Today was a rest day from the gym, but I still had two sessions of cardio to sweat through. Uggh! If this entry is a bit short, forgive me. It's a bit late, and I'm exhausted. Luckily, tomorrow is a Labor Day and holiday, so I can catch up on a bit of sleep.

I've been considering making another career change. Well, personal training wasn't really a career for me. It was a stepping stone away from teaching, for that was beginning to rule my life and emotions, and I had begun to reach a stage of burn out. But I am considering doing substitute teaching, and in this aspect I can still work with kids, teach lessons, but not have to deal with some of the red tape and added stress that took away some of the love of the job. I'll let y'all know more on this as the weeks go by.

In the meantime, I'm enjoying being back in the gym, and while I gripe and complain about eating healthy and sticking to a strict regimen, deep down, I truly enjoy it and the results that come with it.

Normally I'd stick in some intellectual quote from some quintessential author, but my brain cells have begun to doze, so I'll just let Winnie the Pooh (my absolute favorite animated character) do the talking: "When having a smackerel of something with a friend, don't eat so much that you get stuck in the doorway trying to get out." Why oh why didn't someone forewarn me of this before I ate everything in sight in England?! lol!

Goodnight!

Jodi

I recently arrived back to the States and let me tell you, ten hours on a flight is the not my idea of a good time. Eating a whole can of Pringles during the trip did help to soothe some of the jet lag, but it didn't soothe my mind. I walked off that flight looking like a beached whale, for I was holding more water than the Hoover Dam from all the sodium and Italian food and chocolate and ice cream and...oh, you get the picture.

So, it's embarrassing to state this, but I did gain about 15 pounds in about two and a half weeks, but I've dropped five of those this past week. See, most people don't realize that the competitors remain that lean only for the weeks leading up to the show. If you examine the photos in the Michael Cox gallery, then you can see the typical me that walks around on an average day during the winter months. The competition photos are me with about five coats of tan, five inches of make up, and five weeks of hell...ummm...I mean dieting and busting my butt on the cardio machines.

Anyway, I was just asked by Gene Carangal of www.steelfitness.com to do another photo shoot during the Ed and Betty Pariso show in Dallas, Texas, at the end of the September. So it's back to two-a-day cardio sessions and healthy eating, though I did get a yummy cheat meal tonight, which I spent with my parents.

I'm also back in the gym and hitting the weights really hard. It's nice to be back on schedule and though I don't have a show for over eight months, I do still have a goal to achieve and items to accomplish in terms of working on my physique and continuing to mold it so that it's good enough to earn a pro card next year.

Speaking of which, I have lots more to tell y'all about the show. Now that I'm back in town, I promise to write in the journal regularly, so expect lots of details about the show and about my trip to London as the weekend continues.

Be sure to sign the message board and let me know what you would like me to include in the journal. I'm looking forward to making this a daily habit, especially since I'm consistently in the middle of a novel and always have new thoughts, opinions, and ideas regarding the material. As of now, I have just over a hundred pages left in John Steinbeck's East of Eden. I highly recommend this, though it is a bit of a lengthy novel. But it is well worth it, for the discussion of man being inherently good or truly evil as he enters society is the focal point.

That's all for now. Have a great evening (and happy Labor Day weekend to all Americans)!

Jodi

Let's see, where did I leave off last time? Oh yes, I'm at the La Guardia Airport in New York just days before the Figure Nationals. Well, let's just hold that train of thought for a minute. I have to step onto a soap box for a bit.

Recently, Tracey Greenwood won the Jan Tana Fitness show and the sparks of controversy have begun to fly higher than the ones off your dad's barbecue grill when he's attempting to make hamburgers. It seems that some didn't agree that she met the qualifications in her mandatory moves of her routines. And some think she is too vascular and too muscular. I won't touch the first one, for I wasn't there to witness the routines, but I will stick my nose into the second one and ask a few opinions (we have to get a discussion going on the members' message board somehow, right?!). Since when is a fitness competitor going to be deemed too muscular and what is occuring with fans of today? How is it when Monica Brant won in 1998, fans went crazy? (I personally thought she looked the best and thought that figure was going to expect that type of physique from the competitors; my head is shaking in disappointment right now.) What do you think is too hard for fitness, too hard for figure? What should the differences be between bodybuilding, fitness, and figure? I have my opinions, but I'll wait to divulge them until y'all start stating yours on the message board.

By the way, those Gene Carangal pictures (which are the bomb, if I do say so myself...lol; in all honesty, though, Carangal's gift as a photographer put these at the top of the list for the work I've done in 2003).

Okay, I know y'all are on the edge of your seats, awaiting to hear what happened at the show. Well, even if you're not, I'm going to go on with the story...lol!

