Yoga Inspiration #2: Just Stretch.

Just Stretch.

One of the best ways to start off your morning is simply stretching. When you wake up, reach above your head, point your toes towards the foot of the bed, and sweep your arms down as though you were making a snow angel.

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Some yogis have the idea that since the earth is always moving, we should always be flowing and using our energy too. (At least when we’re awake that is – though maybe some people have mastered the art of being energetic even in sleep.) As soon as we start to become conscious each morning, we should stretch out to help get the juices flowing.

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Yesterday morning I used Tara Stiles’s Hangover Yoga to start my day off right (just 5 minutes).

I also did her Yoga for the New Year! video (about 8 minutes).

I didn’t do this yesterday, but I think I will do it today… my own yoga video (Yoga Quickie).

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This is another stretching routine I like to do: DVF’s Stretching Routine.

For more yoga inspirations, click here.

Weekend Link Love – 01.26.2011

Here are some cool reads I found in the last week and a half or so.

Also, I finished that book I mentioned the other day, and it was wonderful. I think I am going to go get a biography of Laura Bush. She seems like an interesting lady. I’m currently working on…

Case Histories, by Kate Atkinson.

Summary: Private detective Jackson Brodie—ex-cop, ex-husband and weekend dad—takes on three cases involving past crimes that occurred in and around London. The first case introduces two middle-aged sisters who, after the death of their vile, distant father, look again into the disappearance of their beloved sister Olivia, last seen at three years old, while they were camping under the stars during an oppressive heat wave. A retired lawyer who lives only on the fumes of possible justice next enlists Jackson’s aid in solving the brutal killing of his grown daughter 10 years earlier. In the third dog-eared case file, the sibling of an infamous ax-bludgeoner seeks a reunion with her niece, who as a baby was a witness to murder.

Can’t put it down.

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What are you reading? What news stories or articles have you liked in the last week?

Also…

Did you watch Obama’s speech? If he follows through on what he said I will be very pleased.

100 Calorie Cheesecake Recipe

The other week I made applesauce, remember?

‘Twas delicious.

But what was more delicious was the fake cheese cake I made with it. This is low calorie, low fat, and sugar free cheesecake. Each large serving is only 100 calories.

100 Calorie Fake Cheesecake

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup fat free (organic) ricotta cheese
  • 1/2 cup applesauce
  • 1 packet stevia (or other sweetener)
  • dash of salt
  • mini food processor

Directions

  1. Blend everything in mini food processor. Top with more applesauce, if desired.
  2. EAT.
  3. (Repeat.)

Last step optional, but definitely enjoyable.

Okay, okay – it wasn’t as good as these…

Mini-cheesecakes from my coworker and friend who came over the other weekend.

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What’s your favorite kind of cheesecake? You can make a version with mashed banana instead of applesauce if that’s more your fancy. I’ve done mashed banana cheesecake with great results.

More Great Books

I hope this blog is not turning into a book blog! Or maybe I do. Anyway, here is what I’m reading this week.

Just Finished: Exit Ghost by Philip Roth.

From Amazon:

When Nathan Zuckerman returns to Manhattan from his self-imposed rural retreat for the first time in 11 years in Exit Ghost, what does he find? Along with his surprising and unsettling encounters with an aged and ill woman who had once been a young mystery to him, an aggressive biographer who won’t take no for an answer, and an alluring young writer who tempts him back into the adventure of seduction, he is confronted with a city whose streets are filled with people behaving quite differently than a decade before.

I really liked this book. It was particularly relevant because I live in New York, but even if you don’t, it’s still relatable. I liked the main character (an aging old man who had cancer that made him both impotent and incontinent – poor guy) and I enjoyed reading about his interactions with the other characters as well. That was basically the whole point of the book – the interactions. It was a great book for vocab-building as well. I got all sorts of goodies that I can’t remember right now but I do have them written down on the back of a paystub at home.

In Progress: American Wife By Curtis Sittenfeld.

From Amazon:

In her third novel, Sittenfeld offers a thinly veiled account (Wisconsin, not Texas) of the life of Laura Bush, in the story of Alice Lindgren, who marries Charlie Blackwell, the ne’er-do-well son of a political dynasty who becomes President. The early chapters, in which Sittenfeld depicts an innocent childhood and adolescence disrupted by tragedy, are the most compelling. As the book progresses to more recent and familiar events, she has difficulty enlivening the ins and outs of electioneering and policymaking. The object of Sittenfeld’s fascination is the seeming incongruity between Alice’s liberal sympathies and her bookish intellect and Charlie’s conservative nature and general insouciance. Neither character is very likable—Alice weak-willed and martyrlike, Charlie unbearably self-centered—but the novel, Sittenfeld’s most fully realized yet, artfully evokes the painful reverberations of the past.

I am still in the first third of this book but already I can’t put it down. Highly recommended so far. I am oddly enthralled by this fake story of Laura Bush – she’s a pretty cool lady, apparently. I picked up this book without realizing that I had read the author’s other book, Prep. Also good.

In the Queue: PHP Object-Oriented Solutions by David Powers.

I won’t bore you with the summary of this one. A picture will suffice.

In the Queue: PHP Objects, Patterns, and Practice by Matt Zandstra.

Same here. Just a pic! My job is programming so I suppose I might be considered a nerd. That’s okay though. I enjoy it 🙂

I have a bunch of other books in the queue as well… I would only ever read a programming book for fun if I’m reading other things for fun concurrently.

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What are you reading?

Weekend Links – 01.17.2011

More Weekend Links of Love. This week it’s fairly veggie themed because I have been vegetarian for the last 3 weeks.

Had to break this one out because it’s so interesting:

  • TED Talk: Keep your goals to yourself. It turns out that people who talk about their goals all the time are actually *less* likely to achieve their goals. So that annoying coworker who keeps talking about how she wants to lose weight? Well if she shut up about it it would be more likely to happen. It’s because by saying it out loud you feel like you are closer to your goal – so you feel like you don’t need to put as much effort in to achieving it. It’s a short talk (~3 minutes) and well worth the watch.

Do you have any cool finds?