Friday, September 30, 2011

Make Your Spine Young

Who needs freakin' yoga?



See other vintage exercise equipment here

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Are You a Holy Yogi - A YogaDawg Quiz from the Yoga Archives



This was from a few years ago and thought this would be fun to revisit (from 2007).

Are you a Holy Yogi? Take this quiz and find out just how holy you are in your yoga. (sorry for the double jump)

Monday, September 26, 2011

The Ego Resides in the Knees

"Don’t fuck with the knees." - Bikram

As I work the yoga class circuit again, I’m coming to terms with my knee issue. Aware that I can’t do certain poses anymore, I have been modifying those that are causing havoc. I’ve also been warning teachers that I will be modifying and hanging in the back of the class so as not to throw off the other students with my mods (though I can’t explain why the majority of the people in some classes seem to also be hanging out in the back of the class…)

With that said, here are the current modifications I am doing (left knee is the one that has the pain):

Pose: Upward facing dog ~ Mod: Cobra

Pose: Warrior I ~ Mod: Warrior I with left leg not bent or on right knee with left knee bent (opposite side normal Warrior 1

Pose: Warrior II ~ Mod: Straight leg on left side, right side normal Warrior II

Pose: Eagle ~ Mod: Done straight legged

Pose: Feet on hands: Mod: Simple forward bend with arms crossed

Pose: Hero pose ~ Mod: Done with block and blanket

Pose: Camel ~ Mod: Standing camel (if there is such a thing)

Pose: Head stand ~ Mod: Perhaps Dolphin

Pose: Shoulder stand/plow ~ Mod: Legs up with sternum on block

Pose: Wheel ~ Mod: Supported bridge (ahhhh, the best pose next to savasana)

Also am switching legs if any one leg standing pose goes on too long

One of more interesting things that I’ve been running into is the reintroduction of some of the intermediate poses that I have forgotten about and simply can’t do anymore due to the not having done them for so long (, i.e. side angle crow, peacock, firefly). I must admit that I have been a little put out by this and have to catch myself because none of this stuff really matters anyway in yoga (yoga is really about nailing the ego and not nailing that advanced asana, right?), but the ego is a funny thing...

I’m currently working with a new teacher who is giving me some good tips and suggestions on knee pain. She recently sent me a link to a couple of articles that I wanted to pass on. These are pretty good and well worth the read.

Yoga Shouldn't Hurt -- Yoga Journal (Oct 2011)

Ground Control -- Yoga Journal (Oct 2011)

See you in class, dawgs…

Sunday, September 25, 2011

The Sunday Yoga Funnies - YogaBoy by Chris Panico

An ongoing series of toons by the mighty Chris Panico, an awesome cartoonist and yogi.

Click on toon for detail



Click here for the full series to date

Saturday, September 24, 2011

YogaDawg's Yoga Week in Review



Reblogged - Yoga mat for sale. Used once. – $1 - Pure genius and what all bloggers attempting yoga humor should study.

The Transfiguration of the Transcendent YogaDawg - I am not my dawg body!

Five Types of Yoga Teachers - These are some of the better ones that I've seen doing this takeoff on my original post years ago

Steve Ross goofs on LA and LA is miffed - Seems LA is not ready for sarcastic, wise cracking yogis.

Snakes know it's yoga - Glad someone does.

Another YogaBoy Toon - Oopsie.........



Other yoga stuff of interest



Yoga Outreach - Zombies - Just in time for Halloween

How often do you seen men of color.... - Not often - read the comments on this one.

7 Things Yogis Love To Hate - This is just the tip of the iceburg

15 Facts That Your Yoga Teacher Won’t Tell You - And 5 Facts The Students Don't Tell Their Yoga Teacher

A New Yoga-Inspired Technique To Help Your Shoulder Injury - On a serious note and will try the next time I have shoulder issues.

