Healthy Living – Thoughts From The Passenger Seat

2026, Healthy Living

Floating

Posted on January 4, 2026January 4, 2026 by nancyb422

Yesterday, my daughter in law and I put last year’s Christmas present to use – we went “floating”.

She and my son have done this several times and really wanted me to try it – hence, the Christmas gift! We were trying to set it up for she and I to go at the same time my son and husband would go on their Christmas gift fishing trip, but it didn’t work out that way.

We went to Float 41 in West Hartford Connecticut. It’s a one hour session. Prior to getting into the chamber, or in my daughter in law’s case, a pod that looks like an egg, put ear plugs in, take a shower, and wash your hair to eliminate any conditioner and lotions.

Once I did that, I turned the light in the room off and stepped into the chamber, rested my head on a donut ring and laid back. Ahhhhhh, heaven!

You can have the soft purple light on or off, and meditative music on or off. There are 2 large soft buttons on the wall to change the features. I started with both on, turned both off, and settled on light off and music on.

I started with my arms in goalpost and gradually drifted them down to a shavasana pose.

I fell asleep twice that I know of, because I jerked awake. A few other times, my leg kicked out so I was drifting away at that point also.

My mind was blank from the moment I laid back.

When my time was up, a woman’s voice came through the speaker, and although with the ear plugs I don’t know what she said, I knew my time was up!

I opened the door, sadly turned on the light in the room, took a shower and washed my hair, got dressed and moved to a room with hairdryers and a vanity to prepare for the outdoor world.

*The private room for shower and floating*

My DIL and I sat with cups of tea and little snacks in another room to talk about the experience before leaving.

I’ve been carrying the floating feeling with me and I can’t wait to go back!

Have you ever floated? If not, do you think it’s something you would want to try?

2026, Healthy Living, life

My Word for 2026

Posted on January 3, 2026 by nancyb422

Engage….

….with people, events, my faith, and dare I say, social media for our business.

More on that word later. Right now I’m heading off to “float” with my daughter in law. Hmm, engaging in something new with someone I’ve really been getting to know much better in 2025.

2025, Goals, Healthy Living, life

2025 Review / 2026 Plans

Posted on December 31, 2025December 31, 2025 by nancyb422

Here I am, the last day of 2025. 9:18am, wondering if I succeeded in accomplishing anything I wrote about at the beginning of the year.

I had physical goals that I wrote about on January 15th. I know my weight was creeping up to a region I wasn’t happy about. I don’t recall the weight I began the year at, or where I am now, but I know I feel a lot better than I did on 1/1/2025.

In 2024, I hit 14,753 minutes on Peloton tracking and my goal was to hit 15,000 in 2025. I did it! I knocked it out of the park with 17,345. So 2026 I’m shooting for 18,000+.

I also wrote about my 2025 Mental Health Goals. To be mindful, focus on self-care. I had good times and not so good with that. I am a worry wort. I worry about things I have no control over, and about things that are miles down the road. Waiting for that shoe to drop? That’s me! And I keep it all in, all bundled inside of me. Definitely need to work on my self-care in 2026.

Something I did achieve that wasn’t on my radar was working on my faith. I embraced my daily reading of “Jesus Calling” and its bible verses. I attended a Beth Moore workshop with my good friend and have plans for another this year. I took a big step in the fall and headed back to church, and went to confession for the first time in over 30 years. I feel whole and look forward to continuing to strengthen my relationship with God.

I still maintain a love/hate relationship with Social Media. My goal was to “read less what other people say and write more of what I want to say”. Did I succeed? Well, I wrote 90 posts which is 3 more than in 2024. Considering quite a few of the 2024 posts were Hump Day Photos, I think I did much better with writing in 2025. But I did not do better in my quest to lighten up on the social media sites! Recently, I set up a timer to block me when I’ve gone over my limit for the day. Some days I respect it, some days I ignore it. Still working on that.

I’ve already talked about some goals for 2026 here and here. Goals are great but if the habits to achieve them aren’t implemented, what good is it to set them? Here’s to working on those habits in 2026!

2025, Healthy Living, life

Beginning is easy, Continuing is Hard

Posted on December 26, 2025December 26, 2025 by nancyb422

That is a Japanese Proverb and it is oh, so true. For me, at times, even the Beginning is hard.

I told my husband this morning that this week will be a week of working on new habits and re-starting habits that fell by the wayside over the year. I’ll determine what works, what I like, and what I don’t and carry that in to the new year.

