I'm Still Here...

I'm here... coming up for air. January is always a busy month for me. Classes started again and although the second semester of Russian is going to be SUPER challenging (we're learning how to type in Cyrillic on a Russian keyboard, along with the regular curriculum), I'm enjoying it already. It's another 4 credit hour course, just like last semester. The only problem with that is I only get SIX free credit hours a year as a staff member. So... my professor and I worked a creative solution involving independent study.

Maura has a respiratory virus. Three of her classmates have tested positive for RSV, so we're assuming that's what it is. My doctor's office tends to avoid empirical tests like the plague, so we we will never know for sure. I think they just don't want to have to take the time to report anything to the CDC. Anyway, what's the one thing the Asthma/Allergy specialist said he hoped we could avoid this month while her lungs heal from the pneumonia? You guessed it. Last night the girls were running around the kitchen and Maura had a full-blown asthma attack. Scared both of us. Sigh. I really WAS hoping she just had allergies. This illness combined with the Deac's attack of gout have really sapped me of energy this month.

My 35th birthday is coming up in another week. I feel positively middle-aged. 35 seems to be hitting me harder than 30 and I think it's because I feel like I need to make some changes to my life - and if I don't do it now, I may never be able to do it. Face it, I'm getting old. My body doesn't have the resilience it had when I was 18 or 25. In other words, I can't just continue eating poorly and not exercising. I'm getting closer and closer to a time in my life where my body might not respond for me in the way I would like (movement-wise) if I don't start training it better and taking care of myself now. So I've started exercising 5 days a week. I have a fully-stocked exercise room about 20 feet from my office - I really have no excuse not to use it. So Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays I spend 30 minutes on the elliptical machine and I lift weights on Tuesdays and Thursdays. To sweeten the deal, the Deac said I could get the expensive iPod I want for my birthday (but couldn't really justify) after I follow this workout routine for one month. After extracting from him a promise that HE will ALSO have to workout for a month before he gets his birthday present, I agreed. You see, the sucky thing about having a birthday in January is that we always feel a bit over-extended from Christmas but by the time HIS birthday comes along in June all is well again. But I am grateful for a little external motivation to get my rear in gear, so to speak.