Photo of the Week


via Ashtanga Yoga Mother Earth

Friday, September 23, 2011

Reblogged - Yoga mat for sale. Used once. – $1

This was removed from Craigslist so I thought it would be worth reposting as a homage to real yoga humor. Brilliant!


Yoga mat for sale. Used once at lunch hour class in December 2009. Usage timeline as follows:

11:45a
Register for hot yoga class. Infinite wisdom tells me to commit to 5 class package and purchase a yoga mat. I pay $89.74. Money well spent, I smugly confirm to myself.

11:55a
Open door to yoga room. A gush of hot dry air rushes through and past me. It smells of breath, sweat and hot. Take spot on floor in back of room next to cute blonde. We will date.

11:57a
I feel the need to be as near to naked as possible. This is a problem because of the hot blonde to my left and our pending courtship. She will not be pleased to learn that I need to lose 30 pounds before I propose to her.

11:58a
The shirt and sweats have to come off. I throw caution to the wind and decide to rely on my wit and conditioning to overcome any weight issues my fiancée may take issue with. This will take a lot of wit and conditioning.

11:59a
Begin small talk with my bride to be. She pretends to ignore me but I know how she can be. I allow her to concentrate and stare straight ahead and continue to pretend that I don’t exist. As we finish sharing our special moment, I am suddenly aware of a sweat moustache that has formed below my nose. This must be from the all the whispering between us.

12:00p
Instructor enters the room and ascends her special podium at the front of the room. She is a slight, agitated Chinese woman. She introduces me to the class and everyone turns around to greet me just as I decide to aggressively adjust my penis and testes packed in my Under Armor. My bride is notably unfazed.

12:02p
Since I do have experience with Hot Yoga (4 sessions just 5 short years ago) I fully consider that I may be so outstanding and skilled that my instructor may call me out and ask me to guide the class. My wife will look on with a sparkle in her eye. We will make love after class.

12:10p
It is now up to 95 degrees in the room. We have been practicing deep breathing exercises for the last 8 minutes. This would not be a problem if we were all breathing actual, you know, oxygen. Instead, we are breathing each other’s body odor, expelled carbon dioxide and other unmentionables. (Don’t worry, I’ll mention them later.)

12:26p
It is now 100 degrees and I take notice of the humidity, which is hovering at about 90%. I feel the familiar adorning stare of my bride and decide to look back at her. She appears to be nauseated. I then realize that I forgot to brush my teeth prior to attending this class. We bond.

12:33p
It is now 110 degrees and 95% humidity. I am now balancing on one leg with the other leg crossed over the other. My arms are intertwined and I am squatting. The last time I was in this position was 44 years ago in the womb, but I’m in this for the long haul. My wife looks slightly weathered dripping sweat and her eyeliner is streaming down her face. Well, “for better or worse” is what we committed to so we press on.

12:40p
The overweight Hispanic man two spots over has sweat running down his legs. At least I think its sweat. He is holding every position and has not had a sip of water since we walked in. He is making me look bad and I hate him.

12:44p
I consider that if anyone in this room farted that we would all certainly perish.

12:52p
It is now 140 degrees and 100% humidity. I am covered from head to toe in sweat. There is not a square millimeter on my body that is not slippery and sweaty. I am so slimy that I feel like a sea lion or a maybe sea eel. Not even a bear trap could hold me. The sweat is stinging my eyeballs and I can no longer see.

12:55p
This room stinks of asparagus, cloves, tuna and tacos. There is no food in the room. I realize that this is an amalgamation of the body odors of 30 people in a 140 degree room for the last 55 minutes. Seriously, enough with the asparagus, ok?

1:01p
140 degrees and 130% humidity. Look, bitch, I need my space here so don’t get all pissy with me if I accidentally sprayed you with sweat as I flipped over. Seriously, is that where this relationship is going? Get over yourself. We need counseling and she needs to be medicated. Stat!

