Up in Dallas

It is three o'clock in the morning and a rainstorm woke me up. Actually, I woke up a bit before the rain storm because a cat was meowing outside. The cat must have known the rainstorm was coming. I'm not really sure if Edwina's cat is an outdoor or indoor cat or even if it is Edwina's cat... so I hope it found a nice dry place.

The Manouso workshop is great. More on that on the teaching yoga and philosophy blog. One particularly nice thing about it is that there is no explicit teacher training. Actually, watching Manouso is great teacher training, but workshops are a little less time intensive without 9 hours of TT tacked on. Yesterday for example, class didn't start until 10 and it was over by three. I had the most leisurely morning I've had in a long time. I did med and pranayama and then went to get a bagel and coffee for breakfast and actually had plenty of time to digest it!

After class yesterday, I went to visit my friend and yoga student Nancy Chinn. Nancy teaches English at Baylor. A couple weeks ago she was diagnosed with acute leukemia and she is up here getting treatment for three weeks. She and her family, David and Nathaniel, seemed in good spirits. Please do keep them in your thoughts and prayers.

Living Room Furniture

I'm sitting on "my new" leather couch in my new living room with my feet up on my very old coffee table. The leather couch is new to me. Christina and Kelly changed their living room to two lazy boy recliners and I'm the happy recipient of their old couch and leather chairs. It really looks great. Jeff and I drove down to practice yesterday and picked up the furniture. Amazingly it all fit in the back of the Honda Odyssey. We had a really great day. Practice was a blast. The cookies and cream ice cream was amazing. Jeff and I went to the Hill Country Bar and Grill for a drink and a snack (decided to wait out the rush hour traffic) and while we were there, we were the happy recipients of blueberry ice cream... The chef was experimenting and everyone in the bar got a scoop!!! I can't remember the last time I've had two servings of homemade ice cream in a single afternoon.

I've got a busy day ahead of me. I want to write for awhile and I've got a chiropractor appointment and I'm subbing for Alice and also for Christina this afternoon.

Weekend Update

I had a great time at the Mary and Eddy workshop. Jeff survived and enjoyed his first visit to Iyengar-yoga-land Aside from my classes, here and there, that is. (I did not make him wear bloomers, but he agreed not to bring his Ashtanga rug!) Mary even used him as a demo to show correct action....


I had a really nice morning hanging around the house. I wrote for a while. I'm happy enough with section one of the Republic Chapter (which sets out the self-mastery and harmony models of self comportment) and I spent some time thinking about how best to reorganize section two and have a plan of action... I have to let go of a lot of the initial structure I had previously written but as with most things in life, once I'm willing to let go of how I was doing something, the new way is so much better.

Then I did a very nice practice. I wrote out a target sequence for M3 (marichyasana three) and worked through some of it... Here's a great quote from the weekly BKS Dallas newsletter sent "practice. It will take care of all of your problems." Manouso Manos...

I also organized a few things around the house and now I'm getting ready to drive back upto Waco for the last yoga classes of the summer. Tonight, I'm having drinks with some friends after class and then tomorrow I've got a busy day doing SACS (assessment compliance reports) and other Baylor related activities.

More on practice, using LOY, and Mary and Eddy nuggets on the teaching blog soon.

Another landmark of really living here

I've mentioned before that I have a great housekeeper up in Waco, Marian. If gas were not so insanely expensive, I'd seriously consider just having her come down here. But, that's not too practical and I am quite practical. Kelli's housekeeper, Celina, agreed to clean my house also and she's here right now. The totally clean house blissful state is coming into being.

Let's see yesterday, I wrote and did yoga. CT's classes were great. I was still in the Red Tent so I didn't get to experience all the backbending bliss, but it was still a lot of fun. Jeff and I watched a very funny movie last night. Better Off Dead. It is an early John Cusack movie from the mid 80s. I'm surprised that I'd never seen it. Anyway, it was quite funny in and of itself and then add to that the existential strangeness of being a 42 year old watching a movie made back when I was a teenager about a character who was exactly my age then by an actor who is around my age now.... One of the many joys of Netflix.


