Happy Halloween
October 28, 2008
Yup, I love Halloween. It’s silly, it’s goofy, it’s creative. It involves devilish amounts of candy. What’s better than that?
This past weekend, lots of kiddies in my neighborhood (socialites that they are) were making their rounds to Halloween pre-parties. I spotted a bumblebee, a tiny Sponge Bob, and a few impressive action heroes I wasn’t up-to-date enough on my cartoons to identify. I saw a father dressed as a king and a mom dressed as a cat. This, in my opinion, is a beautiful thing.
I have some big costume plans for Friday…I just have to work out a few kinks. Okay, I still have to work out all the kinks. First, it was essential that I carved my joc-o-lantern (see above).
Of course, this time of year, I’m forced to think about Halloweens gone by. A skating friend and I were talking over the phone about what costumes her three kids are going to wear – Peter Pan, Hello Kitty, and a Pirate. This led us to the topic of Halloween-past and she revealed that in 4th Grade, she dressed up as a Skating Instructor. She carried a clipboard and wore her skates (with guards) around school all day! Now that’s an homage.
One of my fondest (and maybe funniest) Halloween memories took place at the Madison Ice Arena when I was little. The Figure Skating Club of Madison’s Halloween party that year was going to be a club fundraiser, a Skate-a-Thon for which we were supposed to get sponsors to donate something like 10 cents for every lap we could skate around the rink.
I was personally thrilled with this idea, since we would be doing our laps in costume. My older brother was pleased as well, albeit for different reasons. In several ways, he had already proven himself to be quite a businessman, so he threw himself wholeheartedly into raising money.
Sure enough, he got tons of sponsors. With his help, I also got a few, though my primary focus was really on the costumes. We were going to be Popeye and Olive Oyl. This was mostly our mother’s idea (and it was/is important to ignore the fact that they were a romantic “couple”), but I was delighted and my brother went along with it, probably figuring there were worse get-ups we could foist on him. (And, wow, was he right…oh the skating outfits I would end up forcing him to wear.)
In order to make Brad’s arms look cartoonishly muscular, our mom cut up a pair of my old ballet tights and stuffed them with mounds of cotton for him to wear like sleeves. She then embroidered an anchor tattoo on one arm with yarn. She found him a pipe and a sailor hat.
I wore my hair in a low bun and Olive Oyl’s iconic black and white striped tights with a red sweater and a black skirt. Even though my mother’s big red, clip-on earrings pinched my ears numb, I loved them.
When we arrived at the party, I remember that everybody had a good chuckle over our costumes. My brother immediately sat down to lace up his skates and I bee-lined for a table displaying an assortment of orange and black cupcakes.
Though my brother was not necessarily the fastest skater in the club at that point, he was determined to do more laps than anyone else. While the rest of us skated around at a medium clip, blabbing about nothing in particular, he leaned forward like a speedskater, in order to make himself more aerodynamic. With a grin on his face, he of course skated circles around the rest of us, literally, and raised lots of money, all the while holding a can of spinach.
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How about you? Any good Halloween memories? What are you going to “be” (such an existential question) this weekend? Click on “comment” below. I promise I won’t steal your idea. Then again…if you’re in a different state, or on a different continent, or even in a different borough, would it really matter? Come on…
And if you want to see some fab Manhattan decorations as identified by The Informer (me), Click here.
Power Skating: A Memo
October 21, 2008
To: My power skating students and the skaters of the world Re: The benefits of power skating
It has come to my attention that you hate power skating class. Some of you told me this directly. At the beginning of class, you said in no uncertain terms, with an extremely whiney voice and slumped shoulders, “Awww, I hate power skating.”
Some of you used to do power skating but haven’t been back in a long time, thereby letting your absence do the talking. Maybe there was that one class where you tried really hard and then you woke up the next day screaming in pain, as if a boatload of sailors had extracted the muscles from your legs then used them for knot-tying practice. You didn’t realize that this was the “desired” result, in fact, essentially the whole point.
