Sometimes, we may be really enthusiastic when we’re working out (i.e. hot guy at 9:00 and I know he’s watching me work this treadmill). This extra push on the body may cause strain to your muscles and no one wants leg cramps or excessive soreness the following morning!

Stretching is good for us pre-work out because it warms up our otherwise stiff muscles, which get especially stiff in this cold, cold weather. Post-work out, it reinforces your flexibility and rewards those hard worked muscles. Plus, it just feels good. (Tip: Be sure not to bounce when you stretch because it can cause tears in within your muscle fibers – instead, hold each stretch for 20-30 seconds and even it out on both sides.)

Here are a few of my favorites! Cool down with these easy moves in between classes or right after some crazy leg squats.

1. Child’s Pose

Derived from yoga, this position feels great on your back. Begin in a kneeling position and then lower yourself onto your heels. Bring your arms in front of you, stretching out that tense upper back and elongating your spine. Keep your head down and take a couple of deep breaths here. Ahh, zen.

2. Modified Pigeon Pose

This pose stretches out your chest and hips. Place one bent leg under your body while straightening out the other leg. Slowly lower yourself down as far as you can go. Don’t force yourself to stretch to the point of pain – just where it feels good. For advanced and more flexible people, you can bring yourself to a forward fold, lowering your torso onto your bent leg and placing your head right onto the mat. This is my favorite move to do right after a great quad-focused workout.

3. Glute Stretch (yeah, I know it’s a creative name)

Another one of my faves after a great run. Lay down on your back, bringing both knees into your chest. Place your right ankle on your left knee. Put your hands behind your left thigh and slowly pull your legs towards your chest. This will stretch out your gluteus maximus, aka your booty. Repeat on the other side.

Happy stretching!

Got a problem area you want to tackle? Need some workout ideas? Tweet your questions to @jackelynho. I’ve got your back. And front. And sides.

You’ve been killing yourself all semester to tackle mountains of coursework while finding time to hit the gym and develop the perfect bikini bod to show off in Cancun, the Dominican Republic, Miami Beach…or wherever Spring Break 2009 finds you. When the day finally arrives, you’re ready to leave all of your woes behind. In a tropical hotspot hundreds of miles away from your RA, your professors, and your “Good Girl” reputation, you’re ready to let loose.

But be careful, ladies, because there’s still plenty of ways that your spring break behavior can come back to haunt you.

You say: It’s not cheating if it’s in another country.

The Reality: If you’re on holiday with your best girlfriends, the liquor is flowing, and a sunkissed Adonis named Paolo pulls you onto the dancefloor, it can be easy to forget what’s-his-name back home. But still, a commitment is a commitment, and Paolo will be a distant memory by the end of the week. It’s never a good idea to lie to your partner, and you never know if he will, in fact, find out. Last year, a girl saw her personal life go viral after cheating on her boyfriend. He found out and got an acapella group to “serenade” her with the Dixie Chicks’ “Not Ready to Make Nice”…in front of 1,000 fellow students.

You say: Yes! A million miles from my parents, and in this country, I’m legal to drink!

The Reality: Sure, it’s a lot harder for your parents to keep tabs on you when you’re in a different time zone, but it’s also a lot more expensive to call them long distance if your drunk ass gets busted. Some collegiate hotspots expect masses of spring break drunkards, and are prepared to handle them accordingly. Brush up on legal conduct before you take off, and try to keep yourself aware of your surroundings. An article in USA Today, for example, has expressed that students can find themselves in jail for making an “obscene gesture,” and that students arrested on drug charges in Mexico can be held up to a year before seeing a trial. Be smart, not only for your own safety, but to prevent a listing in your school paper’s Police Blotter when you return.

You Say: What do I care? I’m never going to see these people again!

The Reality: It can be a lot easier to lower your inhibitions when you don’t have to care what others think of you. But with the rise of Youtube, Facebook albums, Collegehumor.com, and the invention of camera phones and digital cameras with video recorders, it’s hard to play it safe. Hell, Joe Francis has made a multi-billion empire off of taking advantage of drunken partygoers with his Girls Gone Wild franchise. You don’t want to come home from spring break and have people come up to you at a party a month later saying, “Do I know you?” or “Aren’t you that girl who took her top off in a Wet T-shirt contest in Puerto Vallarta and then puked all over her naked breasts?” Nooooo you do not, my friends.

