DanBell

I haven't been posting here as much as I'd like, but let me just say: I can't talk up parkour too much. I don't have a car, so I get a lot of walking in, and it's a blast to get some parkour in during my daily "commute" to and from work/the bus stop. It also gives you some real-world context to orient your bodyweight training---how far can I jump? Can I pull myself up using just my arms? How many times in fifteen minutes?

As evidenced by the "What type of nerd are you?" thread, there are many many many many many many types of nerds.Part of nerd-dom (nerdness? nerdaciousness? nerdocity?) connotes self-loathing; sometimes this is a motivational factor and a good thing. Sometimes, however, the motivation is to tear down others for their more extreme forms of nerd(insert suffix here) rather than to improve oneself. That described my (internal, not external) attitude toward LARP'ers, anyone who watched any anime ever, the kid in the video linked to by the last "many", and anyone who played Pokemon cards. For arbitrary reasons, these were "more" nerdy than my habits of D&D, all-night Starcraft games, and pointing out that the comma ought to go before the quote in that last "many" I wrote last sentence. It's been a breath of fresh air, however, to see hobbies I've previously thought of derisively mentioned here, because I admire the people who engage in them---precisely because they're here and want to improve their lives. I'll stop before this becomes a wall of text, but I just thought I'd note my change in perspective---and, hopefully, warn those who might secretly hold themselves above "the common nerds" here. There's no place for that in the Rebellion.

This is my intro post, but I've actually been lurking/reading Steve's excellent blog for a while. It's a little eerie---both he and I got into parkour, eating paleo, and fivefingers, within a few months of each other. Now I can't remember what ideas I got from his blog and what I found from other sources. I decided to show my face when I got wind there was a Rebellion going on. Because seriously, how could I not join a rebellion? My name and username are the same (though I have a space in there offline). I'm a 23-yr-old statistics major in Provo, UT. I've been lucky in that I've never had weight problems, but my choice of hobbies and friends meant that I wasn't as fit as I could be. While I like my weight as it is, I definitely have a (yet undefined) desire to become more athletic. If I have a video game fitness role model, it'd be Guy from Street Fighter Alpha II, or Faith from Mirror's Edge. If I get the time to sit down and write out some goals, they'll probably have something to do with decreased swim times, increased flexibility, an increase in my vertical, an increase in max pullups (or something so I don't suck at climbing so bad), and maybe the ability to do a backflip. Maybe. Also, I freaking love this site. I am a nerd. I also like being fit. Perfect!