Lift it up. Put it down. Repeat.

Hooray! Excellent news.

Once estranged for some time, I have recently re-connected with an old friend and roommate from my undergrad. We shared a mutual love of bad TV and Prince, and a hate of our stats prof, and now she works in the building next to me!

In the intervening time it seems she got awesome with the weight lifting and even entered a figure competition a while ago. Although there will be no grease or spray-tan this time around, we are going to lift weights together this Thursday and she's going to bring her good workouts. We're going to women's-only gym hour, which roughly translates to nobody-in-the-gym hour, so all the more room for us to sweat and yell and maybe cry a little. I'm excited! I've dabbled in lifting weights for a long time now, but haven't seen any real results because I have no idea how much weight I should be lifting and/or reps/sets I should do of said exercises. Mostly I just lift until my muscles scream and I think that I'll be sore the next day. So I'm pumped to work out with someone who knows what she's doing.

As further punishment, we are then going to dinner with our other old roommates from undergrad, who neither of us have spoken to since we parted ways those years ago. Neither of us can say with a straight face that we are even remotely excited about this, but we have already agreed to go and have decided that we are probably going to need to drink a lot so I hope there is cheap beer. And, since the idea of showing up there looking anything less than completely put together and happy and successful (despite what is actually going on) is out of the question, tonight I will be getting a haircut. Cross your fingers she doesn't make me look like a crazy wizard.

In other news, in the name of doing stuff, I have filled out a volunteer application for the John Howard Society of Toronto. Basically they help people who are in trouble with the law, or homeless, or often both, with resources and bettering their lives. This didn't totally come out of nowhere - I went to a lecture last friday here given by a nice lady who works there and does all sorts of neat research about homelessness, addiction, and incarceration, and how it's all one big vicious cycle. It got me thinking anyway, and I'm going to take a stab at working with them in some capacity for no better reason than because I want to. They look like a place that does REAL things for people, and doesn't just "promote awareness" all the time. Maybe I'm missing something, but I think being "aware" of cancer/aids/homelessness/killer bees/etc. seems like a whole lot of talking and not a whole lot of doing. So I will not be promoting "awareness" of homeless people. I think the fact that they camp on the street where you can see them makes everyone pretty much aware that it's a problem in this city.

Hopefully they call me.

Happy Monday - peace out! :)