I’ve been missing from the gluten-free blogging scene, and I don’t like it one bit, especially in October.  I used to mourn when I couldn’t find the time to write twice a week.  Then I got used to it, but I’d cringe when a whole week had passed and I hadn’t had a chance to blog.  Now I’m lucky if I get a moment to glance at Google Reader to scan the hundreds of post titles that my fellow food bloggers have cranked out since the last time I checked. My reader is choc full of posts about pumpkin muffins, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin puree, pumpkin pancakes, and I’m incredibly jealous.  Have I run out of things to say?  Funny thought.  Have I gone back to my glutenous ways?  I’d never do that.  So what is up with the Gluten-Free Cat?  Where has she been?

She’s been pumping through pumpkin month, Les Mills style.

BodyPump has been around for almost 20 years now, strengthening bodies all over the world with intense cardio and strength training workouts.  I had an opportunity to be trained to be an instructor in August and passed my assessments with this amazing trainer.

Think Jillian Michaels pushing you for three 9-hour days in a row.  What a RUSH, what an experience, what PAIN, what a feeling of accomplishment.

Since then, Fall semester started, and the Husband had to say goodbye to Summer Heather.  Starting the school year is always intense.  But this year brought new challenges with a grade level change.

I completed my first triathlon.

I ran Nashville’s first Women’s Half Marathon.

And I’ve been preparing for my BodyPump final video assessment.  CONSTANTLY.  What does preparation include?  Here are 10 examples to give you a little taste of my world:

1.  Listen to the same 10 songs over and over and over again until you know every word, beat, verse, chorus, bridge, and nuance.

2.  Practice choreography in the living room with pretend weights.

3.  Teach practice sessions to willing friends.

4.  Play the same 10 songs while driving but watching choreography in your head.  Assume that other drivers think you are talking angrily on a hands-free phone when you’re really barking coaching cues to the windshield.

5.  Meet with other instructors to practice teaching tracks to each other.

6.  Study compulsory cues, memorize phrases, and hope you’ll remember to say them all when the tape is rolling.

7.  Practice the proper form of EVERY exercise imaginable.  Including pushups.  (Tricep pushups too.)

8.  Lay in bed wondering if the second set of lunges starts 3/1 or 2/2.

9.  Get up and rifle through BodyPump notes to find the answer so you can finally fall asleep.

10.  Find a way to videotape a complete class with real participants, without any errors, before the class is even offered at your gym.

It’s been a long month, I’m exhausted, now I’m sick in bed, which is why I even have a moment to post this entry, and I just hope I’m well enough to lift a weight for Saturday’s taping.

So, the recipes will have to wait.  I hate that we are heading into the end of October and I haven’t even attempted to bake something pumpkiny.  I’m dying to share my gluten-free experiences of the past month.  I even have a box of new products sitting on my kitchen counter sent to me from a vendor.  I can’t wait to review them.  But I’ll have to be patient, because October is pumping month.  Maybe November can be my pumpkin month.

I’ve missed you all.  Let’s hope this assessment goes well so that I can start pumping out more than just weighted plates.  Until then, see you at the gym!