Holy Mother of Whatever:

And this morning, Alan and I were doing yoga in bed. Stretching our bodies, this way and that. bringing our knees up to our chests. Dr. Theirl said that Alan has to be more flexible and since I do some yoga I showed him some moves. Dr. Theirl said Alan should learn Hatha Yoga.

I asked Alan if he could sit in a lotus position and showed him what it means (not that I could do this, I just showed him what it looked like). He looked at me like I lost my marbles. He said "are you for real?" I could never put my body in that position." I responded "Before you went to Dr. Theirl, you couldn't put your body in ANY position". He said "yeah, you got me there".

When I do the spider thing going up the wall, and when I stand up strait and put my arms in big circles round and round for a few minutes, and I do this several times a day, I get more ability to move my left arm. Does this mean anything? Alan said "if you had a torn rotator cuff, you couldn't put your arm in any circles the way you are doing it. It hurt real bad at first but as I move it, it does get a bit easier. The bad thing is when the weather is like today (again it feels like 100 degrees humidity), well, everything hurts, but then again, I am almost 60 and no longer Gina Lolabrigida. But at least I do try and move. I walk every day with my ipod (thank god for my ipod). When the weather is right, and the sun is warm, nothing hurts (why the heck is that?).

I remember going to rehab on my left arm (when I wouldn't let that terrorist nurse kill me with the cattle prod), I went to rehab, and they used the tens unit on my shoulder, and they massaged me, and they put these electrodes on my upper back shoulder area with a hot pack over it. Felt great.

I have always had muscle spasms all my life. I've never been what you consider a cool, quiet person. I'm getting there as I get older, but in my youth I was a bundle of nerves (having a young son with problems will make anybody nervous believe me). But as I age, (too bad that arthritis has to come along with aging), but as I age, and I move, and I exercise, honestly, I do feel better (I certainly am thinner, thats for sure).

I mean, I look at photos of me at 300 lbs and say "what happened to my brain, was I out of my mind?". Thank god, I came to my senses and it took most of my adult life to do this, but I'm getting there.

This Friday I go to Cornell and I shall blow them away when I get on the scale. You should see all these skinny little nursing people (they must weight 90 lbs), and every time I come, they weigh me backwards and they go, "Oh, she lost more, weight, oh my". I say how much and they go "wow, you lost 2 lbs". That's when I want to crack them but I keep my mouth shut. Last visit I lost 10. I'm not doing anything special to do this. Just eating my healthy eating but I am moving more.

I'm going to put on my blond wig this friday. They won't know what hit them. I might even dress like Madonna. Now WOULDN'T THAT BE SOMETHING???".
This friday is my two year annual physical at Cornell, with all the blood work, the blood pressure, the eye thing, the heart thing. I broke their protocol and while that's not good for them, they laughed and said "it's certainly not what we expected for you to accomplish but it's great for you".

This year I turn 60. I want to be a healthy fit 60, not some bent over full of degenerative joint disease, scoliosis, diabetic, full of aches and pains 60 year old.

Oh, you'll love this. I was in Radio Shack discussing how to fix my Directv system by buying a new 100 foot coaxial cable and installing it myself. The guys who work there were maybe 24 years old. They looked at me and said "you know how to fix a satellite system?, and I said "I even know about dish pointing, signal meter strength and barrels and connectors, AND I EVEN HAVE AN IPOD". They burst out laughing and said "Did you know that Microsoft came out with an IPOD thing called Zune? I said No, how is it different from my Apple Ipod?" and the guy goes "well, it comes with video".

I responded "Son, when you are almost 60, all you need is music, not the video". and he said "who's 60"? and I said "well, I will be 60 this year". and he says, and I kid you not, he said this "You can sell someone the brooklyn bridge, but don't tell me you will be 60 this year". I whipped out my non-drivers license and he started to laugh. I never laughed so hard. I mean, what do they think 60 is supposed to look like? Like Grandma Moses? I mean, look at Sophia Loren at 72, and Goldie Hawn. She's almost 60.

We gals are the new 30!!!!! Thats all I can say. That is if I can get up out of my chair and walk to the kitchen.

lol

Melody