mevre

Ceasefire, i'm watching you! sounds creepy as hell, but just know that i'm also holding you accountable, though i might not be terribly verbal about it... i have seen you kick so much ass - i know you can do this. set yourself up for success and take of business!

this, right here. this is what it's all about. excellent state of mind to be in, keep it up! [and thanks for spreading it around!] and you know, even if you had a bad start, you didn't let it stay bad. most people would let a bad start ruin their efforts. stay strong, tree-dweller!

truth. it's a good idea, no matter how much "uuuuuuugh" it elicits. : p heeeey, i like the sound of that!

today was...disappointing. hugely. i ate well, but did not do anything else except spend lots of money on Christmas gifts. i was planning on taking Tiberius out on a "just because" date [was feeling mushy and wanted to remind him how special he is], but when i got home he was hemming and hawing about if he felt up to going out at all. well, we ended up deciding to stay in, but not before derailing all momentum and willpower for workout or writing. we just ate dinner [a very yummy stew that he made Monday night in the crock pot], so while i'm digesting i'll try to write, and then once the food is settled i'll see if i can't get psyched up for a workout. *half-hearted jazz hands*

*plays some sick guitar riffs* word, dude. i totally agree with you. Tzipi speaks the truth! she and i are just starting to hang out again, so i don't know if the competition aspect of our previous friendship will even be a thing this time around. we've both mellowed out a lot since high school which i think is a good sign. anyway, i'm interested to see how it plays out! ditto. man, people say they like to read and i'm like "hooo boy, you have no idea the Pandora's box you just opened." see, i haven't read any of these, i'm not at all interested in them. which i'm thinking could be a problem, given that the book i'm writing is YA, and that these are the most popular YA books right now...

mountain climbers could also work for a warmup, depending on how hard you plant your feet each time. when Tiberius lived in a place with extremely thin carpets, i got very good at stealth burpees.

whale, whale whale. another day, another dollar. hurrah! i like dollars! aaaaaanyway. today was a very good day! i'm well within my calorie limit, and i had a big ol' workout [biked for like 40 minutes pretty hard to a park, where i hiked up and down hills for a couple hours.] not sure if i'll get any writing in, but that's ok. i shall try. yesterday i did a bodyweight workout and it killed my arms. you see, i'm going rock climbing with a friend of mine on Sunday. we were super close as kids, all the way until high school, when we drifted apart. and she was always better than me at everything, especially physical stuff. so i figure, new stage in our friendship, new rules. i want to at least be able to hold my own from now on, so i've been working on my pushups and pullups and so forth, hoping to develop some last-minute strength [because that's how it works, right?] but i'm sure come Sunday she'll be all and then i'll be all *sigh but it'll be great no matter what.

no, i actually prefer to just pay attention to the nutrition facts and then put it in a note in my phone. dunno why, but that works best for me. i tried MFP, and it was just way too cluttered for me. i'll take a look at Fat Secret though! yes! my comfort zone has always been writing and editing scholarly essays. i've never been confident in my creative writing skills, but essays always felt like my territory, ya know? so this whole writing-rather-than-examining a book thing is...weird. and hard. but i believe in myself! what do you read? are you a more casual reader, or are you hard-core grad student-level into the theory? [or somewhere in between?]

hi nerds! end-of-week-1 wrap up here... writing - 4/5 days accomplished. 4 out of 5 ain't bad! i'm calling this a win, especially since i struggled through severals sessions of just not wanting to write at all. it's all about forming those new habits and morphing your mindsets, right? exercise - 2/5 days, i think? horrible. but they were truly weird/extraordinary circumstances, so i'm not being too hard on myself. but those circumstances are pretty much wrapping up, so i have a feeling that this coming week will be great. diet - no exact numbers, but i think i did a pretty good job. could be better though. will try to keep better books on this in future.