Mary and Eddy are in town this weekend for a yoga workshop. They are great! For details, heck out clearspringstudio.com

Enjoying the cool morning

Another nice thing about my balcony is that it is partially shade covered. So even though it is already over 80 degrees, it is still quite pleasant and almost breezy out here. Moving update: the boxes are, for the present moment, under control. Everything I've moved down thus far has a place and so there's a nice semblance of order. It is sort of strange moving a little bit at a time, but it does give me time to go through everything and decide if I really want to keep it.

Yesterday I subbed two classes at Westgate. We worked on standing poses and baby backbends. I wrote a bit on both Plato's Agent and a Philosophy Muse in the afternoon and then went to Devon's class. Jeff and I had Mexican food for dinner. He makes great guacamole!

Monday Morning on the Back Porch

It is a beautiful morning. Great breeze. Fluffy clouds, beautiful light. It feels like I'm living in a vacation house. What fun! Here are a couple picture of me one on the back porch and the other in my study trying to get Jade to acclimate to her new surroundings. The dog is Jeff's dog, Q.

Highlights from the weekend. Finished moving everything out of Kelli's house. Subbed Mandy's classes, went to lunch at Eastside Cafe with Shannon, Jenny, and baby Micah Simone. They are getting ready to move to Ohio. It was fun seeing them and the food was totally yummy. I had roasted veggie enchiladas. Jeff had blueberry crepes that were totally fabulous. (and cheese grits!)

This morning, I'm going to write for a while then head up to Waco. I have a dissertation defense to go to and then more packing and yoga class.

First Post from My New House

Well, this is really exciting. Here I am sitting at the kitchen table, connected via my own wireless. Posting. (Christina and I have decided we don't like the word blog as a verb). So I'm posting to my blog as opposed to blogging.

Equally, if not more exciting, a brand new bed is being delivered and assembled as I sit here. A couple weeks ago, CT and I went by Marigold and I saw this really cool bed. I almost bought it on the spot. But I held back... Since it was still there, I decided it was a sign and even more a sign, they can deliver it today.... It has an interlaced iron work pattern. Curiously, it is from Mexico, though Marigold is mostly Indian imports. Marigold is actually what I imagined that India might be like, nice sound track, lovely things.....

Brief update since my return to Austin. Mostly, the epic unpacking of boxes ... and yoga. I went down to CTs to practice Wednesday. We also had excellent salad for lunch. See her blog for details. Then I got another totally fabulous massage from Rebecca and went to Devon's class that evening. Jeff and I had pasta primavera for dinner. Quite yummy.

Yesterday was another busy day. I woke up early and unpacked some boxes. I subbed Mandy's class at 9 and we worked on inversions. Then I drove out to my most excellent chiropractor, Ben Anderson at Austin Holistic Health. I came home for a while and had some leftover pasta primavera (still quite yummy) and then picked up Jeff at work and we went to Christina's classes and then out for Ethiopian Food with Jesse and Meg. I've been craving Ethiopian for about a month and I was starving so it really tasted fabulous. Each time I've gone, I've liked a different dish from the Veggie Sampler the best. First time, I loved the red lentils. Second time, the yellow lentils. This time, the eggplant was great.

Today, the cable guy came and I unpacked, wrote (for a whole hour!!!). I ventured out for a little while to buy the bed and go to Tuesday morning and Sun harvest, but mostly I've hung out at home. And that is really great.

Back in Waco

I'm beat. Today was a super long, fun-filled, but super long day. Spent the first night in the new house. Slept well. Good sign. The balcony experience is really great in the mornings also. Nice cool breeze. okay, it is hard to remember that right now as it is still 93 degrees and when I came into my Waco house, it was 88 and the air conditioner was confused for some time about its dharma ... but now it is back on the path of liberation. Also, BIG NEWS. I did write a bit this morning. I have one room dedicated to writing, so I invoked the gods of writing and did some work. In case you were worried, I can still write philosophy.

This morning started early. Meditation in the new yoga room was great. I dropped Dylan the dog back off at Kelly's, filled up the gas tank ($3.98).... (insert your own rant about price of gas) and picked up Jeff and work and we headed down to San Marcos to practice. Did a lot of intense backbending, then headed back north to Waco. Taught my class, and came home. Marian, my totally amazing housekeeper, yard person, pet sitter, errand runner, has been packing boxes for me which is an enormous boon. Okay, I do still have to get the boxes into the mini van, but really, to have someone packing things up for me, really makes this whole thing much more manageable.