Others of you keep showing up to class but you let me know how much you hate power skating (and, by the transitive property, me) by that expression on your face, the one where you manage to throw daggers from your eyeballs with such uncanny precision that I now must come to class carrying a protective, metal shield. Soon, I’ll be trading in my down coat for a full suit of armor.
Some of you have never tried power skating or even heard of it. If this is the case, you could probably be in a lot better shape, you could probably be far more powerful, you could probably skate your programs, your dances and your moves with lot more speed and ease. If you were to take up power skating, you might even be a better human being, in every possible, conceivable way. Okay…maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration.
Power skating is like rigorous exercise class in skates, and specifically, it’s on-ice interval training. In other words: exertion, rest, exertion, rest, and so on, usually for about 30 minutes. The rest period isn’t time for you to lie down on the ice and whimper, as you may feel compelled to do, but to glide around at a lower intensity and prepare for the next exercise. The exercises can vary from simple stroking to complex footwork steps, depending on level and experience.
If you have a good class, and you push yourself to do your absolute best, what you can expect is that your lungs will feel as if they have caught on fire and sweat will spray from your pores as if they are shower spouts. Your face will turn neon red and steam will rise off your body like smoke.
As a result of exhaustion, your skates may start to feel as heavy as cinder blocks, increasing the likelihood of tripping over your toepicks. Indeed, you might fall down, slide into your fellow power skaters, and knock into them like a set of equally-tired bowling pins. You might even slam your chin into the unforgiving ice.
Sound miserable? Perhaps. But it’s like medicine: even though it might taste horrible going down, it will make you better.
My brother and I developed our class several years ago with a series of fast footwork exercises, steps that work the entire body, including the torso and the arms, in addition to the legs and the ankles. These are mostly skated on circles, with either one, two, or three separate circles on the ice surface, depending on how many skaters have had the good sense to show up. We put the whole thing to music so we didn’t have to skate around with a stopwatch and a whistle. This way, we can focus all our energy on chasing skaters like crazy banshees, and, of course yelling frightening encouragements like, “Go, go, go!” “You can skate faster!” “Bend your knees!” and the surprisingly necessary, “Don’t forget to breathe!”
I have a friend who is a skating coach and a trained exercise physiologist. Having read lots of studies on the subject and put the theories to practice herself, she is a big believer in interval training. She says that this is a great way to build stamina for skaters. Interval training more closely mimics figure skating programs than continuous exercise because there are similar physiological changes happening in the body throughout a program, such as increases in fatigue and changes in heart rate, etc.
My brother and I were first exposed to power skating by the late Pieter Kollen, a figure skating coach who also did power classes with hockey players. This was during summer skating camp in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The mornings after power skating classes, my brother and I would lie in our beds and repeat the phrase, “Oh my legs,” with exaggerated misery over and over again, until it became one pathetic word, “Ohmaleggs.”
The thing is, my brother was an enthusiastic student of power skating; he knew it was beneficial and seemed to enjoy the pain. He was always up in front, trying to out skate whoever was ahead of him. He pushed himself to his limits then redefined them. Every once in a while, I see a few determined skaters driving themselves similarly and loving it.
Me? Well, like many of you, I hated power skating. I can admit this.
I chugged along, I tried, but also used up far too much energy throwing those dagger glares. So I know it’s hard. I know it hurts. But I also know that power skating helped me become a stronger, faster, more powerful athlete than I was previously. And I’ve witnessed it do the same for many others.
So go ahead, I invite you to hate it exactly as much or even more than I did. But do it. Grit your teeth, scrunch up your face, glare at me angrily then bend your knees and SKATE. You’ll be glad you did.
Oh, and by the way, don’t even think about escaping over to the boards to take an extra long swig from your water bottle or to take off your jacket in a leisurely fashion, one zipper notch at a time. Nice try, though.
