Tough Mudder November 2013

This is for all future Mudders. If you are reading this you probably already know what a Tough Murder is, it is a 10-13+ mile obstacle course race held at different locations worldwide. In America they donate proceeds to the wounded warrior project.
I recently completed my first Tough Mudder on Sunday, November 10 with my husband. It was hard and it was exhilarating! I am going to share a few tips and secrets for those of you thinking about participating in a future Tough Mudder.
First, you don't have to be a body builder to participate. You just have to be able to push yourself and trek 10-13 miles in rough terrain, and you have to be okay with mud, if you don't like mud, stick to a color run.
To start off I'll tell you about the obstacles, then move on to training, clothing, and miscellaneous suggestions.
The obstacles vary from location to location but you can bet that you will see electroshock therapy, walk the plank, Everest and the horrible, Arctic enema, along with many more bad-ass, butt kicking obstacles.
Electroshock therapy is rough if you get zapped multiple times, some like to run through it, the best bet is to wait for a group to go and then go solo so you can maneuver around the strands, you will not get through without get shocked, but you can avoid getting multiple shocks.
How bad are the shocks? If you've ever been zapped by a shorted wire, it feels like that.
Walk the plank is a mental challenge, especially if you're terrified of heights like I am. Dont think about it, find an empty slot climb up the ramp and just walk on over (if you're cool do an awesome cannonball or split, no diving though). The water will be cold, breath steady and normal and use strong strokes to swim to shore.
Everest is not too bad. Just run as fast as possible and leap for the top. Someone will help you up. The main challenge is that it is towards the end of the course so your legs are pretty dead.
Arctic enema, there is no preparation or words to help. Just get in and get out as fast as possible. It will be okay until you resurface, at that point you will be freezing and swimming through ice. Just get out as fast as possible and then run, get your cardio going and get blood pumping to your limbs. Guys- you will hurt, imagine getting whacked in the nuts and that's what it will feel like. Just get through it.
I know that some people will go around every obstacle because they dont feel up to it. If you feel sick dont do it, but push yourself, do as many obstacles as you can.
There were a few obstacles that got to me mentally, walk the plank and mystery number 2 (both dealt with heights). Death march was a quad killer, and seemed like it never ended.

So my advice:
Training
Mountain climbers and burpees, if you do nothing else do these daily! Squats, lunges and upper body workouts are also recommended. Drink lots of water. Walk or run or jog as often as as possible. Walk in mud and water and rain.
Shoes- new balance minimums, Merrill minimums or Salomon trail runners. They are all lightweight and good for rough terrain and can be thrown in the wash machine later and look good as new.

Clothing- compression leggings, you might look silly but your calves will thank me later. Dri-fit compression shirt long or short sleeve. Long will save your elbows. Gloves keep your hands warm and protects them, they dont help grip but I wanted the protection so I used mad grip gloves and cut the tips off, they worked fine. Leave the bandanas,etc. At home, girls throw your hair in a ponytail and you'll be fine.
Some things you might not think about - bring ChapStick, you'll want it, along with sunscreen, advil or Tylenol and a change of clothes, sandals are the best shoe to change into. Get an early slot, it took me 4 and a half hours to finish, so start early. Also pack bandaids, bactine, water, and snacks.

You will get beat up, I have rainbows bruises all over and I pulled my hip flexor and one of the tendons in my left knee. It hurts like hell to go up or down stairs at the moment but it was totally worth it! Dont kill yourself on the course , do what you can. I skipped the hill walking lunges, the wheelbarrow (due to lack of a partner) and the Berlin walls. Do your best. If you go with other people my husband and I found it best to go our own paces, we started at the same time but he finished an hour before me, your fellow Mudders will help you, you will never be on tour own. Just give it your all.
Final note, you will get water stations every 2-3 miles and after they all (except the first one) have snack stations too, bananas and cliff bars are handed out, they also have port-a-potties if you really have to go. Plus they have a medical team to assist in any injuries. These courses are challenging and you can become injured, keep that in mind and know your limits, if you can't swim then dont do water obstacles. Remember that everyone else is struggling too (except the guy who did 30 hand-stand push ups on mile 9) help others around you. Push your limits, laugh, have fun, and really soak in the feeling of getting your first headband and beer upon reaching the finish line.
Remember: no quit, do more! And good luck, embrace the hurt!