wrote the requisite 700 words yesterday, and then some. gotta love the feeling of going above and beyond your goals. caloric intake today was not written down, but i've spent so many months keeping meticulous track of my calories that i've gotten pretty good at guessing if i'm on-target or not. i might have over-consumed a little, but i think i was pretty dead-on again. these cramps have me curled up in the fetal position all dang day, but Tiberius* and i went kayaking nonetheless. we just paddled around the calm lake for about an hour, but it was a decent arm workout, and probably as much strain as my uterus will put up with. i am about to write my words for the day. tough, since inspiration is nowhere to be seen. but oh well. i know you can't wait around for great ideas to strike - you have to seek out the greatness and harness it yourself most of the time. *i have decided to refer to my partner as Tiberius from now on, because that's what a few of his friends affectionately call him.

yes!!! great work on that run, home girl. BASK IN YOUR AWESOMENESS. you deserve it. also, super jealous that you live in Japan. it'll be fun for me to live vicariously through you for a little while. keep doing all the good things you're doing! p.s. how did you end up tweaking your diet? is it working for you? i know the pains of trying to eat well and feeling like shit because of it. very frustrating stuff. just keep experimenting and remember that there's no one-size-fits-all diet. for example, Waldo, a mega-beast he-man of epic nerd proportions here on NF, eats chocolate and bread every day, and he did when he lost all his weight as well. just goes to show that different bodies need different things.

awesome thread, Tzippi! very well-rounded goals, just like a ranger. i once took a personality quiz online to see which class i am, and [big surprise here] my result was "ranger!" i kept the verbage from the quiz and adapted it a little. it seems like a description that would match up with your particular flavor of ranger life as well, so i will share it with you: "Rangers are skilled stalkers and hunters who make their home in the woods. Their martial skill is nearly the equal of the fighter, but they lack the latter's dedication to the craft of fighting. Rangers often accept the role of protector, aiding those who live in or travel through the woods. Her skills allow her to move quietly and stick to the shadows, especially in natural settings, and she also has special knowledge of certain types of creatures and plants." let's kick ass as rangers this challenge, elf sister!

excellent! it's always good to get as many eyes on a book as possible. you can pretty much count on me taking you up on your offer, Tzippi. thanks for letting me know! welp, lost count of my calories today, but i'm reasonably sure that i stayed below 1450. i did not work out because i am stupidly sore as well as crampy, and screw that shit. but that's ok - i'm still on track to accomplish my goal of 5 days of working out this week. i did not write last night. :/ I got mega stuck on the logistics of a scene and stared blankly at my screen for several hours. then my partner got me spitballing with him and we got everything cleared up just in time for me to go to bed haha. but i did write today! 430 words so far. i just had to stop in here for a little break. and now i'm feeling pumped up and ready to tackle those last 300 words! FOR ASGARD!!! [or, i guess, "FOR SPARTA!!!" as the case may be. ]

yeah, slacklining is probably not that demanding, but it might satisfy my desire of mastering a skill... will have to look into that. i'm not so much into team sports. same goes for martial arts and the like [with the exception of beating up on my punching bag ] i do love biking, but there's not much to master. and i feel pretty "meh" towards skiing/snowboarding/weightlifting. : / thank you for all your suggestions though! i really appreciate them! sorry if i'm being sort of a ball-buster... i worked on my fear of heights for several months and made very little progress. and it would always end with me being way too sensitive and getting mad at my partner for no reason. haha poor guy. i think i've put him though enough. however, i was always good at bouldering. for some reason it never really scared me. maybe i could work on that for a while... ok! update time. diet: so far today, i have consumed ~683 calories, out of the 1400-1450 which i'm aiming for. workout: i decided to take it a little easy and do a simple Tabata HIIT session of burpees [along with a proper warm-up and cool-down, of course]. i probably won't be able to manage much more intensity than that for the next week or so, but it felt good to do something after having various ailments holding me back from exercising for so long. writing: i've got my OpenOffice document ready to go, and i expect full success on that front as well. i'll post actual word-count numbers tomorrow. not bad, mevre! *pats self on the back* a couple more months like this, and i'll be in good shape! [literally and figuratively!]

