suz

January 10th, 10:00pm: Before bed crunch session. 100 regular crunches 100 cross crunches 100 side to side crunches ---- January 11th, 10:00pm: Before bed crunch session. 100 regular crunches 100 cross crunches 100 side to side crunches ---- I was unable to get to the kickboxing gym this week due to crazy weather -- hurricane force wind storm followed by a blizzard and freezing rain, downed trees and power lines everywhere, bridge closures, and traffic gridlock. It takes a lot to keep me out of the gym and this was a lot. I feel terrible. My body feels weak, sluggish. My diet has been excellent, 90% raw this week, no coffee at all, I'm well beyond the detox stage, so this feeling's gotta be from lack of exercise. I'm hoping to be back at the gym Saturday and Sunday for 2 monster classes.

The nasty weather has kept me out of the kickboxing gym. It makes me sad. This weekend I'm going hard core though.

Vancouver is getting all of your snow Odidnetne -- it used to be a freak thing to get snow here... not anymore. We've had five majour snow storms and five or six hurricane force wind storms in 2 months. And to think I moved out west to get away from the snow back east. You can't win.

What a cool family. Very inspiring!

Meant to post this ages ago. Saw it near Howard St. and 1st Street in San Francisco (if memory serves me correctly) back in December. http://i117.photobucket.com/albums/o56/veganunderground/2006RoadTrip244.jpg Different angle that shows the street it's on: http://i117.photobucket.com/albums/o56/veganunderground/2006RoadTrip246.jpg

Yeah, can't wait to hear all about Jonzen's retreat.

I'm here!!!!!!!

So I was reading an article in the Saturday Globe and Mail called "The skinny on 2007" which was basically a run-down of the years diet books. I was deciding which diet I would go on this year and I had narrowed it down to either the "wine diet " or the "snack factor diet " when low and behold I noticed the "thrive diet". Looks like the clear winner even though it said "a vegan diet is a bit more work". Yay for Brendan for saving me from copious amount of red wine!

January 7th, 9:00pm: Before bed crunch session. 100 regular crunches 100 cross crunches 100 side to side crunches My abs are definitely hard, they're just not very well defined. This is gonna take a while, isn't it?

Sunday January 7th, 11:45pm-1:15pm: Breakfast at 11:00am: banana, kale, flax oil, rice milk, vega smoothie Pre warm up: stretching Warm up: 2 minutes running, 20 seconds knees up running 10 minutes of kickboxing technique drills Stretching 30 x sidekicks on each leg 15 minutes of takedowns and submissions with partners 10 minutes of kickboxing technique drills with 5lb dumbells 60 x squats with 5 lb dumbells 50 x situps 30 x crunches 25 x pushups 25 x squat jumps 5 minutes jogging on the spot with jumps thrown in Stretching 3 x 2 minute rounds on the heavy bag 10 pullups 7 overhand pullups (with some assistance as I find this VERY hard still)

Saturday January 6th, 9:45am-11:00am: Breakfast at 8:30am: vega and rice milk (we had a blackout so our blender was down, no green smoothie today ) Pre warm up: light stretching Warm up: 3 x 2 minute rounds of shadow boxing Stretching 10 minutes of front kick target drills 50 side kicks with each leg 15 minutes of kata practice 45 pushups 120 crunches 135 squats Cooldown: stretching

Friday January 5th, 11:00pm: Small before bed workout at home: 100 crunches 100 cross crunches 170 side-to-side crunches

Thanks!

Please explain this I get all kinds of freaky associations. You tie each other up and just go nuts or what?? I just realized how this sounds! Get those dirty thought out of your mind, offense 74, it's strictly training! I'm training my stomach and legs to be able to withstand punches and kicks for fighting. I'm all bruised up but I'll heal back tougher.

Thursday January 4th, 11:00pm: Small before bed workout at home: 100 crunches 100 cross crunches 60 side-to-side crunches 30 pushups 30 dips leg raises (holding in air) until failure A bunch of stomach punches and leg kicks for conditioning with my husband Trev (because it was so much fun in class today) I'm really determined to have abs of steel here, so I think I'll be doing this every night before bed.