1:09p
150 degrees and cloudy. And hot. I can no longer move my limbs on my own. I have given up on attempting any of the commands this Chinese chick is yelling out at us. I will lay sedentary until the aid unit arrives. I will buy this building and then have it destroyed.
I lose consciousness.

1:15p
I have a headache and my wife is being a selfish bitch. I can’t really breathe. All I can think about is holding a cup worth of hot sand in my mouth. I cannot remember what an ice cube is and cannot remember what snow looks like. I consider that my only escape might be a crab walk across 15 bodies and then out of the room. I am paralyzed, and may never walk again so the whole crab walk thing is pretty much out.

1:17p
I cannot move at all and cannot reach my water. Is breathing voluntary or involuntary? If it’s voluntary, I am screwed. I stopped participating in the class 20 minutes ago. Hey, lady! I paid for this frickin class, ok?! You work for me! Stop yelling at everyone and just tell us a story or something. It’s like juice and cracker time, ok?

1:20p
It is now 165 degrees and moisture is dripping from the ceiling. The towel that I am laying on is no longer providing any wicking or drying properties. It is actually placing additional sweat on me as I touch it. My towel reeks. I cannot identify the smell but no way can it be from me. Did someone spray some stank on my towel or something?

1:30p
Torture session is over. I wish hateful things upon the instructor. She graciously allows us to stay and ‘cool down’ in the room. It is 175 degrees. Who cools down in 175 degrees? A Komodo Dragon? My wife has left the room. Probably to throw up.

1:34p
My opportunity to escape has arrived. I roll over to my stomach and press up to my knees. It is warmer as I rise up from ground level – probably by 15 degrees. So let’s conservatively say it’s 190. I muster my final energy and slowly rise. One foot in front of the other. One foot in front of the other. Towards the door. Towards the door.

1:37p
The temperature in the lobby is 72 degrees. Both nipples stiffen to diamond strength and my penis begins to retract into my abdomen from the 100 degree temp swing. I can once again breathe though so I am pleased. I spot my future ex wife in the lobby. We had such a good thing going but I know that no measure of counseling will be able to unravel the day’s turmoil and mental scaring.

1:47p
Arrive at Emerald City Smoothie and proceed to order a 32 oz beverage. 402 calories, 0 fat and 14 grams of protein — effectively negating any caloric burn or benefit from the last 90 minutes. I finish it in 3 minutes and spend the next 2 hours writing this memoir.

3:47p
Create Craigslist ad while burning final 2 grams of protein from Smoothie and before the “shakes” consume my body.

4:29p
Note to self – check car for missing wet yoga towel in am.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Steve Ross goofs on LA and LA is miffed


Steve Ross did an interview on Huffington Post on LA but it seems to have offended some there. Maybe he has been taking notes from Bikram...

Some highlights:

If LA were a yoga position, what might she be?
Down Dog with a cell phone in the left hand and a Kombucha and/or mirror in the right hand… or Happy Baby Pose, which many know by my nickname for it, Happy Boyfriend Pose!

Where would you take an out-of-town friend?
LAX if I liked them, the Santa Monica Pier if I didn't.

Do you have a meal that reminds you of Los Angeles?
A banana, coconut water, blueberry smoothie -- with a generous topping of Botox.

How do you choose the music to play in your yoga classes?
UCLA girls tell me what to play… and Elvis appears to me and tells me to play rap.

Why do you love Los Angeles?
I love LA because of its casual ability to undermine any true creativity. And it has nice weather.

Why do you hate Los Angeles?
I don't hate LA, I just hate the people that live here :)

PS I think the interview is hilarious but then I'm a YogaDawg (and don't live in LA ;) But I do still have fond memories from the last time I was there.

Monday, September 19, 2011

Snakes Know It's Yoga

The awesomely bizarre art of Nathalie Djurberg







More here

Sunday, September 18, 2011

The Sunday Yoga Funnies - YogaBoy by Chris Panico

An ongoing series of toons by the mighty Chris Panico, an awesome cartoonist and yogi.

