". what they don't understand is to me that initial lift is key, it is my way of ensuring that i can lift the weight. if i am struggling to get it up... then i know to put it back down and try something lighter. if i can't get it up by myself, then i surely won't be able to control the weight mid-set.

or maybe im just justifying my independant streak??

they like me... they really like me

well as i've mentioned previously i've been green-lighted for my return to the gym and to training. something odd happened monday morning and i did not wake up in time to hit the gym before work. at the time i was pretty pissed off but in hindsight i think it was for the best. i went to the gym monday after work with a plan, i was going to squat, i was going to start off light and work my way up.

well i had to park my ego in dry dock as what i expected to be 'light' was all kinds of kicking my azz, there was no going up. and to add insult to injury i did not experience DOMS, (delayed onset muscle soreness), but rather its evil twin IOMS, (instant onset muscle soreness). my quads and hammys were locking up tighter than fort knox! but im a determined lil cuss and i kept in there and got 'er done even though i left the gym with the grace of fred sanford.

that night i received a lot more email and private messages from people within the bodybuilding community. i am hugely flattered over all of the positive feedback and supportive comments i have received. one thing is for sure i still don't see what they do. i guess that's a good thing though. since i don't think i look like a bodybuilder yet i will just have to keep working hard.

i was having this very conversation with one of my bb friends today. she was commenting how 'we' had a distorted sense of self, as fans of bodybuilding we are used to seeing athletes with more years in the sport, with physiques we can only dream of. thats not to say we aren't going to move heaven and earth to get dayumm close but the reality is, the chances of looking like an ifbb pro is slim to none.

another friend told me that i needed more pictures up here. she feels that my witty repoirtee is not enough to keep people tuning in. well here then is an example of what i think of when i think of a competitive fbb and what i see when i look in the mirror.

yup... miles to go before i sleep

back to the drawing board

well today was a very good day. it was my first training day after a forced 2 week layoff. i am sure for some of you 2 weeks out of the gym doesn't sound nearly so bad at all. but try to remember that training is one of my favourite things to do. it centers me and it helps to regulate my mood. which is by no means an easy task.

i was a bit like an unmanned missle. my coach was too pooped to make it in this a.m therefore that was both a figurative and a literal comparison. all in all i would have to say that i didn't do anything stupid. i didn't overtrain and i didn't start out too heavy. i lifted with my head!

saturday was a fun day. i went to a bike shop in ajax with my riding buddy, she has a hot hand so i've taken to calling her speed racer. anyway we both came away with riding pants. so with my new tinted visor and my full leathers i feel more than a little like the miche-inator.

on saturday night i judged the musclemania show. at the event my coach talked to one of the physique photographers about scheduling a photo shoot for me. basically i have 3 weeks in order to get my body back on track. suffice it to say that i spent the past 2 weeks nutritionally cliff-diving. i replaced training with carb ingestion... i think i've had nothing but sugar filled crap in the past two weeks. so it should be of no suprise to learn my coach and i went out for a late dinner after the show. we went to eastside marios and i put away an 11" new yawker pizza. why go out with a whimper when you can go out with a bang??!!!

i now have two sets of show pics, from my friends who were there and the event photographer. i've shared both sets of pics with a variety of different people, both within the industry and out, i'm both pleased and a bit suprised about how favourable the reactions have been. i guess even now i can't help but doubt myself. i know my friend in jersey had hoped the show would 'fix that', but i guess since it took me so long to develop all these interesting idiosyncrasies its going to take more than a minute to get rid of them. but you know what?? it's all part of my charm.

tomorrow is quad day and i will be going to bed shortly to dream of free squats!!!!

you see friends, my prep for 2007 starts now!!
buckle your seatbelt dorothy it's gonna be a bumpy ride

the decision is in...

i ran into my nutritionist today. he congratulated me on my showing. we talked a bit about the show, unofficially and without pics, he mentioned taking a look at the pics, 'seeing what was missing and what i need to bring up for next year'. in the only conversation i had with my coach about 'my future plans' he said, "... you could take the summer off and enjoy your bike."

so my friends i believe my team has spoken. i am officially offseason. i imagine that the 'official pics' will show that i can easily add more back density, quad size, calf size and delts.

and finally a situation that didnt make sense at the time, but since i talked to my nutritionist, i understand it all much better.

on wednesday my mother went in to see the nutritionist for a follow up appointment. he said to my mother 'so miche did really well this past weekend eh?' of course my mother didn't know what the hell he was talking about. he then apparently tried to dance his way out of trouble, he told her i did some fitness thing. she told him that she knew nothing of it.