But right now, I'm sort of out of steam, tuckered out, (bizarre Georgia idiom )

Busy Week

I've had a fun week down in Austin. One of my best friends from high school, Josh Hilberman, is in town for a tap festival. Yes, he is a professional tap dancer. He's performing tonight at the Sole to Soul dance festival out at St. Stephen's Episcopal School. Anyway, enough commerical promotion for my friend. We've gone out to lunch (Z Tejas, CM, and Mr. Natural) this week and caught up with the present dimension of our lives. Josh and his wife live in Boston, so our paths don't cross much anymore. However, it is just very relaxing/ mellow hanging out with someone who knew you way, way back when. As I've mentioned on previous posts, most people I hang out with these days haven't known me that long, so that contrast continues to be on my mind.

Wednesday I got the key to the new house. I love it! Jeff and I have watch the sunset off the balcony the past three nights. Really just stunning. I think it is my favorite place I've ever lived and I'm not even quite living there yet. Sort of moving stuff over gradual. Today, I'll probably move a bunch of clothes and books over. Then another van load of stuff next week. I won't have internet service there until Friday, so posts may be a bit sparse next week (like that's an unusual thing...) .

Thursday, I had marathon yoga sub day. I subbed four classes. It was really a lot of fun, but it would be a very hard way to make a living, so its good I've got the philosophy gig.

Other highlights of the week. Wednesday night class with Devon, a lovely afternoon practice at her studio as well, and my hatha start class this morning was really fun also. As much as I like subbing, there is something nice about just having my own class as well.

Off to do some packing.

Starting to Move

I just finished loading my first van load of stuff that I will need in the new house. Wow. Really exciting. Up until now, my Waco house has remained more or less intact in that Kelli has a wonderfully furnished abode and i really only needed to move my clothes, yoga props, and various work related items. So far, I've put outdoor furniture, a coffee table, two chairs, a bed side table, a toaster oven, clock radio, and various other household items in the van. Mostly, I decided to pack what I could move easily and what I'd need most immediately.

Yesterday, I got into Waco around 4. Did a brief inversion practice and then went to teach my Monday class. We had a good session. This is the start of a four week mini session before the summer hiatus.

Then I got drinks with Gabrielle.

On a more sober note, Jeff had to put his cat Zulch to sleep last night. Jeff rescued baby kitten Zulch out of the light fixture of a house in East Zulch, Texas (hence Zulch's name) when he was a kitten. Zulch had a lot of personality. One of his most endearing traits was that he liked to have people watch him eat his food. He would meow quite insistently until you came to look at him eating. Anyway, by the time I met Zulch, Zulch had lost most of his hair (which didn't bother Zulch or Jeff) but last week, he lost a good deal of weight all of a sudden and so Jeff took him in for tests and it turns out he had kitty leukemia or something equally dire. Anyway, it is sad to lose a pet, so do send Jeff kind thoughts and wish Zulch well in his next incarnation!

Monday Afternoon getting ready to leave

I'm getting ready to head back upto Waco to teach my Monday and Tuesday night classes. I went to see Craig this morning. Exciting news, he does not think it is necessary to give up dairy, though eating cheese earlier in the day where digestion is best might be advisable. So i've decided to be moderate in the no dairy thing. And see how it goes.

Last night's dinner at Clay Pit was pretty tasty as were Kathryn's eggs this morning. I think they are particularly fluffy. Another yummy dining experience. Tortilla soup at Mr. Natural (I even had cheese in it). I'm quite excited to be living less than a mile from there.

Well, I'm off to watch a bit of the Carlos Video and then off to Waco.

Sunday Morning pre Immersion

Today is the last day of the Yoga Immersion. I've had a fun time being the Iyengar Emissary to Anusara Austin land. I've learned a lot about yoga, but mostly I've really just enjoyed being part of the Kula. It is really great to have such a nice group of people to interact with as a new Austinite.

Last night, Jeff and I split a veggie burger at Central Market and did some shopping there (non dairy Parmesean topping for example). I'm really looking forward to eating at the Clay Pit tonight. I have been craving both Indian food and Ethiopian Food.

Today is Day Four of no dairy. In general, I feel slightly less congested (though I do think I may be getting Jeff's cold). Sigh. It is a huge change in how I eat, but there are many yummy things like Pineapple Basil Sorbet that I never bothered to get because I like chocolate and cookies and cream gelato so much.

Off to Immerse.