Click on toon for detail




more toons can be found here

Saturday, September 17, 2011

YogaDawg's Yoga Week in Review



Three yoga images - Just look

Yoga - It's all Good... - ...said the yogi to the gunman.

Are you addicted to social media? - Step away from the Twitter....

Careful, I Know Yoga - Now that's a coffee cup!

In the fall - A cautionary tale.

In memory of 9/11 - and an alto solo by the awesome Grace Kelly


In other yoga stuff that happened this week


Fauxga - It's not yoga, it's fashion...

Freezing time - An awesome post from the blogger Paloma

Deepak Chopra Creates Video Game - If a buck is to made, Deepak is there.

Towards a Topology of Moving Yoga: Transcending B.K.S. Iyengar and His Cultural Moment - When you want to do some serious reading... fascinating.

Photo of the week



via TwoDressStudio

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Sunday, September 11, 2011

In Memory of 9/11



Caught Grace Kelly (not that one) the 19 year old wailing alto saxophonist at the Rosslyn Jazz Festival yesterday and she played the National Anthem solo at the end of her gig in memory of 9/11. This is not from yesterday but will give you a favor of her playing...

Saturday, September 10, 2011

YogaDawg's Yoga Week in Review



Tom did Yoga - Tom Brokaw Was Doing Yoga When He Learned About 9/11

Your Liberation Will Not Be Televised - One of the most creative things I've seen in a long time.

Yoga Career (continued) - The Missing Chapter from My Third Eye Itches - Oh my, there's money to be made in those yoga hills!

Are you happy? - 2014....

Om by John Coltane - Play this next time in yoga class and watch your students transcend.


Elsewhere in the yoga world

Where is Yoga Headed These Days? - If Forbes is looking at this you know there is real money in yoga.

Hindus welcome Miley Cyrus’ new “Om” tattoo - Well then, she should go for the full body tattoo of the complete Bhagavad Gītā!

Yoga is so annoying - “Can my newly authentic hamstrings help the angry guy?"

Yoga police - Kind of stupid, but hey, sometimes you have to play to the lowest denominator to get traffic.

Powerful images from yogi artist, Mark Laita - Wow. An interview on Yoga Modern

Yoga And PTSD: One Vet's Story - Inspiring and a thanks to our veterans and warriors

Are Narcissistic Yoga Teachers Ruining Your Asanas? - An older post that I just came across.


Yoga photo of the week

The Buddha will not be televised...

via They Are Not You

Friday, September 09, 2011

Tom Brokaw Was Doing Yoga When He Learned About 9/11

"Tom Brokaw on tonight's Report about what he was doing when he learned of the attacks, how he got through the day, and the degree to which the tragedy changed America. You'll find all of Brokaw's responses in this video, but let's just quickly address the first one: he was in the middle of a yoga class."

Hee, hee, his wife made him go and there is the question of whether he was wearing yoga pants....




Go here to view the video on Gawker

The Liberation Will Not Be Televised

Absolutely brilliant!!!

Thursday, September 08, 2011

Yoga Career (continued) - The Missing Chapter from My Third Eye Itches


Previously on Yoga Career

Entreyoganeur - Teachers that are Entreyoganeurs have no shortage of money for they have learned to successfully milk the teat of the Yoga-Industrial-Complex. These are the teachers who found that yoga students are an endless source of wealth; not from yoga classes, but from yoga materialism. You will find Entreyoganeurs hawking their yoga wares in large commercial yoga venues such as yoga festivals and conferences and on ad ladened websites and blogs that seem to exist simply for the enrichment of the entryoganeur themselves. You can easily spot web sites that are run by entreyoganeurs by the endless blog posts and articles found on them that are just thinly disguised advertisements for their own yoga goods and services (and lame, inappropriate posts designed to piss off the larger yoga community to gain more traffic). The most cherished thing that they sell is the ability to get yoga students to work for them for free in the guise of dana for the good of the yoga community.

