catspaw

My days sweep by quickly. Time-markings swirl past like planets on orbits: daily shuttles, weekly Hyrule, six week NF threads, quarterly team goals, yearly perf season. Their position in the sky softly signals time's passage. And yet contained within each day is an uncountable number of interactions, decisions, nudges, wins and failures. Far too many to hold in my hands at once, trickling through my fingers like grains of sand if I try. In only a single day; every day. It's complicated and messy, life. We weave narrative through it, but the lines never quite trace perfectly through the dots. I wish I could pause time long enough to see it all more clearly. I miss you all, from times of orbits past. That's a planet that needs to come 'round again.

Sun, Sep 27th - Workout Log I'm stupid and wore the wrong shoes today, accidentally coming in chucks instead of weightlifting shoes. "That's okay," Hyrule shrugs, "we're doing mostly pulls anyway." It did make snatching feel a little weird though. Snatch 75 95 105 115 (100%) 120 x F The 115 was "damn good. Fuck weightlifting shoes. That was solid." 120 pull was strong, but the failure, as always, was likely just all in my head. Snatch pulls (without quite touching floor btw reps) 95 x 3 135 x 3 ("damn, that's looking too easy, okay we're going up") 155 x 3 155 x 3 155 x 3 155 x 2 (slipped out of my grip a second before lockout on the third rep) "Grip's never your limiting factor," Hyrule muses. "It's cool to see it fail." Power clean + power jerk 95 x 2+1 115 x 2+1 125 x 2+1 135 x 1+1 (power jerk PR) 135 x 1+1 135x 1+F+1 (missed jerk, caught it, did it again and got it) Clean pulls 135 x 2 155 x 2 165 x 2 165 x 2 165 x 2 165 x 2 These were mostly fun because the bar had a ton of plates on there due to just building it from previous exercises. 15+15+10+10+10. Looked way more badass than it was. Deadlift (mixed grip) 165 x 10 Deadlifts at the end were "bonus points" mostly so Hyrule could see that I'm capable keeping lats engaged while mixed gripping.

Nope. Random stranger child sitting next to me. View from plane window this evening on the way home. (Yes, I flew out earlier today. Fast trip.)

Glad this isn't a longer flight.

Yeah yeah yeah.... (from the plane)

"Why do you have ground bison in your fridge?" the IC asks. "Because it would go rancid if I left it in the pantry." Off to LA for work. I work closely with an LA team and really should make the trip more often, especially since it only adds about an hour to my commute time. Honestly, I don't travel nearly as often as I should. It's been months since I visited Zurich (hoping to make it there in early Nov), and months since I visited NY, and forever since I visited Boston or Waterloo or any of the other places I should be going on a more regular basis. I'm traveling in a few weeks to host a summit. It started with a few teams I brought together who I declared should talk with each other more. Somehow it turned into a huge thing, with 50 leads attending, and everyone around me freaking out at me about why they didn't receive an invitation. I admit to being concerned about how to make 50 people productive, but there's a few great-organizer types who are handling the details and I'm learning to flex my "let it go" muscles. Tall Manager is out for 3 months, and though I miss the mentorship and company, I'm enjoying the additional strategic work on my plate. My team is self-sufficient enough that I can spend less direct time with them, but I do feel guilty about it regardless. I keep reminding myself that it's a good opportunity for them to step-up too. Boarding time. Here we go...

One of the laws of nature is that msuroo and Catspaw can never be at the same place at the same time.

Tue, Sep 22nd - Workout Log Had to be super-quick today, so rest periods were much shorter, so weight had to be a bit lighter. Alas. Was in-and-out in 18 minutes, including warming up a bit. Bench 95 x 5 95 x 5 115 x 5 125 x 2 115 x 4 115 x 2 Squat 135 x 5 155 x 4 175 x 3 195 x 1 195 x 1 GO GO GO!

I know I said I wasn't going to workout this week, but I woke up feeling like I wanted to get some bench reps in, so I went with it. It's called adaptability! It's what Batman has! .... along with a lot of money. ... and a shitton of issues. ... and no parents. MY POINT IS: adaptability. Yeah, so I'll be doing that when my shuttle gets in this morning. Yeah I've tried this before. The problem is that unlike basically everything else in the universe where tenacity and dopamine-seekage can power through, sitting quietly is actually anti- these things. If I sit there hyper-engaged in beating my own PR, I'm losing. Alas.

