Well, I've actually managed three days of working out at the gym... trying to find a program that works for me. I want one that simultaneously gives me cardio and also makes my muscles all achey but not too achey afterwards, which I reckon must be a very fine line, and one I've never been super-skilled at finding. So far I'm adjusting both notches slowly up. Today was 15 minutes stretching-yoga, 22.5 minutes on elliptical, 22.5 minutes on the exercise bike, 5 minutes on the stairmaster, and 20 minutes on the weights. I think I'm going to try swapping the bike and elliptical and reducing the bike while increasing the elliptical.

How's that for excitement? Anyhow, figuring out the optimum resistance and program is, I guess, one of the more interesting aspects of a chore I feel mostly bores me although I know it plays a part in the ultimate indecipherable nature of happiness and existence (which I wish I didn't have to deal with, particularly the reality and concept of death as I figure out the nature of "right now," but somehow the small gets caught up with the large and there I am in the gym, figuring my bike-height at 6 and sensing also how incredibly strange this particular participation is; and listening to an Atwood apocalypse story doesn't help with the irreality of hr, hr, hr, making my body over.) Anyhow and regardless, I have so far been listening 1/2 to high-energy music, and 1/2 to Atwood's book Oryx and Crake on audio, which I have already listened to, but I find I don't remember super well after two years. The problem with the audio book so far is that my mind wanders and then I have to catch up and feel embarrassed about what I missed. But with the music, I start getting irritated at the pace, so I think I just have to train my earballs.

There's a pretty sweet view at the Y though - the gym is on the 3rd story, and it looks out over the tops of the buildings towards the bay so you can see the water and nearby islands on a clear day. The rest of the time (90%), you can watch the occupants in the buildings and make up imaginary conversations for them.

Oh, and I think there should be a "fat people showering only" period during each hour, when people who have bellies that are wider than their hips have the shower-rooms to themselves. Oh, and I think the Y should rip out 3/4 of the mirrors they have in the ladies locker rooms. It's. Just. So. Depressing. And no, it doesn't motivate me. It mortifies me. And just look up the latin roots within that word. But in terms of my happiness schedule, I always feel pretty smugly happy and spry as soon as I hit the streets down below on my way to my studio.

I am having difficulty being diligent in my studio in the afternoon however. I went home on Wednesday, and today I think I'll probably go home to instead of getting a head start on the work that I need to do. So, I'm going to have to figure out a way to make all that diligence stuff seem a naked slip-n-slide on a summer day. Something to get a running start on.

My students seem okay. I have the same division between mostly-youngsters but a handful of older men (and one older woman), which makes me nervous, but so far the older men seem like they'll not begrudge me their wisdom and experience and might help out the youngsters as well. I've got a couple of smilers and head-nodders, which is important, and I also have a couple who seem sharp and able to talk. However, my evening class looks like it's going to be a hard one to get talking. A quiet group, with a couple of nodder-offers in the back. I wish I had the funds to bring a big keg of coffee to that class, because they all seem way sleepier than my 8am class. Both are full, though, and that is going to mean a nightmare of grading. I'm going to have to streamline streamline streamline.

And today the brolaw and sister took off... to an apparently icy snowfield of craziness in Europe. I'm crossing my fingers that their travels go without a hitch... no long waits in the airport or anything. And their visit was pretty darn awesome. No fights with either of them (I think my sis and I are both well skilled in each other's buttons, both purposefully and accidentally) and the only minor argument over whether America has places that contend with the youngness and rude and nasty hooligans that apparently Edinburgh has shocked my sister with. She says there are crazy-young pack of boys (anywhere between 8-16) that roam around and chase women, senior citizens, or nonburly men, throwing snowballs & iceballs at them, and screaming profanities falling within the extreme edges of crassness. She told me how last time she met a pack, she had to scare them off with a high-heeled shoe and the expressed willingness to drive its tip into their craniums. So, our argument was over whether America has similar packs anywhere, with my sis's perspective being that even our gang-kids back up and show respect for the Mothers and Grandmothers.

I dunno. It certainly sounds peculiar to me. And I don't think I've ever heard it suggested that the British can be ruder than Americans, and I rather like the flip on the criticism. I've been reading Elizabeth George mystery novels, and though I like her characterization most of the time, I've just about had it up to here with her crappy-ass American comments and people. Not only are they stupid, rude, vengeful, oblivious, and loud, they are also inexplicably inconsistent. I get the feeling that somewhere an American, specifically an American man, did George wrong, and never will she forgive it, and so she'll bumble around inaccurately representing the foibles of most Americans in her otherwise well-written mysteries. Ah, so banal and easy. Anyhow, that was off topic. The topic being that A) Ali and Peter don't really seem to like Scotland other some of the scenery and people outside of the city where they live, which they rarely get to leave because Ali has to work so damn hard, and B) as far as arguments go, that one was benign.

So, I'll be very sad to see them go, although I'll be less distracted and will hopefully develop a rhythm with my school- and writing- work again. But both of them say I need to send my novel-shit to them and they won't judge. Sounds enticing albeit scary.

Not much else going on... So bye.