Fitness for dog agility-some red flags out a flappin' in the breeze.

There was this time, some years back, when I sadly packed up all the little Size 5 pants and teensy, tiny tanks and t's and sent them away. I told myself I was giving them to a nice farmer and his family, where they would live happily and free, have a better life than I ever gave them. And maybe I would get to visit them on weekends.

Ha. What a crock. That was it. They were gone. And Size 5 and me, we never met again. Sometimes I cried. Size 5 never looked back, as far as I could tell. Moved on to greener pastures.

Then we moved into the Even Numbers of Size, and puttered along at 6. 8. 6. 8. Oh sure. I flirted with 10 once or twice, but never got serious. I had this whole era of buying really expensive jeans on ebay, dirt cheap, and wearing them to work. Dog agility. Super skinny little jeans in reasonable sizes. Built up quite a stack in my clothes cabinet. They were my friends.

Something happened a while ago. I like to call it Christmas Cheer, if Christmas starts sometime in the spring and cheers it's way through summer and rolls along into fall and by the time it's actually Christmas, well ho ho ho. There's some extra junk in the trunk where trunk equals maximum epidural surface area from all regions south of neck and north of ankle. Ho ho ho, little skinny friends, all lonely and folded in the cabinet. There was a trip to the Gap. Tunics. Puffy jackets.

I asked a newly svelte friend one day, how'd you do that? She said, "Had to stop eating like a man."

Oh lord. I always have eaten like a lumberjack. Food groups include the pizza, taqueria, bakery and fancy beverage. But being someone that runs around a lot, through the forest, around the agility, down the beach, up to the barn, down to the arena, never seemed like much of a problem. Until you are 44 years old and you get the Christmas Cheer.

So I cut to the chase now. I cut to it whilst wearing a long, man size t-shirt and granny Spanx undergarments. Besides the somewhat modifying the man eating, we have a fitness project. Every morning, while other breathers in the house are still sleeping, mad crazy dance party in the dark. Sun hasn't come out yet. I just fire up the itunes and off we go. There's no other choice. The stack of pants in the cabinet, makes me weep. The thought of dog shows starting up again and good god. The jiggling and slow running potential.

Front cross hip hop with OutKast. Rear cross hustle with Kool and the Gang. Gwen Stefani serpentine. You get the idea. Do this until you are sweating really good and your ass hurts bad. That may or may not be long enough. When done, leash up the dogs, rain boots on if neccessary, and walk run walk run as fast as you can all the way to the ocean. Try not to walk. Run back with dogs pulling like tiny little iditarods.

I'll let you know in a few weeks if it's working. It has to. It will. Otherwise, there will be trouble.

Moving at the speed of fat burning.

Many of you, I mean actually, one of you, asked how the fitness challenge was going. Because apparently I made some kind of crack a while back about how skinny I was going to be for next time I run Hobbes. Which is at Madera. Which is in like a week and a half. I just looked at the calendar.

Oops. We forgot to exercise. I mean, we practice. We dog walk. Shuffle. So Timmy can go. I ride horses at work. But that is not the same as the glorious Fitness Challenge I had planned. Of exercising every day and melting those inches right off.

So we tried this morning.

For like 1 Elvis Costello song.

Luckily my spacious 800sf home, filled with 4 dogs, has ample exercise room in the sparkling clean Fitness Studio. Which can also be called spare bedroom or where the computer is due to unplastered office (see flood fiasco of rain), or currently the Tax Record Keeping System Room. Also room of where my shoes are that should not be chewed on by certain dog/puppies.


I tried some sit ups. You can see where this is going.


It involves stomach pouncing. For like 5 situps. Not sure if this counts as muscle building. Then I just gave up and I'll take 'em all for a shuffle. I mean they can run while I shuffle along with Timmy. I risk getting them a huge ticket because now I am a criminal for walking dogs on no leashes in the park. I shuffle for Timmy. We will burn at least several calories I hope shuffling. Maybe enough to destroy last night's Dirt Nite Cupcake Calories?

Maybe tomorow is the Project Runway update. You all know who won, right?

Dog Agility Fitness Challenge-a continuation.

