July 27, 2008

Apparently, I’ve Got Junk in My Trunk

I promise to continue my BlogHer conference recaps, but first I must tell you about my visit to the gym today.

Many of you know that I’m not satisfied with this body of mine. It’s not suiting me the way it once did. I have too many pounds to take off (I’m not revealing how many, but I’ve broken it down into ten pound increments. Smaller goals are easier to tackle, than say, a hundred pounds all in one shot, right?) and I’m doing my best to change my overall health because I do want to become pregnant one of these fucking days (I’m bitter about that subject, and boy, oh boy, do I have a fertility post in the works for you, lucky readers). Holy fricken run-on sentence. Did that even make any sense? I sure hope so.

After attending the conference and being surround by beautiful, healthy women, I realized how unhappy I am with my body and I’ve restarted my insane workout regimen with a personal trainer who should really be called The Drill Sergeant. Anyway. Back to my story.

So I got up this morning and did my BlogHer work, and then I told the Hubs that I wanted to go to the gym. I got my workout clothes on, laced up my sneakers and drove to the YMCA.

My favorite training machine is the elliptical. Perhaps this is because when I first started using it I could only survive 7 minutes on it. Over the last year, I’ve built up the stamina and I can now do 60 minutes, no problem.

That’s right. One whole hour. And I’m addicted. I confess: I’m addicted to the elliptical trainer (ET).

The high I get as I visualize my ass melting off is unbelievable. The rush of adrenaline and endorphins, combined with the rockin’ music on my iPod, makes me want to work my body to the max on that beautiful machine. I’d kiss that damn thing but knowing that many, many people have left their sweat all over it keeps me from doing so. Thank God.

I love the ET so much that I often forget I’m working out in public, and sometimes the music streaming through my ears distracts me. Many times, it doesn’t even feel like I’m working out, because I’m having so much fun. I know I’m insane. You don’t have to remind me.

Often when I’m working out, the music practically transports my own heart and soul out of my body. I can’t resist the urge to almost, sort of, dance while on the ET. I know, that’s a visual almost impossible to imagine. But I’ll do my best to describe it.

Certain music makes me want to sway my hips, so as I’m jamming along to Joss Stone (and fighting the urge to sing along, out loud), my behind is kind of rocking in an almost unnatural, yet cheeky, kind of way.

I was pushing myself to the max and suddenly one of my earphones popped out. The words I heard from male voices behind me almost caused me to fall off the ET.

“Daaaaamn, dude. Check out the ass on that white girl!”

I nonchalantly tried to put the earphone back in my ear, but quickly pushed the pause button to hear the rest of the conversation. Then I angled my neck in a way that allowed me to catch a glimpse of the two handsome black men pumping iron at the row of weight machines behind me.

“Ooooh, yeah. She’s got somethin’ goin’ on back there.”

I was desperately trying to fight back the laughter. Then I wondered, which white girl are they talking about?

I casually turned my head to the left to see a young gentleman on the treadmill next to me. Definitely not a white girl. Then I craned my neck to the right and smiled politely at the thin blond with the tiny waist and practically invisible behind. Not the girl they were speaking of, I imagine.

Oh. My. Gawd. Are they referring to me? They can’t be. I’m wearing three year old yoga pants and an old man t-shirt. Not exactly one of my most attractive gym outfits.

I turned my iPod back on and resumed my workout, trying to ignore what I thought was going on. When my hour was over, I went to get the rag and disinfectant to clean my sweat off the machine. When I turned around, the two guys were standing in front of me. I felt my cheeks flush with color (the ones on my face, duh).

“I hope you don’t mind me saying this, but your ass is fiiiine,” the first guy said.

“Daaaaamn baby,” the other chimed in. “If you keep working out like that, your ass will be non-existent.”

I started to stutter. I have never, ever in my life been approached in this way. So I said, “Ummm….well….thank you? I ummm…don’t know what to say. This the first time I’ve been complimented on my butt.”

“Well, big asses are in, girl…” the first guy said.

Did he just say I have a big ass? Oh, my gawd. My butt must be HUGE.

I honestly had to fight the urge to look over my shoulder to see just how big my butt really was. I think they sensed my freak out because, the second guy said, “Don’t be shy, girl. This is a good thing. Don’t hide it! Flaunt it.”

“Ummm, okay….I will.”

What did I just say? Oh my God. Get out of there, Dana. You’re making an ass of yourself. Oh cripey, bad choice of words. Bad, bad, BAD!

I was so nervous that I’d say more stupid things, so I politely excused myself, cleaned off the machine I had used, then ran to the women’s locker room. I took my time changing into my street clothes and when I exited the locker room, my two admirers where chatting and smiling in the hallway.

I tried to be cool and casual as I walked up the steps to the main floor of the gym.

“Take pride in that behind, girl!” one of them called out.

“Okay….thank you!” I called back.

When I got home, I told Doug all about my compliment and he replied, “Well, you do have a cute butt. Big, but cute.”

