Anger management skills, estrogen for men, health at every size & more

I had another batch of articles published:

A Review of the Book "Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight". (I have no idea why the whole article published in italics. I didn't do it!)
Where Can a Man Get Estrogen Pills?
Uses of Microsoft Excel Formulas
Anger Management Skills for Teens
Types of Art Careers

What I've been reading

"Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight" by Linda Bacon Ph.D. A solid contribution to the canon of size acceptance literature, with a healthy dose of "how to".

and

"The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay" by Michael Chabon LOVED this book. Much funnier than I expected for a Pulitzer winner.

My full comments on both books here.

Ah, April Fools...

Strangely enough, April Fools always makes me miss my family and feel nostalgic for my childhood. My family really got into the spirit of April Fools in a fun and usually-not-mean way. For instance, I told my mother in a recent phone conversation that I'd learned to make mozzarella from custardfairy , and when I mentioned rennet tablets, she asked if I remembered her having them around the house when I was a kid. I didn't. She used them for a couple different culinary uses, but also for pranking. She would put a rennet tablet in the glasses of milk for us kids so when we went to drink them, they'd be solid.

I remember other pranks, like blue milk and green orange juice. I also tried pranking back, but it was usually lame (fake snake in the bedside lamp) or went horribly awry. I remember putting a wet cloth in my Dad's bed thinking he'd go "Yuck!" when he felt something cold and wet. Being 6 or so at the time, it didn't occur to me that it'd soak into the mattress and make a majorly wet and chilly night's sleep for him. :('

The only really mean prank I remember was my brother A. calling and telling Mom he was on his way home for a surprise visit from college... but no, just an April Fool's joke.

When my sister got married, it was beautiful weather in Michigan and the family camped at a park near Lansing the night before the ceremony. At the time, my brother A. was dating Y., the woman he eventually married. She came along for the trip, and I remember lying in our bunks in the Scamper talking about family traditions. Y. said that when she and her brother were little, her father played an April Fools prank by getting them up around 5 a.m. yelling, "The pig got out! Help me catch it!" They were down in the yard in their pajamas running around the yard before they realized, "Wait, we don't have a pig." (They had owned one but had sold it the previous year.)

So, yeah, I understand why some people are annoyed by April Fools pranking, but it has a special place in my heart, even if I don't do much of it myself these days.

Activity update: Mixin' it up edition

I just realized that I have had a pretty good week as far as mixing things up and not staying in a rut, even if I have kind of fallen down on the regular stretching front.

One: Last Friday, I went for the first outdoor bike ride of the year.

Two: Yesterday, I got in the pool and swam laps for the first time in 2009. I was so out of practice that I was beat and had to climb out after 18 minutes. I just walked around the track and did some stretching for the rest of my workout, but it's good to use muscles in different ways.

Three: Today, I tried out the "Drums Alive!" class I've been curious about. They have an hour-long session on Mondays, but Thursday is just a half-hour quickie class that someone could do on a lunch break. Nevertheless, I worked up more of a sweat than I expected to. This class is good for deflating the ego a bit, for helping you not take yourself or your exercise routine too seriously. I felt really ridiculous, but I suspect many of the other women in the class did as well, and I had fun. The instructor puts out risers topped with exercise balls in rows and gives everybody drum sticks. You pound on the balls in rhythm to such timeless classics as "Love Shack" and "Footloose" and "Mony, Mony" and do some footwork along with it. Because of the way the routine is done,  you end up doing squats and lunges as you change which ball you're pounding on. Plus, she has you do some basic aerobics steps (grapevine, chausses, pony, etc.) and dance around the balls while beating on them. Apparently the hour-long class contains an abs workout at the end, and this one didn't, but that was OK with me. Silly, silly, silly, but definitely not boring!

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