When Life Hands You Lemons...

Add vodka, ice, a little sugar and stir...

I've been working out quite a bit; kick boxing mostly. Kick boxing is a wonderful way to work off stress. You just pretend all the people who annoy you are in your line of fire and POW!! A left hook, a right jab, a round-house kick... You feel 100% better.

Funny thing is, it is improving my skating.

I had been working out on and off for a few months. I re-joined my old gym because it was on the way home from work (when I drive). Then winter decided to show up in the NYC area and with it came snow, snow, a bit more snow and ice and freezing temperatures. As a result, I haven't been driving to work (which has been reducing my stress. Are people now getting their drivers licenses on the back of cereal boxes?) which also means I haven't been going to the gym. Desperate to loose a ton of weight in a healthy manner, I started working out at home, and returned to working out during my lunch hour (40 minutes) at work.

What happened? Other than a really sore backside, I had a heck of a lot more strength, stamina and core stability. As a result, Wednesday's skate was absolutely awesome. Did everything go perfectly? No; nothing is perfect, but this was the best skate I've had all season. I had cat-like landings on jumps, three revolutions on that vile backspin (the bane of my skating existence!) and back three turns as good as I've ever done.

Hot diggity dog-dig!!

Sunday, it was cold. Very cold. I arrived at the rink and warmed up, checked people in and hit the ice. I stupidly wrapped my knees a bit to tightly, so bending was a little harder than expected, but I did double threes, some moves in the field, a few jumps and a couple of spins. I learned that I need to warm up just a bit more because my timing was a bit off, but, all in all, no complaints.

And that session was crowded! We were full. Full of little kids. There were only 3 of us skating over five feet tall; everyone else was my shoulder or below. Sixteen skaters, thirteen short. Even with the coach who took over 1/4 of the ice to teach his student with the traveling pole, I was determined to have a decent skate.

One of the parents even said, "I didn't know you knew how to skate." Thanks, I guess...

After performing my monitoring duties during the second session, I skated the third. It was a good day.

Amazing what a little kick boxing and putting one's foot down about ice time can do!

Now, a glass of lemon aid...