January the . . . . oh, whatever . . . .
Today, Monday the 22nd January, is supposedly the most depressing day of the year.
There is even a formula (from BBC News):
The formula for the day of misery reads 1/8W+(D-d) 3/8xTQ MxNA.
Where W is weather, D is debt - minus the money (d) due on January's pay day - and T is the time since Christmas.
Q is the period since the failure to quit a bad habit, M stands for general motivational levels and NA is the need to take action and do something about it.
Now, my day wasn't particularly depressing, but there are a few things I can whinge about, just to get into the spirit of things:
- This morning, I fell asleep on the bus. This wouldn't normally be a problem as I am a very light sleeper. Not today. I woke up, looked out of the window and had a minute of confusion because I didn't recognise my surroundings. Yes that's right, I had slept through my stop. Cue slinking into the office 20 minutes late with a very sheepish grin on my face.
- Do you know how they prepare the ice for curling? They smooth a lane of ice, and then sprinkle droplets of water over the top to make lots of tiny bumps for the stones to glide on. Imagine a load of snow dumped on top of that, and you are probably about half way to the surface today. The Zamboni, as I had mentioned on Saturday, although may not be dead, is certainly very, very sick. As in comatose. It "broke" this morning and the ice was awful - bumpy, snowy, and with a melted pipe track which I had to keep stepping over. And a corner coned off, with tyre marks on the ice!
- 3-turns I have decided, are the devil's work. I get how they are meant to work. I get what my arms, body, legs, head and feet are meant to do. But I can't get my body to do it. And it is driving me crazy! I suppose there was a miniscule improvement today, but I am a long, long way from doing these without the barrier.
- Winter has arrived. I swear I nearly got frostbite on my ears, waiting for my bus to get home after skating. You know it's cold when you warm up by walking into an ice rink where there is a huge sheet of ice. Snow is imminent according to Metcheck, along with "frost and biting cold". Great.
- Tomorrow morning I have to be at work for eight o'clock am. Bleeeeeeuuuurrggh! Although I am not seasonally depressed, getting up in the morning is torture at the moment. And that won't get better till the clocks go forward.
I am going to stop complaining now as I don't want to depress everyone else!
Skating was non-eventful, leaving aside those despicable 3-turns. It was packed and the ice was horrible. Apart from that, I have to hope that they sort out the Zamboni soon, otherwise I won't be skating until Saturday. And for those 3-turns, I think it is time to do a little off-ice training: in my socks on the kitchen floor!
And for those of you who are feeling a little mournful today, remember this: the most depressing day of the year is almost over . . .
6 comments:
Honestly, I know where you are right now with the 3 Turns. I felt like they didn't improve for weeks and was so doubtful when people kept saying they'd fall into place...but they really do.
Just keep doing them- over and over, they *will* get there :)
Thank you for that - I need all the encouragement I can get!
I am lucky that because of my dancing history, most things on ice have come fairly easily, and I am finding these darn things really frustrating!
Don't despair about 3turns - they are HARD. I think they are the hardest thing to learn because they require so many different skills:
one foot balance
control of free leg
core strength and core flexibility
upper body flexibility
strength in the skating leg (down up down)
coordination of upper and lower body
and of course determination
patience
practice!
They WILL improve. I promise. And once a 3turn feels comfortable, so will so many other things, and learning new things will be less of a challenge too.
3turn
Thanks 3turn :-) The practice is certainly going in - it seems like they are all I do when I practice at the moment. Just have to work on the patience side of things!
My coach actually said to me on Friday "3turn are the basis for all freestyle moves"!!!! Adn of course I immediately thought of you. He was trying to get me to do more down up down.
3turn
Well, off to practice them again tonight, a whole week later (unfortunately was all coldy and sniffly over the last four or five days). I will add the "down, up, down" to my list of things to remember! My head is going to explode at this rate . . . . :-)
Post a Comment