You say: Whatever, I trust my friends to keep a secret

The Reality: They say that once a photo hits the web, it’s impossible to completely delete it. And the post-break Facebook albums are inevitable. But the more people that have access to your pics, the more potential for these pics to be distributed. All you have to do is right-click a photo in a Facebook album and you can save it your desktop. We’ve all heard the horror stories of people getting fired for the content of pages on social networking sites. Just like the latter warning, the internet can cause your “secrets” to spiral into the public domain. It’s one thing to get drunk and tell your friend an embarrassing story, only to retract it the next morning and say that convo never happened. It’s another to try to erase your World Wide life.

You say: I just want some no-strings-attached lovin’ to get my mind off of my GPA.

The Reality: Studies have shown that spring break correlates with an increase in sexual activity – by 74 percent! Obviously, the more sexual activity, the more chances of coming home with a spring break souvenier…in the form of herpes, genital warts, chlamydia, gonorrhea…you get the idea. Besides, sure, local heartthrob Paolo may seem exotic to you, a naive American tourist, but you’re probably not his first, and you probably won’t be his last. No matter how strongly you and your pals swear each other to secrecy, an STD (or an unwanted pregnancy, for that matter) won’t be left behind.

You say: I’m in tropical paradise! I’m totally safe!

The Reality: If the above reasons to stay safe haven’t convinced you, think about the horror stories that have developed in the past few years, such as the Natalee Holloway story. If you’re worried about your sh*t spread all over campus, how about when your tragedy becomes worldwide news, and people start making their own assumptions about your spring break behavior?

Even if you are trying to play it safe, in a foreign land, it can be more difficult to get the medical assistance you need, should something go awry. And with all the booze that’s flowing, the chances of getting seriously hurt escalate. The aforementioned USA Today article cited a young girl who fell off of a balcony and died after drinking too much; I’m sure there are countless scratches, scrapes, black eyes, and ankle sprains that haven’t made the papers – and they’re all telltale signs you had too much fun over Break when you get back to class.

I’ve seen a lot of drunken injuries in my day. Some are funny; some not so much. You really shouldn’t need to wear hard hats or protective armor to a party, so here’s a brief list of some potentially painful injuries, and how to avoid them.

Injury: Cigarette burns.

Avoid them by: Not drunkenly smoking your cigs all the way through the band; not giving someone with a lit cigarette your hand; not putting the wrong side of your lit cigarette into your mouth.

Injury: First, second, or third degree burns.

Avoid them by: Being conscious of where the bonfire pit is at a keg party on a cool autumn night; not attempting to walk through said pit in an effort to reunite with your friends after peeing in the woods.

Injury: Stitches on your scalp.

Avoid them by: Not jumping up and down on your lofted bed and cracking your head open on the ceiling; not falling out of a lofted bed after sloppy, drunken, sex, and cracking your head open on your f*ck buddy’s desk.

Injury: A shiner the color of an eggplant.

Avoid it by: Not chugging straight Bacardi and proceeding to faceplant your nightstand. These actions may or may not also have a negative effect on the nightstand, which may or may not break apart from the impact of your face.

Injury: Swollen, bruised kneecaps.

Avoid them by: Not attempting to do “the worm,” despite your complete lack of dance ability. Especially on concrete surfaces.

Injury: A cut-up upper lip.

Avoid it by: Not drinking from your beer bottle after all of your friends slammed their beer bottles on yours in an attempt to make the beer foam up and overflow; you never know if they chipped the bottle.

Injury: Sore [insert body part here]

Avoid them by: Not trying impossibly tricky, kinky new things while having sloppy, drunken sex. Sloppy, drunken sex can also sometimes lead to accidental penetration in places that no man has gone before.

Injury: Dislocated knee.

Avoid it by: Not dropping it like its hot with your guy friends at the bar when you already have a history of bad knees that dislocate easily.

Injury: A bruised ego and a crippled reputation.

Avoid it by: Knowing your limits and partying wisely. Once you’ve sobered up, all of the above are pretty embarrassing to have to explain to inquiring minds, and you don’t want people to think that you are the victim of domestic violence.