"A nice way to start a skip-a-dee doo dah day. I'm the happiest gir-ul in the Whole USA."
-Donna Fargo

So it is a pretty funny (tragic) idea that I would ever give diet tips because if you saw how I really eat you would wonder how does she even walk let alone sprint so beautifully (um, lumber?) around those dog agility courses with her blindingly fast dogs?

Because my line of work means I am outside on a ranch dragging horses about and making them bend and get lead changes and not put 5 strides down that line and trying to get her head DOWN to clip her ears, I am not sitting around on my butt most of the day. Not that I wouldn't like that! But it's just what I do. So for a long time it was ok to eat like a lumberjack at all times and it didn't really matter. Then I quit riding for what I thought was FOREVER to become first an ARTIST of art shows, and then after being too broke an ART Director of the dotcom where I sat on my butt and pretty much only got exercise when I was stomping out of meetings slamming the door and throwing pads of paper down on conference tables and shouting at all the other people. And I had to give away all the size 5 pants. So that didn't last real long and then I was a horse trainer again and lost that fatty office weight as soon as I had to start hefting people up and down off of horses again.

But then I went to an age that is over 40 and I learned about the over 40 fat! It is different and stickier. And I looked at the things I ate and they were very, very different than the Food Pyramid. I had 6 foodgroups, not 4!

I had the coffee group.
The pastry group. Includes donuts and cookies mostly.
The mexican food group.
The pizza group.
The candy group.
The alcohol group.

Sometimes I ate out of my food groups, but actually, no, I didn't.

And you are not supposed to eat these things due to there is no vitamins of health AND you will be fat. And I did not listen and somehow I was still healthy probably because I pay lots of money to eat these things from takeout and restaurants without cooking so I had bought my way to sparkling good health.

Um, now would be the part where I am writing the diet tips about the healthy diet I eat now.

So anyways, I'll conclude with I will eat a piece of healthy fruit sometime today!

Dog Agility Fitness Challenge-a primer.

So remember how I will not show you the video from the Steeplechase Finals last week? Yeah. That's right. Because I made the dog hit a bar, blow a contact, and I looked really, really fat.

So next place we go is Madera in March. And I am not going to be so fat by then. Maybe I'll still make the dogs mess up, maybe Ruby will have a sore back, maybe Otterpop will be slow. But I am going to be skinny-er. Or at least less fat. So here's our new fitness regime. Of healthy exercise and diet. The diet part-let's get there later. But first, the exercise.


First of all. While checking the email, and doing the blog, there will be some madcap exercise. To get the blood flowing. In the fancy exercise studio. OK, the office. Well, OK, actually the spare bedroom with the piles of files and ugg boots and books. But there is a tiny patch of floor. We will jump! And twist! And listen to disco hits of the '70's until we are no longer so fat. It is important to exercise for more than one song-maybe a song by Gorillaz. Who are not even people that need to exercise but I believe are fictional animations. I don't get all that.


And we shall do some yoga stretching too. Right? Think about the cute yoga outfits available but only to the cute yoga girls. I go to yoga. Sometimes. Rarely. I went a few weeks ago. I wore sweatpants. I am wearing cowboy pajamas for my fitness challenge right now. Once we are skinny there could be tennis skorts and little capri pants with tiny tank tops that do not expose muffin guts that will make us feel chipper even when dogs are doing horribly at the dog show.


There is much dog assistance in the exercise. And my feet may get bit while they are doing a hip hop jig-like dance move. No one said this wouldn't be dangerous. Because it is the belief of the dogs that they should be on a dog walk. Which is sort of one of the exercise problems. I HATE leaving Timmy at home when I take the dogs somewhere. But he can walk about as fast as a 3 legged turtle pulling a birdhouse full of potatoes. We creep. We shuffle. And it burns absolutely no calories. In fast, I believe that walking Timmy actually adds calories to my self. Which is how the fat to skinny ration has grown against me this year. Of which I have actual scientific Proof.



So when it's time to go for a walk, everyone is waiting. They know. You have to wait for your name to get called or else it's mayhem.


Mayhem looks like this.


Except for Timmy. He doesn't know we are ready for the walk yet. Being nearly blind, completely deaf, and somewhat alzheimer's-esque in demeanor, he is still laying there. I'll go get him and carry him down the stairs. And off to the shuffle we go.

Team Small Dog Diet Tips coming soon!