now mom doesn't say anything to me but i guess she told my dad. so later that night my dad comes into my room and tells me to watch the discovery channel. they were doing a feature on the 'science of superhuman strength'. from across the hall, my dad screams and when i turn around to ask him what is wrong, i happen to notice kevin levrone is on screen in the middle of a back double bicep. my dad's one word explanation for the scream 'ugly!'. i may have muttered fawk-off under my breath... the details are sketchy at this point.

a couple days later dad traps me in the kitchen and he gets uncharacteristically talkative.

dad: ya know that show that was on the discovery channel the other day
miche: ya? (not liking where this is going)
dad: man... when those guys puffed themselves up like that... ya know... ugly!!!... ya know... there is nothing to admire about that... you know what i mean?
i am fuming inside but i say nothing
dad: and... how much of that STUFF, they must have to take to get like that... you know what i mean?
i grab my food and head up to my room and close the door.

so, clearly my decision not to include my parents in my journey was the right one!

and the winner is....

somebody else!!!

the fat lady is slinking off the stage, they have dimmed the lights, we have scraped the last of the protan and pam from our bodies.

so how was it? well suprisingly enough it was not nearly the mind numbing nerve wracking experience that rollerblade contests were. in fact i can almost say that except for a quick little second i did not get nervous at all.

it took more time to get ready (get my suit on, tan on, oil up, makeup and what not), than i spent on stage. we were called onto the stage, the head judge called out front double bicep, side chest, back double bicep, side tricep and abs and thigh and that was it... we were done. then it was back to the hotel to wait for the night show.

the most fun was doing my routine for the night show. i guess the ham that has always been in me really shines during something like this. when i got off the stage i got a lot of congratulations for my routine. i was even complimented by laura creavalle (retired ifbb pro bodybuilder).

a couple of my friends from the board came out to bring me my oatmeal and raisin cookies. i was drowning my sorrows in a fistful of cookies when they announced that i was the winner of the best female poser!! apparently they liked my routine that much. so i went back up on stage... stopping only to hug my coach and i collected my trophy. by far i am the most proud of this part of the journey. my coach was always the one to win the best posing trophy, it is so amazing to be able to uphold the family honour if you will.

so whats next? well i do have the option of competiting in the canadians but there are many variables that will determine if i do or not. first i need to sit down with my coach and find out if he has the time to go around again. then i need to sit down with my diet guy and find out if i peaked for that show or if i can peak for the august show. the august show would have stiffer competition, since it would be the best from each province. so if the august show is not in the cards then i will be back to the drawing board. growing more muscle for next time.

i will keep you posted

closerthanthis

okay folks this is likely going to be my last post before the show. for those of you who don't know its saturday.

on the good news/isn't it ironic front. i called canada post yesterday morning and was told in no uncertain terms that my suits were on their way back to texas and there was nothing that could be done. then the lovely gentleman in question asked me if there was anything else he could help me with. he did not seem to enjoy my request that he make me a couple of suits before saturday. sense of humour sunshine... get one!

so then i had an epiphany. i remembered that at the shows there are always suit designers there and they always have booths with suits on display. figured it was a long shot but on the off chance that there was a suit that would fit, it would likely look better on me than something off the rack. one of my friends from the boards hooked me up with passion fruit designs and i gave her a call. okay now i must gush. rather than laugh hysterically at my plight and hang up, berns was compassionate and more than willing to step in and help me out.

i raced across the city and she had me go through some of the suits she had. there were more than a few that would have worked or only needed a simple modification, (her words not mine... i know nothing of this stuff). but in the end she decided that would not do, that i had to have my own suits made for me. and so she went and got some material and made some colour choices, (don't get me wrong she attempted to get my input but since i am more than willing to admit i know sh*t about that i let her make the call). i paid her and i drove home.

and here is where the irony comes in. guess what is sitting on my bed? yup my purolator package. the suits finally did arrive i actually laughed. so what am i going to do? well i am going to wear the passion fruit suits. why?? well i liked the way her suits fit, they are hella easy to put on, based on passion fruit reputation those suits will not need to be glued on and finally one of the suits that came in the mail was the wrong colour. i was expecting a teal blue and a guess what you might call a royal blue. instead i ended up with a royal blue and a greenish suit, i don't really like the look of the green suit against my skin.

