UT 1 Debate Panelist

The fame of the Duchess grows and grows. Not only does she provide organizational advice to hopeless friends but she also grills Congressional candidates with tough questions. That is, of course, if she can come up with some tough questions.

Tomorrow I will be a panelist on the KBYU Bishop-Olsen debate. This election here is a squeaker, much like the rest of the nation, um, no wait, it's Utah. This election will be a landslide. But we go through the motions of democracy and I will be on the television asking questions. What will I wear? Hmmm.

Any ideas for questions? Please send them along.

Prom Night

Last night a friend of mine decided to have a prom. It was FABULOUS!!! I really enjoyed it. I danced for 4 1/2 hours (hey - boot camp lady - I lost 3 pounds since yesterday...so clearly all I need is hip hop and no figure 8) dressed as a flapper going to the prom. It was so much fun.

I will never get over wanting to dress up. Of course I don't look as good as I once did, but I still love curling my hair (but then I realized I no longer have hair spray, hard to get those curls to stay in without some aqua net) and putting on too much make up and wearing high heels.

And my date (husband of course) was going to get some prom sex, except he passed out from too much alcohol and then threw up all night...smile...love the prom!

a Little Politics

What a fun election we have coming up in 2006. Midterm elections are never exciting excepting their commentary on the president (1994 for example) but this year they are fabulous in their own right.

But this is nothing, compared to what will happen in 2008. This is the first time since 1952 (Eisenhower v Stevenson) that we have an open presidential election. Meaning, that neither an incumbent nor the vice president of the incumbent (with the inherited agenda) has run for president. Ooh la la bring on the primaries. Bring on the campaign ads. Bring on the fun.

You think the Republicans are nasty in midterms, wait until you see them in an open election running against each other for the annointing...

the Figure 8

Or...the hills of death.

My boot camp is situated in a valley, kind of, and to get out I have to downshift in my little Mazda. So today we are told, go run the figure 8. We head out to a run that begins straight up, runs straight down, turn right, straight up, run straight down. Remember the Duchess has shin splints. So I sigh and I start to run (well maybe plod along at a trotting pace). By the top of the first hill I am wheezing. By the bottom of the first hill my calves and shins start to explode. I begin up the second hill and I start limping. I make it to the top, turn around and limp back. At which time I am supposed to sprint 3 times across the parking lot. Well, I could barely walk, much less sprint. But I did the figure 8, the whole damn thing, limping for 50% of it

That's called powering through...I think...um, where's my cake?

Moral Indignation Averted

One thing I cannot stand about myself is how I get hurt feelings, tremendously, highly sensitive, hard to rationally pull myself back together, hurt feelings. This is why I will never run for office, I do not have a thick skin. Case in point, but I was proud of the outcome.

Today I get shin splints again...well I guess I'll have them forever but they HURT...so I ask the boot camp trainer about it. She replies, look you can quit or you can power through it. And I sheepishly walk away and say, no no, I don't want to quit, I just want to make sure I am not doing more damage. By the time I get in my car, I am completely pissed that she was so dismissive. I mean, damnit, they HURT. And, damnit, I don't want to be told to just quit, I want to be told some neat stretches to do, or something. By the time I was halfway home, I am completely in realization that I am not pissed at her but at myself for asking the damn question. I know the two options with shin splints are quit or power through it and I wonder at why I asked...is it because I want her to know how painful this is and how fantastic I am that I am powering through it? And I think (despair despair) the answer is yes...ARGH! How silly to want her to know that! By the time I am home, I am dancing into the house (like I have after every boot camp because I feel great) thinking I will power through this and it will hurt but it will be fabulous.

My feelings were hurt (as they usually are) but I was able to rationally pull out of it within 15 minutes...that may be a new record.

Oh, and, shin splints be damned!

Shin Splints?!?

Boot camp has delivered another punch: shin splints. I haven't had shin splints since the 9th grade when I really hurt myself running in track practice. Since then I have avoided any kind of fierce running, now I remember why. 99% of boot camp is running and 67% of that is sprinting. SPRINTING! Seriously, are 32 year old women supposed to be sprinting?

Note to self: don't wear 4 year old cross trainers to a boot camp that is 99% running, wear the brand new running shoes you bought over the summer in an attempt to kick start your exercise.

Oh, and, I am 32. Now I can actually swear...nice fat f-words and c-words...and I am exercising with a bunch of Mormons who look at me like I am the antichrist when I say "!@#$%" at the end of a particularly tough sprint up hill. Well, hell, I am going to swear anyway and if I happen to say something that seems like it is anatomically impossible, deal with it!

Pain Sets In

Yesterday was fantastic, this morning was not so hot. Smile. My body aches every where and I can feel the muscles that were used for the medicine ball throwing. I just stood in the shower letting hot water soothe aching muscles. And of course I am completely not into using medicine, so I am suffering through this in the stoic way I handle all things that bother me.

I also ended up with a harsh headache yesterday all day that I believe came from too little water. If you are going to work out the way I did, you need to hydrate. Reminder to self from when I use to work out a lot. My friend, Sharon, thinks that exercise also releases toxins so maybe the headache was from the toxins in my body. I seem to remember that from taking Ashtanga yoga years ago, so maybe that's also correct.

But, even with the headache, I felt great. I was wide awake from the moment I got home until the moment I went to sleep at 10pm last night. No afternoon slumps. No zoning outs during lectures.

Welcome back exercise!

Boot Camp Rocks!

Okay, so 6am did suck, but boot camp was fantastic. I arrived to pick up my devastatingly beautiful friend Sharon (who I think looks like the lead actress in Gray's Anatomy and she was told that today by our boot camp instructor as well so I have some evidence that I am correct) at 525am. Yes it's dark. Yes not even God is awake yet. We drive over to the club, which Sharon cannot find in the dark, so it takes us a little while.