On a serious note, folks, alcohol-related accidents happen all the time on college campuses across the country. The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse and the Harvard College Alcohol survey reported that between 1998-2001, alcohol-related unintentional injury deaths increased about 6% among the college population, and during that period, over 500,000 students were unintentionally injured because of drinking, with over 600,000 students admitting to being hit or assaulted by another drunk student.

It’s all good to look back at last nights’ antics and laugh it off, but when weekend craziness goes too far, it can have extreme consequences. So keep yourself and your friends safe, designate a DD, and if you’re accident prone before you even crack your first beer, it may be in your best interest to invest in some protective gear.

Sometimes, I think finding out that your mate has cheated is a blessing in disguise, because you can sidestep the entire “this isn’t working” discussion and end things in an explosive fight instead. Of course, for those of us who just had to choose nice, faithful boys, it can be hard to let the poor guy down. So, we make up excuses. Sometimes we even lie.

If you don’t think your man can handle the truth (“You’re obviously not going to get any better at foreplay,” “If I have to waste one more Sunday watching football with you and your frat boy buddies, I’m going to slit my own throat,” or, simply, “I can’t wait to bang Johnny from Journalism class, as soon as I get out of these shackles,”) you may want to/be forced to fabricate a reason for ending your exclusive relationship.

Junior year of college, I was in a dead end relationship. I had chased my boyfriend, and won, and within six months, I was bored. I tried so hard to instigate a blow-up, but it never worked. Instead of the ever-dramatic, uber-conclusive “Get out!”/ doorslam combo, my ex started crying and pacing around the halls of my dorm room, where a concerned RA took pity on him and returned him to my doorstep.

I considered a plethora of lies to catapult me back into the singles scene. “It’s not you, it’s me” is too generic an excuse, and when I tried to play that card, the guy started promising to change. I tried to use money as an excuse, arguing that I needed to pick up more shifts at work and spend less money on nights out. That one blew up in my face, since we worked together, and he thought that more work for me would also mean more time we could spend together; he also suggested saving money by staying in and watching movies. By this point, cuddling with him was making my skin crawl, but of course, I bit my tongue and sat through Quentin Tarantino’s Four Rooms. Since he was a pothead, I considered using narcotics as an excuse, but, as a partier myself, I would sound hypocritical, unless I vowed to cut booze out of my life.

How was I ever going to end this one?

Truth be told, it took an ambulance ride and a percocet prescription to get back into the singles scene. I kid you not.

My blessing-in-disguise came in the form of a dislocated knee. I had to take a leave of absence from my waitressing job, where my ex was a cook. Bonus: no awkward post-break-up interaction! I ignored the guy for a couple of days, and then told him that since I was incapacitated, I thought it would be too difficult to continue with the relationship. He was working full-time, after all, and I had to hobble around campus on crutches and crash, exhausted, at the end of the day.

I pretended I was more upset than I really was and said I was going to throw myself into my schoolwork for the rest of the semester. In reality, I was at the bar most nights, crutches and all. But at least I was single at the bar on crutches. It is sad that it took bodily harm to end my relationship, but sometimes there are no other options.

Am I alone on this one? Anyone else ever have some ridiculous story to get out of a relationship?

5. A lost wallet and/or clutch. This is particularly disturbing because it is usually the first thing that hits you in the morning, well before you’ve had any time to nurse the hangover you earned. It feels very similar to being on a deserted island that smells strongly of vodka and lime. You are cell-less, cutting off contact with the outside world. With credit card whereabouts unknown and no proof of identity, you are left defenseless against fraud. If you are underage, there is the heavy burden of finding a new fake i.d. The brand new lip gloss and powder from MAC that you inevitably JUST bought are gone forever. Worst of all, your dear, loyal, and perfectly fashionable clutch will never be wedged into your armpit for pictures or table dancing ever again. R.I.P. Limited edition Coach Python and Boucle clutch. You will be missed.

4. The guy you went home with. Okay, last night this guy was h-o-t! He was witty and charming and so attentive to your needs; not once did he let you have an empty glass! Whether you met him at the pre-party, the bar, or on the way home (never a good sign), this dude – who seemed like a great idea at the time – is now nothing more than a big (or worse, tiny) mistake. Often, this error in judgment will use trickery and promises of rides on his family’s yacht to get you home with him, but come morning all he can offer is a ride home…if you’re lucky. High-tail it out of there and head to the nearest health clinic to make sure all he has given you is a bad memory.