but the upside is, should my coach and my online friends be right... that this is just the beginning well i now have suits for next time. i met a fantastic designer who taught me so much about how to properly wear the suit, the kind of stuff i would never have learned without the 'fitting'.

so now its just time to focus on the job at hand... and as my friend tg from the board said 'hold your head up and flex hard'.

time to get 'er done people.

next stop... tim horton's cookies!!!!!

pressing on...

so the most interesting to report is probably the fate of my suits. i mentioned yesterday that it would appear somehow that i messed up my address on my order form. so my suits have been deemed 'undeliverable' by purolator, they are either on their way back to canada post or houston, texas. i've been trying to see if there is a way that i can get them before they are returned but since it's a) not the standard procedure and b) since neither company is really sure where they are... chances are, they are going back to texas. hopefully they had a lovely trip.

i am sure i am coming across as unnaturally calm and in a way i guess i am. fact is although i am still trying to locate my suits and get them here, they reality is this situation is out of my control. my coach feels that if this is the worse thing that is going to happen on my way to the stage then i am doing ok. as he pointed out, my physique has come in the way that both he and the nutritionist intended, thus it doesn't really matter what i am wearing. any placings i have are not going to hinge on the fact that the suits i will be wearing will be off the rack. he also said that 'we both know this is not the last time you will be doing this so...', ummm... its not???!!!.

the other interesting thing was i completely lost my mind yesterday anyway. i woke up in this funk that i can't explain. i unloaded in my online journal on my bodybuilding board and i think i may have scared the hell outta some of my friends. those of them who have competed previously told me to calm down and that my feelings were a direct result of the show prep. again... i had no idea that show prep would be like this. my mood is sometimes comparable to a whammo super ball bouncing around inside of a squash court. although for the most part, i think i haven't been too difficult to be around.

finally ran into one of the account managers from work, who i haven't seen in a while. she noticed that i had lost a lot of weight, (17 lbs to date), apparently she thinks i look good at this weight and was amazed to hear that i had no intentions of staying here. i may look good to her but i can barely stand, i have zero strength and energy.

today i get to try boiled chicken... there's the microwave, well here goes!

no more drama

well i am up at 4:00 am as per usual, but yesterday was my last workout. for the better part of 3 weeks i won't training. to be honest i have no clue how i am going to make it through that.

pre-contest is really traumatic to the body. don't get me wrong you do adjust your workouts according to your carbohydrate input but you still require your body do way more, on way less than its used to or comfortable with. but nothing about the last few weeks is particularily comfortable. that was not a complaint mind you, just merely a statement of fact.

today i get to start putting carbs back into my diet. i have spent the last few weeks getting as flat as a pancake, and i honestly can't explain how much of a mind fawk that was. i finally made myself take pictures on the weekend. i have never been this lean, you could see teeny tiny muscle bellies... but they were still teeny and tiny. according to my coach, my nutritionist and others in the know after the carb loading phase those teeny tiny bellies are going to fill up and i'm going to be huge. currently praying for 'huuuge'.

seems i somehow managed to screw up my mailing address and my suits have yet to arrive. since i can't afford to lose all my hard work to increased cortisol levels i am trying desperately not to worry or panic.

interestingly enough i am very tired. as i sit here typing this, my belly now full of chicken and sweet potato, i am suddenly aware of how tired i am feeling. i think i will set my alarm for 6:00 am. i will go back to bed and sleep for a little bit and then get up practice posing and go through my routine a few times before i get ready to go to work.

its due to rain today... so i won't be riding my bike in. besides i think i am probably still too carb depleted to be trying something like that.

untitled

usually when i sit down to compose a blog entry either the title is already in my head or at the very least i have a vague idea what im going to be on about. today however, is not like that.

things are definately more tricky at this point. i seem to be okay when i get up in the morning... sure my balance is a bit off but i do seem to be able exhibit some motor control. post gym however my balance and motor control seems to be, well... how can i put this eloquently??? for sh*t. it is my best guess that there are some horrified people at tim horton's in the mornings. i just know they are disgusted that i am clearly drunk at 8:00 am.

i went to a opa show last saturday. i went with some new 'old' friends. new in the sense that was the first we've met, but old in the sense that we have been online friends for some time. i think that is why i felt like i was spending sometime with old friends.

the show was long. i was frustrated by the number of figure competitors and their ridiculous class distinctions; figure short, figure medium, figure medium tall and figure tall. ok people what da azz if medium tall? its like watching a physique contest at starbucks. really what is next? figure short medium??? anyway as luck would have it we ended up leaving before we even got to see the mens middleweight bodybuilding class. it was already almost 11pm and i had to train and work in the morning.

