Megan Fox. Angelina Jolie. Jessica Alba.

These actresses are considered “sexy” by media standards.

I, however, do not look like any of the above-mentioned names; far from it, in fact.

As a woman living in Southern California, sometimes I get the feeling that everything is about image and looks. Everywhere I look, I see beautiful, fit, well-maintained bodies (both male and female). No one really cares about “the content of their character” anymore. I blame the media. The massive piles of magazines piled into the supermarket showing a 5’7” supermodel wearing size 2 clothing; the super-fit actress who has the perfectly shaped stomach, arms and legs that I so desperately want to achieve. The off-chance that we do see someone “normal-looking” in a magazine is few and far between. And don’t even get me started with the tabloids! (more…)

So this is exactly what happened.

The day before the performance, my neck started to hurt badly.

Some of you who have read my previous blogs know that I have a chronic neck pain, but so far it’s only affected my right side. Well, this time it was on my left side, which was a first. Luckily it wasn’t as painful as my past experiences with the right side of my neck had been. Believe me – that really was awfully painful!! But it still hurt when I moved my neck and, at the same time, the left side of my back felt icky and stiff too. The pain in my neck was coming from my back – I could feel it. But even with the pain, I was still able to move my neck – and since there was a rehearsal in the morning on that day, I had to go! (more…)

I bought a Neti Pot off eBay the other day because I have been having some allergy issues and, quite frankly, I hadn’t tried it yet. So I thought, why not? I don’t really like to take a lot of medication if I can help it, and this seemed to fit right in with that mentality.

So I approached my new Neti Pot with a bit of hopeful skepticism. (more…)

In my first blog about this workout, I basically got wrecked by the routine. Well, it’s been about two weeks since I first started, and I wanted to try it again just to see what kind of improvement I was able to make.

Here’s my latest breakdown:

1 – 8 pull-ups
2 – 25 dead lifts at 135 lbs
3 – 50 box jumps
4 – 50 push-ups
5 – 25 floor wipers at 135 lbs
6 – 50 single arm lean and presses with a 35-lb dumbbell (I guess people are still stealing those kettle bells from the gym)
7 – 5 pull-ups (more…)

I recently found the 300 Workout online and decided that it would be a good way for me to get into shape. As the name implies, this is the workout used by the men in the movie “300” to get them into shape for the film.

The workout consists of 300 repetitions divided among seven exercises. The breakdown is as follows: (more…)

I recently had surgery done on my eyes. Based on personal experience, it is not something that I would want to do again. I’m sure you can imagine the amount of discomfort one would feel, having to lie awake while people are inserting foreign objects in and around your eyes.

The surgery I had was Epi-Lasik, which was done about two weeks ago. Yes, I know it is not an “intense” surgical procedure like ACL replacement, but it is still surgery nonetheless – AND on my eyes, for that matter. Epi-Lasik is a cross between Lasik and Lasek, where it requires the doctors to cut the outer layer of the cornea – the epithelium. They do this by inserting a tubular device into the eye to suction the layer prior to cutting it. I won’t go into gory details about the procedure, but natural human instinct shies away from having things done to the eye area. People don’t normally go sticking things into your eyes, and to have to force yourself to calm down while this procedure is taking place takes a lot of effort. (more…)

Finally! I’m not sick anymore! And to celebrate, I went out and got a burger. Not one from a fast food joint, but a delicious juicy burger from a restaurant. I looked at the menu and the burger was just screaming at me, so I gave in and got one with a nice order of garlic fries. YUM!

I’m coughing a lot less now. I’m still coughing, but that’s primarily to get rid of the phlegm build-up in my throat. I feel so much better with my energy level. (more…)

I think I’ve finally hit the plateau of my cold.

When I talked to Christina about what was happening to me, she told me that the Neti Pot is a powerful cleansing tool and my body was just releasing whatever build-up was clogging my system. Great – that was something I was totally not expecting from nasal cleansing. I have not been so sick in a very, very long time and I definitely do not want to experience that again.  (more…)

Christina was right. After two or three days of fasting, I wasn’t “seriously” thinking and looking at food anymore. Yeah, I still felt like “I wish I could eat this or that” but not in the way I’d been craving it on day one. And I was actually waking up lightly before the alarm went off. Plus my co-workers told me that I looked much better and brighter, even in the morning!? (Yes, I’m a pure night person and grouchy in the morning!? bad….) (more…)

I skipped work today. I couldn’t talk very much and have extremely low energy. And I’m still coughing like mad.

However, what surprised me was that, despite all the sleeping I’ve been doing these past two days, my sleeping patterns haven’t been hindered at all and I still managed to stay awake for the majority of the day. (more…)