Some of those habits include:

Reading my daily bible plan entry in the Bible app
Writing a morning journal entry from the Ordinary and Happy website
Morning time management. I don’t have to get to the office at 9am, but I like to because then I can focus on organizational tasks instead of routine tasks
Schedule at least one day off each week
When we get a text for a bike ride – do it! Even if it’s a Monday (payroll can be done up until 8pm EST)
Plan breakfast, lunch, and my workout the night before
Wind down for the night after dinner so when the 9pm alarm goes off to take my magnesium pill, I’m ready to head upstairs. I love time to read in bed!

Is that too much? There at times, especially at night when I’m watching a show, I’m like an obstinate child. the alarm goes off, I turn it off, continue watching, and forget to take my pill altogether!

Wish my luck and we’ll see what sticks!

2025, Healthy Living, life

Goals Are Good…

Posted on November 19, 2025November 19, 2025 by nancyb422

Unless you are obsessive like I can be about things like goals.

I downloaded an app called Streak because it was recommended by a (real life) friend whom I admire. I decided to try it because I want to focus on keeping myself mentally and physically active.

With Streak, you create goals and select how often they need to be completed. Multiple times a day, every day, a few times a week, and so on.

My goals were 5 20 oz water a day, 7,000 steps a day, write blog post every day, take vitamins every day, leave for the office by 9am, and post a picture to Facebook every day. Some are simple like the water and vitamins, and the Facebook post. Getting my steps in is a little more difficult because I work in a very small office. I incorporated walking around our complex during my lunchtime for a half hour. However, I still have to get additional steps in during the day to hit that 7,000. Leaving for work by 9 is a struggle! Writing every day is a struggle!

After a week, I changed the office time to getting there by 9:30, because honestly, I like my morning time at home and, since I’m the boss, I guess it’s ok to set my own hours. I changed the writing to 3 times a week because I needed time to research and write for my family blog.

I guess that represents growth within me that instead of saying “this isn’t going to work!”, I make some simple adjustments.

Here’s to continuing my Streak!

2025, Healthy Living, life

Give Blood

Posted on November 14, 2025November 12, 2025 by nancyb422

On Wednesday, I attempted to give blood for the first time in over 20 years.

I was a regular when I lived in California because Sonoma County had a “blood bank”. I could make an appointment during my lunch hour, pop in, give blood, and head back to the office. Unfortunately, Connecticut doesn’t have that. Donations are through blood drives.

After moving to Connecticut, the first or second time I went to give blood, I was rejected (deferred they say) because my hemoglobin was low. I never tried again.

My sister and a friend give blood on a regular basis so I thought I’d give it another shot.

I was signed up and ready to go, headed to the app and answered all the health questions (about 56 of them!).

My sister coached me on how to pass the hemoglobin test. Get “hot hands” and wear mittens. Bring the hot hands in with you while waiting. I googled the reasons and evidently cold hands slow circulation and slow circulation give an artificially low reading. In the past, they would prick your thumb to test your blood, but now there is a machine with a sensor that goes around your thumb and can measure the hemoglobin level.

I tried, I really tried! I had a Hot Hands but didn’t know about the mittens. I could sense the tips of my thumbs were not warm but I hoped I would make it. The minimum Hb level is 12. My right thumb was an 11.7. The technician said, “let’s try the left”. Unfortunately, the left was only 9.8.

As I left the table, I told the man at the check in that I was rejected. He said, “not rejected, deferred”.

I’ve read up on giving blood and how to prepare for it – warm hands, red meat and green leafy vegetables, avoid coffee, get a good night’s sleep – so I look for the another local blood drive, sign up, and buy Hot Hands!

Do you give blood on a regular basis?

2025, Healthy Living

Beautiful Connecticut Ride

Posted on November 13, 2025November 11, 2025 by nancyb422

Last Thursday, our crew headed up to the Northwest corner of Connecticut for a bike ride. We started out in Colebrook which is just over an hour from our home. The ringleaders of our group, Mark and Marilyn had completed the ride over the weekend and instantly knew we all would love it.

There was a brief shower on our way up and the car said it was 42 degrees outside by the time we got there. I definitely wasn’t prepared for cold – even though I was told it would be! That is typical me, I just can’t understand a temperature change until I’m in the middle of it totally unprepared. Thankfully, Marilyn lent me a pair of gloves with battery pack heaters, and some toe warmers. My husband lent me an extra buff he had in his bag. At least I was wearing long cycling tights so I pulled my wool socks over the ends of them, but really wished they were my fleece lined pair! Dressed and off we went!

The ride was a mix of country roads and packed dirt roads. I was happy to not be riding on dirt roads with ruts and rocks like our central Connecticut rides! There were a couple of intense hills that for the first time on this bike I kicked it into Turbo. If we didn’t have e-bikes, we’d be sitting home on the couch instead of riding.