as for the rest of it... well i didnt tell the other women with me but watching the show yesterday really kind of wigged me out. i started to get nervous... i started to wonder about my decision to compete. i never wanted to be small on stage and yesterday i realized that i don't look any bigger than the women i intended to be bigger than.

also for the first time in a really long time i shot some progress pics. i was really hoping that the pics would recover my fallen ego... i guess that was the reason why i hadn't been taking pics of late. my fallen ego remains... in a pile of ashes. i think i will share the pics with a few of my online buds... i think i need a healthy dose of blown sunshine to help me recover my confidence. everyone keeps telling me to wait till the morning of, after i fill back out... but at this point i just can't see how i am going to look any way other than tiny.

finally i found out that one of my friends has made the decisions to share with some people my decision to compete. i am pissed about that. the decision who to share this information with is mine. bodybuilding is a sport that you either love or you hate. those who hate it base their opinions on that which they do not understand and leap to all types or ridiculous conclusions.

since i know that there is a faction of society who equates bodybuilding with drug usage i am careful who i trust with the information that i am stepping into the realm of competitive bodybuilding. i guess it all boils down to me not wanting some think they know it all azz monkey assuming im taking this or that because they only know of one side of the sport.

hell my family doesn't even know and they are front line in dealing with the brunt of my funky moods. had a doozy rockin' today too. my coach thinks they should be told... i think its a bad idea. fawk, we are into the home stretch now... all they have to do is sit tight a little while longer and it will all be over.

on final approach

i am on the final approach on my journey to the stage. it has been a very interesting trip. there were things i anticipated and expected and things that caught me completely off guard.

i had an interesting reaction tuesday morning. in my opinion one of the few times i've really struggled with this prep. tuesday morning entailed some posing practice, routine practice, i don't think i told you that my coach changed my music... basically in the studio he and the musician doing the edit changed a few things that basically entailed me having to learn a new ending, leg extensions and a.m cardio. never in my life have i ever felt that tired. i could barely walk, i was nodding off in my car at the lights. i would be lying if i didn't admit to starting to worry. luckily a couple sticks of gum and a meal fixed me right up.

tuesday night had me at the MAC counter augmenting my make-up collection. which is pretty funny when you realize that i never wear the sh*t... so spending another $90 to add more make-up to my collection is ironic to say the least.

i sat down with my nutritionist today and he layed out for me the plan for the last few miles of this trip. i am glad he wrote it all down because right now my head is spinning. i think i need to petition someone to get an extra 4 hours put into each day. i am going to need that time to get things organized for the show.

go figure

okay now this i simply don't get i am on a low carb, essentially no carb diet rotation. from all pre-diet reports i would likely be somewhere between maniacal and uber-b*tchy. now i will admit to having 2 reported occaisions wherein i can honestly say i reacted with a bit more 'ummmpf' than was duly necessary (but burn your yams on your carb day and see how well you take it!).

but what confuses me is that in many regards the loss of carbs seems to have settled me to some degree. i find i am calmer, i don't feel that i over-react as quickly or as often as i am used to. in fact the azz monkeys in my life who are determined to piss me off, well they do annoy but i just can't be bothered to react.

but for the record... no matter how well it settles me, as soon as the diet is complete i plan to re-embrace the carbs. this lil girl's got some growin' to do people!!!

watch out world here i come!!!

diggin deep

this my friends is the interesting part of the journey. this is the part that, if you allow me the use of an old cliche is, seperates the mice from the men. the carb cycling, the lower calories, the training, et al have netted me with the most interesting of feelings. monday worked out to be a day without carbs and it was still my quad day. so there i was running on empty but still doing two squat variations.

well i woke up tuesday and i was not myself. even though i got carbs that day i was still a mess. standing, walking you name it every activity was carried out as though i was standing on the deck of a small boat floating in rough water. i soldiered through one of the most challenging cardio sessions of my life. i literally felt like i might fall and just trying to co-ordinate my legs was something else entirely.

in fact tuesday evening i went to the liquor store to buy a bottle of wine to thank one of my friends for his help with my bike purchase. best guess, i think i made it all of 20 feet from the front of the store before i was standing over a $33 puddle of wine. one second i was holding onto the bag and the next i just let it go. so back into the LCBO i went for another $33 bottle.