Entreyoganeurs can often be found teaching in comfortable suburban yoga studios or in small isolated upscale communities far removed from the more trendy studios found in gentrified but still somewhat dangerous areas of big cities. Entreyoganeurs tend to own their own yoga studio in which they have set up an extensive yoga shop that looks like an Indian marketplace selling a never ending supply of yoga themed merchandise. These studios also provide additional revenue streams by up-selling students who simple come for a relaxing yoga class, a mind boggling array of yoga workshops, teacher training programs and yoga adventures to foreign lands.



The Entreyoganeur are accepted by their neighbors as hard-working citizens (they are careful not to give any impression that they are of the same breed of as the yogi hippie freak so often associated with the yoga 'trade') and lend just the correct amount of the exotic to be invited to parties and cookouts thrown by them. They have manage to dispel the image of the flaky yoga teacher and are always quick to explain that “yoga is just another business” to the approving nods of those who hold normal jobs and live a normal life style. Outside the neighborhood, though, and among their yoga peers, the Entreyoganeur goes through great pains to justify their yoga shrilling by claiming that, by making a living selling yoga stuff, they’re able to keep their yoga teaching “unpolluted” and pure from commercial yoga styles.

Behavioral Identifiers:
- Air of dignity
- Wears normal clothes
- Has normal friends
- Chronic fatigue
- Always on the prowl for something to sell
- Masters of yoga BS
- Split personality

Virtues: Competence

To be continued

Tuesday, September 06, 2011

OM by John Coltrane

I laughed in yoga class during savasana as they play some of that saccharin sweet yoga music thinking what would happen if they put this on instead...or played it all the way through a yoga class...



In October, 1965, John Coltrane recorded Om, referring to the sacred syllable in Hindu religion, which symbolizes the infinite or the entire Universe. Coltrane described Om as the "first syllable, the primal word, the word of power". The 29-minute recording contains chants from the Bhagavad-Gita, a Hindu epic. The 1965 recording, issued posthumously, has Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders chanting from a Buddhist text, The Tibetan Book of the Dead, and reciting a passage describing the primal verbalization "om" as a cosmic/spiritual common denominator in all things.

Monday, September 05, 2011

YogaDawg's Yoga Week in Review



The latest YogaBoy cartoon - This is a masterpiece

Follow YogaDawg to his latest yoga studio prowl - Too hot to handle!

Ice Box Yoga - That's some cold shit....

Yoga Career (continued) - The Missing Chapter from My Third Eye Itches - The lastest installment where rich teacher meets yoga.

YogaDawg meets YogaBitch - Yes, it's true. She is awesome and funny.

Extraterrestrials Do Yoga - From the YogaDawg Archives - They're bad and they're back. Check out the YogaDawg crop circle.

Yoga Morons Pose All Over NYC Subway Car, Make Homeless ‘Joke’ - This is all over the web with the consensus being this is kind of douchy...


Other yoga things mentioned in the yog-o-web:

YogaDawg gets mentioned in a post on Yoga Modern

Yoga Flash Mob: Take Two - In NYC

Top 10 Reasons Why Drinking is the New Yoga - This make me smile.

The Irony of Yoga Fashion and Its Gusseted Crotch of Higher Consciousness - The best yoga post title of the month and a funny read.

Why Yoga Can Be So Irritating - Kind of stinky (you'll have to read to get the joke)

Socializing with Students – To Brunch or Not to Brunch? - All kinds of ramifications that even I have had to deal with.

Iyengar in 1977 - Interesting to see how he aged from the films in the 1930s

Great interview with Yoga Bitch - “So I simply can’t keep it together when my placid-faced yoga mates start honking at each other like Ganesha the elephant god."

And the best yoga pic of the week:



Sunday, September 04, 2011

The Sunday Yoga Funnies - YogaBoy by Chris Panico

An ongoing series of toons by the mighty Chris Panico, an awesome cartoonist and yogi.

