the good, the bad and the funny

Time for a little catch up. It’s been a busy November which, to be honest, is usually the case. I’m slowly catching up on restaurant reviews. I still have so many photos that haven’t been worked into a posted review here, and I’ll continue putting those up. I’m on a bit of a roll that I hope continues.

 

The good

Painting Sunflowers with Mom

My family was just here for the whole week of Thanksgiving, which was great. When they’re here, I’m able to experience the city in a different way. It’s more relaxing. My hurried pace to dart from Point A to Point B as quickly as possible slacks and I’m able to enjoy NYC from a different angle. We brunched at Jane and Cafe Lalo. We did Thanksgiving dinner out as I mentioned below at Pylos, giving my mom a stress-free Thanksgiving Day for once. No Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade though – maybe next year I’ll mark that off of my list. My parents helped me with Dixie’s annual Christmas Card photo shoot (she doesn’t mind much – especially when bacon and cheese flavored treats are involved). My mom and I, along with my friend Jenn, went and even did a painting class at Paint Along. I just love sunflowers. It’s always hard when my parents eventually leave since I only get to see them a few times out of the year and they are so far away (especially this round since they take Dixie back between holidays), but I’ll be heading down South myself soon enough.

 

The bad

Win Some, Lose Some

I was really looking forward to the challenge of this year’s NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). This was my third year to sign up, having won both years I did it before. The structure of the month plays into my competitive nature and I really enjoyed writing in a big teahouse with a bunch of other frantic writers. How many words did you get that last 10 minute sprint? Oh really? I got twice as many as you did… The other two years, I spent writing the same piece, with the 100,000 words from winning those two years bringing me to a book of some 300 pages. It was my magical means to the end I had always wanted to achieve. When it comes to longer works, I’d only ever focused on memoir. This year, I wanted to tackle fiction head-on, convinced after 50,000 words I would feel better about the idea (whether I had an amazing start to a novel or not).

However, I ended up being sick the greater part of November, the impetus being my galavanting all over Manhattan leading up to the Halloween parade sans coat in my Thriller 80′s fabulous outfit. And I ended up not just slightly sick. Three visits to the doctor sick. Thank goodness, I finally am feeling better. But it left me feeling run down all month, coughing and foggy-headed from my codeine cough syrup. It simply wasn’t the right time to tackle this demon, that’s for sure. Instead, I plan to keep plugging away at this on my own, just to see if I can get into the swing of thing with fiction. I have faith I can. Getting over 20,000 words in itself was a huge feat.

 

The funny

So recently at trapeze, I have begun tackling a new beast – turning around (apologies for those of you who have seen this pop up both on Twitter and Tumblr). The trick I am working on is called the Three Kick Turnaround, but for me as of late, it’s more appropriately dubbed the Three Kick Mad Fling Turnaround. With trapeze, I’ve learned you’ve gotta start somewhere … and be able to laugh along the way. Even when you manage to seemingly undo some of the prior class’ good work. Especially once you admit to yourself that turning around is a whole new way to swing. I’m still laughing at this one – don’t miss the sound, cause it kinda makes the video.

This past Monday I tried again. It’s better, but still not quite there. I realized in watching the video that was only doing two kicks for the three kick turnaround. Seeing as it’s kind of in the name, might be a good idea to fix that! I ordered some grips to start to use on Sunday so that I have a better grip on the bar for this. I’m learning the harder the tricks, the harder it is on your hands, so getting used to using grips sooner rather than later might be wise. I ordered them yesterday from a gymnastics supply company. They’re essentially men’s high bar grips, which kinda makes me laugh because me and gymnastics? Not so much of a combo. Come Sunday though, I’ll add in my obnoxious pink EVERLAST boxing wraps around the bottom and see if it’s the magic something-something I needed in this equation. Wish me luck!

 

 

Visit LJ at City Grits

Comments

[Lara Ruth]

Frances, thanks for sharing this with the group :) Just to note, the grips proved helpful as I caught and returned my first trick ever on Sunday. Had to share the video as an update!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtUZ9IiHBhM