wednesday was a follow up with my nutritionist. its not suprising to find that he still has a battalion of other 'tricks' to help dial me in. i am currently 12lbs less than when i started and i have also lost about 7% of body fat. i expect that i will be somewhere in the neighbourhood of 12-13% by the time the show rolls around. cardio twice a day has started now... yippee! as well i've also started back in the phone booth, time to lay down the base colour before the show.

i am proud of a few things. they are small changes in the grand scheme of things, but they are huge for me. i have been going into the studio at the gym on my cardio only days and i have been practicing my posing and my routine. there is just way more room there than in my bedroom at home. i am trying to force myself to ignore the curious onlookers. also i have started to do the cardio in my tank again. simply because i am that flipping warm, i am still suffering from 'smallness' but the desire not to pass out from overheating is superseding my feelings of inadequacy. the kicker is i have sort of invited 2 people to the show and told another i was doing it.

why? well my coach, i strongly believe, has told half of the free world and wether i like it or not there are going to be way more members of my gym at the show that day. bodybuilding fans??? nope just curious onlookers. so i figure since i already have all these people coming... what difference does it make. if i crash and burn like i normally do in competition in front of friends and family well then the more the merrier... cuz trust me nobody crashes and burns as entertaining as i do. i believe ESPN probably still has the footage!

today is friday and i can honestly say its the best my legs have felt in days however, i am still feeling like a marionette... as though someone else was pulling the strings that operate my legs.

i am the warrior

guess who's back

well my friends my computer has been resurrected. i'd love to say that i got the information of my seized hard drive but sadly that's not the case. as it stands i still have the unit, but i've got to save up a whole wack of cashola to get my information off the drive.

again, i can't just turn my back on 3 years of bodybuilding progress, nutrition plans. that is information that i feel i can't do without. there is a lesson here. next time i will be smarter.

well i'm heavy into the carb rotations. in the beginning it wasn't as bad as i feared. the carb free days weren't even as hellacious as i imagined. however i have been doing it for a little over a week and i can honestly say i am starting to feel different. my legs are tired and heavy. i feel the need to sit more than i did before. granted i can still train but cardio is really starting to suck something awful.

the other interesting change in this journey to the stage is a sudden feeling thats overcome me in the last little while. simply i feel small. okay now i am currently 12lbs less than i was when i started this journey but that's not what i mean. i mean when i look in the mirror i dont see a bodybuilder, i just see small... and i don't think i like it. i've asked around on the boards and what i am feeling is normal, its part of the mental game that has to be endured. i guess the lack of carbs to some extent is responsible for my irrationality.

i will continue to charge toward the stage but in the back of my mind i focus on the muscle mass that i will be putting on in my next offseason.

the battle continues my friend and this tired warrior marches on.

'click' and then silence

hey folks. in case you are wondering i am not in a carb depletion coma, nor have i expired. what has happened is the hard drive on my computer is dead. i was happily surfing and posting along and i heard this click sound after the click the system froze and that my friends was all she wrote... literally.

since then i have had a new hard drive installed in the machine but everything i need is on the other drive. i currently have said drive on a life support system with a data recovery specialist. its going to cost me 'nuff ducats' to get my info but ive got sh*t on there i can't do without. at least 3 years of progress pics, jobs i've worked on, dietary charting going back easy 3 years, etc...

as for training. well i am into the low carb dietary rotation. its going a lot better than i previously expected it to be. basically i switch between low carb days and no carb days.

i had an incident yesterday at the gym post workout. i was attempting to cook my yams in the gym microwave, ive never done yams that way before and subsequently i overcooked them. i was left with little yam shaped bricks. well the realization that i was going to have to go to work basically hungry was too much. hucked a bit of a fit at the gym in front of my coach and then i stormed out of the gym. so i am in my car driving to work. i am hungry and i am pissed off. as luck would have it yesterday was also the day the transit system decided to stage a wildcat strike. it took me 2 hours to drive to work!!! needless to say i was not a nice person to be around yesterday... to say the least.

hopefully i will get some good news about my drive today and maybe i will soon have my system up and running.

btw the bike and i are having a blast!!!

i'm good enough, i'm smart enough, and gosh darn it, people LIKE me!

interestingly enough, this journey to the stage has me becoming more aware of my qualities. well i'd say the good and the bad but the truth is i have always been aware of the bad. i guess i just haven't always given myself enough credit.

i think i mentioned before that i have been losing sleep time because a couple of friends are going through their own personal turmoils. usually they turn to me, to talk, minutes from my 9 pm curfew and because of who i am, i usually end up staying up way past the aforementioned curfew.