Click on toon for detail




more toons can be found here

Saturday, September 03, 2011

YogaDawg on the Prowl - Yoga Fusion

About a year and a half ago I stopped going to yoga classes due to variety of issues. I recently decided that I needed to get back among the yoga living again (those DVD were just not cutting it anymore). So I’m on the prowl again, dropping into yoga studios with the hope of finding the transcendental truth, blissful humor (and hopefully find the one person who can help my knee). “YogaDawg on the Prowl” is a semi-regular photo record of my yoga wanderings.

Alberto Giacometti. Dog. 1951 (cast 1957) MoMA

Yoga Fusion is a pleasant enough space with clean lines and modern art on the walls in the reception area. The studio space is plain, uncluttered with white walls and no decorations...everything neat and orderly down to the posted, fully illustrated instructions on how to fold and re-stack the blanket after you are done with it. It was only when they opened up the studio doors that I realized is was a hot yoga studio. It was so hot, I seriously considered leaving then and there.

I stayed because the teacher came in and mercifully turned down the heat from the previous class. The classes are heated to around 90, so that studio is essentially a bust for me since I can't deal with heat. It's too bad because the teacher was great, a student of Shiva Rea who had a beautiful visual flow in her vinyassa.

So if you are into the hot yoga this might be the place for you.



Friday, September 02, 2011

Ice Box Yoga


Okay, this is pretty funny in a "I can't believe that got people to do that" kind of way.

The Yogi™ - video# 3 "Ice Box Yoga" from dan damman on Vimeo.



more videos here

Thursday, September 01, 2011

Yoga Career (continued) - The Missing Chapter from My Third Eye Itches



Previously on Yoga Career

Ascetics – These teachers have discovered that the clearest path to survival in the yoga world is to simply have no need for money. While many yogis teach yoga with little regard for paying students, those who are lucky enough to have an independent source of wealth (i.e., the trust fund yogi, the pampered mate yogi) have the luxury of disregarding students entirely. As a general rule, the wealthier the yoga teacher, the more intellectual perplexing their yoga is and the loftier their rhetoric about yoga freedom and innovation. Many of these teachers practice in their own ‘yoga spaces’ where they are the lone teacher. They are the Yoga Star in their own world. Their students consist of the same four or five people who show up for each class dressed in the same manner of the Ascetic. As the Ascetic finds the whole concept of dealing with money distasteful and unyogic they will, nonetheless, have a donation box sitting prominently in place (though this tends to piss off the “for profit” studios for undercutting their prices). It really doesn’t offend the Ascetic if you donate or not, for it is the lofty goal of ‘pure yoga’ that these teachers believe in and are motivated by.

Ascetics spend their abundant free time thinking about and writing deep philosophical essays on yoga with a special emphasis on their brand of yoga on their own yoga blogs. These writings are then adapted to serve as the dialogue to spout while leading their students in class. The students, knowing almost nothing about yoga, equate the teachers’ impressive discourse with a depth of yoga knowledge. All too frequently though, these same students are horrible confused as the teacher tends to contradicts themselves getting lost in their lofty ramblings about yoga. Uncomfortable with the perception that other less fortunate yoga teachers may view them as a ‘moneyed yogi’, the Ascetic tend to live a non-descript lifestyle that enables them to pass among their less privileged yogis unnoticed and unchallenged.

Behavioral Identifiers:

- Carefully chosen trendy second-hand yoga togs
- Yoga nickname (usually Sanskrit granted from extended trips to India spent in an ashram)
- If questioned about their crack pot views about yoga by a student, they usually say “some illusions are more illusory than others”
- Yoga conference addiction
- Yoga festival addiction
- Yoga cruise addiction
- India ashram addiction
- Multiple subscriptions to trendy yoga magazines

Virtue: Ideals

To be continued