Some new-ish clothes, and my favorite old dress

I got the last few moves to the broad sword form tonight, and Sifu told Lee and I that once we had that down, we'd get our next belt. So, hurray! But it's a lot harder to retain all of the stuff he taught us than I thought it would be. I've been having such an inordinately easy time with sword form up until now, I sort of didn't expect it to get so hard so quickly. He's not breaking it down moce by move for the entire class anymore, but teaching us sporadically, one at a time. That makes it more difficult, for me anyway, because I'm not forced into the repitition anymore and I'll just do the parts I like over and over again. Left to my own devices, I will stand in the parking lot swishing my sword around and listening to the cool noise it makes. ( I love my sword too much. )

/cam-whore

Afterwards, Erica asked me to her house to take some of her clothes that she didn't want anymore. SCORE! She has the coolest stuff ever, I'm not talking about stuff from Target like I always get, but, like, real clothes from actual clothing stores. She had a bunch of size 8 pants and some size 6 that I immediately decided I'd give to some of my friends at work. Before I left, she said "Try those on before you give them away, because I think they'll fit." I didn't believe her because they looked really small. yet when I showed them to my Mom, she said the same thing. I scoffed, but then later on, alone in my place, I tried them on.

When the hell did I get down to a size 6?! Seriously. A few of them are too short, or too high-waisted for me, or have darts in them that don't feel comfy, but dude, they totally fit.

Backtracking about ten years, there was this pure white, mandarin-collared, embroidered satin and silk, short Chinese style dress I used to wear. I can prove I used to wear it, because I've got pictures of me wearing it. It was my favorite dress back then, and though it was a little tight around the chest, the rest fit, well, like a glove I guess. Shoot forward to a few years ago when I wanted to wear it to Oceans of Ho and I couldn't get it over my thighs. It really upset me, not in a body image way, but more because it was my favorite dress and I couldn't get it up to my hips anymore without busting the seams (seriously. I tried.) I got all manner of excuses from the people I told. "Dry cleaning shrinks silk!" and "Your thighs are really muscular now from dancing" etc. I ended up lending the dress to my friend Tricia, who is 5'1" and weighs about 100 pounds. It fit her beautifully, and she loved it so much that she asked if I would ever consider giving it to her. I thought about it for a few minutes and then decided that I couldn't. I said, "I want to show it to my kids someday, so that they could say, 'Geez, Mom, you must have been so skinny!'" ;) And then if I had a daughter, she could have it if she wanted it.

On a whim tonight, I busted that baby out. Imagine my surprise when it slid down over my waist (I put it on over my head, thinking if I tried to pull it on I'd kill it with my butt.) Imagien my further surprise when it fell smoothly over said butt, hips and thighs. Imagine my jaw on the floor as I zipped and buttoned it and found that I actually had some room in it around the waist. I should thank Lao Shir and Sifu for this. ^_^ Oh, and Shirataki, because I think that cutting out pasta made a huge difference. I'm not anti-carb and I'm not anti-fat, either, because I eat bread, cheese and chocolate in abundance. But I switched from white bread to rye and 7 grain, and I think there's something about the bleached flour that stops up certain stuff in your body, maybe clogs things up, doesn't let water weight drain or something. I dunno. It worked. I have my favorite dress back. ^_^

Oh, completely OT: Lo-Fidelity Allstar's "How To Operate With A Blown Mind" is maybe one of the best CDs ever.

Some new-ish clothes, and my favorite old dress

I got the last few moves to the broad sword form tonight, and Sifu told Lee and I that once we had that down, we'd get our next belt. So, hurray! But it's a lot harder to retain all of the stuff he taught us than I thought it would be. I've been having such an inordinately easy time with sword form up until now, I sort of didn't expect it to get so hard so quickly. He's not breaking it down moce by move for the entire class anymore, but teaching us sporadically, one at a time. That makes it more difficult, for me anyway, because I'm not forced into the repitition anymore and I'll just do the parts I like over and over again. Left to my own devices, I will stand in the parking lot swishing my sword around and listening to the cool noise it makes. ( I love my sword too much. )

/cam-whore

Afterwards, Erica asked me to her house to take some of her clothes that she didn't want anymore. SCORE! She has the coolest stuff ever, I'm not talking about stuff from Target like I always get, but, like, real clothes from actual clothing stores. She had a bunch of size 8 pants and some size 6 that I immediately decided I'd give to some of my friends at work. Before I left, she said "Try those on before you give them away, because I think they'll fit." I didn't believe her because they looked really small. yet when I showed them to my Mom, she said the same thing. I scoffed, but then later on, alone in my place, I tried them on.

When the hell did I get down to a size 6?! Seriously. A few of them are too short, or too high-waisted for me, or have darts in them that don't feel comfy, but dude, they totally fit.

Backtracking about ten years, there was this pure white, mandarin-collared, embroidered satin and silk, short Chinese style dress I used to wear. I can prove I used to wear it, because I've got pictures of me wearing it. It was my favorite dress back then, and though it was a little tight around the chest, the rest fit, well, like a glove I guess. Shoot forward to a few years ago when I wanted to wear it to Oceans of Ho and I couldn't get it over my thighs. It really upset me, not in a body image way, but more because it was my favorite dress and I couldn't get it up to my hips anymore without busting the seams (seriously. I tried.) I got all manner of excuses from the people I told. "Dry cleaning shrinks silk!" and "Your thighs are really muscular now from dancing" etc. I ended up lending the dress to my friend Tricia, who is 5'1" and weighs about 100 pounds. It fit her beautifully, and she loved it so much that she asked if I would ever consider giving it to her. I thought about it for a few minutes and then decided that I couldn't. I said, "I want to show it to my kids someday, so that they could say, 'Geez, Mom, you must have been so skinny!'" ;) And then if I had a daughter, she could have it if she wanted it.

On a whim tonight, I busted that baby out. Imagine my surprise when it slid down over my waist (I put it on over my head, thinking if I tried to pull it on I'd kill it with my butt.) Imagien my further surprise when it fell smoothly over said butt, hips and thighs. Imagine my jaw on the floor as I zipped and buttoned it and found that I actually had some room in it around the waist. I should thank Lao Shir and Sifu for this. ^_^ Oh, and Shirataki, because I think that cutting out pasta made a huge difference. I'm not anti-carb and I'm not anti-fat, either, because I eat bread, cheese and chocolate in abundance. But I switched from white bread to rye and 7 grain, and I think there's something about the bleached flour that stops up certain stuff in your body, maybe clogs things up, doesn't let water weight drain or something. I dunno. It worked. I have my favorite dress back. ^_^

Oh, completely OT: Lo-Fidelity Allstar's "How To Operate With A Blown Mind" is maybe one of the best CDs ever.