here is my battle log, just in case anyone was interested. #shamelessselfplug

lol kids killing kids... disturbing trend, to be sure. well i'm off to a not-too-bad start over here. though it's hard to eat well right at the moment, what with the cake i made for one of my housemate's birthdays, the cookies another housemate baked, the caramel apples my partner's mom made us, and all the Halloween candy hanging around. i keep hoping it'll all just disappear...and not in the "oops i ate all of the candy and an entire cake" kind of way. so, i realized earlier today that what i really want is to be good at things. to have athletic skills. i thought parkour would be cool [and i still think it would be cool] but i can't get over how much i hate running. i tried rock climbing, and i've got the necessary raw skill for it, but i'm paralyzed by my fear of heights and can never make progress. i'm into backpacking and hardcore hiking, but finding people to go with me is tough. plus, a lot of mountainous-type activities are getting hard to do as we enter into November. and besides all that, i'm not sure i'd count backpacking as the type of skill that i'm after. same goes for swimming and kayaking [both of which i also enjoy immensely]. i want something a little more offbeat than those things. maybe slacklining? that takes balance and lots of core strength, right? i dunno, would you classify slacklining as a workout? do you guys have any other thoughts for an athletic skill that i could develop? gonna start hitting the workouts and writing hard again tomorrow. wish me luck!

thank you! the one i'm currently working on is a modernized tribute to gothic literature, but for YA audiences. haha so the short answer would be "young adult." though i am interested in period/historic stuff, as well as gritty mysteries. i might dabble in those sub-genres, but i think i'll always stay within the young adult camp. do you write? or read? i love meeting fellow readers. thank you kindly! yes, lots of salads... oy. haha and salads are the last thing you want on a cold winter day. give me creamy soups and fatty roasts and lots and lots of potatoes, but don't make me eat salads!

sup y'all! well i was planning on kicking into high gear on the 1st of November and have decided to be undeterred by the next challenge's far-away start date of November 10th. my goal is to do this challenge from 1st November - 1st January. so here we go! let's get physical - 5 days/week working out i've got a punching bag. i've got running shoes. i've got a weighted vest. i've got HIIT and bodyweight routines. in short, i've got a lot of options and i shouldn't get bored doing the same thing over and over again. i am going to hold myself accountable for doing one workout for five days of every week. don't eat that shit! - eating at a caloric deficit pretty self-explanatory. i'm allowing myself to moderately over-indulge on Thanksgiving, the one or two days following Thanksgiving, and pretty much the entire last week of December. this one is gonna be hard, and it's my main goal. we'll see if i can do it! write now - 700 words/day, 5 days/week again, it's exactly like it sounds. i'm currently working on my first novel and would really like to make a living from my books. but i have to actually finish the damn things before i can sell them! so there ya have it. my challenge. it's been a long time since i've done one of these, but i've got a good feeling about the next two months. let's crush it, nerds!

good ideas! thanks guys!

hello ranger friends! had a question for you all. i had my heart set on starting my next challenge on the first of November, but I'm guessing the challenge forum won't be up and running by then... is there a way i could start a thread and then move it once the challenge actually starts? or will i just have to be patient?

oy. the Murph makes me want to weep just thinking about it. right now it doesn't sound like something i'd enjoy, but i'll probably change my mind over time. it's something to aim for, that's for sure. that punching routine, however, looks right up my alley. thanks so much for the idea! i will probably give that a go tomorrow or the day after.

jealous! i wish we had Ren Faires in my area... the only one we have is pretty lame. it's great that you're walking so much! i remember how hard it was for you to be inside during the brutal winter months this last year, so it's good to see you're enjoying the warmth while it lasts.

just remember how much better you feel afterwards when you do go. : ]

in situations like this, i end up making myself use it, even if i don't totally love it. ["after all," i think, "i spent all this money..."] it's a fallacy to reason that way, but i embrace it because hey, it's getting me to exercise more!

double post, derp de derp