We don’t stop very often. Always for lunch, meaning whatever we can fit in our small bike bags, and occasional water breaks.

This time we happened upon a small cemetery – the Munson Cemetery. I only took a picture of one nearby stone, but google led me to the Find a Grave website. The Judd and Munson families are interred there. The oldest grave is for Sarah Booth Munson and she appears to have ties to Hamden and New Haven. I’m not going down that rabbit hole though!

Our ride also took us through the Great Mountain Forest which is a 6,042 acre forest that within Norfolk and Falls Village. It has 13 miles of road to ride on. We went in one entrance and came out another. And we saw a porcupine! It looked so cute waddling away.

The last 2 miles felt like 10 miles and it felt like it was all uphill back to our cars. 28.9 miles (I need to start riding around the parking lot to get that whole mile!).

*Just kissed the border of Massachusetts*

We definitely warmed up during the ride, and on the way home we celebrated ourselves with a cup of Dunkin’ pumpkin spiced coffee and an a glazed donut stick. I think we earned it!

2025, Healthy Living

It’s Special(ized)

Posted on November 9, 2025November 9, 2025 by nancyb422

Name the most expensive personal item you’ve ever purchased (not your home or car).

It’s a good thing I love to ride a bike because my most expensive personal item recently purchased is a new gravel e-bike I brought home in September. It replaced the first e-bike, a Salsa Confluence, I bought in February. It quickly became evident the Salsa was not up to speed (pun intended), for the rides our group takes. The Salsa was half the price as the Creo, had a smaller motor, thinner tires designed more for bike paths than dirt roads, and unfortunately for me on dirt roads with rocks, no shocks in the handle bars.

My new, best bike is a Creo Turbo 2 Comp with a 1.2 SL lightweight motor, and SRAM hydraulic disc breaks. A really crazy feature is the “etap levers” for changing gears. If you’ve ever shifted gears on a bike, you can hear it going on down at your feet as the chain moves higher or lower. Not this bike because it’s electric! There’s only a delightful little “click” as I press the right or left lever, and the chain makes its move on the cog.

It is worth every penny because my hands no longer ache after a 30 mile ride, I’m more comfortable and confident barreling down a hill, and I have more electric power for that hill at mile 27!

2025, Healthy Living, life

Digging In

Posted on September 4, 2025 by nancyb422

If you are a reader here, you’ll see I can be “in my head” a lot.

I am reading a book entitled, “High Functioning” overcome your hidden depression and reclaim your joy by Dr. Judith Joseph.

I have told myself that I don’t fall into the perfectionist category and a lot of what she says about overworking was something I did in the past, but not now. However, by beating myself up mentally, I think I should be perfect, or strive to be perfect. Both in my work and my “being”.

She says it relates back to “trauma” most times childhood based, but not always. There can be trauma with a capital T or it can be lower case t.

What I’m more concerned about is that feeling of “blah”. Anhedonia – the reduced ability to experience joy in life which makes you feel meh or blah all the time. For me, I t’s a feeling of doing to get through the day and then the night. When did that start?

I have begun to explore how all this figures in my life. I can see why I am never (never ever) happy with my weight or shape.

I’m beginning to understand some thoughts and reactions in my marriage.

As my business coach says, “what gets measured, gets improved”.

I’m looking forward to digging in deeper.

2025, biking, Healthy Living

Today’s Ride – Getting Stronger!

Posted on August 24, 2025 by nancyb422

We packed up the bikes today and met our friends for a ride that started out on the Airline Trail. The fifty mile trail is an old railroad that used to travel from New York to Boston. We start out in Portland CT which is on the east side of the Connecticut River. One section of the railroad still exists and was taken over by Tilcon Tomasso (or what we used to call Trap Rock) and travels from there operations in Middlefield down to the harbor in New Haven, or so I’m told!

So, we headed out and although we start on the trail, it’s not too far before we take a left and start UP THE HILL. We’re on the road for a while and then head into I think some state forest which involves gravel roads and washouts, but thankfully no massive puddles of mud! I wish I could take pictures as I ride but honestly sometimes I’m just praying to get me down the steep gravel hills in one piece!

*Today’s route ! Not sure what the colors mean!*

It was a beautiful day – not too hot, not too cool and we stop for breaks along the way. My husband and our friends are very patient with me because I’m always bringing up the rear – especially on downhills!

I couldn’t record this as a Peloton outdoor cycle ride because I’m at 499 rides and I want to do a live ride so I get a “shout out” by the instructor! Silly, but, whatever. I’ll do a live ride on Tuesday afternoon for that!

After burning all those calories we were starved! So what better way to fill our bellies?

I’m hoping I’ll be able to ride more often in the next few months. I’ll have to work on that!