New York always scares me a bit. So many people rushing here, rushing there. Remember, I'm a Southern girl. I move in backwards time! I'm getting knocked into by everyone as I try to lug my bags (there were about six of them...hey, I had a lot to pack!) and navigate my way through the crowd. Once outside, a limousine driver accosted me immediately, and I decided to go to the Marriott Financial Center in style. An hour and seventy dollars later, I arrived, checked in, and rode the elevator up to the 17th floor, where a corner room where a view of the Hudson bay from two different angles awaited me.

The weather in New York was quite breezy and tolerable compared to last year in August, when the girls nearly melted in the sweltering heat. You just don't want to be sweating (oops, wait...girls glisten, men sweat...lol!) when you have five coats of Protan on and two inches of make up adorning the face and only a can of hairspray holding your hair in place.

It didn't take long for me to settle in, munch on some egg whites, and stare at the Protan bottle, knowing that the inevitable was about to occur. Tanning is an interesting (and I use the word loosely) process. I don't know how all the other girls do it, but I am fair skinned and even though I've been attending the denomic tanning salon for the shows this year (Junior USA's revealed that I was distant cousin of the Hulk, and I didn't think that green-tinted skin was very appealing for the stage), I still have trouble with the spray on tanning process. Basically, my nerves come out to play when I begin to tan for the show. It's a sign that the I'm truly about to compete.

Anyway, I diverge from the topic, which you'll notice I do regularly. My tanning routine is this: two coats Thursday night, rinse off in the shower Friday morning, three coats Friday, hope and pray all Friday night, wake up Saturday, peek out of one eye while prayers are still running through the mind, take a look in the mirror, breathe a sigh of relief, look at pasty white face and mangled hair, and scream in fright...lol! Lots of make up is needed to match the face to the newly bronzed body.

Well, this particular Thursday, I didn't get to the tanning ordeal right away. I had to call all my friends, of course! I talked with Lesli Russell for a while, and she was kind enough to part with her asparagus, for I somehow forgot the one-pound bag I meant to pack. I took a look at her, provided a few suggestions, helped her to calm down (she looked great, by the way; that girl has worked hard this year!), and sent her on her merry way. Then I called Dina al Sabah and chatted with her for an hour. She gave me my snickerdoodle cookies and took a shovel...ahem...handful of my chocolatey chocolate brownies and then left. I was finally able to begin tanning and was up until after midnight waiting for each coat to dry. Mind you, I had about three more tasty meals throughout the evening.

Wow! I'm exhausted already! I don't know how I keep my endurance going (adrenaline, huh?) before a show, but you can see that there is so much to do, and I haven't even gotten into Friday's events. I'll get there eventually. Just be patient!

In the meantime, I arrive home from London on Monday and will be able to write in the journal on a much more regular basis. I do hope y'all are reading. If not, then I guess I'll just have to laugh at my moronic jokes all by myself. What else is new?! lol!

I'm off to eat a bowl of cereal (cereal is so yummy! I never get it during the in season, or in the off season, for that matter, so this is quite nice!). Have a great Sunday!

Jodi

I want to begin today’s entry with a huge congratulations to Dina al Sabah for her recent win in the pro figure division at the Jan Tana. Definitely visit her site and extend your own accolades. She has finally qualified for the Olympia and is quite deserving of it! She has been a consistent support base for me this year, and I’m sooo proud of her.

Okay, now on to me. I’m not an only child or anything! I thought I would take y’all back to the day that I traveled to New York for the Figure Nationals, so you could traipse along the same path I took towards my top-five finish.

The chaos had actually begun on the Wednesday before the show. Three days’ worth of food had to be prepared and packed into the cooler, for I would be traveling to New York on Thursday, preparing for the show on Friday, and standing on stage on Saturday, and I couldn’t stray from the diet. With each meal consisting of either egg whites, steak, chicken, turkey, fish, or protein powder, you can just imagine the mess I made in the kitchen. So, 120 cooked egg whites, two pounds of chicken, one pound of turkey, half a pound of fish, and a bag full of protein powder later (I haven’t even begun to discuss the ordeal of packaging the oats, the baking potatoes, and the yams), I was finally ready to collapse into bed at about two in the morning. My mother was arriving only six hours later to cart both me and my multitude of bags to the airport to catch a 10 a.m. flight.

Now, I’m grateful to Tim Gravens and Steven Elliott Hendrix—two photographers whom I work closely with—for picking up the tab on my flight arrangements, but I ended up traveling via Air Tran Airways (no it’s not the same as ATA, as I was soon to discover) and had a connection in Atlanta. So, remember the five million pounds of food that I had stuffed into the cooler in the wee hours of the morning? Yeah, it was going to sit in that cooler for the majority of the day. I was on my knees praying that the dozen or so ice packs would keep the food cold enough until I could convince the New York hotel manager that I needed a refrigerator much more than the 260-pound bodybuilder who was also carrying five tons of food with him (I succeeded in this, by the way).