my coach and i were discussing personality types during our last workout, which is what prompted todays comments. he described himself as an 'extremist', in the sense that everything he does or tries to do is on a grandiose level. he was also talking about other extremists we know and explaining that when extremists are up they are way up and when they fail, you just don't want to be around them.

it was then that i realized that i am a 'fixer'. i assume that it is a positive trait but since there aren't that many people in my life perhaps it is not. at any rate, if you have a problem i try to help. if you are down i try to make you happy. if your hurt... you get the idea. in a way it suprises me that i don't have more friends, you would think that would be the kind of person people want in their life. the reality seems to be the opposite. life can be funny like that.

i was supposed to pick up my bike and bring her home yesterday. unfortunately her fairings are still at the shop getting the plastic welds. this is not the best time of the year for cosmetic bike repairs as the shops are all filled to capacity with bikes that are getting ready for the summer. the new plan is to get her today. keep your fingers crossed.

oh yeah my coach, had this to say about the impending bike arrival. "if you ever kill yourself on that thing... i will bring you back to life, so that i can kill you myself!!!". and he THINKS after 6 years he needs to TELL me that he is an extremist???

must be made of sugar

set the alarm for 6am like i've been aiming to do on the off/cardio only day. got up this morning got dressed looked out the window and saw rain. rain and i really hate running... so i made an executive decision. i WILL be going to the gym on my way home from work tonight to do my pm cardio. fawk this a.m running shit. i will be sleeping in till 6:30 as before. if i get stuck at work and can't leave on time, so be it. gym is open 24 hours anyway. does it really matter if i cut into my sleep in the mornings or in the night? i think not.

ordered a couple of bottles of pro tan yesterday. looks like they had it in stock too because i've already gotten word from canada post that the shipment will be here shortly.

i need to go by the MAC booth at work i need to investigate what colours might be best for the stage. my coaches girl will be doing the make up for me so i no longer have to worry about application but the stuff that i do own, is likely not dramatic enough. i probably have to let one of those tranny guys have at my face. will do this BEFORE i leave for home. i will not be going back to work like that!!

i still need to stop by the hair salon and let her have a go at my hair again. we really need to come up with something i can live with.

finally sunday night i put my 'music' on repeat and practiced it 15 times in a row. i think maybe i can pull this off. my coach has added this element in the middle that concerns me. concern in the sense of... will i have the inner cajones to do that on stage in front of a room full of strangers while dressed only in my underwear. i mean i can do it in my bedroom but there was nobody in here... so it wasn't intimdating in the slightest.

i guess... only time will tell.

dis, dat and de udda ting

on friday i got an email from a friend i used to skate with back in the day. as you know life happens and we drifted apart. the fact that she lives in another province didn't help much either.

well she was one of the many people i shared this blog url with and she ended up sending me an email. i gave her a call and we spent probably an hour on the phone today getting caught up. hey give me a break its been 4 years, its hard to condense 4 years into 5 or 10 minutes.

it was great hearing from her and it is amazing how many similarities there still are in our lives. believe it or not she bought a bike last november and i just got mine. both of us own ninja 500's hers is an '03 and mine is an '93. anyway we made a promise to do a better job of staying in touch. and i for one really think we will, we were really good friends and we had a blast whenever we hung out. i don't think we ever had a bad or uncomfortable minute. i realized after i hung up how much i missed our friendship.

my coach and i have been working on my posing routine more frequently of late. today we were in the studio for an hour or so. i have most of that time on videotape. i just finished watching it... well the parts of it i could see through the tears. my coach and i are sooooo silly. we are working hard on this piece but we still manage to add moments of absolute hilarity. in a way its a shame no one but me will ever see this tape.

i went looking for competition tans today. the most popular brand seems to be pro tan but unfortunately i can't get it here. i found a site online out of b.c that says they have it, i think i probably should order a couple bottles. i want to do it early enough that its here when i need it but not too early. i think i may have to ask around on the boards to see if i have to worry about its shelf life.

woke up again at 3am. this is a habit i do not like. was pretty tired all day too.

and finally the turkey burger at lick's today was awesome!!!!!!

yikes!!!

okay if ever there was an argument for healthy eating this was it. i woke up this morning the day after a 'healthy' serving of pasta and the day after, the day after a slice of pizza annnndd...

it's all gone. the detail in my delts, the beginning of my ab pac... all of it gone. adios, see ya later and goodbye. bummer.

