On my walks to the gym in the mornings now, the shadows give me plenty of angles of myself to view. Thankfully, I’m not infested with Vashta Nerada, though many times I have to giggle, particularly when I reach the corner of St Mark’s Place and Victory Blvd, because no less than four shadows surround me due to the overhead lighting and time of day.
If I catch the stoplight just right, it’s five shadows.
Smiling to myself, I am happily walking to my sweat-institute in my Doctor Who hoodie, delighting in my fangirl’g moment.
However it’s on the walk home that the sun, now slowly creeping into the sky-area of the day, gives me a shadow view that I truly didn’t notice before this past week.
I write to various friends as I go to and from the gym, and I’m usually very tired from just giving it everything I can for the last hour on the bike, treadmill, machines, free weights, medicine ball, TRX cables…. yeah, I leave that place feelin’ pretty worn out but glad to have the sweat equity building.
They don’t get too much conversation on my way home other than Whineypixie, who has offered one girlfriend (Luloo, who is located in Manchester, England) all the cookies she can ever wish to eat if she would just come drive across the Atlantic Puddle and drive me up St. Mark’s Place hill. Sadly, she does not own Chitty Chitty Bang Bang*, 
and her car is not equipped for ocean voyages.
Between Luloo, Ping, D, and a few others, I’m pretty sure if they ever tried to collect, I’d be out several trillion dollars, all the kitten purrs ever sounded, and all the chocolate.
Alas, I must summit that hill on my own, with aid only of my determination and desire to sit down.
(*…That moment when you are searching for a good pick of your favourite car of all time and it dawns on you, this is why you LOVE steampunk so much… it’s been in your heart your whole life!!!*)
I sent Luloo, Ping, Ash, Bas, and D the same pic this week… because I noticed my butt for the first time in … well, I guess forever, as I can’t recall ever noticing or mentioning or (dare I say?) admiring my posterior’s form before this week. There is clear definition between the hindquarters and the flank so to speak. Thighs are thighs, and the rump is rumped. I’m chuckling to myself, because all I can think now is “pirates ain’t the only ones with good booty” and I’m not even done carving mine out yet!
Sharing this news with others, I then did an incredibly BOLD {though I really need you to read that as “exhausting” and “insane“} thing: I walked, without pause, all the way from the gas station to where I stop to mentally yell “Whoohoo! WTC1 is in sight! You’re on the flat stretch, Pixie!!!” I usually pause to send a message, catch my breath, and sigh heavily a few times up this hill.
That might not seem like much, but it’s a deceptively long steep climb. We are 110 feet above sea level (the Hudson River is visible from our windows) not including the fact we’re on the 9th floor. I walk from 110.880 at home to 19.755 feet above sea level at the gym. And trust me; doing it downhill heading to the gym is a breeze, but it’s a brutal climb when you’re pooped. Even as fit as I’m getting, that still takes its toll on my body. 
Gimme a sec, I just need to catch my breath… as I did the entire walk up that hill without a stop though, it was definitely my “YAY ME!” moment of the day.
SP came over on Monday, though we soon realised that we wouldn’t be able to see the thrift store that day (yeah, the one that I went to on that first walk with the boy back in April that I vowed I wouldn’t go back in because, reasons). They are closed Sundays and Mondays (who knew!?) and had to make plans to go back sometime during the week – we decided Friday she would come back and we’d try again. We made dinner for the hubs, stuffed pasta shells, with ground turkey (soooooo good!!!), talked cameras, film, photography, and had some great laughs, and she headed back to Brooklyn.
Wednesday, I decided to traipse down to the Comic Shop, and then figured while I was out, just add a bit more to my walk – so I headed over to the thrift store. I found two pair of pants (one size Large! and YES they fit [a little snug, but still!]), and found a cute t-shirt, and a shirt for the boy. I LOVE vintage stuff, and almost all my wardrobe ever has been hand-me-down or second hand because of my financial status. I have no shame having someone else break in clothes for me first, and after they have been laundered, no one can tell that they haven’t always been mine from the date of purchase.
I met a wonderful guy, Brian (not listed in the credits anywhere, but has worked on several films and shows, including Spiderman and M.I.B.!!), who is one of the crew for the upcoming HBO series “Vinyl” (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3186130/?ref_=nv_sr_1) – saw him at the Comic Shop Wednesday and Thursday, and then SP met him when we were walking back from the thrift store on Friday.
Funny thing was, because I had seen him the two days prior in Hypno-tronic Comics (it’s about time I at least link their FB page, as they are awesome and I think everyone should come to Staten Island just to visit the shop!! https://www.facebook.com/Hypnotronic/), he thought I worked there. Well, maybe it was because I knew where the items were that he was looking for when he was inquiring about them in the shop, or the fact that I knew the prices… yeah, I apparently spend a lot of time in the comic store these days. We chatted with him for quite a while about the different things going on with the show, and found out they were currently shooting Season 1’s Finale episode at the St. George Theatre.
When we were walking back to the apartment, SP and I passed the trailers and had a fun giggle about how awesome it was that we even just saw the smallest part of the production side of a HBO show.
This is SP’s last visit with us while she’s in NYC this time. She will be leaving November 2 but we’re not going to be able to get together again, as we have other events happening. So we had a grand goodbye dinner (Chinese), a couple of epic selfies (and a few with the boy even!), about five hundred hugs and eighteen dozen tears later, the hubs walked her to the terminal as I got ready for bed and my regular night routine consisting of journal writing, filling out my Memory Maker page, and the usual bathroom rituals.
It’s hard to imagine that our lives have been so connected for coming up on a year now; SP has seen me at some of my worst times, and has seen this transformation with her own eyes. When she says that she’s proud of how far I’ve come, that squeezes the part of my heart that is reserved for sacred good moments… like smelling cinnamon and hearing kittens purring. I know how hard I’ve worked to get to this point, and I’m no where close to where I want to be. The hubs and I were chatting yesterday, and I joked that (as I’m younger than him by … a few years…) I’m working to become his sexy lil’ trophy wife. We had a fun laugh about that. I’ll just be happy when I’m his scuba companion. I can’t wait!!!!
Heading into Birthday Week, I can say that I’m quite excited. As I am typing this up, I’ve already received my birthday presents from the boy (OH MY STARS!!! – nope, you have to wait until next week to see it, sorry!) and when this review is completed, I shall be hastening out to the nearest desk to read and play with both of them.
Just going to say, that I’m pretty sure next week’s review will be all about the Twigaland visit (yes, I realise that other mortals call it the Bronx Zoo, but let’s face it, I don’t even know what else is there!!), and D’s arrival on Friday. I’m not even going to apologise for the fact you’ll be seeing 80,000 pictures of the same giraffe blinking at me. Just prepare yourselves.
I love how this week is like the first week of this #100days – high points on either end of it to make the week spectacular. Wednesday will give me time to collect myself from the events of trying to steal-rescue-rehome the giraffe here to Staten Island (I really hope that Kickstarter Bail Money is good to go…), work on NaNo, and deliciously pace the apartment floor until D lands in Newark, and gets her hugs over here on Friday.
I plateaued with my weight – didn’t go up or down this week, so that is going as a good mark, as it’s probably weight lost and muscle gained.
I am still well above my expected steps as well, and other than my bust, hips, and legs, I went down again in all my stats.
Have a fantastic week everyone!!!!
