shanmonster | Orange You Glad I Didn't Say Banana?

The day is trying to kill me, but I abide. It's brutally hot outside, and almost as hot inside. I don't own an air conditioner, but I do have two electric fans, and the benefit of living in a dungeon of an apartment. On days like this one, it's a good thing this place doesn't get any sun.

I went to the gym this morning. It was my first workout in almost a month. I'm unimpressed with myself for having missed so much time, but, the excuses are pretty valid, what with a bum leg, asthma attacks, and f00's crazy appendix adventure. Still, I wasn't terribly happy when I was back at the weights. I had to drop almost everything a few kilos. I'm turning into a wuss! And when I weighed myself, I discovered I'm down ten pounds. That's ten pounds of muscle, damnit. Argh. It's back to pushing iron on a regular basis for me! I also signed myself up for swimming lessons again. Starting on Monday, I'm going to learn how to swim again. I always forget all those fancy strokes and revert to doggy paddling. It ain't pretty.

After my humbling experience at the gym, I came back home and did the finishing touch on my dance bra for tonight. I sewed an additional hook and eye on it. I'll need help getting dressed, but at least the bra won't take itself off of me while I'm in the spotlight.

I checked out the opening ceremonies, and stuck around for Stacey Macklem's dance. She showed up in the barest nick of time. Maybe she was caught in traffic. In any case, I think the organizers were about to suffer strokes from the suspense. But she did a nice set wearing a beautiful wine-coloured Turkish bedleh. I love the look of a velvet, Turkish dance costume. It sure puts my bargain-bin Egyptian costume to shame. But mine will sparkle under the lights tonight, and catch lots of movement.

While I was there, I was dressed in one of my summery, homemade dance outfits. It was an orange three-tiered cotton skirt with an orange tribal-style belt, and a white and orange midriff-baring peasant blouse. As I walked home, I was hit on vociferously by three different guys. Two of them held up traffic in their SUV while they talked like the Backstreet Boys to me. "Hey girl. Whassup? You're looking mighty fiiiiiine!" Stuff like that.

And then, a metalhead guy walked about five blocks with me telling me how hot and sexy I looked, all while telling me terrible cow puns. It was rather surreal.

Maybe there's just something about bright orange that brings out the humpy dog in guys.