plate

Had some beautiful dreams last night. Mostly I remember they were in the style of Beowulf, the movie I watched yesterday. Among the images in the dream were an inverted look, while stretching on the back, under tables, where several pieces of "clothlike" on fire pieces merged into one image to display a fire in a fire place at the other end of the room. Several images of faces used the sunset turning golden theme, one face in particular was Penelope Cruz. Perhaps because she looked particularly stunning in her at the Oscars pix yesterday.

When I woke up, just as I was arising, I did a few stretches to see which muscles were tight. I particularly test for tension in the jaw, neck, back, sides of hip, hamstrings, knees, abs, throat, forearms, hands and fingers, ankles and feet, and toes. The hamstrings were the tightest, needing attention. Perhaps because yesterday I had done weights till tired, then walked up my favorite hill a few times. The legs were well used.

The stretching that felt the best today could best be described as rotating the hips over one leg, such as a plate being balanced on a stick. One side goes up, the other down. I found that I liked to kneel in a lunge on a soft pad and rock the standing (on knee) leg to and fro. Paying particular attention to the "softness" of the interaction of the hamstrings to each other. As the weight shifts around the hams flex softly. Rather than just a normal lunge, I added leaning forward and back into ham stretches. And letting the "free" knee go sideways, to also lightly rock the "plate" around, lean into stretches, then when the hams are soft, to feel some body weight, of varied amounts, applied to the free leg as if about to give it full weight to stand up.

The rotation of the hip complemented the "reading on the floor" front of the hip stretch I've described elsewhere. But particular care to do rotations of the hip, AND to flex the hamstrings within the hip, ASIF the hip were a hinge rather than a rotator joint. This helps to feel the hams "make a muscle" under me. They FEEL like squirrels fighting in a bag.

After walking up the hill yesterday, equal to walking up about a dozen flights of stairs, the "fire down below" was HOT. The legs were smoldering hot coals, flexing, pushing. I thinking that it is because of the week or so of front of the thigh Yoga stretching I've done down there, that there was absolutely no pain in my knees! The only part that had any "tired" or used feeling when I got done was the small of my back, on the left side, which is normally the first to go.

So I've added "cardio" to my weights and stretches. A complete package once again. I'm Ba-a-a-a-a-a-c-c-c-k!!!!