sent out an email at work yesterday explaining that i would be low carbing it after may 25th and begging their forgiveness and understanding for my moods from now. when i told my mother the same thing she asked me to move out till the diet was over. since i have no plans to move out she told me that she was going to find herself an apartment until the diet was over.

what do you suppose my mother was trying to tell me??

the calm before the storm

i had another positive and interesting meeting with the nutritionist who is doing my diet prep for this show. i am still coming in nicely and i am still maintaining my muscle mass. at this point its almost time to shake things up and bring the pain. by bringing the pain we are talking about severly low carb days. yikes!!

but that will not start until after my next appointment two weeks from now. until then i have been directed to have a few cheats. the man told me to go have a slice of pizza right after i finished seeing him. he wants me to have a couple of pasta meals and i am also supposed to go to lick's and get a couple of turkey burgers with cheese. well okay... if he insists. i am a little afraid about how much harder the low carb days will be after a couple weeks of cheats.

and... cardio is now up to 40 mins a day.

wide awake again

couldn't sleep i've been up since 3am. i have to be up at 4am anyway so i guess it's no big deal. guess i started thinking and couldn't stop. there are a lot of things that i am excited about so likely that has much to do with it.

had to go and find originals of the songs that we are going to use to make the posing routine. i'm not sure when we are doing it but next we will be going to a studio to put it all together. we are opening with the intro to the song hope by twista that is used on the coach carter soundtrack, from there the tempo changes. originally it went straight into guess who's back by rakim but my coach fell in love with this other song that he really wants to use. the beat is cool and all but i'm not really feeling the lyrics.

the song please by toni braxton he wants to use after the twista piece. toni's song lyrics include:

I know you watch all over here,
Tryna finda way to come into my situation,
But you should know this. Its all good so be cool.
Tell your girl i dont care to fight I got him locked,
and he's all mine so you should know better than
To think that you could ever put it down like i can.

now those of you who know me well, know that i always lose the man, wether someone is trying to take him from me or not. after 6 weeks the guy in question always becomes a track star and takes off faster than an olympic athlete coming out of the blocks.

why do the lyrics matter? well i know from training and from skating that i preform best to songs i like, that i identify with, i basically feed off of the songs energy.

my coach likes the song because it opens up a lot of opportunities with regards to the routine itself. we have discussed my concerns and he hopes that i can focus on the beat and not what she is saying.

oh well its only going to be about 15-20 secs of that song and then its rakim all up in yo face!!!!!!

the little details

well as you know i have been pretty focused in my prep and my desire has always been to be prepared and leave no stone unturned. well i still have a couple of stones that haven't recieved their fare share of attention. the hair and make-up.

sure i got juliet to try something with my mop a couple months ago, but it didn't appeal to me. i need to go back and get her to try something else, i think i want her to braid my hair into some soft of pony-tail type thing. im thinking that will keep the balance of my hair off of my shoulders and back (the locks are pretty freakin long now).

as well i did go to the MAC counter and i did buy a darker foundation off of a young transvestite who seemed rather enamoured of my arms. and as much fun as that experience was i haven't done anything about application.

need to get my azz in gear. i think hair and make-up are too areas that intimidate me greatly and this is why i'm not really giving them the attention i should.

in other news there is a vein in my bicep that i no longer have to be training to see. now for those of you not into bodybuilding, the appearance of veins is a good thing. it basically means that i am getting nice and lean, which i might add has been the goal all along.

as well... she wrote me back. which was kind of cool and honestly, quite unexpected. her email was very encouraging and she asked to see pictures, she may put them up on her website. i talked to a few people first and the general consensus was go for it, so last night i did.

finally made it into bed for 9pm. unfortunately i got a call from a friend about a GS500 at 10:45pm and then a wrong number at midnight. i don't think the wrong number appreciated my choice of language.

lights, camera, action!!

so as i mentioned yesterday morning was posing practice. we went through the mandatories a few times and then he wanted to see how i was coming along with the routine. well i have this one area of concern, basically there is this turn element at which the posing tempo changes briefly from a two count to a one count. most times i get all fawked up at this point. anyway we got through it a few times and i have it on tape.

when i got home from the gym yesterday i unpacked my camcorder but i could not bring myself to watch the footage. i was, i guess afraid. now my coach was so excited about what we were doing and the more times i got through it successfully the more animated he got. he is convinced i am going to do very well. this is very comforting, however, it was still a few hours before i got up the nerve to watch it.

