Haute Haute Haute

 

We were not actually awoken by Dave, though we would have been if not for the time change between our state and his. Jess and I do not, as a rule, like getting up early. 9am-10am is our favourite time to arise as it’s late enough to enjoy sleeping but early enough, in our mind, to have a full day to get things done. So, waking up at 7am would have been a challenge but it wasn’t 7am to us, it was 9am, and we were both awake and getting ourselves ready by the time Dave came knocking telling us to get workout gear on and be ready to go by 7:30am. We were out the door at exactly 7:33am and headed to Colorado’s Haute Yoga studio for a session of actual Hot Yoga. We took off our shoes at the entrance and headed to our respective locker rooms to drop off anything we had and head to the yoga room. The thermostat said the room was 103 degrees and boy did it feel like it! Jess and I live in Florida though so we didn’t think theheat would be too much of an issue for us. We were right and wrong. 

Dave socialized a little with the folks he knew as we all stretched and got ready. Jess and I have never taken a yoga session so we didn’t know what to expect and just kinda did whatever stretches we knew. I had no idea how long the class was or what was going to occur at all, but that’s the magic of travel I guess! At least in our experience with our friends. Guess that might not be a universal experience though. After a few minutes of that the instructor came in and got class started. I was doing alright for the first bit, the breathing stretches, but when we moved onto the standing stretches suddenly my stomach felt violently ill. I sank down briefly to take a rest and see if it would pass but when it didn’t I fully left the room to get ill in the bathroom. Jess followed me to make sure I was fine, but I think she too felt a little sick, though not as bad as me. We think this sudden onset of nausea was a combination of things. Jess and I are good in the heat, we’ve been lifeguards in Florida so we’ve not only been in the heat but we’ve worked in it. But we didn’t eat anything this morning, and we’d been drinking the night before, and both hadn’t gotten much sleep, and we were likely experiencing jetlag, and Colorado is at a much higher altitude than Florida, so best bet is as soon as we started working out in a high temperature with no food in our stomach in all these conditions our body just tapped out.

Not for long though! After a few minutes of calm in the bathroom I made my way out of the bathroom, rejoined Jess in the locker room, and we headed back to class. We’d missed a few poses but we jumped back in and caught up. We did a few more standing poses that didn’t make my stomach feel amazing but I wasn’t as bad as before so I kept with it. It wasn’t long until we moved onto sitting poses and I was fine through those! Jess and I both agreed we don’t do well with holding our arms up or in poses but our legs are quite flexible and all the sitting poses agreed with us nicely! All in all, we survived and felt rather accomplished with ourselves even if we did have to tap out for a few minutes. Everyone was very nice to us also, which always makes me feel better about having not done excellent but as good as I could. Jess and I took a bit in the locker rooms to get ourselves together as we changed from our sweat soaked, and I do mean soaked, workout gear into our change of clothes. Before we left the studio, however, I notices they sold incense and despite having plans to go to the renaissance faire tomorrow I can’t say for certain any vendors will be selling incense, which seems probably silly as one assumes there is always going to be incense vendors at renaissance faires, and yet my past two experiences have given me no cheer on the matter. Two faires, no incense vendors. There were some places that sold a little assortment of incense, but nothing of great interest. So, I checked out Haute Yoga’s selection and was delighted to find a Coffee scent, which seemed interesting, and a ‘Jungle’ themed scent, which also sounded, and smelled, delightful. I purchased the two and we were off on our way!

We stopped at some local store that I can’t recall the name of to get some cat treats for Crixus but it had a little pop-up Starbucks inside and I was so delighted to have a chance to get a fun coffee drink! I had assumed I would just go without any coffee for the duration of my trip because I only like highly flavoured coffee, basically hot chocolate with some coffee for flavour and caffeine, but most people don’t keep a stock of Praline or Banana Cream Pie or Cinnamon Bun coffee on hand. Most folks just have, you know, coffee-coffee. I didn’t want to spend money buying bags or pods of coffee I couldn't possibly finish before leaving so I just figured I’d do without but no! A Starbucks! And they weren’t just serving ‘coffee’. Jess and I decided on the Java Mint Chocolate Frappuccino and it was delightful! I generally don’t like spending money on coffee from shops when I’m back home, as I could make my own, but on this trip I’ve had a delightful time ordering fun coffees at airports and stores as a fun little treaty for the day! 