Everyday Use

The mother-daughters dynamic in Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” was interesting to see progress throughout the story. The mother has two very different daughters, Dee and Maggie. Dee, the eldest is very snotty, rude, and disrespectful towards her mother and sister in her behavior and attitude. Dee is used to having things in life go her way and does not look kindly on her mother and sister’s rural lifestyle. Maggie, the younger daughter is more loyal and respectful towards her mother. She is more timid than Dee personality wise but she is just as voice tress when she needs to be. Maggie, who has terrible skin burns from an earlier incident, is constantly at odds with her sister due to their opposing views and personalities.
The mother statement about Maggie is an eye opener:
“Maggie will be nervous until after her sister goes: she will stand hopelessly in corners, homely and ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs, eyeing her sister with a mixture of envy and awe. She thinks her sister has held life always in the palm of one hand, that “no” is a word the world never learned to say to her.”
The statement does give the eye opener that Maggie feels envy and inferior to her sister due to her burns but it also clarifies another issue in this mother-daughters dynamic. The mother has often back down to Dee which made Maggie believe that Dee always gets what she wants. When Dee came to the house for a visit and wanted the quilt meant for Maggie, the mother tried to offer Dee another quilt by saying, “Why don’t you take one or two of the others?” She knew the quilt was meant for Maggie, so she could have told Dee. But she did not. This makes me wonder how many times in the past has incidents like this occur. The blame for Dee and Maggie’s failed relationship also fall on the shoulders of their mother. Only in the end of the story does she stand up for Maggie but it seems as if her actions were a little too late.

How It Feels to Be Colored Me

Zora Neale Hurston’s “How It Feels to be Colored Me”, was an interesting text to me. Hurston’s title, when I first read it, made me think that she was going to talk about how terrible life was for colored and black people according to her experiences. To my surprise, her stance on the matter was a breath of fresh air. Her views on slavery and how she decided to view the world was amazing to me. She stated:
“The terrible struggle that made me an American out of potential slave said “Go!” The Reconstruction said “Get set!”; and the generation before said “Go!” I am off to a flying start and I must not halt in the stretch to look behind and weep.”
She refused to allow the past hurts due to slavery to hold her back and keep picking at it like an open wound. For Hurston, slavery was, “Sixty years in the past.’ The fact that she was, ‘the granddaughter of slaves”, was not going to become a constant handicap for her. She was not going to apologize for who or what she is as a colored woman but she also was not going to harp on the past either.
Hurston stated, “It fails to register depression with me.” I believe her mindset towards the issues she faced as a colored woman was a good one. Self loathing, depression, and pains of the past would not cloud her future. That was one of the main reasons I was drawn to this essay. I took away from it the idea of constantly moving forward and ignoring those things that cause emotions of pity, pain, and anger.