Just looked this book up on Amazon. Looks good! A few other books I really love and thought I'd recommend: Battle Royale - Koushun Takami (the back jacket says: Lord of the Flies for the 21st Century. It's a fun, albeit somewhat disturbing, page turner that really made me think about how messed up humanity is) A Fortunate Life - A.B. Facey (A hard to find Australian book. Absolutely enthralling. I think I cried the whole way through) Voices from Chernobyl, The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster - Svetlana Alexievich. (Without a doubt one of the most disturbing/haunting books I have ever read, and that's saying a lot because I read a lot of disturbing things) Papillon - Henri Charriere (An oldie but a goodie) Night - Elie Wiesel (Another oldie and a must read by everyone)

Vegan and returning to the natural world are vastly different pursuits. Rewilding groups such as http://www.wildroots.org/ consider themselves post-vegan, and support hunting and eating animals. Rewilding is much more a process or returning to the natural world. Veganism is directly opposed to this thought process, we seek to enable a cruelty-free existence. This process involves such things as b-12 supliments, soy protein, synthetic fabrics and shoes etc., not natural by any standard. I think you might have misunderstood Trev's point, Michael. It has more to do with understanding that we are animals too. Trust me, Trev is not a "Rewildest". Well said, Gaia. All of this negativity is distubing.

As a Canadian who also has Australian citizenship, I often think of hightailing it outta Canada and heading for Australia -- and funnily enough, for pretty much the same issues you've just brought up (or the Canadian equivalent anyway). Your post is a big reminder that every country has it's share of problems, you've just gotta make the best out of what you've got.

Wow, so many great books have been listed here. My "to read" list continues to grow. I just finished "Healthy at 100" and I totally agree, raven. Long, and repetitive, but still worthy of the read. I'm currently going between 2 books: "The Art of Happiness, A Handbook for Living" by His Holiness The Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler, M.D. -- I'm very much enjoying this book so far. A very easy, thought provoking read. and "The Tibetan book of Living and Dying" by Sogyal Rinpoche -- which is heavy...intense...seems I can only read small portions at a time in order for it to sink in properly, hence the going-between-two-books-thing. This'll be one I'll have to read and re-read over the years for sure. I'm 242 pages in and I HIGHLY recommend it.

Thursday January 4th, 6:15am-7:15am: Breakfast at 5:30am: 1 banana Warm up: 5 minutes of skipping Intense stretching 5 minutes of shadow kickboxing 10 minutes of sidekick target training 10 minutes of jogging 6 sets of 10 pushups 60 crunches 3 x 2 minute rounds of no contact sparring 10 minutes with a partner of giving and receiving leg kicks for conditioning 5 minutes with a partner of giving and receiving stomach punches for conditioning 2nd Breakfast at 8:00am: banana, kale, ginger, flax oil, rice milk, vega smoothie. Yum.

Under 'Take Action', then Page 4 of 'What you can do at home' it says: "Eat less meat Methane is the second most significant greenhouse gas and cows are one of the greatest methane emitters. Their grassy diet and multiple stomachs cause them to produce methane, which they exhale with every breath." Sort of a pathetic half hearted attempt but at least it's sorta mentioned. Other steps you can take on page 4: buy locally grown and produced food buy fresh food instead of frozen seek out and support local farmers markets buy organic food as much as possible avoid heavily packaged products

No, but it is mentioned on the website. Probably because the film was meant for a pretty mainstream audience they didn't want to turn anyone off my talking about the vegetarian thing. For most people this sort of change in thinking takes baby steps. The first is just acknowledging that global warming even exists. Really good movie tho, highly recommended.

Tuesday January 2nd, 8:00pm-9:00pm: Dinner at 5:30pm: banana, kale, rice milk, water, flax oil, vega smoothie. 1x homemade raw kamut/hemp/raisin bar. 1/2 Cup carrots dipped into hummus. Pre warm up: light stretching, 9 pullups, 2 overhand pullups Warm up: 3 minutes of flat out running 2 minutes of shadow kickboxing 10 minutes of Intense leg stretching, splits, etc. 2 minutes of sidekick drills 2 minutes of roundkick drills 15 minutes of roundkick target drills 15 minutes of jab/punch/hook/front kick drills 60 x situps 25 x pushups

Check out the little vid we just put up on our website. It can be seen on our home page: http://www.veganunderground.com/ Or on youtube: And no, that's not Trev or I in the vid. We would never do such a thing. We did edit the footage though.

Sunday December 31st, 9:30am-10:00am: Breakfast at 8:45am: banana, kiwi, kale, ginger root, lime juice, rice milk, 1/2 scoop of vega smoothie 2.5k (1.5 mile) trail run. Pretty rugged, rocky, rooty, west coast trail, lots of uphill and downhill and some sections with built stairs where it's steep. First real run I've had in a few months, so I'm happy...and beat. Post run snack: home made raw hemp, kamut, raisin, cranberry, chocolate, walnut bar.