Category Archives: random

Climbing rocks and swimming

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A few weeks ago, Baron and I went rock climbing at Joe Rockheads. This marks only the 4th time I’ve attempted this sport. Good friends of ours are hardcore rock climbers and haven recently opened up a gym in Kitchener (www.grandriverrocks.com – check them out, they are awesome). The benefits of the sport are easy to see. It’s an amazing physical work out disguised as fun, which is exactly what I require. It’s also a very supportive community and going at your own pace is highly encouraged.

Like every other sport/physical activity I have tried, I’m not very good at it. I don’t usually have a fear of hieghts when I feel safe (ie. on a balcony, or a roller coaster), but hiking down a mountain, hill or even slight incline can really send me into vertigo. This seems to be fairly new, and rather disappointing. When I was climbing up the walls, I felt this fear, but it made no sense. I was strapped into a harness with a competent person belaying me. Even if I were to fall, I’d just dangle there. In fact, that has happened… and I LIVED! Then why am I so scared? I can’t quite figure it out. It could be the adrenaline going into overdrive.

Whatever it is, I am determined to find out. This is a change of pace for me as I normally shy away from something I find difficult or scary. In my ongoing quest to better myself I’ve decided to take this challenge on. I rock-climbed once in my early 20′s. I loved it like a child. I want to get that back.

This new found desire to attack a problem is a major skill in bouldering, so at the very least I feel I can try to improve in that area.

Something that is helping me stay motivated and positive is my ongoing experience with swimming. I briefly mentioned it a while ago, but to refresh: I had a life-long fear of water that I finally decided to overcome in the fall of 2011 by taking adult swimming lessons. That was a great experience but just the beginning as there was still so much to go. With the help of an amazing friends I am getting there. One of them is Jenn K who used to be an instructor (who taught and enjoyed teaching adults), and the other is Steph M who suggested Jenn teach me swimming an exchange for me teaching her manual photography. It was a brilliant idea, one that I hadn’t pondered on my own. Near the end of December, Jenn would come to my pool every other Monday, with Steph and I aiming to swim every Monday. With holidays and life plans we had to stop before Xmas and resumed near the end of January. I’ve made it about 8 times in total, with about 4 lessons with Jenn and I have made so much progress. I can now complete a lap doing backstroke. I’m improving my front crawl by a lot and hope to be able to complete a lap within the next months. Swimming is the best physical exercise for my asthma. The warmth and humidity of the pool means my lungs never get strained, so I can push myself to my limit. In other exercises I had attempted I found that my asthma was the thing that stopped me, not necessarily my muscles.

It’s so great to overcome a fear, but also great to discover that I can be good at something physical. I wouldn’t say I’m good at swimming yet, but every week I feel a bit better and that confidence helps me continue. I am applying that to other areas of my life and it feels great. I guess this is why kids participate in sports when they are younger. Hrm.

I hope to keep improving my physical abilities, and it feels really good!

Happy Christmas Eve

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Xmas Bunny

Xmas Bunny


It’s almost dinner time on Christmas Eve, and I just finished packing for my trip. It was surprisingly easy. Partially due to my excellent list making skills and partially due to my decision to not care so much. I can easily stress myself out packing. I usually start a few days before and add, remove, add and remove things before I settle on what I feel I need. It’s always too much. This time I just made my list, and put it in.

This is a very different type of activity to be doing on this day. Normally I’d be with either my family or my in-law’s, doing the pre-Christmas celebration. Even those few years where my family chose not to celebrate Christmas, we’d still be together and eat and talk.

It’s kind of nice to experience a non-Christmas. I’ve never stayed in Toronto at this time. Tomorrow we are going to go see a movie (and yes, probably get Chinese food).

There are no presents to unwrap, and no huge meal to consume with family.. just yet. In a few short days I’ll be eating with family I haven’t seen in 6 years. Family that Aaron hasn’t ever met! I’m excited about my trip.

I bought a new lens for my camera:

New Lens

New Lens

It’s a nice extension to the kit lens that came with my camera – which ias a 14-42mm. The last time I went to India, in 2006, I borrowed my brother’s Canon ultra zoom. It had a few manual fuctions, but they were the easiest to get to. The 12x optical zoom was the key feature. We traveled around the north in Delhi, Agra and Rajasthan and I was able to take some great photos. In fact, not having to fuss or rely on manual functions really forced me to take note of my framing and I learned a lot from that. I had quite a few beautiful shots. So this time I’m excited to have a fully manual camera, with 2 lenses (and a new camera bag) so I can have even more choice.

It’s pretty exciting to buy my first lens for my camera. I’d wanted a DSLR for so long, but the price always stopped me. I had borrowed my cousins Canon Rebel DSLR for a trip to BC. While it had produced wonderful photos I realized how quickly I tired of carrying around such a heavy thing. He had the standard kit lens which was about 18mm-55mm plus a 300mm telephoto. My camera is a “micro 4/3rds” or DSLM. It’s fully manually but almost half the size. I’m getting almost the same zoom capacity in a much smaller and lighter rig.

Here are my photos from my last trip to India:

I hope every has a wonderful holiday.

I’m jealous of athletes

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I’m jealous of athletes…or even people who enjoy physical activity. Mostly because this idea is foreign to me. I can sum up my life easily and accurately by the following stats.

Growing up I was:

  1. asthmatic (still am)
  2. picked last for every sport (still am)
  3. always preferring to stay inside and read at any given opportunity.

