the good sort of hurt

Last night I went to dance class. It was a longer class than usual and much more focused. Warm-ups and basic conditioning were longer and more difficult than I'm used to and the technique portion of the class was...challenging. Last night's goal: How to do floorwork and build the strength necessary to make it look good.

Ow.

I got home and immediately pulled off my jeans. It wasn't that I was too hot - it was that it hurt way too much when the cuffs would brush the tops of my feet! Also, I couldn't exactly walk in a straight line because of how tired my thighs were.

This morning, my feet and knees are bruised. Walking the dog wasn't too bad, but climbing the stairs at work about wiped me out. Obviously, I need to practice this stuff more. I also need to find knee pads and very thick socks to protect my bony extremities from impact with the floor. Even though it hurt a lot, I'm still really glad that I went to the class.

might as well go to Farm & Fleet and get it over with

Downwood has been saying for months that we need a new blender. I've been responding that we use it once a week at most, and that's only when I'm coming home from dance late and want a smoothie for dinner. Real food doesn't sound good, but a smooth blend of fat free plain yogurt, blueberries, bananas, a drizzle of honey, and a couple ice cubes gets rid of the hunger and restores vital potassium. And it's bright purple. Win!

Over the course of the summer, the ice cube crushing and chopping ability of the blender has slowly deteriorated, going from 1 cm diameter round ice to "same size but with rounded edges" ice. The blender also leaks from the bottom a little, so you have to be careful where the bottom is pointing when you're pouring.

...Actually, that strikes me as good advice in general.

But last night's smoothie was what totally convinced me that a new blender is necessary. I put my yogurt, blueberries, and honey in the blender. As a hopeful afterthought, I threw in three ice cubes. I pushed the button and waited for the choppy sounds of ice dying a speedy, splintery death to fade away. After a while, it looked smooth and purple enough to be poured.

The first clue that all had not gone as planned was when a chunk of ice THUNKed into my glass. It was the same size and shape as three ice cubes that were stuck together. Yes, the blender completely failed TO DO A DAMN THING to the ice cubes. I cursed (Downwood laughed in a vindicated manner) and retreated to play some PackRat.

I let the smoothie blended yogurt sit for a while to hopefully get more cold as the ice melted. My bendy straw had a structural malfunction, so I gave up on it. As I got to the bottom of my glass, I realized that I had mutant ice. It didn't go down into the blender blades at all, but was fused with the bottom of my glass. I thought I was going to get a nifty physics paper out of the deal when I saw it. It was next to the ice.

A solitary, perfect, completely untouched by blender blades blueberry.

Not chopping ice well is one thing, but a BLUEBERRY?! Blueberries are squishy! They take almost no effort to smash, mangle, and reduce to component parts! Any blender worth the counter space - and even some that aren't - should be able to handle a freaking blueberry!

I showed it to Downwood. He remarked that the new Farm & Fleet has a nice home appliance section. They even are selling the same model of blender as we already have, but he thinks we should maybe give another manufacturer a try. He tried to play it casual, but I know him pretty well and could see the triumph he was throwing himself in his head.

Stupid blueberry. Should've had it on my Cheerios instead of in the smoothie.



...And Downwood just came in after taking his homemade machete to the huge weeds out back. He's taking it back into the shop tomorrow to discuss edge geometry and design with his mentor.