“Is my ass really that big? Jeepers. What the hell?” I shouted.

Doug laughed.

“Had I known this was my greatest asset I would have had it insured. Like J-Lo.” I continued.

“J-Lo…now she has a great ass.” Doug replied.

“Better than mine?” I asked, half-joking.

“Ummm…errrm..” Doug stumbled.

“Hey now….” I started laughing. “Watch what you say, because if you don’t like my butt, I know two gentleman that do!”

Suddenly, my husband bursts into song.

“What you gon’ do with all that junk? All that junk inside your trunk?”

Yes, apparently, I’ve got junk in my trunk. Who knew?

July 26, 2008

BlogHer ’08: Thursday Edition

I know I’m very late in posting my BlogHer Conference recap, but after I returned home from the beautiful city of San Francisco, it took several days to decompress and return to normal life. Whatever normal is, I have no idea.

The Wednesday before my departure, I frantically ran around town as well as around my house, completing last minute errands and checking my luggage 80 million times to make sure I wasn’t forgetting anything. Total waste of time, because I realized I packed too much when the mountain of swag I collected wouldn’t fit in my suitcase. I ended up having to ship most of that stuff home on Sunday, because there’s no way that Northwest Airlines would let me check that bag without charging me $50.

I couldn’t sleep at all that night, the anxiety and anticipation were killing me. However, I had nothing to worry about, because this year’s trip to BlogHerCon was fantastic. 100% better than Chicago, and I love that Windy City.

Thursday morning I woke up at the ass crack of dawn, showered and got dressed, while Doug got Dawson ready. My boys were driving me to the airport and thankfully, I was smart enough to put all my bags in the car the night before. At 5:30 a.m. we were on the road for the 35 minute drive to Central Wisconsin Airport.

It was kind of difficult for me to leave Dawson. I must have kissed him 100 times and I started to cry as I walked into the airport and saw my little boy waving from the backseat as they drove away. Doug didn’t want to bring him inside the airport because Dawson wasn’t so happy with me leaving and it might have made matters worse.

After the usual checking-in procedures and getting through the grueling security measures, I was on my way to San Francisco . My plane departed at 7 a.m. and I was dreading the 4 1/2 flight. I was so excited to be going to California for the very first time.

I arrived in the City by the Bay at around 11:30 a.m. Pacific time, and I managed to find a shuttle to the Westin St. Francis Hotel where the conference was being held. Once I got to the hotel, I tried to check-in but didn’t realize the intricacies of hotel check-in procedures.

Turns out, I need a credit card with a huge limit in order to stay at the fancy Starwood hotel. For security reasons, we keep our credit limits low ($500 max) to avoid huge losses in the event our cards are stolen, so I wasn’t able to get my room keys. I tried to use my debit card to pay for the room in full, but apparently the Westin doesn’t accept payment in full until check-out (which is very, very strange) and instead they asked me for a cash deposit for the room cost plus $200 for incidentals.

Unfortunately, I don’t carry $800 in cash because my greatest fear is being mugged. So, I had to sit in the lobby for nearly two hours until my amazing roommate got to the hotel. She was able to use her American Express card to get us checked in.

While I was waiting for Anne and our other roommate Elizabeth, I found PunditMom wandering around the lobby and we had a quick bite at Caruso’s, a little cafe in the hotel lobby. While we were chatting, Jenn from Mommy Needs Coffee stopped over. A few moments after that, Christina from A Mommy Story popped over and we all hung out for awhile.

After that, Jenn welcomed me to her hotel room to wait for my roommates, and I met Busy Mom for the first time. She and Jenn were roomies and they graciously allowed me the use of their ladies room to straighten my hair and change out of my travel clothes.

A little while later, I met Krisco from Crib Ceiling and told her how much I missed Mary Tsao. She and Mary were roomies at BlogHerCon last year, and I told her I go to Flickr every day to get my Daily Dose of Mary via her fabulous photos. I was happy to learn that Kris does the same thing!

Finally, Anne called my cell phone to let me know she arrived at the hotel and just a little while after that we had keys to our room. Or so we thought. We got up to room 952 and started to put our luggage on the beds. The I looked in the closet and saw someone else’s clothes hanging in the closet. Anne discovered a man’s business cards on the desk. We had been checked in to an occupied room.

I made a frantic call to the front desk and told them about our problem and I was assured that we’d be checked into a fresh, clean, unoccupied room immediately. I ran downstairs to get the new keys and then Anne and I rode the elevator to the eleventh floor and where we found our new, much larger and totally awesome room.

We each claimed two corners of the room to toss our suitcases, and then I patiently awaited for Elizabeth’s arrival a little while later. Once she got in, I gave her a room key and then we all just sort of chilled for a few moments.

Elizabeth then introduced me to her friend Lori who came down to our room awhile later. Lori is awesome. She has this sweet, southern accent that I somehow managed to pick up. Okay, really, I’ve always had this knack for picking up accents, but the suthin’ speak is something I’m accustomed to, being that one of my closest friends is from Texarkana and whenever we hang out I start saying things like, “Fixin’ to” and “All y’all.”