MLA formatting

Shiloh

After completing my summary of Showalter's chapter 19 from Jury, I expected to be reading a Vietnam War story from Bobbi Ann Mason.  I was neither surprised or disappointed to find out that Shiloh was not a war story.
From the beginning we see the struggles between husband and wife.  The husband used to be a long haul trucker who was gone the majority of their marriage.  The wife enjoyed her time at home alone and when the husband became injured and had to stay at home all the time, the strain on their marriage was overwhelming.  The mother in the story does not help matters at all.  The wife already feels like she has no privacy from her mother because she is always dropping in and spending tons of time at the house, but now she also has no alone time from her husband.
The husband just wants to please the wife, but as most husbands :) is clueless as to how to achieve his goal.  He wants to build her a log cabin which is the last thing the wife wants.  All she wants is some time alone!
When the couple goes to the Shiloh battlefield for a day trip, the setting could not be more appropriate for their fight to play out.  The battlefield setting gives them the perfect backdrop for their disintegrating marriage.
I think that this story was very interesting and I loved reading it, I look forward to reading more from this author.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Jhumpa Lahiri’s story showed the internal hardships that one faces when growing up in a place where you look different from everybody else. It not only shows the cultural difference between her and her parents, since they were raised in an Indian household, and how she has become “Americanized” because she is raised in America but also the confusion of not knowing where she fits in. She looks Indian and acts American in her parent’s point of view but is Indian in her peers’ point of view so naturally there is another conflict on whether to seek her parent’s acceptance or that of her peers. This, I believe, is what affects her will to write. In the beginning of the story, when she was younger, upon discovering the fact that she was different from everybody (at least in appearance) drove her to write in order to have a common ground with the other students in her class: “When I began to make friends, writing was the vehicle […] [it] was less a solitary pursuit than an attempt to connect with others.” During her teen years when insecurities are usually at their peek it lead her to not only reject herself but to quit writing all together. I see the direct correlation between her internal strife and her interest in writing. While writing she finds that it is a safe-haven from all her insecurities and worries, a place when no-one will cast stones and judge based on race or social status or gender but only by what is written. When writing she no longer has to dwell on whether she should act Indian or American in order to gain acceptance but only focuses on the fact that she is a writer.

Bloodchild

I’m usually very picky when it comes to reading fiction for pleasure. Normally, I would never even think about picking up something in the sci-fi section at Barnes and Nobles because like a lot of others expressed in class, it doesn’t really hold my attention. To be honest, the only thing in that genre that mildly holds my interest is attractive male vampires, and oddly enough I have no idea why. Anyways, needless to say I cringed a lot while reading Octavia Butler’s “Bloodchild.” Imagining large worm-like insects that use humans as a host to implant their eggs severely disturbs me. If this were made into a movie, I would do my best to avoid watching it. The scene when T’Gatoi is removing the worms from the human and placing them in the carcass of a dead animal was mildly awkward compared to “implanting” scene. I’m almost positive I was holding my breath while reading that except. The thing that makes it so awkward is the fact that not only is it a worm and a human, but the female is injecting something into the male. Something about that made me feel awkward in my own skin. For some reason it crossed my mind that Butler was taking the fear, anticipation and pain of a woman giving birth and placing it on the mans conscience, only taking it to a whole other level of reality. Maybe it was, in a way, to bring attention to what women go through physically to bring life into the world and the toll it takes on our bodies. Regardless of whether I liked this short story or not, I have to say it kept my attention.

Shiloh

I really enjoyed reading this short story by Bobbie Anne Mason. I can actually relate to both of the main characters, Leroy and Norma Jean. For some reason, reading about people’s relationships really intrigues me. Whether its fiction or nonfiction, the way people handle disappointments, betrayal, and heartbreak fascinates me. It’s almost like watching reality T.V in a way; you want to see how people handle certain situations so you can compare how you would react. I like this story because it’s real. It’s something that probably happens often in marriages. When I was reading this story I found myself really feeling bad for Leroy. The poor man has a steel pin in his hip, a bad knee, no job, his past time hobby is making arts and crafts, his wife is checking out of the relationship, and nobody wants to live in his stupid log cabin. His wife, Norma Jean, seems to be having a somewhat midlife crisis. She doesn’t seem to care that her husband is now home all the time; in fact it seems to annoy her. I liked it at the end when she says, “In some ways, a woman prefers a man who wonders.” It’s just like that old saying, “nice guys finish last.” It’s so true. At the end when Norma Jean tells Leroy she’s leaving him, I couldn’t help but wonder if that might one day happen to me. What if someone you’re with just doesn’t want you anymore? What if they’re like Norma Jean and they aren’t even trying anymore? To be honest, it terrifies me to invest half my life with someone and then get left by the curb side. I guess I understand why people don’t get married.