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You? Have you experienced or witnessed the splendors of power skating? Click on comment, below.
Skaterwoman to the Rescue!
October 14, 2008
She skates faster than a speeding bullet.
Glides with more power than a locomotive.
She triple axels over tall buildings in a single bound.
Look up in the sky!
It’s a bird, it’s a rhinestone-studded plane. No, wait, it’s Skaterwoman!
Are you concerned about what’s going on in the world today and even a little scared? Nervous about the faltering economy? The endless war? The rapid depletion of natural resources?
Have no fear, Skaterwoman is here! She’s been training for this moment. She’s all warmed up, stretched out, and it takes her less than .0000000004 seconds to lace her skates. So just breathe a sigh of relief and sit back to enjoy the performance.
In the next four minutes, Skaterwoman will not only “balance” all the budgets in the land, her spinning will generate enough alternative energy to power the entire planet.
Her smile will melt the hearts of the coldest dictators and her dove-like grace will smooth over international disputes. Besides, you’ll see that she can touch her foot to her head, fly like a camel, shoot ducks with her eyes closed, and stealthily disguise herself as a pancake.
Most impressively, the ease with which she transports herself from place to place will inspire commuters across the universe to abandon their gas-guzzling cars and instead travel to work in their own skates.
Trust me: she skates softly, but she wears big blades.
And so, without further delay, I present the one and only super-heroine who can rescue us from this mess…Skaterwoman!
(Pause.)
(Silence.)
Wait, is the stereo broken again?
Skaterwoman, can you please save the world without the music today?
No? Okay. Well folks, I forgot to mention that Skaterwoman is also a larger-than-life primadonna. I guess we’ll just have to figure something else out.
Hello Facebook
October 7, 2008
So I finally gave in to something I’ve been resisting for a long time. I’d been getting these e-mail invitations from friends to join that social networking site Facebook. No offense, guys, but I deleted them. I mean, I already have about 502 separate e-mail accounts and at least 75,000 websites I need to check in with on a daily basis. How much more can a girl do?
And I know myself: I’m a social creature. I’m prone to blabbing on the phone for hours on end, going out to dinner with friends eight nights a week, and writing jokey e-mails all day long. Besides, I am an avid and (despite what my teenage cousins think) speedy texter.
Outwardly, I played it like I just couldn’t be bothered with one of these online social networks – “Look, I’m already in touch with everyone I want to be in touch with!” – but secretly I knew I could become an addict.
And that’s exactly what’s happened. I joined up about two weeks ago in response to some particularly enthusiastic peer pressure. It’s a good thing I don’t have a Blackberry or a fancy iPhone – otherwise I might be logged onto Facebook every waking moment. What’s remarkable is that I’m not on it right now. Wait, let me just check to see if I have any new Facebook messages….okay, I’m back.
So, other than wasting gobs of precious time and serving as a procrastinatory crutch, what is the point of all these sites, like Facebook, Friendster, and MySpace? I suppose, like the internet as a whole, they make the world a smaller, cozier place by connecting you to others…instantaneously. Feeling lonely? Facebook. Feeling friendless? Log onto Facebook. Questioning whether or not you exist? There you are onscreen, smiling from the picture on your “profile page”. And there you are typing a quippy little note on your “wall” for all to see.
In some ways, it’s the new address book. If you manage your “Friends” page meticulously enough, you can put together a pretty thorough list of just about everyone you’ve ever known (and some you never knew, or maybe you did, but it’s getting a little fuzzy…).
Granted, Facebook fulfills different purposes depending on your age. I can’t speak for other age groups, but for those of us who are over the age of say, 20 or 25, this site is a slick way of traveling backwards through time. Very few of us stick around our hometowns, anymore: I myself have moved six times since leaving Mt. Horeb, Wisconsin at age 14. I have attended several different schools and have had lots of different jobs. Try as I have, it has been nearly impossible to stay in touch with everyone who I have genuinely enjoyed being acquainted with over the years.
