I’m Back

• Yes, I'm back from my excellent European vacation and I will have to write up a separate post about that!
  
• I've been back at work for just over a week now too and things are quiet and going well.
  
• I'm back running and tonight I'm taking part in a 5k race. I'm not as speedy as I had hoped to be, but I'm still looking forward to it.
  
• I'm back at pole dancing classes and they are hard work and quite tricky!
  
• I'm back to making plans, but not the important ones, I've a few things to sort out first.

Happy Days

Hubby and I have just booked a 2 week European vacation which I'm very excited about!

It's an organised group tour so most of our activities are already planned and I have the itinerary printed off and almost committed to memory. Since this means I don't have too much planning to do, I've turned all my attentions to my holiday wardrobe and packing list.

I've decided on a colour palette of gray, pink, purple and green. Of course none of my existing clothes are suitable so this means shopping!

Like most females in the run up to a holiday, I was hoping to lose a few pounds, but since my holiday is very close I can't imagine that I will lose that much to make any new holiday clothes not fit me so I'm taking the chance and going shopping this weekend.

Maybe I'll put together a collage of my holiday wardrobe?

As if the holiday wasn't enough to keep me smiling, my pole dancing classes have started up again.

The first lesson of the intermediate classes was last night and there are 3 other girls in the class. Everyone seems quite friendly which is good.

Most of the lesson was a refresher of things we had done in the beginner class that we'll be building on in this course. We practised climbs, sitting on the pole and a spin we did with both hands in the beginners class we did one handed. The first new thing we learned was how to go upside down. I've tried this myself at home and it's a bit hit or miss if I manage it, so I was really pleased that I managed it both times! The only thing I couldn't get was a move called the crucifix. This really frustrated me as I've managed it in the past.

I'm pleased that there are no bruises. I saw a glimpse of the lesson plan though, so I know there are bruises to come!

I've also said that I'll take part in a 5k race in June with some work colleagues. I've now got the fear that I'll be rubbish so I had better get in training, maybe after the shopping this weekend ...

Holliewood's Pole Dance Routine

I’ve become a pole bore!

Pole Dancing. It's all I talk about now and I'm really sorry to all the people I bore senseless yapping on about it.

After I finished the beginner course I signed up for the intermediates, but it's been postponed and is now due to start on the 12^th May. So I decided to buy a DVD to keep me going and I ordered Pole Peoples The Art of Pole Dancing Vol 1 and Vol 2. But my back luck continued and they are currently out of stock of Volume 1 but that should arrive by the end of the month.

They've sent me Volume 2, which is for the more advanced dancers and it looks awesome but it's made me aware of how much strength and flexibility is needed to really do these moves. I've done a couple of the ones I can do and I'm still learning how to make them look good.

I've also been trying to go upside and I've been pestering my colleague who knows a teacher to drill her for some tips on how to go upside down and bless her, she really pulled through. (I can now get upside down, but immediately start sliding and can't figure out how to stick!)

Again, loads of core strength and flexibility is needed to get it right so I attempted to go to a Yoga class, but as is my luck, it's postponed for 2 weeks and I've signed up for a Pilates class that starts next week (hopefully!).

Most of the time I'm learning or practising pole tricks. I'm also working on a new dance routine because it's really fun to do. I've been doing a bit of jogging for about 20 – 30 minutes a couple of times a week and some core work, just not enough I think!

I'm thinking about making a video catalog of the pole tricks and moves that I can do.

Anyway, I'm really aware that I've become a pole bore but I'm trying to correct this!

My Pole Dance Routine

Yay! I completed my pole dancing beginners course. For graduation we had to put together a routine to showcase all the moves we learned and below is the video of my routine.

I picked AC/DC's You Shook Me All Night Long to dance to because it's a great song to dance to and I hope you think I did a decent job at fitting my dance moves to the music. For my costume I choose a school girl outfit as a nod to Angus Young. It was a bit nerve wracking dancing to an audience too but in some ways the whole experience reminded me of the (very) old days when I was in the majorettes.

I'm already selecting my song and costume for my next routine - this is so much fun!



I realise with the AC/DC soundtrack and the aussie flag in the background you maybe confused so I just want to clear this up:

Ya Wee Dancer!

I'm about to complete the beginners pole dancing course. It's been great fun and hard work; very hard work at times, so much so that my muscles were shaking with fatigue, but it's been great learning something new that's so different.

I excitedly tell people about my new activity and try to describe the athleticism, strength and agility that I, yes *me* somehow, I managed to pull it off and do a wonderwoman into dizzy first time and almost no one gets it first time!

But sadly I say "pole dance" and some people hear "sex industry".

I expected a few people to poke fun a little bit in a friendly banter way, and I can laugh along with that, but others go too far. They audibly make assumptions about my sex life, some confuse pole dancing with stripping and lap dancing, others inappropriately ask me how much my husband enjoys my pole dancing and someone even suggested to a male colleague that I perform at his bachelor party!

These comments are often embarrassing for me but it also belittles what I'm actually doing. I'm fairly certain that if they ever tried pole-dancing they would soon realise that it's not just doing a sexy strut around a pole, I work hard to learn the spins and moves and some of them are complicated and others just hurt (have you ever pulled your body weight up a vertical pole and then wrapped your legs around it and let go?).

Because I get wound up and frustrated by the sole focus on the sexy side of pole-dancing I tend to argue to these people that pole-dancing is not sexy and instead is a vigorous strength and endurance workout. And this is true, I've certainly received lots of comments and compliments about how much trimmer I'm looking, but I should not deny the sexy side of pole-dancing.

Dancing is sexy.

Throughout history dancing has been used for a whole bunch of things and sex is part of that. Even cave people used it as a means of wooing a mate and things haven't changed much (been to a night club recently?)

For graduation I have to put together a routine to showcase all I've learned. I'm going to embrace the sexy side of pole-dancing and if I can pull off those gymnastic moves and still look alluring and confident then I'll have accomplished something to be proud of.

A New Activity

I decided to try something a little different last night, to break out of my comfort zone. It's something that I've wanted to try for a while – Pole Dancing!

After a quick Google search I found Pole Hunnies and got in touch with them.

I roped in my niece and we both went to a taster class to see what it was all about. I wasn't sure what to expect. There were two instructors one was average height and very lean, the other was short like me and told us she was 14 stone (89kg). The shorter girl had an injury (not from pole dancing!) that meant she wasn't supposed to demonstrate any of the moves (she did show us one though). The other girl did most of the demonstrating and she wore ordinary workout wear that I would wear to the gym – except for her amazing flashing high heels of course!

There were about 8 of us in the class and we started with walking around the pole to get comfortable. We then learned a few moves, a couple of different spins called Fireman and Dizzy and then we learned how to put it all together as a routine.

Most of the time we were either concentrating on what we were trying to do or laughing at ourselves doing what felt like ridiculous things. It certainly wasn't at all sexy! It was however, a huge amount of fun and gave me a laugh. And even though every muscle in body aches today, I'm going to sign up for more classes – I just need to come up with a Pole name ???