I'm forgoing workouts during the week this week, just like the last. With writing all these performance reviews on my plate, I just need the hours of the day too badly. Especially since I don't intend to let it creep into my evenings and weekends. My morning hours at work are precious. I get in ~6:45 am, and by 8:30 am I'm full of meetings, and people at the office, and noise. But those nearly two hours before everyone else arrives is a good opportunity to actually get shit done. In silence. So that's why you won't be seeing workout logs from me. Still here. Not dead. Just skippin' 'em. I'm into week 2 of cutting season. Packed my lunch this morning instead of eating food here. It's intentionally boring, as boring-food seems to work better for me than good food while cutting. Chicken breast, seed crackers, nut butter packet, raw veggies. Too much omega-6, but, meh. I'll deal. Dropped 7 lbs of primarily water weight last week which was reeeeeeally needed since it's about a hundred thousand degrees outside these days. In the moments I wasn't out with friends this weekend, I literally spent my time nearly-naked on my couch with a fan pointed at me. San Francisco doesn't do air conditioning. Anyway, cutting while super-busy at work is probably great timing in the long run. No free time to sit around thinking about being hungry. Go go go. Speaking of....

Sat, Sep 19th - Hyrule Workout I arrive at the gym and it's packed with people doing an intro to crossfit class. I mean, packed. Hyrule himself is finishing up his own workout in the corner, doing sets of pullups between gasps for air. I get guilty pleasure out of watching him, for once, being the one who is out of breath and struggling. He finishes up and messily pulls his shirt back on, still out of breath and unable to speak, pointing to me and then to the barbell. Start warming up. "We're doing sets of four snatches," he says a few minutes later. Oof. Power snatch + snatch + hang snatch + hang snatch 75 x 1+1+1+1 85 x 1+1+1+1 95 x 1+F 95 x 1+1+1+1 95 x 1+F 95 x 1+1+1+1 95 x 1+1+1+1 These are rougher than I'd imagined. By the time I finish, my heart feels like it's lodged in my throat and all of the colors in the room seem too bright. The skin on my palms are ripped. I've gathered a small audience from the intro to crossfit class, but I'm too dead to care, walking in circles to try to get my heart rate back down. Hyrule's happy how quickly I get into the hole on the last two snatches on each set. By necessity. There's an up-and-down wobble when I catch the bar, which he thinks is mostly due to my body not being familiar with the feeling of getting under there so quickly. "It's good. You'll adapt." Snatch + Overhead squat 100 x 1+1 100 x 1+1 100 x 1+1 These are actually really great. The overhead squat especially. It's all back. My stance is pretty narrow, even for me, and the whole up and down is just like a back stretch. We move onto presses. Push press + power jerk + split jerk 75 x 1+1+1 85 x 1+1+1 95 x 1+1+1 105 x 1+1+1 115 x 1+1+1 Technique here was a little inconsistent at the start, but felt pretty solid by the end. Split jerk (w/ 3 sec pause at receiving pos) 115 x 1 115 x 1 115 x 1 No problems. "Sometimes I forget that you have a lot of strength to spare," Hyrule says. "And that when your technique isn't total garbage, things look easy." Uhhh thank you? Front squat + split jerk 115 x 1+1 115 x 1+1 115 x 1+1 Finished the last three sets up in the three mins we had remaining. "Alright, get out of here," Hyrule orders. "Go eat something and get stronger this week." Some orders never change.

I operate in one of three modes. The first is focussed intensity. Every thought along the periphery fades into the background, like zooming a camera forwards down a long hallway. Here is where I write my best code, my best words. There's a metallic taste in my mouth of adrenaline and dopamine, and all I can see is the goal. I would live here forever if I could, bathing in the high of productivity and achievement. The second is organized chaos. Twelve balls in the air, and I'm rapidly switching contexts between them. I talk to a report about a personal issue he's having, then answer two emails about system design, then strategize about how I'm going to get what I want from another team. It's rapid-fire, but there's a thrill that comes from doing it well. If focussed intensity is deep, organized chaos is broad, with many parts of my brain being exercised at once. It's exhausting but I'm operating at full capacity, and it's a good, well-used kind of tired. The third is wandering. The rarest of the three, most commonly found on long airplane rides or rucks through a grey-skied city. It's where long, meandering descriptions come from, and where I can distill meaning and lessons I've gathered from the other two modes. I find comfort here, but I'm also at unease, because my mind untethered is most likely to wander into alleys I'd rather leave undiscovered. But ultimately it's a necessary part of the cycle. What I'm missing is silence. Even if I'm at rest, watching a TV show or playing a mindless videogame, I'm likely to be in one of the three other modes; either doing twelve other things in my head, crafting narratives around the game's characters, or flexing the ambition to perfect the game. I check my laptop, I check my phone. I'm planning the next day, week, month. I remember silence, climbing the dangerous peaks in Japan, but it's something I can't recreate. I can't meditate or sit in a yoga position for more than about ten seconds without my brain getting itchy. "Stop overthinking it," Hyrule sighs. "Just lift. Tell your brain to shut up." I can't give him that; I don't know how. But I can give the next best thing; focus. My fingers curl around the barbell and the noise of the rest of the crossfitters in the gym fade into the distance. I take a deep breath and can hear the air pull into my lungs. I feel my heels pressing against the floor. Shoulders pull back, lats pull down. There's nothing but this lift. But here is where I overthink it. I'm aware of every micro movement; the feeling of my knees pulling back, anterior chain giving way to the posterior. The leverage of the bar in space, and my weight against it. I make the lift, but Hyrule can tell: "You're still thinking too much." They say you need to focus. That you need to drown out everything else. But that's not what they mean. You need to let go and let silence take over. You can't let your mind wander, but nor is it useful to think through what you're doing. Let muscle memory take over. I'm missing that silence. Hyrule sighs and sets me up with a shorter rest period. Tiring me out may be the next best thing. He turns the shouting music up even louder. Anything to drown out my thoughts.