And skaters of the world are an especially amorphous group. I have been associated with several different ice rinks and skating clubs. From both competing and training, I know skaters from all over the country and I’ve never had any organized way of keeping up with them…until now. It’s not like there are reunions or a directory of “past skaters.” In the last two weeks, I have contacted and been contacted by all kinds of flashes from my skating past: people I’ve often wondered about. It’s great to have them on my so-called radar, now, and vice versa. And we didn’t have to hire private detectives to track each other down.
Of course, it’s still not possible to be in really close, meaningful contact with everyone you’ve ever known, even with the help of a conduit as smooth as this. I have to resist the urge to individually e-mail all the people who have “friended” me or vice versa: I’d enjoy doing so, but I’d never have time to leave my house again. On that note, I have to wonder when I see that some Facebookers (mostly those under the age of 25) have more than 500 friends – do they really know all these people or are they just amassing friends of friends of friends? What percentage of these people are they managing to be in contact with?
If you can keep control of your Facebook experience (or maybe just accept that control isn’t really possible), it’s a hoot. If you’re like me, you’ll find yourself chuckling a lot. Like, “Oh, yeah, her. Wow, she lives in Seattle, now. Who knew?” You might also find yourself going to dinner with two long lost friends from high school on Thursday night.
If you haven’t joined Facebook yet, then I think you’re time has come. You’re not the last person on earth who hasn’t done so, but I have a feeling you will be, soon. So here’s what you do:
First, go to the Facebook Website by clicking here. Signing up is free – while it will probably end up costing you many many valuable work hours, they never ask you for your credit card number, an admirable and rare thing.
Upload a picture of yourself looking fabulous. (Or, in my case, the best one you can find…and then get a friend to de- redeye it in Photoshop so you no longer look like the devil.) Try to not cringe too visibly when one of your skating students remarks how dorky you look in it and suggests you switch it out for something a little “sexier” i.e. without the glasses.
From there, you just fill out a few general details about yourself, like where you went to high school and college and where you live and what websites you may be associated with that you want to shamelessly promote, wink wink.
This next part is when it starts to get interesting: you start to amass “friends.” The first step is allowing Facebook to rifle through your e-mail address book to identify all the people you know who are already in the so-called club. By simply checking their boxes, you will be requesting their Facebook friendship and, unless they still owe you money, the chances are very high that they’ll accept.
Once you start collecting Facebook friends, you can go through their personal lists to see who you know, and contact those individuals as well, forging more and more paths in this gigantic online maze. Along the way, over in the right hand column of your “home page,” Facebook will be constantly suggesting people you might know, based on their association with someone you already have on your list…and, as a matter of fact, you will know lots of them. Lo and behold, some of them have just sent you a request to be their friend. Receiving such requests might give you a nice tingly feeling: it’s like getting a “Will you be my friend?” note passed to you across a few desks in the second grade.
Finally, using the Facebook “search” function, you can also look up individuals one by one, but just make sure you know the exact spelling of his or her name…and also hope that they have a unique spelling because, according to Wikipedia, there are over 100 million Facebook users worldwide…and, I’ve found, for example, that many of them seem to have the exact same name as that one guy I dated for 10 minutes in high school.
But, in this way, I successfully found a friend from grade school in Wisconsin who I haven’t seen in more than…well, let’s just say many many years. Turns out that, though she now lives in Minneapolis, she often comes to visit my exact neighborhood in New York City. We’re going to meet up next time she comes through town – and I am thrilled about this prospect.
I will also be thrilled to stumble upon your lovely mugshot on Facebook, whether you’ve already jumped on the bandwagon or this CSOM installment is inspiring you to join up. Either way, I cordially invite you to be-”friend” me, Facebook style, by clicking here.
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What do you think? Is Facebook a waste of time, or the perfect conduit, or both? Leave a comment below.
