Fantastic mood today

Delia's jewelry sale was a success! They made $250 the day of the sale, which wasn't quite what they were hoping, but then the girl scout troop leader took the leftover jewelry into work the next day and sold another $250 worth.

Fiona has a cold, and is going around heavy-eyed and sniffling.

I'm in a great mood today. I have no idea why. Frankly, it almost feels a little strange. My husband is still unemployed, and the headlines about his prospects of finding another job get gloomier every day. The economy is tanking, and I don't dare look at my 401(k). There was snow on the ground this morning, and it's a gray, foggy, gloomy day. And yet I'm humming a tune (wizard rock, natch) and drinking a specialty coffee drink (1/2 egg nog, 1/2 skim milk latte) which cost a whole four dollars and seventy-five cents which is an incredible decadence for our budget so I should feel guilty but instead I feel fricking fantastic.

Well, part of it is that Alternity is so much fun I CAN HARDLY STAND IT. Spent some time last night in a chat brainstorming out plots for years 3, 4 and 5 (I had a SCATHINGLY BRILLIANT idea for year 4). And debating whether or not one of my characters will end up getting killed off. Which will absolutely break my heart if we decide to do it, because I've absolutely fallen in love with that person. We explored both avenues, and determined if the person isn't killed off (and I'm guaranteed a GREAT death scene, if we go that way), there's a whole other extremely interesting avenue to explore. I told the moderator that I'm craving to write another character because it's so much fun.

"No, you can't," she tells me sternly. "Four characters is enough."

Hips

Sometimes my hips just won't do what I want them to do.

I didn't really want to go to class last night. It was spitting freezing rain, and I hated dragging myself away from Alternity. But I went. Came in, and tried to warm up. Some days, when you try to warm up, it's like your muscles are sulking. You want me to be loose and flexible? Ha. I'll show you. And the tendons constrict like stubborn rubber bands. I've been sooooooo frustrated with my straddle stretches lately. They just. will. not. budge. I can't open my legs widely enough, no matter how much I stretch. It's perplexing. A recent New York Time article on the subject suggests UR DOING IT WRONG. I've tried incorporating some of their suggestions. But I'm really frustrated. We worked on the Zhang Du Moon form for awhile, teaching it to the red belts, and then from there we went to practicing pop-up round kicks, pairing with a partner on muay thai pads. Honestly, I was embarrassed to be a brown belt. Since my hips were refusing to open up enough to do the kick properly, I know that my form absolutely sucked--it was like I'd totally forgotten how to do this kick, which I've been working on since white belt. But my hips acted like they were frozen, and to compound my problems, I got a foot cramp in my supporting leg.

Some days are like that. It's as if the body just refuses to cooperate. Nyah, nyah, nyah, you can't make me.

Stupid body. Well, no. It's doing the best it can. It is annoying, though.

Hopefully class on Thursday will be better.