This past weekend was a very interesting one for me.  I opened my mind and, as a result, hooked up my body.

Yoga has never been something I'd consider a hobby (or even an interest) of mine.  Probably because, in college all those years ago, I signed up for a class just to follow a girl on whom I had a crush.

Needless to say, that didn't end well (on any front) and left a really sour taste in my mouth for yoga.

It might have been the attitude (a good one), the clean country air, summer sun or all of the above which conspired to make my first (technically second) yoga experience a really great one.  Alignment, happiness and clarity came together at once to make me feel better -- on the spot.

Seriously, what the heck is this all about?  I am definitely on to something here, there is much more to come.

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On Friday night, after a long week of work (in a short week of work days), I figured I'd go for a walk around my hood with a neighbor.  Nice weather, stiff joints, and a craving for frozen yogurt are the ingredients for a little stroll.

Sometimes when you have a long day sitting at a desk or in a car (or both), a nice stroll feels great.  I had a chance to stretch a little bit (as much as I can stretch while in the elevator going down nine floors) and to use more muscles than those ordinarily used all day at the keyboard.

It was going great.  We headed over to Park Avenue, which is where the hot shots live (ever the celebrity stalker).  Until, that is, we unassumingly hopped on the New York City Nature Tour.  Turns out, they're free every spring.

First up was the rat.  Rat is actually too short a word to adequately describe an animal with a tail that long.  This thing jumped out of a construction site and right in front of us.  "Good thing you're wearing open toe shoes," I quipped.  But actually, I was terrified.  This thing was enormous and hairy and making it very apparent that it was quicker than us.  I mean it was so big it should have been named.  So I obliged.  Gus.

This turned the pace of the stroll up two notches, going from "leisurely" to "frenetically paced."

Then came the cockroach two blocks later.  For the record, we were on Park Avenue, lined by the nicest apartments in the world.  But this cockroach was so enormous, it would have taken the weight of a Ford F-150 to crush its prehistoric shell.  I think this thing was born in the 1700s, around when this all was still called New Amsterdam.

We turned the corner and headed directly home.  Gross and ridiculous (but, spring is definitely here!).  If there was an upside, it was that the walk's pacing kept getting quicker and quicker.

What turned out to be a fro-yo stroll turned into a full-blown exercise walk-run.  Which kind of made me chuckle at the irony that on the very Park Avenue streets which Tom Wolfe described as home to the "Masters of the Universe," today live enlarged cockroaches and mutant rats.  Go figure.

G-R-O-S-S.

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The yoga craze has definitely made stretching "in vogue." It's now totally OK to stretch in public. Provided you're not blocking anyone while you do it.  Remember when it was weird to carry a water bottle? It feels really good to give yourself a nice, hearty stretch. Lately I've figured out what hurts and I somehow come to the edge of what would be pushing the limit. Stretching.

Traveling for work gives me lots of space to stretch. It's impossible to go anywhere without a lot of extra time, and there are lots of free areas to stretch. I don't think there's a stretch-free zone in public. Although I learned the hard way that you can't plug in your laptop to a train station outlet. That'd be theft of service. Just a word for the wise.

I think, for all this stretching going on in public, maybe now I'm a little bit prepared for the  unchartered world of yoga. Yikes.