We run for 10 minutes. We then do all sorts of strange circuit training things like the football string exercise and ski jumping around cones and hurling a medicine ball at each other. This is sporadically interrupted by running for a lap or two. Then we do a million sit ups and get our body fat weighed. UGH.

Well, I didn't need to have my body fat measured to know that I have body fat. But what I discovered was very interesting, apparently I have so much muscle mass that I will have 0 - 1% body fat at 130 pounds. This means that when I weighed 125 pounds in high school and college and thought I was fat because my friends weighed 115 pounds, I was actually super skinny. In fact, I had no fat at all. Too bad I didn't know that then, those bouts of bulemia could have been avoided, and I might have actually worked to keep it off. But, I'm on the way to a new, fitter, more fabulous Duchess. And my instructor says it's not impossible for people to lose 20 pounds, so may Christmas will be fantastic!

Go Weight Watchers! Go boot camp! Size 5's, here I come...now do I still have those really skinny jeans???

The Body

This week I finally weighed less than I did when I got pregnant a year and a half ago. So, basically, I am back to the weight I was when I had gained more weight than ever after a surgery two years ago. I have lost 23 pounds. Which doesn't sound like much, but for me, it is. I love to eat and unfortunately I have no tragic allergies to wheat or yeast or whatever all the skinny people have. So, I fight every day not to eat great food.

This week I start boot camp with a girlfriend. Time to kick it up a notch and have exercise play a larger role in my weight loss. I enjoy exercise, problem was I was so big I was worried about having a heart attack with anything too intense, but now I'm back to a place where I can actually do high powered aerobic exercise and my heart won't explode. I'll probably still turn purple, but I won't die from it. So, Sharon (gorgeous, tall, skinny friend of mine...I need to get some more fat, short, ugly friends to make myself feel better...strike that, I need to any fat, short, ugly friend) and I are going at 6am Tues, Thurs, Fri to boot camp. 8 weeks. Results guaranteed. If I can lose 15 pounds doing this I will be back to the weight of grad school (which is still way more than undergrad, but way less than post-pregnancy) and all my clothes will fit again.

But, 6 am is going to SUCK!

My Bohemian Self

I have a vague sense of deja vu that I have perhaps written about this before...but oh well...here goes.

I just watched Rent the movie. I have seen Rent on Broadway. I love this musical. I have the soundtrack. I love the soundtrack. I made husband watch it (grudgingly as he is not a fan of musicals) and he kept saying oh yeah you love this song...because he's heard all the songs a million times having been with me ever since I saw the original musical.

I love that people dying of AIDS are shown with compassion and without judgment. How many times have I heard someone say you get AIDS because you have done something wrong (drugs, casual sex)? How often have we heard some crazy wacko say AIDS is the cure? In how many ways can we treat people badly? And..thank God people like Jonathan Larson write musicals to challenge the way we think. To challenge the mainstream.

I also like to think that in some parallel universe there is a Duchess who doesn't love dishes and Burberry and Levenger and wasn't committed to walking the straight and narrow all the time.

That Duchess is a Bohemian...I bet she is having a fabulous life.

It's Been Too Long

I have been quiet. Smile. I am never quiet.

What to say?

Interesting to watch those values-Republicans wriggle under the heat of a focused populace. Fantastic to drive through the canyon seeing all the beautiful fall foliage and realizing New England doesn't beat Utah for sheer beauty. Fun to watch new seasons of Battlestar Galactica and Dr. Who. Stressed writing my dissertation into a book and getting my 3rd year review together all at the same time.

Happy to be chosen as a "fun" professor to participate in jeopardy.

Life's good.

I Kind of Like Being Catholic

Much to the dismay of my father (who honestly believes my Church is the Anti-Christ... on those days he believes in Christ...on other days we are the Axis of Evil) I am a practicing, acting, relatively good Catholic.

So I am defensive against my father and his wife and her family all of whom think the Catholic Church is evil. For a whole list of perceived snubs by the Church against their persons and against people in general.

I am also defensive against the majority religion here in Utah, the LDS faith, all of whom think the Catholic Church would be so much better if all its members just jumped ship and became Mormon. I'll never forget that young, earnest missionary saying, we don't like to think of Christ on the cross, which is the hallmark of your religion... after which my husband politely asked them to leave.

I am also defensive against my husband (a little bit here) who is more of a secular humanist and is concerned with the blind faith intelligent people have in a myth. He is also concerned with the vast steps to the right the Church sometimes takes.

Yesterday I went to the Pastoral Congress (God bless their hearts, those Utah Catholics, planning their Pastoral Congress on the same weekend as the Mormon General Conference which is all we hear about in Utah this weekend) and found some new reasons to be defensive. So, Dad, LDS friends, and Husband (and all you others who question my faith) watch out...I'm ready for the next argument!!

The Pro-Life table said: make abortions rare, discuss options with women...none of this blow up the clinic talk.

The Legislation table said: as Catholics we need to push for better health care, more care for our elderly, better education, stopping the death penalty, a living wage...none of this gay marriage ban stuff.

The Mass was bilingual...none of this English ought to be the most official language stuff.

The keynote speaker discussed the power of mythic story in the Bible...none of this Biblical literalism and we hate science crap.

The Youth Bibles were written with teenagers in mind...none of this 16 year olds ought to love to read arcane literature from 2000 years ago bull.

So, Catholic detractors, bring it on. I defy you to say that all these things (and this is an exhaustive list...not a cherry picked list) are not in line with what I, as an intelligent woman, would argue.