Podcasts, BAs and BJJ

The day after the competition we decided to take it easy. We had a delicious brunch with mountains of crepes and meat pies and all the toppings you could need, then spent the afternoon hanging out and watching movies. The rest of the day was equally as productive, comprising of video games with friends and a few episodes of Breaking Bad (I know, I’m way behind, but I’m getting there)

On Monday it was back to the grind. I spent the afternoon getting ultrasounds for work, then in the evening went to the Women on Screen: Out Loud podcast wrap party. To be completely honest, other than the first Serial and Chris Hardwicke’s nerdist interviews that kept me awake during my Montreal-Toronto drives before I made the big move, I don’t really listen to podcasts. I did listen to this one though, to prepare for the event, but I went more with the intention of meeting and listening to the cool producers who would be on the panel.

This quickly changed as I listened to the powerhouse women talk. I think one thing that stopped me from ever even thinking of doing a podcast was the fact that I don’t really consider myself to be mainstream funny. I mean, yes, I think I’m funny, but you have to get to know me to catch on to it, and you have to remember the initial conversations that I’m making the jokes on. Let’s just say it’s not funny for everyone. However, this panel was really inspiring, and though the women were all hilarious, their podcasts weren’t necessarily all comedic. They dealt with mental health and diversity and women trying to change the industry and getting to know/share how badass one of their mothers is. I’m not saying I’m off to start a podcast ASAP, but the panel definitely made it feel possible and achievable, even for me

On Tuesday and Wednesday I did some Brand Ambassador work at a mall, which basically consisted of entertaining children, so right up my alley. Afterwards I went to BJJ, where on Tuesday we reviewed the matches from the tournament to learn from our mistakes, and on Wednesday we did Day 2 technique. My elbow still hurt from the competition, so I was cautious in my rolls, and I started working on things that I don’t usually work on. For instance, I will usually stay at the bottom when I am in mount and work on a sneaky Dave, usually getting a half guard, sometimes getting full guard. Sneaky Dave involves pushing or blocking with the elbow, which I wasn’t down for, so I bridged and rolled instead. Chokes are usually the submission I am best at, but a lot of them involved muscles my arm didn’t want me to use, so I had to try other things. But most of all, I was terrified of another Americana, which I knew would hurt my arm because it would basically be repeating the injury, so I fought to not get into that position. Watching these rolls, I might call them lazy, but I was working on and acquiring a bunch of new skills.

On Thursday I was at 4 points, helping out with the March break. Most of the kids were new to me, but by the end of the day, I discovered I can do L-sits for very brief periods of time, and the kids made a short film. As in they came up with a concept, cast it, chose the scenes they would need to tell their story, found costumes and props, then the 10 of them organized themselves so we could film it. It definitely makes me feel like I have absolutely no excuse to not be creating shorts with my friends every weekend. Any takers?

When camp was done, we went to see Captain Marvel. Apparently, he isn’t the only one who didn’t like it, but I loved it. I thought it was funny, nostalgic, revealed so much backstory about beloved characters, got me excited about Endgame, and gave little girls an awesome female superhero to look up to. And I’m not just talking about Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel. I want to see where Monica’s bravery and determination took her, what Maria accomplished since the 90s, and have more Dr. Wendy Lawsons out there. There was a moment during the movie, I can’t remember where, when I thought “I hope this becomes the norm someday. That when my daughter watches a movie about a female superhero with strong, powerful females supporting her (or trying to take her down), she takes it for granted.”

On Friday I ended up running around from picking up cheques to ultrasounds to a fitting, topping the day off with some Brazilian jiu-jitsu. The class was 2 hours because we did Friday drills, learnt some stretches to take care of our bodies, then made sure to get in a few rolls at the end. Well, the others did. My first roll was with a guy who got an Americana on me and it was all downhill from there. But, I did get to hang out with Ayisha and make plans to take over the world/take the world by storm, so it was all good!

On Saturday, I taught the kids class for 4-6 year olds, the age at which absolutely everything they do is the cutest thing ever, so you have to constantly be on guard to make sure they actually learn things. I ended up hanging around and helping out/attending all the classes that day, which included a lot of reviewing tournament matches and coming up with ways to get ourselves out of the jams we put ourselves into.

After open mat, we met up with some friends of his and ate so much food. Ciao Europa is a little Italian restaurant in Liberty Village where the portions are humongous and the food is delicious. They were having a special of 3 courses for 27$, so I got fried ravioli (about 7-10 in my basket? I took no pictures and didn’t count because I was too busy savoring every bite), calabrese pizza (thin crust, sausage, fresh mozzarella…if only there was more of it) and Italian donuts with honey, cocoa powder and a white glaze (there were at least 10 of them, and they weren’t all mini). It was absolutely fabulous, and totally worth every calorie.

Sunday I worked as a standardized patient, but the students never actually used us, so I got to know a lot about my fellow SP, and got a lot of personal work done. When my shift ended, we watched Triple Frontier. Netflix had a booth at the car show in Toronto, so I had been waiting to see it for a while. I love almost every single one of the actors in it, so I may have been slightly more involved while watching, because I was convinced someone was going to die. I was definitely way too worried about fictional characters.

“Most people focus on the wrong thing; They focus on the result, not the process. The process is the sacrifice; it’s all the hard parts – the sweat, the pain, the tears, the losses. You make the sacrifices anyway. You learn to enjoy them, or at least embrace them. In the end, it is the sacrifices that must fulfill you.”

-Ronda Rousey