Welcome, everyone! Active Folks Over Fifty is a place to talk about fitness, exercise, and healthy eating information as it relates to weight loss and/or maintenance--and also about any work, fun, hobby, or volunteer activites you're engaged in. In other words, the active part of your life!

Just a few guidelines for this thread:

- Raves about grandkids or ranting about your kids is out of bounds.

- Discussion of your illnesses, conditions, treatments, and medical procedures in general is also out of bounds on this thread. So is whining about old age!

- Positive stories of vacations taken, volunteer activities, or achievements at work or elsewhere are highly encouraged! As are recommendations for books, movies, lively discussions of weight related issues, etc.

Join in!
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Good morning! We had been discussing to what extend government should attempt to legislate food consumption, based on an article posted by Spinymouse:

http://usgovinfo.about.com/cs/consumer/a/aathinner.htm

Feel free to comment on it! Or, on anything else you'd like...

Jay

Good morning everyone!

It is just starting to get light here. I looked out the window and saw fog! We don't get much fog in the desert, so I looked again. It is smoke! We are miles and miles from any fire, but the air is full of smoke. We had some yesterday, but it is much worse today.

A couple of days ago we had a small earthquake. Mother nature is keeping us Californians on our toes.

I'll tell you what, though, I am very grateful to live out here where there are no skyscrapers to fall on me in an earthquake, and nothing that burns very well on the ground. Besides that, it is peaceful.

It's sure quiet on the weekends sometimes at 3FC.

Yesterday I went to the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg. This is one of the largest single collections of Dali's work, and we had a wonderful time.

Dali's earliest painting is there--a little postcard sized oil painting that is thought to have been done when he was 6 years old. Of course, he was not a surrealist painter at the time! It's a little landscape. The museum also has his last painting, which is on loan from Spain.

Dali was always interested in current findings in science and mathematics as well as world events, and many of his paintings reflect that interest. Since he painted into the 1980s, much of his work's topics are quite contemporary. They contain image references to DNA, the atomic age, Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and so on.

I had not realized how really huge some of his paintings are (not all, though--most are normal sized or small). In one gallery are four paintings that are roughly 13+ feet high by 9+ feet wide. And they are full of symbolism, hidden images, and multiple meanings. They bear a lot of study!

Here's a link to the Dali Museum:

http://www.salvadordalimuseum.org/home.html

Jay

I didn't know he started painting at such a young age. Obviously very talented. I liked the short article called "curator's choice". I like to read the analysis.

Now that you have seen some of Dali's works in person, would you like to have something of his in your own home? My impression is that I would not, because I tend to like things that are serene/relaxing to look at or else decorative - ie the colors are right. Very shallow, I know. Sometimes when I see a certain artist's works in person, I change my preconceived notions of decorativeness or desireability.

I have been to the Thiessen museum in Madrid. They have a variety of well known artists displayed.

On a much more mundane level: DH and I rewired one of our circuit breaker panels yesterday. I tried to hire someone to do this with no luck. So we got a couple of books and I figured out how to do it. Cost us the price of the books and four new circuit breakers. I am really proud of myself for being able to follow the directions and finally see the light .

Working on the electric box required lots of sitting on the ground, getting up, sitting down, going to look for a tool etc etc. I am a bit stiff this morning. Also I did crunches in the car almost all the way home Friday.

I didn't do that well with my eating yesterday. Too much fat. We had left over Kentucky fried. I removed all skin and coating and wiped with a paper towel - man, what a lot of gunk on it. I am sure it was still awful, fat and calorie wise.

Gail - I agree with you about wanting serene looking art in my home. I am amazed at Dali's work but I especially don't like seeing humans distorted. It gives me the creeps. But then so do clowns, for the same reason. I have a good freind who has a lot of art in his home consisting of distorted people. I have to avoid looking at it. That sort of stuff is what nightmares are made of.

Well, that sounds interesting JayEll. What I did this weekend was revamp my exercise program again. I had spent some time reviewing some of the workout dvds that I have to determine which ones I could do right now.
I spent about an hour making out the spreadsheet on my pc. Now, I have my revised workout program in place.

I did a lower body Pilates dvd on Saturday morning. I was thrilled that I was able to keep up with the ladies on the dvd. Then, on Sunday I did one from Prevention for dancing. What I like about this one is that it is divided into parts so you can mix and match different 10 minute segments. I figure I will never get bored with that one. I did the warm up, the ballet one and the cool down. I used to take dance when I was a youngster and I have wanted to find one that I could do. I did!

So, now I will be walking on my treadmill 20 minutes a day M-F, lifting free weights Tu-Th-SA, and then doing the two dvds above 5x a week.

I have energy to burn after that too! I am busy painting and wallpapering my kitchen besides working full time.

That's my healthy "activity" to share!! I figure this program should keep me motivated and stimulated for a couple of months before I need to up the ante.

Wow! I am really, really impressed, Pat. I have trouble just getting in a little walk. I am going back to my regular schedule tomorrow, so let's hope it includes exercise. I have such a problem making myself move.

On Sunday I trimmed our bushes and hedges with a power trimmer. I thought it would take, oh, half an hour--but it took two hours by the time I was done with raking up the clippings. According to FitDay I burned a lot of calories--and I hope that's true, because I just couldn't quite imagine going to the fitness center after that....

But today is a new day!

On the art topic--I have a few artist friends, and so I have some original art. Some of it isn't what you would hang for decorative reasons, but some is. Probably people who would have enough money to own a Dali aren't interested in the decorative aspect.

Dali's art has many different topics--and it changed over the many years he lived. There are some pieces that I find too disturbing to hang over my fireplace, say--they would dominate the room--but many others are quite acceptable.

Here's an example of a piece that has many interesting elements--it is called 'Still Life--Fast Moving':

http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/L/A-Robe...gstilllife.jpg

Jay


Jay

So here I am, back on my regular schedule. I did my walk this morning. I think I am going to alternate doing the one mile with the two mile until I get into a little better condition. I can do it, but I feel almost too tired after I do it two days in a row, and it is even harder to get going the next time. We'll see. As long as I do something......

I am still parking my car way out in the parking lot at work, grocery, and Wal-Mart.

The last couple of times I walked, I listened to one of my books on CD. Part of me thinks I should not do that - rather I should enjoy the scenery and meditate. Another part of me finds it much easier to do the exercise when I have the tape to listen to. So....I will probably let myself listen.

Hi everybody . . .

I'm feeling brighter this morning and the sun is shining (mostly) too. Have a great moving and shaking day gang . . .

Gail--do I hear those new shoes calling?

No big excursions for me today--but I did my morning walk. I love my walks!

Does anyone here do folk dancing? I'm thinking of possibly joining a group. Many years ago I did lots of international folk dance--Greek, Balkan, etc.

Jay

A sympathetic Scot summed it all up very neatly in the remark, "You should make a point of trying every experience once, excepting incest and folk dancing."
Sir Arnold Bax, Farewell my Youth (1943)

Seriously, I would like to try it also. Folk dancing, that is.

Spiny!

Jay