But I stray from the topic. I wasn’t ready on time for my mother. Surprise, surprise. One of my biggest flaws is that I run late. Everywhere! I had actually overslept. Likely excuse, I know, but I had turned the alarm off when I had meant to simply slam the snooze button, and thus, I had lost an hour that I needed to do the last minute things (like pack). Suffice it to say, I was in a panic. Then, when we couldn’t figure out which terminal the flight was departing from, my mother fell into a panic. And when an entire family cut in front of me in the line and later the security guard began searching my luggage and re-arranging (i.e., making a mess of) my clothes and shoes, I continued to panic. And when I rushed to the gate, desperate for a bathroom (you try drinking a gallon of water in just three hours and then see if you can make it through a two-hour flight) and finding the women’s restroom closed for cleaning (they sure do have awesome timing, huh?), I had to make an impromptu decision. Suffer or sneak into the men’s restroom. You guessed it. I have no shame. I rushed into the men’s room, did my thing, came out, and began washing my hands. A very perplexed look spread across the face of the man next to me. He turned to me and said, “I could have sworn this was the men’s room.” I nodded and stated, “Yes, you’re correct.” And I hightailed it out of there.

Can you believe all of this occurred before I even took my first step onto the plane? My anxiety level only rose after that. Remember the cooler with the tonnage of food? Well, it wouldn’t fit in the luggage compartments above the seats, and it wouldn’t fit under the seat no matter how much I shoved, pushed, grunted, and pleaded with the stubborn object. And the stewardesses began to lecture me about having objects obstructing leg space. I tried to explain that I didn’t need leg space. I’m 4’11” after all. I practically have no legs. Just kidding. The argument didn’t work with them, so after a few more grunts, shoves, and pushes, I finally got the cooler stuffed under the seat in front of me, and with sweat now pouring down my back in the heat of the airplane (did I mention that I was leaving 103 degree weather in Texas?) I was ready for take off.

Once in Atlanta, I had the luxury of snacking on cold fish while the scent of greasy fries and even greasier cheesesteak sandwiches wafted through the air. I was miserable. To make things even worse, when I got onto the connecting flight, I had to go through the cooler ordeal all over again. I’m pretty sure my blood pressure was off the charts at that point. And as if that wasn’t enough, I also lost my driver’s license. Well, I actually misplaced it. But I wasn’t in the mood to listen to reason and instead decided to freak out about that little incident rather than shuffle through bags to try to find the darned card (why do they make those things so flimsy and tiny?).

So, three hours and several anxiety attacks later, I finally arrived into New York’s lovely and peaceful La Gaurdia airport. And that is where I will leave you for now.

Just know that I’ve been enjoying yummy food and lots of rest and relaxation. Of course, I’ll be back to doing cardio and weight training this week so I can undo some of the damage I’ve caused to my body with the chocolates, ice cream, and cheeseburgers I’ve been munching on.

Enjoy the start to your week!

This will be a quick one and then I'll relay more details as the days go by.

As I'm sure you've already noticed from my homepage, I've finally left a national show with a trophy in hand. In the toughest class at the 2003 Figure Nationals and amongst 40 girls, I received fifth place. I had been hoping for one of the top three slots so that I could end the year as a pro, but I narrowly missed out on this opportunity. Though a bit of disappointment has set in, the thought of quitting has not. I believe next year will be my year, and thus, I am beginning to set the 2004 game plan in motion.

I have two weeks off from the diet. This week is a free-for-all! I've had the wonderful opportunity to visit England and Ireland, so I'm experiencing all types of food! I've had Thai food, true Italian cuisine, American cheeseburgers, and Belgian chocolates! All I can say is, "yum!" I did run a few miles the other day and with all the walking and climbing of steps to get everywhere in London, I'm definitely working off a bit of ice cream and the bites of cheese I've had throughout the week. Next week, I'll get back in the gym and for two weeks will play around with the weights. That means that I won't worry about rep ranges or sets or weight amounts. I'll just enter the weight room, look around, and decide at that moment what I want to do. It's the idea of having the freedom of choice--whether it's in terms of food, cardio choices, or weight training exercises--that excites me the most!

I will soon have photos developed from the competition and will have my webmaster post them in the members' section in the next couple of weeks. I should also have a few photos from England as well. And don't forget my shoot with Brian Moss. It was an absolute success and I shoud have that disk of photos in a month or so. Y'all will be the first ones to see these. A true exclusive!! Don't miss it!

I will write more tomorrow or Saturday, so definitely check back in. I'll describe more about the show, the preparations, the New York experience, and my thoughts on everything, including plans for 2004.

