learn to belly dance

I got my new DVD in the mail a couple of weeks ago, but didn’t crack it open until today. It’s a little different than I expected, but I think it’ll be really good.

Today I worked on shoulder, rib cage, and hip isolation exercises. I’m going to do them a few more times until I really get them down pat, then move on.

I have, though, come to the realization that I’m going to have to take a real class to be able to really do this well. I can never tell if I’m doing the moves exactly as they should be done or not.

Right, so after taking that belly-dance class a couple of years ago, my obsession with it quickly faded into nothingness. I practiced again a few times after that-maybe a bunch of times, I can’t remember-but it never developed into anything.

But my mom has this fanatical love for “Dancing with the Stars,” which, every now and again, I watch with her. I make fun of how B-list the stars are, but I watch it, and it’s kind of fun. Sometimes when I watch it, I think, “That’s not so hard. I could do that.” Which I’m sure I actually could not. But last night was Latin dance night, and I thought that looked awfully fun, and I decided that when I move to the actual city next month, I would take some sort of Latin dance class. That has nothing to do with this, but I realized that I actually do have some belly-dance experience, and that I was pretty good at that once upon a time, so maybe in the meantime I’d get a DVD and get back up to speed. So I just ordered Bellydance Basics and Beyond from Amazon, and that should be good fun. Plus, when I move out, there will probably be no more cable, so I can dance instead of my nightly “Family Guy” reruns.

No, really, somebody actually told me that I had a natural talent for this. I’m pretty excited, seeing that so far the most impressive talent I’ve had is that I can drink lots of shots of rum in a row without a chaser.

The next class isn’t offered until April, but I can’t wait for it. I’m glad I’ve got my book to practice with.

I’m probably going to look like a twit when I finally get caught practicing my hip circles in the kitchen.

I have a two-hour class in two weeks. What a perfect way to put a stop to this recent development of my jeans being too tight!

Before work a few days ago, I popped into a bagel shop, where they have lots of trinkets to peruse whilst eating your bagel. And/or drinking your wine. (I didn’t, because I don’t know whether white or red goes with bagels. Also, because it was 9AM. But mostly the first reason.) Inexplicably, they had a book there called “Bellydancing for Fitness.” (In this town? Trust me, any recognition that bellydancing exists is inexplicable.) I bought it, but haven’t tried it yet. It’s on my to-do list for this weekend.

Furthermore, the owner of the shop noticed that I was looking through this book, and said they would be offering a class next week! (More inexplicable: there will be a bellydancing class in January in a bagel shop in a tiny Minnesotan town.)

Damn, son, I didn’t think I would ACTUALLY ever make any progress on this goal.