After our introductions and a few photos, Elizabeth, Lori and I headed to the lobby to meet Jennster (also known as Dirty Mouth Whore, if you ask Lori — don’t worry, it’s a term of endearment, I promise) before going to the Kirtsy/Alltop party at Guy Kawasaki‘s house. Anne stayed behind to freshen up and grab a bite to eat before the many other cocktail parties going on Thursday night.

Let me just say that Guy Kawasaki lives 31 miles south of San Francisco, and somehow we thought he lived 31 minutes south of the city. After a two hour shuttle ride to Atherton — two hours because our driver was a moron who twice passed the street we needed to turn onto — we arrived to a beautiful California home with rose bushes and hydrangeas lining the flower beds.

Guy’s backyard was meticulously manicured. Green grass, beautiful Japanese lanterns and swimming pool in shape of the number eight were just part of the scenery. The food was delicious. We had paella, grilled vegetables and barbecue in a cup, as well as delectable hors d’oeuvres and wines.

I was in awe of everything, and when I was introduced to Guy Kawasaki, I was rather shy. In all honesty, I didn’t know who he was, other than the founder of Alltop (and no, I’m not on Alltop, but I was asked that a hundred times that night).

We stayed at the party for about an hour and then promptly got back on the shuttle to head back to the city for the three other cocktail parties we had to attend. We stopped by the Mom Central party, the Experience Project Party and then finally, the People’s Party. (Note to future party hosts: Please, don’t have all the parties on Thursday night! It’s too much stress and takes way too much planning to be able to attend everything all in one night.)

I can’t exactly remember all of the goings on of Thursday night, but I’m sure the pictures will explain it all:

Shannon, Shannon, Crunchy Carpets, Liz, Amber & Me

Christina, Me, Deven, Lori & Jennster

Christina, Me, Julio & Lori

Lemon Drop…deliciously tart.

Yumm-O

Guy Kawasaki & Me

Me & Jennster and boob grabbage.

Jenn & Me

Caruso’s, in the hotel lobby.

More photos here.

Stay Tuned for Part II of my trip to BlogHer.

July 25, 2008

Four Going On Fourteen

This morning, Dawson refused to listen to me.  I swear the child was testing me, to see how much I’d let him get away with.  I wasn’t biting that line, and when he threw the mother of all temper tantrums, I sent him to his room.  Five minutes later I heard this:

“Mommy, I hate you!  You’re so stupid!”

And I thought I had 9 more years to prepare myself for life with a teenager.

I know he doesn’t mean what he said, but I still cried just a little.  This motherhood thing sucks ass sometimes.

July 24, 2008

Discussing Pelvic Health With Poise

I have a confession to make. I have something to share with you, dear readers, but it’s kind of embarrassing to discuss. But here goes: I have this problem with my bladder. Either it doesn’t hold the same amount of liquid it used to, or maybe it has gotten smaller after childbirth. Whatever the reason, sometimes I have a problem with light bladder leakage.

It’s not as though I can’t hold my bladder, it’s just something that happens occasionally. Like when I’m busy all day long and forget that I have to pee. Or if I drink too much water and both of our bathrooms are occupied. Occasionally it happens if I can’t stop laughing or if I’ve sneezed or coughed too hard.

This condition is so common among women, it’s still considered a taboo subject even with close friends and family. Recent research found that 80% of women who suffer from light bladder leakage are hesitant to talk to their peers about this sensitive topic for fear of embarrassment. I’m one of those women. And I always blamed my “problem” on childbirth, an after affect of pregnancy.

The fabulous ladies of Mom Central have asked me to help women become aware of this very common and uncomfortable condition, and I learned that Kimberly-Clark’s Poise brand has joined hands with the Women’s Health Foundation (WHF) to increase awareness of pelvic health and wellness.

Recently, the Foundation held the “Below the Belt” benefit to raise awareness of the issues effecting women today and celebrate champions of the cause. At the event, Poise presented the first-ever Passion Award to Linda Michael of Portage, Indiana because her story of personal triumph over pelvic pain and bladder control issues – and her willingness to tell it – has inspired women and doctors alike to share their stories. Click here for Linda’s Story (you’ll need Window’s Media Player or equivalent to play the video.)

Linda personally struggled with and overcame her own pelvic pain and bladder control issues after giving birth to her son and now works toward breaking down the stigma surrounding these and similar problems affecting many women.

We’re hosting a blog tour in conjunction with Kimberly-Clark, to help jump start a conversation on Women’s Pelvic Heath. (To learn more about bladder control, click here.) What kinds of pelvic health concerns do you have? Have you ever suffered from light bladder leakage? How did you “control” the situation? Do you have any advice you’d like to share about your experience with this condition? Comments are open!

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Did you check-out Dana Reviews yet today? Head over there to read about the Box Tops for Education Program, and the really cool contest they launched with Kimberly-Clark!