Sure, I ran around with friends from time to time, but that was the extent of my physical activity.  My parents decided to put me in swimming lessons, but because of my scaredy-cat nature I eventually quit (and developed an even deeper fear of water/drowning).  Outside of that I was never in any sort of sport, or dance. And I never wanted to be. It didn’t interest me in the least.  Looking back I feel like this is kind of odd. Most people I know were in at least one  sports league, even if it was through school. Not me. I grew up easily avoiding physical activity of any meaningful kind. I walked everywhere (an hour a day at least), but that was it.

Once I got into college, and after that ‘freshman fifteen’ kicked in, I tried out a few things like using the school gym, workout dvd’s, even a few classes, but nothing piqued my interest. It wasn’t until the summer of 2010 when I got  sick of being so inactive and weak that I randomly signed up for a 2 month women’s ‘boot camp’.  This was pivotal for me. I never thought I could be strong. I went from not being able to do 1 “girly” push up to being able to do 20 “man-style” pushups in 8 weeks. Unfortunately, the nature of boot camps, combined with their steep price, made it something I couldn’t sustain.  I did come back to it off and on when I felt I needed that physical boost.

This fall I finally decided to get over my fear of water. In hindsight it seems to have been a silly fear…but it was very real. I took an adult swimming course at a local community centre and again my mind was blown with the things that my body was able to do! Namely: not sinking.

For me, being asthmatic made me think I couldn’t be physically active. I learned that was wrong. I just needed to be a little careful. And in fact being physically active would help keep my asthma under control – a wonderful, if obvious, discovery.

Now back to the title of this post. So even though I’ve discovered physical activities I enjoy – canoeing, hiking, swimming… I still feel jealous of those who are active with a purpose. For example, my husband plays soccer and he’s always training to be better. So when he goes to the gym, he goes with a purpose…to train. I don’t feel like I have that. Sure, being healthy and all is a great reason…but let’s face it: I’m lazy.

I’m lazy and I hate sports. There isn’t really any sport I want to be a part of – but I want to want that. Maybe there’s more fear holding me back. I mentioned that I liked canoeing so I thought of joining a rowing team – but the thought of being on a team is genuinely scary. I was the ‘weak little asthmatic one’. While in boot camp, I was improving myself at my own pace… but if I were to join a team… other people would be depending on me. I don’t like that! So that leaves me with single person activities such as rock-climbing and running, which I can pursue at my own pace. I am slowly dabbling in these things, but being physical on purpose is just not a habit I’ve developed yet.

While it’s embarrassing and slightly depressing to admit all of this…I’m slowly becoming more active, and finding physical activities that I enjoy doing. The chance that I’ll become some super athletic person is slim but I guess the point is that I am trying. I’m trying to do more…to get out there and let go of my fears. It’s not easy and I don’t know if I will ever get over all of them…but I’m making an effort. For that I am proud of myself.

Birthmeh

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For most of my life I have gotten really excited about my birthday. I would sometimes have expectations that were too big to fill but for the most part I’ve always had a great time. As I got older, I started to feel that it was decidedly uncool to love your birthday like a child, so I learned to hide my excitement. I’m sure I didn’t do a very good job. My late 20′s have changed that. I’ve stopped caring about doing anything special and it felt like just another day, but at least another day with guaranteed chocolate cake.  I still don’t hate or fear my birthday. I think I’ve done a pretty good job of dealing with aging. Maybe it’s because I look a lot younger than I am – something that used to bother me when I was younger but of course now is something I treasure.  Maybe it’s also partially because of my child-like behaviour… Either way, I’m not sweating birthdays… yet.

I remember when I was a teenager I’d prepare the birthday wish list no less than 1 month in advance. Having a mid November birthday meant that all unfulfilled birthday wishlist items automatically became the Christmas wishlist. It was just efficient, I thought! Then I got to that point where I could buy myself whatever I wanted, and all the things I really wanted were way too expensive to ask of anyone.  This never stops my mom for asking me what I want.  It’s an interesting thing. As a kid I’d ask my mom what she wanted for mother’s day, birthday and Christmas and I’d rarely get a real answer. Every couple of years she would run down her old slippers or run out of perfume and those were easy… but other than that she mostly wanted nothing. How frustrating! Surely there’s something you’d want! Well, now I find myself in that position.

Last year when I turned 30 she bought me and Baron a return flight to NYC as our combined birthday gifts. It was perfect. I’d always wanted to go, flying is very convenient and this way I could force Baron to come with me. I loved it. I decided at that point that every birthday in my 30′s will yield a trip. Lavish, indulgent and maybe a bit much but that’s what is happening… Though I can save up and take these little weekend trips myself, and I could never ask someone to buy me that… so it doesn’t quite solve the problem of what my mother wants to give me.

Since I am taking myself to Chicago (my kinda town), I started to think of things I would want.

So far I have come up with this:

A chocolate covered caramel apple.

Birthday Yum

Birthday Yum

 

Failing that, I will gladly take an edible arrangement:

More Birthday Yums

More Birthday Yums

There are a few other things I want like a cusinart food processor, a better blender and perhaps slight more fun, cooking classes. Those things can still get pretty pricey.

So apparently I want either: fruit dipped in chocolate, or things that will allow me to cook. Hrm. Can we say one-track-mind?  I wouldn’t mind getting a wacom tablet, but it’s not a necessity. When I was younger it was so easy to make a list of things I wanted… now even the things I want seem slightly silly. Perhaps I’ve actually succeeded in becoming less materialistic. I’m totally fine to not buy things, to wait it out or at least save up for it.

All I really want on my birthday is this: to spend time with people I love and to have chocolate. Taking a trip to somewhere is really just the chocolate on the fruit. :)