How to lose weight in 4 easy steps.

Unrelatedly, easter egg of the day: search for [super mario bros] and click on the "?" box. (On desktop, it's on the right. On mobile, you have to scroll down a bit.)

It's my third day cutting and I'm already grumpy about it, even though the water weight is dropping quickly. In many ways, the first week is the easiest week. My body's not actually hungry. Even though my stomach is grumbling and my brain looks at a plate of food and is like: "....wut? What is this, a lunch for ants?!" It's all psychological hunger, which will-power alone can overcome. I'm not yet doing that thing I do around week seven when I stare at a box of sawdust and wonder if it's edible. Psychological hunger is annoying but it's not all-consuming. Here, I made you a graph: Today's my first rest day. Ughngn. Rest day calories.

I signed up for the Google lifting competition next month with the following three lifts: Bench, Squat, Clean+Jerk. (You could only select three.) Hyrule is disappointed. "Why did you choose squat?" "Why not?" "You're competing against all the other women there, right?" "Yes." "There will be women who squat more than you do. Your back squat is not impressive. But you know what there won't be there?" Tact? He continues: "There won't be women who are snatching 115, I promise you that." "Yeah," I object, "but my snatches are my least reliable lift. Plus I'm really bad at OLY PRs so I assume that I'm really bad at competition situations." "Yeah but you can snatch 95 with a blindfold on on a bad day now, right?" "I guess..." He nods at himself: "So do 95 to get your first one, you'll definitely get it, and then do 105 and 115. Even if you only make 95, I'm sure no other female will." I make a whiny sound like "uhhgnhn." "Go change it," he orders. Uhhgnhn.

Sun, Sep 13th - Hyrule Workout Lifting time. I'm walking down the street listening to some classic Clint Mansell, still a few minutes' walk from the gym, when movement catches my eye. About 100 meters in front of me, way off ahead on the next block, is some crazy guy doing what can only be described as a hybrid of dancing and line sprints. He's running back and forth on the sidewalk, his hands flailing in the air. It doesn't take long to recognize that this maniac is Hyrule, a big shit-eating grin on his face as he's noticed me first and is doing this dance (if you can call it that) for my behalf. I pull the earbuds out of my ears and by the time I walk up to him, my grin is as large as his. "Hi," he says enthusiastically. "It's been a while." "3 weeks." "I feel like we should hug." We do. Hyrule gets his coffee -- we weren't even at the gym yet, just outside a coffee store -- and then we head to the gym together. Warmed up with some clean + jerk + narrow overhead squats. "Your right shoulder's looking good," Hyrule noted. "Time off suits you well." Power snatch + OHS 75 x 1+1 75 x 1+1 75 x 1+1 75 x 1+1 Snatch 75 75 75 85 85 85 95 95 95 105 105 (F) 105 "Your predictor of a successful snatch," Hyrule notes, "is whether or not the bar lifts slightly off the ground before you start your pull. If it does, your lats are engaged and the bar stays close to you and it's a great pull. If it doesn't, it tends to be a little in front of you and when you catch it and it's too heavy to yank back at the bottom, you miss it." He sets up a timer for the next part. "Clean and two split jerks." "Two?! What is this, cardio?" "Don't worry, we'll bump it up to something that'll feel heavy after a few sets." Clean + 2 split jerks (50 secs rest) 95 x 1+2 95 x 1+2 95 x 1+2 95 x 1+2 120 x 1+2 120 x 1+F 120 x 1+F I am dead. I am laying on the floor dead. The limited rest time wasn't enough to catch my breath and I am just failing every jerk I attempt. Hyrule comes over to where I am hyperventilating on the floor and squats down next to me. "We need to work on your conditioning," he says. Between gasps for air I manage to get out: gasp "ass-" gasp "-hole". He laughs and gives me a few minutes to retrieve my lungs from my throat. Push press (5 sec pause on dip) 75 x 2 75 x 2 75 x 2 75 x 2 I'm so bad at these. I just really can't get dip tension. I'm sure it kills my jerks too. I do not feel like a coiled spring, I feel like someone being forced to accelerate out of a shitty compromised position. Push press (5 sec pause at top) 95 x 2 95 x 2 95 x 2 Push press (5 sec pause at top + 5 sec slow descent) 95 x 2 95 x 2 95 x 2 These are a lot better but my midline starts failing by the end of it, and my ribcage won't stay down. We spend the time in between sets discussing computer hardware and dinosaurs. Hyrule decides on the Ankylosaurus as his dinosaur of choice, though we spend some time discussing the pros and cons of dimetrodons, stegosauruses, triceratops, and allosauruses. "We'll spend more time doing that clean and jerk doubles thing again," Hyrule promises. (Threatens?) "Those are good for you." "Oh joy."