Sandra Cisneros

I just finished reading the poetry by Sandra Cisneros for class.  I was really surprised that poetry was what was chosen to read by her.  Her work that I am most familiar with is The House on Mango Street which I loved when I read.  I had never read any of her poetry until tonight.  I have to say that I am not a huge poetry fan (as we have all established in class!!) but I did enjoy reading these poems.  I especially liked Las Girlfriends and thought that the violence of protection in the poem was very well disguised.  I found it interesting the descriptions of how the speaker defends her friends in the bar.

Anne Sexton. "Her Kind."

Sylvia Plath. "Lady Lazarus."

The Mother

I think while reading this I let my personally opinions get in the way. I reread it a couple of times trying to see where i could connect with her but I never did. I felt that she thought this was the only option she had but I just dont think its acceptable especially more than once. I kept feeling reading this over and over that she was making an excuse for what she did, in being selfish and trying to make HERself feel better. Yea, it does take two to tango and I don't know all the ends and outs but I feel that something could have been done than keep getting pregnant and keep aborting the baby. At least throughout the poem she does show remorse for all the good and bad things she wont be able to experience with the babies life but I always feel that life is better than death. I couldnt help but be judgemental all throughout reading this. I did not feel sorry for her when she was descrbing everything she would miss out on during the childs life. Overall I wish I didnt let my opinion get in the way to better understand the writers reasoning but for now I couldnt help it.

The Fish, Anaylsis.

wade
through black jade.
Of the crow-blue mussel-shells, one keeps
adjusting the ash-heaps;
opening and shutting itself like

I feel that this is symbolic of women writers of the time period and the struggles they had to become 'successful.' They must wade through darkness and solid matter, sift through the prose and poetry of women authors who have long since died.

an
injured fan.
The barnacles which encrust the side
of the wave, cannot hide
there for the submerged shafts of the

sun,
split like spun
glass, move themselves with spotlight swiftness
into the crevices—
in and out, illuminating

the
turquoise sea
of bodies. The water drives a wedge
of iron through the iron edge
of the cliff; whereupon the stars,

I feel that this is symbolic towards the way that although women writers have tried to hide behind androgynous names, male critics still blare the spotlight on their short comings and in the male point of view ineptitude towards the art of writing. The water iron is symbolic of the two ways women must internally navigate through housewifery and duty and the need to create and not let atrophy take over the creative muscle of the mind, a cliff one must take a leap of faith with or ignore to the quiet discontent of housewifery and duty.

pink
rice-grains, ink-
bespattered jelly fish, crabs like green
lilies, and submarine
toadstools, slide each on the other.

Pink is a feminine color and rice is traditional at weddings in order to promote good fortune and fertility. The jelly fish, crabs and toadstools could all by symbolic to the three faces of Eve. The crabs- like lily's indicate that while pretty on the outside the core of woman is much harsher. Going along with this imagery is the toadstools which are poisonous. Jelly fish also pretty to look at but poisonous stingers align to show that woman is a creature of nature that may look pretty, or harmless has a poison or mean streak hiding in her bosom.

All
external
marks of abuse are present on this
defiant edifice—
all the physical features of

ac-
cident—lack
of cornice, dynamite grooves, burns, and
hatchet strokes, these things stand
out on it; the chasm-side is

dead.
Repeated
evidence has proved that it can live
on what can not revive
its youth. The sea grows old in it.

This I believe reestablishes the fact that women writers have been scorned and as a result many have their creativity killed. However, it is also saying that creativity can procure out of experience of growing up and that knowledge envelops itself in the mind of women in their creative abodes. Overall I think the fish is a metaphor for womens creative muscle and the way it has been spurned throughout history and although facing so many obstacles is still able to live in the slimy, dark, submerge of male dominated society.