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Hi Claire! Cool to see you on SV! I'm Meagan – we met for a second at the Pole Con in the shuttle to the convention center on Friday. Hope the Con was awesome for you! I had a great time, I wish there had been more hours in the day to do it all!

Have fun on SV – it's a great community.

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Sorry I didn’t check this until today guys. I’m in the Pole Jam this morning. I’m chilling outside the X Pole workshop room right now.

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Hey ladies! Leaving tomorrow morning – so exciting!

Is anyone else Beta testing the new Pole Fit shorts from Bad Kitty? (So cool that they are doing that, by the way!!)

If any of you are tweeting, Jennifer Michelle (@poleskivvies) and I (@meaganoff) are using the hastag #polecon for Pole Con related tweets!

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The lessons worked on my PS3 before the Veena site redesign. They have not worked since. I'm not terribly worried about it since I can pull them up on my iPad and other devices – just more of an FYI. 🙂

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Hey gals! I just wanted to make sure everyone saw that X Pole is giving away private lessons with featured instructors at the Pole Con over on Facebook. I won one with Jamilla last week (WOO!!!) – they are giving away one with Natasha Wang on Monday!!! Make sure you "like" their FB page for details and good luck!!

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I just got a Travelocity notice that they have a fare for $144 RT from Chicago! I didn't look too closely at it as I am already booked…

But for anyone interested, it's out there. And there may be lower fares for other cities as well.

Ryssa– I would LOVE to see more pole wear vendors – I feel like there are a lot of casual & practice wear vendors, and not a ton of performance wear / 'costume' type vendors. That is my dream for the Convention… Casual wear is good, too, though – I can always add rhinestones later… 🙂

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I hadn't been on the site in a while – saw they added a workshop with Marlo, but it's the same time as Becca Butcher – shoot! I would love a handstand class! Anyone who's taking it will have to tell me all about it! 🙂

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Natasha is so incredible! Congrats to her, I’m sure everyone was wonderful though! Can’t wait to hear about the performances and everyone’s stories of the weekend!!

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So I have been stretching 6 days a week for the past two weeks now. I'm doing a version of the Splits in 6 Weeks program, combined with Dara Torres' stuff, and some stretches from my Aerial Circus class… And not only has my progress been much better than before… A magical thing happened today…

I LIKED stretching!! It felt good!! I mean, still stretchy / ouchy the way that it is when your muscle fibers are lengthening, but… I liked it! I got a nice warm feeling in my leg muscles when I slid into the splits!! I have always HATED stretching. This, is, like, crazytown. I think I'm more excited / astounded by this fact than I am about being really close on my right side.

If this goes well for a few mroe weeks, I'll do a vid of my modified routine in case it helps anyone else…

Anyone else learning to love stretching?

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MizVix – Why would you think someone would tell you that it's bad? I would love it if I could do better meal plans. I love to cook and I'm getting quite good at it – but looking at the ingredients, I always feel like I am making so much… and then we eat, it and it's all gone!! LOL

I totally second MizVix's advice – even though I find it hard to do myself! Making a ton of something fresh  / from scratch and eating it for 3 – 4 days is a great way to go.

I completely agree with ChemmieG – you have to find something you can stick with in the long run. Most clean (or clean-ish – we all need cheats now and then!) diets have an adjustment period as you get the bad stuff out of your system. But if you're finding whatever you're doing hard to sustain, or you feel badly, you might have to re-examine what you're doing.

If you have access to a CSA (community sponsored agriculture) group or a farmer's market, it's a really good way to get local, healthy, tasty fresh food. Some even deliver!

Also, I'm totally addicted to coconut water (not coconut milk) It's light and sweet and a small package is only 60 calories. So refreshing after a workout. I have subbed out coco water, squares of dark chocolate, and dessert teas for actual dessert on most night.

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I have had great success with Paleo / Primal, which is basically a whole foods based diet. Higher fat/protein, lower carb, with all of the carbs coming from lots of fruit and veg. Basically Gluten free.

This website and the accompanying book outline a very easy to stick to diet (and it really is the true meaning of diet – it's a lifestyle change, not something you do for a period of time): http://www.marksdailyapple.com/

Lower carb got a bit of bad rap with Atkins, so I was really skeptical at first. But this diet has nothing to do with ketosis. The premise is that low carb isn't magic – calorie deficit is still what is making you lose weight when you get down to it — it's just that fat and protein provide a high degree of satiety – meaning it keeps you full for longer, so you don't have cravings.

I'm not involved with the products or the book or anything, I and my husband have just had really good success with it. (He's lost 30 lbs as well.)

It's really similar to "Clean eating" or "Whole9" and lots of other whole food based diets that have sprung up. It actually has a lot in common with the Raw Food diet in terms of what is allowed and being whole foods based, it just doesn't require that food is kept below 118 degrees (raw), and there is no goal of eliminating meat from your diet. (If you are a vegan or vegetarian, I do recommend the Raw Food diet. It was just too hard to maintain without the meat-based protein.)

Here are my progress pics / stats from the Primal Forum I'm on, if you're interested: http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b374/meaganoff/WeightLossVisual.jpg

 

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I'm another 1983 baby, wicked song choices! I just made a playlist.

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Sorry if this is too "new-agey" or something… but what about a video having to do with spring symbolizing new growth?

Lots of ways to interpret this. Could show your growth as a dancer, could wear green and have to do with plants, could be about the using the vertical space on the pole…. Growth of yourself personall, growth of your family…. Lots of ideas.

I like open-ended stuff… Although that may be too open-ended.

 

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Or, for the locals, more than one date! 🙂 I know us out-of-towners (me and Dayanara) will be in at different times in May so if there's more than one event, that's cool too! It's all good.

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Did anyone pick a date? I'm starting to book theatre tickets and events during my time in London so I'd love to know about a meetup soonish! 😀