Guess where I am? Yep, Hollywood, Los Angles California. I’m so excited to be here. My job sent me here for a week long computer training class, but I’m staying for the weekend and spending time with my Aunt that’s an actress. Everyone in LA is such a character…. I’m still trying to identify who is a Drag Queen and curiously listening when everyone discusses their “positive energy” or their latest auditions. I’ve had so much fun already. I forgot to bring my camera cord to hook to the computer, so you guys will have to wait until I get back to see pics, but last night I met Anthony Kiedis, the lead singer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers
! I even took a picture with him. I met him at M Cafe, a really nice vegetarian restaurant. I ate dinner at In & Out Burger, and only sampled the vegan food. That’s backwards, I know. It was so funny, my Aunt said “you know we do have weight watcher points here in Cali, they still count here too”…. After the restaurant we went to hear spiritual motivational speaker Marianne Williamson. This lady was awesome. You know that famous poem about ”Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure…; Marianne wrote that. I always wondered where that awesome quote came from. Anyway, She packed the theater with several hundred people. She said that God made each and everyone one of us completely unique from one another, and that fact alone proves that we are special and can be perfect because God created us just like we are for a purpose. One of the most important things that she talked about was how we often look for earthly solutions to problems, instead of praying about it and relying on spiritual resolutions. I’m not trying to get all preachy on y’all, but I was really moved. If you look back over my posts, its seems like cookies are just such a huge downfall for me, and for about a week, I’ve been struggling with just completely eliminating them from my diet. I felt silly praying about cookies, but last night, I got enough courage to do so. I came back to my hotel room and threw the cookies in the trash!!! Just like the leader at the WW meeting, I actually threw perfectly good, fantastically tasting cookies in the trash. Now, I could lie and say it was liberating and felt good, but it honestly just felt like I threw cookies in the trash. However, when I woke up, I felt good about it. I cut out of my biggest food temptations. Just as I figured, when I went to computer training today, there were free soft chocolate chip cookies. I just shrugged my shoulders and thought, I’m so over cookies ruling me! I didn’t touch not one. 
Yesterday, I casually checked my blog stats expecting to see the normal couple hundred or so visitors. When I saw 1,034 hits in one day, I screamed. I literally screamed. Nyah came running in to see what was wrong. I told her ”Baby, I’m going reach my goal of 2000 hits in a day before you know it!” She gave me a crazy look, and walked away. I guess blog stats are a little complicated for even my dog. I’ll just pretend like it doesn’t freak me out to know that all these people are reading my blog and running to the sound of my voice. Anyway, I went to boot camp today. My cousin went with me again; class was super hard tonight. Lyle was busy, so we had a substitute teacher. He is the same guy that taught the class at 6AM that me and my little sister used to go to. I’m glad that I’m getting back in my workout groove…. But its something about cookies. I ate a whole row of the peanut-butter sandwich girl scout cookies. The whole row! This is precisely why I don’t keep this kind of food in my house. Well the good part is they’re almost gone. The lady at the weight watcher meeting said she threw her cookies in the trash. Hump…I guess I’m not there yet!
Hey Everybody! I’m BACK!!! Yesterday I wrote my sad little post about how upset I was that my blog got hacked, but I maintained that there would be life after death, and that I wouldn’t give up. And guess what??? The same night I got an email from an awesome guy named Donald in Texas. *virtual hug* God bless him, he told me how to de-hack my blog. Since I’m really not as technically savvy as I would like to think, I kept reading his email over and over and it took me about an hour to really figure out and find what he was talking about. Then finally I discovered the “java script” that was attacking my blog. I’ve been trying to figure this out for weeks. And in about 5 seconds, I was able to click and delete, and everything was back to normal. I”m so super excited. I really missed blogging and I was so sad every time I got a “what’s wrong with your website?” email. There were friends and family who asked “what’s wrong?” that I didn’t even know read my blog. Having my blog back has really given me a burst of inspiration and I really needed it. I was feeling so stuck. I won’t even give you the gory details on how I’ve only worked out once a week for the past few weeks, missed weight watcher meetings, and how my pants are tight from eating too much “devil food.” Fortunately, I gave away all of my fat girl clothes, so I have no choice but to get it together! I’m back, get ready for the great return! P.S. On a funny completely unrealted note, I went to the allergy doctor and they ran some tests. My biggest allergic reaction was to “dog.” The lady asked in her nicest voice “is there any chance of the dog finding a new home?” I really almost laughed in face for asking me to get rid of my baby! Nyah has lived with me for 6 years since she was 2 months old. I just smiled and said “No, that’s not negoatiable.” I’ll wash my sheets everyday and keep all the windows closed before I do that!
OMG! It’s Official! I am an ACE Certified Group Fitness Instructor. I wonder if I get to add credential letters at the end of my signature? LOL. My wildest dreams are slowing coming into fruition. My crazy ambition is gradually becoming a part of who I really am every day. This morning I woke up 10 minutes before my alarm went off, which never happens to me; but I guess it was because I was so scared that I would over sleep. Since I’ve been studying all of this nutrition stuff, I selected a breakfast of whole grain toast (complex carbs) and scrambled eggs (protein), and a cup of 100% fruit juice to get me started on the right foot, and prevent hunger later. Then I was on my way. While I was getting in the car, I started to feel so sick to my stomach, why today, of all days would my stomach want to turn flips. Then I remembered back to the day I had to do the TV Evening News interview, and the day of my All-Star 5K race, and I realized it was just nerves. I coached myself, “failure is not an option, calm down, pray, You only need a 71% to pass, quit trippin’” My stomach began to settle. When I got to the school testing site, there was a huge locked gate with no access to the testing building. “Dang it!’ They said in all the study materials that you should scope out the place before test day to help with test anxiety. I figured, “well it’s 10 minutes away, I can find it.” I started to panic again. I had to start up the positive self talk again, “calm down, you’re 30 mins early, failure is not an option.” I had to go around a few streets and finally made it to the security desk. All week I prepared myself to deal with skinny overly excited fitness gurus to look at me ”ask why are you here”? When I pulled up, the security guard said, “what are you here for?” I replied to take the Group Fitness Instructor test, he said “okay”….then he paused said “Ma’am what did you say?, as he sized up all of my extra curves. I repeat4ed I’m here to take the group fitness instructor test, I’d like to help overweight people reach their goals and become more healthy. “Oh! Thats great” he said and gave me a visitor pass. The school building was so beautiful! It was marble everywhere. I snapped a quick pic for you guys. I logged in to the computer based test and I got really antsy after an hour. I was so tired of sitting there. I decided to take a bathroom break and did some stretches and jumps and kicks to get moving again. Two more hours later, when I finished my test the results popped up and the 1st number I saw was 68%, my heart sank, I read down 71%…..still not good enough, down some more 76%, down some more, in the last section I scored 100%. Averaging about 78%, and finally at the bottom in tiny little writing: “PASS” I can’t believe it, I am a real group fitness instructor! No more audio study CD in the car, no more studying until 2AM, no more flashcards in my purse, no more textbook under my pillow for osmosis, (yes I did this, lol). It’s turning out to be a fantastic year for me….My cousins pastor put it best, “God wouldn’t put the desire to go south in a bird, if he didn’t think it would make it there, just like he didn’t put those dreams in you, if he didn’t think you would make it!”