3. Bar-Dancing Induced Injury. An injury caused in part by your favorite jam is highly unsettling; it feels like betrayal. Unfortunately, though, being hammered enough to hop on the bar and shake your shiz with the shot girls is begging for disaster. One minute you’re on top of the world (bartop) doing the drunk girl dance; the next, you are falling in slow motion into a sea of A/X clad gentlemen. While that group of guys was immobile for the last 5 minutes trying to look up your skirt, they have swiftly parted, allowing you to fall directly onto the floor. So much for chivalry. The only up-side to this drunk-tastrophe is when the bar staff take pity on you and set you with straight shots of Ketel One.

(Note: This mishap will always occur a day or two before a major event (like graduation) where you will then be forced to explain your injury to your grandparents.)

2. Hitchhiking. Only the biggest and baddest of theme parties (and the most alcoholic hunch punch) can inspire such stupidity. The problem with being both extremely intoxicated and too impatient to wait for a cab is that it often results in severe underestimation of distances, which can lead to the (incorrect) assumption that everywhere is within walking distance. While you saw nothing wrong with stumbling down a busy street’s sidewalk dressed in lingerie, angel wings and 4 inch pumps on a 38 degree evening, a kindhearted stranger did. He rolled down his window and had you at “Um, are you okay? Can I take you somewhere?” After hopping out of his car and wastedly thanking him (and God for letting you make it out alive), he sped off into the night with your angel wings.

1. Getting Arrested. While it seemed completely appropriate to hit on the hot young cop outside of the bar last night, this morning all that attraction has turned to regret. Despite his insistence that he was working, and that you should probably run along to the nearest Taco Bell and head home, you couldn’t resist to ask “Why, is there a plobrem occifer?” Cue his disgruntled and older partner to walk over, demand I.D. and arrests you for being drunk in public. Those hilarious comments about “ASS-aulting an officer” and your demands to have “Officer McChiseled-Abs” cuff you instead probably didn’t help your case, either. Use your one phone call wisely, because if you call your still-groggy girlfriends in the morning, they will most likely be laughing to0 hard to take you seriously.

Now, I’m usually pretty skeptical about any news I see on the Daily Mail. It’s kind of like the internet’s version of the NY Post. The articles have some basis, usually, but they’re stretched like that last little bit of ice cream in a mostly empty pint container. Still, when I saw an article that told me that something that’s been a problem of mine for years is all in my head, I was not pleased.

I’ve had back pain since a little into puberty. Friends and relatives know that one of the biggest (pun intended) issues I have is the size of my breasts. They’re huge – and I do not mean DD huge, I mean F. Yes, there is actually an F, and that is what I am. Mind you, I’ll be getting a reduction at some point this year. But needless to say, I have back problems. My mother has back problems too, and so did my dad. It runs in the family, and it sucks, but it’s something we have to all deal with. And when I say we, I mean everyone; at least 80% of people have back problems.

But according to a recent study, only 15% of the people who complain of back pain are actually in pain. They seem to somehow come to the conclusion that the brain tricks the body into thinking it’s in pain, when it really isn’t.

Excuse me?

Alright, I admittedly know a few people who complained about back pain when they really didn’t have it. But other than that, I know how real back pain is. People I know who have back problems have legitimate reasons; arthritis, overweight/obesity (which is a problem unto itself), and various injuries all play a part. I know people who walk around all day long and come back to their home with an aching spine. There’s nothing faked about it for most people I know, and most likely at least half of the people who actually experience it.

However, the head of Pain Support did make a very astute comment: “Psychological pain is still real pain and patients still need help and support.” What I would like to know is how they determined psychological pain from physical pain. I’m also curious about how they did this survey, or even the course of treatment they tend to employ for those who are “faking it”. Curious and peeved.

As for me, I know I’m not “faking it”. And though I don’t doubt that people do, I think a significantly larger number is in order. Maybe a recount…?

Whatever. I’m going to go lie down on my memory foam now.