It's almost here! I fly out tomorrow, so don't worry if you don't hear from me for several days. I'll be in New York and won't be able to get back onto the site until early next week. Then I'll relay tons of details about the show, the food, the results, everything!

In the meantime, I'm busy preparing all the food for the next three days. Most people are able to grab a bite to eat at the airport or on the way to the hotel or order room service. A competitor cannot do this, though. When my meals consist of egg whites and oatmeal (plain, no sugar) or tilapia and asparagus spears or turkey breast and a yam (measured out by the ounces), most restaurants or fast food joints are unable to accommodate these requests. So, luckily I found a cooler that has wheels (got it on sale!) and I could basically fit myself in it, so it should be big enough to hold three days' worth of food. Well, I really need four. On Sunday, I'm doing an all day video shoot with Women's Physique World. It will be a gym shoot as well as a bikini and dress shoot, so this will be exciting! I'll be doing bicep curls and leg press and seated rows and whatever else I can think of for the video. This should be available for purchase off of their site (www.wpw.net) by the end of the year. I believe I'll be doing another interview with them as well.

I also have a shoot with Brian Moss, whose photos tend to find their way into Flex and Muscle and Fitness. I'll be working with Boomer and Jabber as well (from www.thevalkyrie.com) in between the prejudging and finals on Saturday. Busy, busy, busy weekend! Somehow, I'll have to find time to nibble on (I mean wolf down) chocolate once the show is finalized Saturday night.

I also talked with Optimum Nutrition last week, and it seems that I will most likely be attending the Olympia and have a booth at which I'll sign pictures and be able to chat with y'all. Let me know on the message board if you'll be attending.

Speaking of which, where are y'all?!! I want to hear from you on the message board. It will be changing format soon, but let me know what suggestions you have for the site and what you like about it. Speak! Speak!

Okay, I'm off to tan for the last time. It's a long flight tomorrow and I'll be happy when I arrive at the hotel and can begin applying the Protan (yes, the orange stuff...but, if done right, it doesn't appear orange on stage). Let the fun begin!!

Thanks for supporting me!

Arrrgg! My back is sore this morning from my workout yesterday. And I did light weights too, in preparation for the show this weekend. I'm off to do 45 minutes of cardio and some posing practice and then to dream about cookies and ice cream and cheeseburgers! I begin packing today and am making oatmeal raisin cookies and brownies for the girls and I backstage when we finish the show Saturday night. We will have a food fest with all the goodies the national-level and pro-level girls are bringing. Lots of fun!

I'm nervous, excited, anxious. Basically, I'm a bundle of energy right now. I have confidence creeping in here and there, but I also am paying close attention to the portions of my physique that need to tighten up and improve by Saturday. You ask how--with only a few days left until the show? Well, playing around with carb intake each day, the types of foods put into the body, and the level of water depletion are all factors in bringing the best physique to the show. It truly is a science, and my physique can change ever so slightly by the day. Luckily, I'm so detail-oriented that I notice these changes and understand what caused them. For example, if I were to eat a Snicker's bar today and cheat on my diet, in one hour, the veins would pop out along my arms and abs, and my muscles would fill out with the fast-acting carbs and the simple sugars. But I would be smoother in two days as a result of the sodium, sugar, and fat levels, which is why I don't cheat on my diet unless it is off season or the days after a show.

So, you can see that every meal, every workout is very important!

Hi, gang! Thank you so much for joining my new members' site and for visiting the "members only" personal journal. I have so many things on my plate right now with the new additions and of course with preparing for Figure Nationals, which are this weekend in New York. After placing sixth at the Junior Nationals just seven weeks ago, I am ready to step on stage and give it a go again.

The training has been a bit rigorous. For almost two months, I have had a total of two days off from working out and doing cardio/sprint training. I'm exhausted! But it is well worth it, for my goal was to come into this show in better shape than I did for Chicago, and I'm hoping this will be seen on Saturday. Either way, I'm pleased with my efforts. I haven't skipped workouts, haven't cheated on my diet, and haven't veered off from the course I've set.

And I've gotten stronger. Last week, I did dumbbell chest press with 45 pound dumbbells for sets of 10, and the hardest part of it was the falling back onto the bench and getting the weights up without straining my left shoulder (I had been in a car accident my last year in college and had injured that shoulder, so it still gives me problems periodically). It was awesome! Of course, leg training is light and with multiple reps and lots of plyometrics and sprinting since I gain muscle in my quads so quickly. In fact, my legs have been my nemesis on the stagefront for quite some time. So, the goal has been to increase size in my shoulders and back and make my waist look smaller and get my legs trimmed down. It's working!!

Speaking of which, I have to go off to the gym to train back for the last time before the show. I end all weight training on Wednesday and travel to New York on Thursday. Woohoo!!! I can't wait.

Stay tuned for more info!

Jodi :)