what do i think? i don't know, i guess i will have to watch it again. i do know that it is always difficult to watch yourself perform. i know that from my skating days, on the skate footage i always appeared more stiff and more herky-jerky than i felt.

my coachs final comments and recommendation. practice, practice, practice smiling more.

in one of my earlier entries i made mention of a friend who was going through a difficult time. i am happy to report that i spoke to my friend recently and there has been a light at the end of the tunnel. this makes me very happy, i worry about all of my friends... some of them i worry about more than others. but my ability to worry is all part of my charm. now to that friend i say this; i am so very glad that things have finally improved for you. i want you to continue to do everything in your power to stay on this path.

also, i think i've been feeling a bit lost on this journey. i don't know too many natural bodybuilders and sometimes i think that although bodybuilding is still bodybuilding, there is enough of a difference that its sort of not the same. so anyway there is a natural bodybuilder who's website i've been to and who's blog i read regularily. i decided yesterday to send her an email, i wasn't asking for anything, i don't need anything per se. but she is about 10 weeks out from her show and of course she has been doing shows forever so i thought she might be good to talk to. guess we will see if she has time to respond.

better get to the gym.

loadin up the u-haul

holy crap! it's early saturday morning and i am about ready to head to the gym. well i have a busy morning ahead of me so it looks like i'm getting ready to leave the nest, permanently. we are going to be working on the posing, probably more specifically the routine after we train. as well i have a massage appointment booked and i also have a training appointment.

so i am leaving the house with a cooler bag containing my next 3 meals, a tripod, a camcorder, my music, an extension cord, my gym bag with the appropriate changes of clothes, my vitamins, two 1.5L bottles of water and my knapsack. methinks half of todays workout will be getting everying to the gym.

well another snafu on the bike front. the friend i asked to go check out a bike thursday night, simply forgot to go. it was not cool because the seller went out of his way to be available and have the bike ready. now i can't have anyone see the bike till monday and the bike is now officially out on the sales floor. which means it could be sold out from under me... again. i've asked a different friend to go check out the bike for me on monday. now if your wondering why i am sending people instead of going myself... i would go myself if i knew the first thing about buying bikes.

work still sucks.

my weekday client rocks! i explained to him about the situation at work. rather than opting for a different trainer he would prefer that i 'volunteer' for the free overtime work and then call him and cancel. he understands that it could drastically reduce his sessions per week but he is cool with that.

still re-thinking this work situation.

better get going, it's going to take me 10 minutes to load up the truck.

lookin for the rainbow

when i woke up this morning i happened to notice a change. i guess this is the time in the prep where changes really start making themselves known. in a way its like christmas. anyway this morning low and behold i notice that the love handles, saddle bags or whatever you want to call them are about gone. i really can't remember ever being this lean in my mid section. i am looking forward to my next present.

yesterday morning i got up early and my coach had me practice my mandatories for about 20 mins or so after our workout. he said that i 'looked great' and that my posing is good too. i believe he said 'you look like you've been doing it for years'. hopefully i can exude that same amount of confidence and poise on d-day.

ok i think i am chasing my last bike. seriously, if this bike is not the one i think im going to just give it up. i just can't stand shopping anymore without coming away with anything. so this one better be neo*

* you all remember the matrix i trust??

and the reviews are in...

had my first performance review at the mouse pushing j.o.b today. i can't say it went well. first of all they don't feel i am making myself available enough to work. i haven't been volunteering to stay late and work any of the overtime hours. so i guess now is the time to finally up and give up the evening training sessions.

the other problem area was my use of the internet. the bodybuilding message board that i often had running in the background was noted and referred to as a 'chat room', i guess i probably don't have to go into much more detail beyond that.

so needless to say my day sucked azz. i hate what i do for a living and the time i spend in front of that mac sucks azz. yet here i am... with the money to buy a fawking bike and no bike.

and ya know this all had to go down on a tuesday, a day when my mood is already funky cuz i can't train. thankfully tomorrow i can train again.

i never got the chance to tell you before. my coach was a victim of a hit and run early saturday morning. i have been training by myself for the past few workouts. he wasn't injured in the collision but he did have the head, neck and back pains usually associated with a car accident. hopefully he will be feeling better soon.

i have not abandoned you

life has been crazy busy of late. i am trying desperately to keep to my curfew and still somehow am failing miserably. but i am a strong chick and i will survive this and every other challenge this show prep brings my way.

more later... must get back to work