Coffee and cat treats in hand we returned to Dave’s place where Jess and I freshened up a little better to get ready for brunch at EAT! Jess also got to feed Crixus a little treat cause he’s such a good kitty. We headed out pretty soon after and got a nice, shady outdoor table to have our brunch at. Jess got a breakfast burrito that was ENORMOUS, I got a Huckleberry Monte Cristo, and Dave got a Reuben’s Cousin, all of which was excellent! Jess also got a Peach Bellini because one get’s drinks at brunch! We stayed there and chatted about whatever before heading to the Walmart next door to look for energy drinks and shoes for the inevitable hike we expect Frank to take us on. We brought two sets of shoes each but none are appropriate for a hike so we went looking for some cheap sneaker-type things. We tried on a number of shoes and settled for some $10 Vans knockoffs as they were the cheapest and probably the fastest to break in before a hike. We also found an assortment of cool energy drinks, Sonic and Spyro themed, and loaded up on those for the days ahead.

Then back we went to Dave’s place to relax for a little before heading to the pool. We watched some of a show Dave likes, ‘Make Some Noise’ before he went to take a quick nap. Jessica soon followed and I was left to do some writing and watch ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’ on my own, which was fine as we all needed a little rest following our heavy-activity morning. Dave came out about halfway through the movie and we decided to get ready for the pool as it was nice and hot with the high afternoon sun! Jess took a little while to get going after laying down for a while but she eventually joined us in the living room. Dave had a bottle of sunscreen we were all going to share but it only lasted long enough for Jess to get some on her and then it was out. Dave decided he didn't care about a little sun but I was nervous about getting burned before the renaissance faire tomorrow so I decided to just sit on the side of the pool in the shade when we arrived. 

So sit I did! It was hopping at the pool with a whole family doing a barbeque thing at the grill, clearly some resident entertaining some family members they don't was screwing up their own house. I respect it. Jess and Dave both went swimming and then we sat in the hot tub for a hot second before hitting the pool again real quick. We weren't out there for long, it was hot and we were all tired from hot yoga so the water was really just to sooth our muscles and cool down a little. We talked about the Wheel of Time and actor changes and Dave's job here in Colorado. Just casual talks for a leisurely pool time. We headed back and I showered so my hair would have a little time to dry a little before I did my Tentacle Braids (multiple mini braids in my hair) so it'll be wavy for the faire tomorrow. I didn't brush it yet though, it would be over an hour before my mane would be dry enough to even get a brush through.

In the meantime we went back to Walmart to buy some stuff to hand make some macaroni and cheese for dinner. And by 'we' I mean Dave because Jess and I can cook as well as your average raccoon, but Dave was determined to widen our palette outside of boxed Mac and cheese and who are we to stop him! We also picked up a cheap reusable water bottle as we had lots the sad Disani bottle we kept refilling at Haute Yoga and wanted a new one, and also wanted a fresh bottle of sunscreen for tomorrow's faire day. We all split up as soon as we arrive, Dave to get the dinner ingredients, Jess to find egg rolls as we wanted them for appetizers, and I to get the water bottle and sunscreen. Found a cheap blue bottle for $1 and Walmart brand spray-on sunscreen for $6, which are prices I can appreciate!

We once more headed back to Dave's place, in for the evening, to make dinner and relax. On the way back Dave had me read him aloud my blog post from the previous day to entertain him which was quite nice as I know my blog posts are long and probably not half as interesting or witty as I imagine them to be, but he listened to the whole thing and had a few laughs so that was fun! We put on 'Marvel Secret Invasion' to watch while we (Dave) cooked. I grated some cheese so I participated! And Jess did all the dishes so there's our part! We got through about three episodes of 'Secret Invasion' but we weren't all to invested so Dave showed us the PitchMeeting video for 'Rings of Power' and had a hearty laugh before putting on 'G.I. Jane' as Dave had wanted to show us the movie. We all got changed into our pajamas, had ourselves our bowls of macaroni and cheese and egg rolls with some sauces Dave insisted we do a blind taste test with to see which we liked more, and settled in for our movie night. Dave got comfortable on the couch, Jess settled onto the big chair, and I stayed at the island counter. I thought I'd move to laying on the floor eventually, as I do because I'm a floor sitter by nature, but I stayed at the counter through the movie. It was good. Very 90's. Boy they were really afraid of lesbians back then, huh. 

We were all winding down so Dave put on an episode of 'Human Resources' and we all got a laugh in as we started to fade away. All our stuff was packed up as best it could be for the evening but we'd still have to get into full cosplay so there were a number of things we couldn't pack before bed. For tomorrow it would have to remain! But we wouldn’t be up until 9:30-10am Colorado time and we’re not headed to a flight or anything time sensitive. We’re headed to faire!