I recently finished my third playthrough. Worth it.

Time's passage is marked by how dark it is when I get to my shuttle stop in the morning. These days the sun has only risen when I hop off at the other side. Our summer has arrived, and it's hot and dry, even though autumn is dawning elsewhere. With the changing of the seasons, it's performance review time again. This round it falls into the "low stress, but very busy" bucket, as I'm not going for promotion myself, but I have 44 reviews to write. Yes, forty-four. I keep staring at the list of them, and then switching tabs to do something, anything, else. My status message at work reads "Perfcrastination". But on the whole, everything is quiet. My team is functioning like a team. The fire is out, and though the coals will smolder for a long time to come, you can see leafy green poking through the cracks. My job is now about giving that regrowth the space and care that it needs to flourish. It's an odd feeling to stand on the same ground where I once brandished huge hoses against massive flame, flush with adrenaline and purpose, and to now change roles into a quiet cultivator. It will require patience, and an acceptance that regrowth takes time. I was never any good at waiting. I encourage all of my reports to think of performance review season as an opportunity for reflection more than a system for judgment. Think about where you've been and where you're going, and how you want to get there. What's one thing you do really well that you plan to continue doing? I persist. I lift. I lead. I teach. I reflect. I run towards the fire. I get my hands dirty. I thrive when it feels hard. What's one thing you plan to do to have more impact? My cursor blinks at me, waiting for a reply, but none comes. Not because I don't have areas for improvement, because those I have aplenty, but because this question really asks what's next. Can you be a peacetime leader? Do you have that in you? Our summers are hot but brief, and in a few weeks the rainy season will arrive, though with the drought it's likely to just be an empty season. Not hot nor cold; not the bright sun of Sept nor the oppressive grey of Aug. Nondescript. And then the days will start getting lighter again. The cyclical ebbing and flowing of dawn will continue. And one day a great forest will stand here. These saplings just need a bit of love.

Ugh next challenge time already? Alright, here you go: Catspaw Keeps Blahblahblahing.

Next verse, same as the first. Yeah, just like this, only for another 6 weeks. Catspaws gotta blahblahblah.

Yeah, as much as I love bulking (and I do love it), I'm sorta looking forward to cutting a bit. Not so much for aesthetic purposes as the fact that it's hot out here right now (heat advisory warnings and all that) and the extra fluff means clothing is extra-tight and I'm hot and bleh and would feel happier just running around a little lighter.

Final bulking week. Saaaaadface. Tue, Sep 8th - Workout Log Bench 75 x 5 95 x 5 115 x 5 130 x 1 140 x 2 [PR] 125 x 5 115 x 5 Woo! Finally broke that 135 barrier, and for a double. Squats 135 x 5 155 x 5 180 x 5 (87%) [5RM PR] 165 x 5 165 x 5

Sat, Sep 5th - Workout Log Bench 75 x 5 95 x 5 115 x 5 125 x 3 135 x 3 (100%) [PR 3RM] 135 x 3 125 x 5 125 x 5 125 x 5 I'm kinda pissed off about this PR, even though I did my 1RM for a triple, because I had 1-2 reps left in me but I was at a visiting gym where there was no way to bail except roll of shame and I was too wussy to ask for a spotter. Blargh. Next time. Squats (oly shoes) 135 x 5 155 x 5 175 x 5 (85%) [PR 5RM] 175 x 4 175 x 3 Yeah there's more room for pushing it in there too.

Fri, Sep 4th - Workout Log Clean + OHP 75 x 5 85 x 3 90 x 2 95 x F 87.5 x 5 [5RM PR] 77.5 x 5 Paused Front Squat + 2 jerk dips 95 115 125 135 135 135