We were doing pretty well for awhile there.  I really thought Elena was working out.  She was a great cook.  She wasn’t the most stellar cleaner, but she did a good enough job without me having to be mean and picky that Eric and I were satisfied.  She didn’t seem like she hated me too much or resented me all that much for asking her to do certain things.  But, fortunately for her and unfortunately for us, she got a full time job at a factory.  She offered to come on Saturdays, but that’s no fun because we would have to stay home all day while she was here.  Boo.

So after a couple of weeks of searching, I found Paola.  Paola is Colombian, which I love because she speaks a beautiful brand of Spanish.  Clear, pure, intelligible….just lovely.  She has also been in Panamá for 16 years which means she is legal.  A rare find.  I’m betting she won’t be around for long, but I’ll enjoy her while she’s here.  Oh, and did I mention that her resumé said she has worked as a supermodel?  Eric’s in Seattle this week for work and yesterday I happened to need to send him 4 emails throughout the course of the morning, including one announcing that Paola was going to come today for the first time.  Guess which email he responded to within ONE MINUTE?!  Yep, the one about the supermodelo housekeeper.  Shocker.

Paola showed up perfectly on time this morning – that in and off itself may have been a first.  However, when I opened the door and she saw Addie, she looked HORRIFIED.  Pure terror on her face.  Apparently she was not the one I warned about the dog.  Oops.  I’m usually pretty good about that.  Not this time.  So poor Addie went out to the porch for a bit.  I know that all Addie wants to do is sniff the woman once and then leave her alone, but Paola is so scared.  Poor thing.  We’ll work through this, but I’ll give her a minute to get used to the idea before I force them into the same room together.

Anyway, Paola is not a woman that I would look at and say “WOW!  Supermodel!”  First of all, I don’t know what distinguishes a model from a supermodel.  Secondly, I’m not trying to knock her at all.  I’m thinking in a “we surveyed 100 people and they said…” kind of way.  She might be a couple of inches taller than I am.  Maybe 5’5″ tops.  She’s 36, so perhaps she’s changed over the years.  But as a veteran America’s Next Top Model aficionado, I can say with authority that she does not have any particularly striking features.  Maybe she’s really good at smizing (or however you spell it…for those of you who don’t watch the best show ever made by Tyra Banks, that’s smiling with your eyes).  Of course I’m being harsh, but come on, when you say “supermodel” on your resumé, you create expectations.  I just want to know more!  Now she’s gonna think I’m weird when I stare at her and try to figure out what the deal is.  Google to the rescue!  I’ll keep you updated…

So last night, I went to my first gymnastics class since I was four years old.  Mono invited me while I was working again on my front walkover type move and explained that the idea is to help us to train in the acrobatics side of capoeira.  So I went.  And Mono didn’t.  Apparently he had some pain in his neck or something.  I went even with my jammed and swollen finger and aching wrist.  (Again, Eric, I’m sorry I can’t get my wedding rings on my finger.  And Mom, yes, I still kinda blame you for the Taylor Swift concert related wrist injury that is flaring back up.  Why are you so freakishly young and athletic?)

One other capoeirista went, thank goodness.  His name, and I feel I have to explain it, is Kike.  It’s pronounced KEY-KAY.  It’s not a racial slur.  It means robocop in Portuguese…or at least that’s the idea.  Anyway, he’s super in shape b/c he trains like mad and runs a bazillion kilometers every day, plus he’s at least a foot taller than me.  Let’s just say he has a slight advantage when we train together.

So this gym was PACKED with 5-12 year old little people on all the apparati that you think of when you think of gymnastics.  We were upstairs in this warehouse type gym…you know, where the proverbial heat rises.  The warm-up lasted for, as far as I can figure, 7 hours.  I can’t remember the last time my skin felt so hot.  I was seriously worried about my body temperature…and also about the possibility of vomiting on the super cool springy floor.  At several points, I just had to sit down on the floor and put my frozen water bottle (ice bottle, i suppose) under my knees, on my arms, behind my neck, etc.  I thought I was going to quit several times, and I was pretty shameless about it, as I thought I was going to die, but then I would get back to just moderately overheated and Kike would convince me to return to the “warm-up.”  I did get it all done…just not quite as quickly as some of the others.

Some goofuses came in about an hour after us, warmed up, and ended up doing the class just like we did.  That’s the way to do it.  Good thing to know for next time.

I met a nice Canadian girl who must’ve been all of 20 who reassured me that, yes, it’s hard, and yes, it gets easier.  Mostly she was just really nice about saying that it wasn’t weird that I was dying.  I liked her.

So we finally got to the class part and got to play on some super big mats.  We ran and did front rolls, then front handsprings (with help).  Then we jumped and landed backwards on big stacks of mats.  Being the second to shortest and the newby, I had some trouble with this one.  Plus, apparently I jump like a high-jumper (leftover from my two weeks of fame during middle school…not that I like to brag) and arch my back, so I pretty much just ran straight into the side of the mat.  Awesome.

We ended the class doing back flips (back tucks?  What do you kids call them?), which was actually pretty cool.  Again, I had the coach on one side and a guy from the class on the other side, but still, it was cool.

Will I go back?  Hard to say.  I really really really hated the first part.  It was awful.  Really awful.  But the rest of it was fun.  And probably pretty helpful for capoeira.  I’ll probably say that I don’t want to take yet another night away from my husband and leave it at that.  We’ll see.  Or maybe I’ll try to talk him into going with me.  He called last night and told me how awesome he thought the videos of my back flips were….not the one I put on facebook, but the next two when I improved a lot.  That made me feel pretty awesome.

Okay, back to my day of writing to prisoners, icing my finger, tending to my random gymnastics bruises, and hanging out with a supermodel.  You know, the usual.