“what’s next to the moon?” mmmmmm, one of the best songs on ac/dc’s best record, powerage. there isn’t a lot of detail in this moon shot, but it’s not bad for just being my camera, unassisted.

crack. pop. my right shoulder is making so many sound effects this past week. my right shoulder is learning to relax a little more into proper alignment. this has been going on since i started practising bikram. little adjustments that feel so major. my insides realigning themselves. bikram yoga will change your body and mind. i’m feeling that change in my body big time right now. if you practise with regularity and with intensity & precision, you will see results. xo,m

bonfire on the beach. figured i might as well share one with you. the only thing about bonfires is you end up smelling like smoke. i don’t mind smelling like marijuana smoke, but wood smoke is gross. there’s a boat light at the top of the fire, not some trick of the flame.

one of my tweeps had over 50 people in class today. quite a difference between toronto and santa cruz, we only had 9 benders. despite the small numbers, i swear that was the hottest class of the year! oh my god, i thought i was gonna die a couple of times. definitely one of those days where i switch to auto-pilot, no thoughts in my head at all, only focus on the words and doing that. i hate to say it, but thank god for coconut water after class! oh, tasty goodness. see you tomorrow ~m

after bikram, i stopped at petsmart and ran into these two. six year old anna is trying to raise awareness about the dolphin slaughter in japan. i din’t get all the specifics, but i thought it was cool that she made the signs and wanted to stand outside of petsmart with them.

this weekend was another two days off from bikram. i wrote earlier that two days off wasn’t showing a dramatic difference in my body, but now i’m really feeling it inside my body.

the other day, my teacher said you “build strength through flexibility.” no lie, i’m feeling way stronger than i ever have. class today was exhausting, an early class, i was still waking up. i din’t know where i was gonna find the strength for the third part of locust, but i din’t even struggle, my core felt so strong. that was the effect of two days off, feeling and being stronger than when i was in the room on friday. okay heartbreakers, see you tomorrow ~m

alright, sweat friends, i gotta give it up to bobby of bobby’s can cookin’. his backyard bbq festival was bombtastic. thanks to this man, my friends and i sat in the park and enjoyed the sun for two days straight. you can relax in the park anyday, but usually you get hassled by cops, homeless people or tweakers. this weekend, my friends and i sat in the park, enjoying our barbeque in the sun, listening to the mellow jazzy r&b bands. i think i was in the park for 6 hours today. when one of the bands would play a good song i would think, “my dad would really like this right now.” not just the music, but also sitting in the park, eating bomb-ass food. funny that i would think of my folks when i’m hanging out with my friends, but that’s the kind of nerd i am. it was definitely better to be with my friends though because we were in the park for so long, at the end of the day, live oak smokers hooked us up fat with chicken! oh man, that was so cool, “you guys want some chicken?” um, hell yeah! alright friends, that was my decadent weekend. well, only the day because i din’t tell you about the bonfire, but that’s another post for another day. xo,m

from the polynesian festival on the wharf.

how was your saturday friends? not only did i bike to the beach and enjoy the sun, i went to the park for the first ever “bobby’s backyard barbeque festival.” two things you may or may not know about me: i hang out in san lorenzo park almost everyday and i love barbeque. the fact that bobby brought one to the other makes him a genius in my blog, i mean, book. this was good eating, mom and dad, you would have enjoyed it. not everyone had fun, some woman named @CaelesP tweeted, “went to rib cookoff today. it was pathetic. 6-8 contestants and a taqueria. not many people there santa cruz is more about vegan than bbq.” hmmmmm, it’s all in your point of view, 6-8 booths to choose from was enough for me. there weren’t a lot of people, but there was a way steady crowd all day. enough squares were around to take over drunk hill and enjoy the bands that played. *plus* the cook-off kept the homeless tweekers out of the park all day. this was my tweet from the actual park: “baking in the park at the barbeque cook-off, r&b jazzy band playing at the duck pond”. you say pathetic, i say awesome, it’s all how you look at it.
just like being in the hot room. your totally hot class is another person’s 90 minutes of bliss. it’s all in your mind, always. see you tomorrow ~m

p.s. check out the pig that din’t enjoy bobby’s backyard bbq festival

wanna get lei’d? snark snark. cool colours from the polynesian festival. click on the picture to really enjoy the details.

perfect day in santa cruz. even though i say i don’t notice the heat, i was still kinda bugged that it was only 102º in the hot room today. and everyone was acting like it was the hottest class ever! i’ll admit, i *did* enjoy my coconut water after class. oh! you know what else i enjoyed? i took @writeouschick’s lead and had a post-yoga cheeseburger, fries and milkshake! from the local burger shack, jack’s, it was bombtastic and om nom nom at the same time. much gratitude for another beautiful day. ~m

scene from the polynesian festival on the wharf recently. luv the colours of this photograph. don’t forget to click on the picture to see a larger version.

before the noon, a newish girl asked me how i managed to get through class without fidgeting. i told her it was all in the mind. once you realize all you need is your breath, you stop using water to get through class. once you learn to accept the things you have no control over, like the sweat dripping or the length of the postures, then you learn to focus on yourself and the poses. learn to save energy by making the most of your savasana. most importantly, if you’re doing something that isn’t part of the dialogue, stop it! alright heartbreakers, i’m off my soapbox and off to the kitchen. xo, m