Thursday, July 21, 2011

What a Gyp!

Because I'm all about "My Big, Fat Gypsy Wedding" which is/was (who knows if there will be a Season 2) the best show EVER, I found a book on Amazon that was a Must-Have.

"Will and Kate's Big Fat Gypsy Wedding."

Combining Will & Kate's, excuse me, William and Catherine's wedding with the fabulousness of MBFGW was a win-win for me and I couldn't wait until the book arrived.

And yesterday, I got a package from Amazon.  And WHAT THE HELL, Amazon!!!!

Here is the box Amazon sent:
And I'm all, "ooooh, this is gonna be good!"  So I open the box and see all this crumpled up paper.
 Okay.  So I fling the paper aside and peer into the box.  Which was a pretty large box, by the way.  And there at the bottom of the box is my book.
 And I'm all, "Really?  REALLY?"  This big, enormous box just to send this itsy-bitsy book?  Here I'm thinking this is going to be a coffee table sized book because of the size of the box but nope, it's a 5" x 7" book.  That required a huge box for shipping it to me.
Look at the size of the box.  Look at the size of the book.  Look at my reading glasses next to the book.

Can you say, "Excess packaging?"  A padded shipping ENVELOPE would have sufficed.  I'm surprised this book didn't come in a wooden shipping crate that required a forklift to bring it in my house.

But wait.  It gets better.  Or worse.

So I sit down to read my brand new book and well, to use a derogatory expression, I was totally Gypped. 

33 pages.  33 pages of very poor quality pictures that have the members of the Royal Family & Friends superimposed on them.  And when I say "superimposed" I am not talking about PhotoShop.  No, these look as if someone took some nail scissors, cut out the faces of the Royals from magazines and then got themselves a glue stick, stuck the faces on existing fuzzy out of focus pictures that were obtained by taking a picture of the television during a broadcast of "My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding" and THAT is how BAD this "book" is. 

I'm not going to say how much I paid for this book okay it was $12.95 and yeah, What a Gyp!


Now if you'll excuse me, I must go and write a SCATHING review of this for Amazon.



Tuesday, July 19, 2011

THE RHYTHM IS GONNA GET YOU. OR NOT.

So last week, my friend Ramona, convinced me to do try a Zumba class with her.  And I, being so on top of what's Hot and Now in the Fitness World (or not), had to ask, "What's a Zumba?"
And if you're like me who didn't know what a Zumba is, well for starters, it's not A Zumba; it's just Zumba, and as TheManTheMyth described it, it's like Jazzercise set to Latin/Brazilian/Salsa/ music and you will sweat even more than you do with The Oldies.  You can also Google it and/or YouTube it to see what the heck I'm talking about.

So seeing as I could stand to lose a pound or so and seeing as how I'm going to be in Lake Tahoe next month with a bunch of people who can easily hike uphill in the snow both ways in 100' weather and seeing as how there is such a hike scheduled in our List of Things To Do While in Tahoe and I don't want to be the one who has to be airlifted off the mountain, I told Ramona, "Sure.  I'll give it a shot" to attend last night's class, thinking to myself that when yesterday rolled around she would have forgotten about me.  

I thought wrong.

I received a reminder text from her and despite my attempts at feigning ignorance with replies along the lines of, "Who is this?  I think you have the wrong number!" she didn't fall for it and commanded my presence at the local torture chamber dance studio.


Fine.


As soon as the music started, I was itching to get my groove on.  Except there was one big, huge, painfully obvious problem.


White Girl Can't Dance.


I looked like such a spaz, flailing around, going left when everyone was going right.  Moving forward while everyone else was moving backward and failing miserably at any sort of rhythm that came even the tiniest bit close to what the instructor was doing.  My feet would not move correctly, my hips DO lie as in "Oh SURE you can shake your hips like Shakira!  Would WE lie to you?"  And the answer to that is, Yes.  Yes you do lie.  Squidward and his Interpretive Dance has more rhythm than I do.


So, I pretty much just flailed around and fought like hell to keep from collapsing in a puddle of flop sweat.  And lemme tell you, I was sweating like you wouldn't believe.  So that would be one big-ass puddle of flop sweat.  To go with my big ass. 


Oh, and another thing?  The full length of wall mirror?  Was not my friend.


Yes, I had to frequently stop and pant like I was going into labor and guzzle water because I? Have the stamina of a sloth.  A dead sloth.  I did get a bit lightheaded whenever I stopped to pant and heave and the instructor instructed me to KEEP MOVING so that I wouldn't pass out.  And I didn't.  Pass out, I mean.  So, yay me!


However, I made it the full hour and when we were done, I was completely drenched in sweat and my heart rate was a lot bit higher than normal. 


I didn't stop sweating even after a cool shower and an icy cold beverage after I got home (I earned that cocktail, dammit!).  I haven't sweated like that in years!  Possibly even decades.


Will I do it again?  Yes.  It was fun, if you can call having a coronary while sweating and flailing to music "Fun."  As long as none of the other people point and laugh at my flailings, I'm good.


And God knows I need to sweat some of the Del Taco out of my system.  Which, by the way, I went without this morning.  The Del Taco, not my system.  I need my system.


Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go practice some moves so I don't look quite so stupid next time.