Waanie

Soooo tired. Thursday's food was great; a stir fry with chicken, brussels sprouts, mushrooms, bell pepper, onion, courgette and cashews with a delicious sauce: Climbing on Thursday night was meh, especially because many new routes assume that you're at least 5cm taller than I am... Otherwise, I did not do anything on my challenge since my last update, I just haven't got the mental energy to start anything, even for 10 minutes.

Wednesday I still did waay too much, even though I planned for it to be a rest day. I'm not sure what happened, but I was so tired in the afternoon that I had to cut the PoGo with friend short, and went to bed early after doing some very short yoga and longer stretching/foam rolling session. I focused on my lats a bit, and my overhead mobility improves so much if I stretch them, it's insane! Thursday I started of very productive with tidying/cleaning the living room and kitchen, walking, baking muffins, cooking beans, and doing some laundry. Now my energy is gone though, and I haven't played the clarinet yet nor done my yoga. I have portioned out my beans: On the left are black beans, including the big zip-lock, on the right are black-eyed peas. I prefer my beans cooked from dried, since the taste is so much better and they are much cheaper (I saved around €5 with this batch compared to canned). Once they're cooled down, I'll put them in the freezer. I love beans, so these will probably be gone within a month . Week 4 status: Yoga: 2/4 Mobility: 3/7 Cleaning: 3/0

Honestly, it sounds like you can't afford to go on this trip right now. Even if you get a raise, you need to have an emergency fund with AT LEAST a few thousand dollars in it. Otherwise, what will you do when e.g. your heating breaks down? Live in the cold? Pay hundreds more because you need to take out credit? The keyword here is eventually. It will still be there a few years from now, so why the rush? There's plenty of people into Harry Potter, so even if your horse friend won't be around by then, you can find someone else. You need to get your finances in order first; it will make you less anxious, improve your relationship with your boyfriend and, eventually, make your life more comfortable.

Great! I also ate Indian food tonight, although I've never eaten stuffing I think. I can find recipes online, but I wouldn't know what to look for or what to eat it with. Do you have any tips? For the trip, that still adds up to 1.5k. That's a lot of money for a holiday, especially such a short one. You have to consider for yourself if you find it worth it. Can you currently afford it if your car breaks down or Daisy gets a serious injury? Would you feel better with that amount in savings/paid off credit, or go on a trip? Would you rather go on this trip, or maybe a longer one with your boyfriend or family? These are all very personal questions, and I'm personally very financially conservative so I can't really give you advice. I often measure fun things in months of savings to convince myself that I can easily afford the fun thing (my last holiday was just 3/4 months savings), but it might also work the other way: is it worth X months of savings to go on this trip? Good luck with your decision!

The same is true for me, although I don't want to learn Finnish . Gamifying my outside time by playing PoGo works very well though, and when we had a point system for chores, both me and my boyfriend did more adulting. On the same note, the difficult chores never get done unless I spend conscious thought on it. Otherwise I default to the clearly defined tasks like laundry. Your gray-scale experiment sounds interesting, especially because I'm spending too much time with it myself as well. I now enabled it, and I'll let you know how it works. Then you'll have at least n=2 .

This month has not been kind to you . Stay safe!

Yesterday was exhausting, on top of an exhausting Monday! There was some confusion about paperwork, and nobody in our group actually knows what I should/shouldn't do. I figured it out after a few phone calls, but it felt like a waste of energy. In the afternoon I went to the party-location to talk about some organisational details, but fortunately I did not have to decide much; they will organise everything as they think best. I was planning to cook these fancy fajitas with roux-based sauce, but in the end I just make chicken/bell pepper wraps with the same ingredients (chicken, bell pepper, onion, tomato puree, cheese, salad) and extra garlic. It was very tasty even though it was not fancy. Somehow, when I'm exhausted I crave garlic and spicy food for dinner. I'm weird like that . Today and tomorrow, I will not read my email and not do anything for the organisation of my PhD. I should rest and think of other stuff, so I folded a few loads of laundry, played some Harry Potter, Wizards Unite! on my way to the grocery store, called with an aunt and played the clarinet. This afternoon I will go to a friend and play either Pokemon Go or Dance Dance Revolution, depending on the weather. It will be fun either way .

I saw it in one of your posts, and decided that it would be a great way to lazily spend my mobility time . Here you go:

Walking up a hill can be great for endurance . Generally walking faster or walking at different speeds is also cool. Walking the stairs might kill your knees, but how would you like dance-style workouts like Zumba? I hope that the cold will pass you by this time!

Ah, this is my bad. It still would be good to do a variety of stuff though, and not just binge-learn Finnish. Especially if you don't really need it . Do you prefer to plan your fun things in advance, or just do them as you feel like?

This sounds like a really good plan . I don't see any problem with spending your down time with something useful, especially if you get the other things out of the way first.

Oh, that's nice. Now I don't have to feel guilty about climbing anymore . Me too! Yesterday was a really busy day; working, clarinet lesson and orchestra rehearsal. It was probably a bit too much, as I couldn't sleep yesterday evening after orchestra and woke up very tired this morning. It didn't help that it was the first time back at orchestra, so everyone was asking how I was doing and what a PhD graduation looks like... Maybe next week will be better in that regard. At least I really enjoyed making music together again. Before work, I cleaned the kitchen (I even opened one of the ovens to start cleaning it before time was over). In between all the craziness, I did yoga that I really liked (yoga for if you're as stiff as a robot by Erin Motz), and rolled around on the ground and called it mobility work. Yesterday's food was easy and tasty; salad with small potatoes, bell pepper, cherry tomatoes, walnuts and feta cheese. It was very colourful, and tasted both autumny and fresh .

Nice challenge . What/Why are you doing with the ice for hands and feet? Is the idea to get all your blood to your centre? Glad that your neck is fine again .

You did very well; 3 low-carb days, all your exercise and adulting, and you didn't eat/drink out a lot. Maybe the weekend could have been better, but that's now done. Realise why you ate so much, and move on with your life . Did you make a meal-plan for the week?

Fair enough! Usually I climb around 10 routes, including warming up/cooling down, and this was much more. I guess that most of the participants were just really bad-ass . Oh yeah, if it doesn't hurt I can do the thing, right? xD Week 3 report Yoga 4/4 Mobility/stretching 6/7 Cleaning 3/0 This week was good goal-wise, and on top of climbing twice as well . My cleaning is still behind, but at least my house is not getting dirtier than it was .