Thrillho

Long story short... chronic exhaustion, insomnia and depression now MIGHT actually have SOME link to my extremely low testosterone levels (only took nine months to convince my doctor that I wasn't lying) and nascent IBS which isn't doing wonders for my energy levels. So... my focus isn't on this challenge anymore. I'm just trying to work on my flexibility and some light jogging, but mostly dealing with food and weight issues that are currently more pressing. Cheers to you all, and I hope you assassinate the heck out of your goals!

OK, somewhat of a reboot! I have such great plans to find time for all of this, and every night it's like 9:30pm and I crawl into bed to watch an episode of Bojack with my wife and I realize... well, the whole day is gone. My free evening time is currently being spent frantically editing a story for submission to an anthology. It's already been accepted, but is well over the wordcount limit remaining in the publication. Tomorrow, I'm going to wake up a little bit earlier, try and power through a full workout as shown in the Original Post, and then walk my dog as a 'cooldown' before I need to start making lunches and getting kids ready for school. I've been doing better waking up early these days, so this might be where any self-improvement has to go.

3d spatial surveying scanner. You ever see Prometheus? The gadgets with the lasers that they use to map out the tunnels? This is the real-life equivalent. We need to run piping and new equipment through insanely congested areas, so I'm laser-scanning the areas, getting every last wire and bolt and whatnot. It's line of sight, so I'll sometimes need to run 8 scans around one pump, just to make sure I get EVERYTHING. And it ain't light. And we've got SEVEN active projects in this mill right now, so they figured "Eh, we'll just get him to scan EVERYTHING, as long as he's there!"

OK, TO EXPLAIN... on somewhat last-minute notice, I got sent out of town to do some mill scanning. I'm not entirely sure how to quantify it, but hauling 100 lbs of scanning equipment all over a working mill for three days (Top floor: 280'-3" above grade, stair access only), and working around boilers, furnaces, kilns, steam blowers, acid tanks, causticizers and delig reactors SHOULD count for a lot of leg and lower back exercising. Now to work on the rest of the stuff.

For most of the last four-ish years (might actually be longer...) I've been chiefly over with the Monks. Boxing, BJJ, MMA, most of my fitness goals had been built around combat sports. It was pretty much my favorite thing. I loved having something that allowed me to actually demonstrate whatever physical skills and abilities I had. I loved the competition, and always getting better at something that I enjoyed. A couple weeks ago, I had what will probably be my last amateur boxing match. I didn't train nearly as hard as I could have for that fight, and I know I could have done better, but the thing is... I think I'm hitting that point in my life where I enjoy watching it more than I enjoy doing it. Only took 25 years. And now, in my advancing age (I turn 38 this year! Get off my lawn!) I really need to focus more on general mobility, bodyweight exercises, whole-body fitness, running, and maybe more recreational sporting. If my wife were here, she'd also probably point out that American Ninja Warrior is my favorite television show at this time of year, and then she'd poke me in the belly and laugh. So! If you'll have me, this monk is going to be swapping out the brass knuckles for some nice skintight black spandex. Sneaky sneaky. Working out quantities of each of the following, per day, per week, to be determined. Challenge #1 - Aerial Combat Bodyweight squats combined and jumps. Hockey jumps (side to sides). Jumping split squats (sort of like lunges). My hips and knees are in terrible shape. Challenge #2 - That Upper Body Pushups. The bane of my existence. Double-arm army crawls. Triceps and shoulders. Negatives, IF I can figure out some way to hang a bar at my house. Challenge #3 - Zero-G Combat Practicing handstands. Against the wall, to start. Probably for the entire challenge. I've never managed any success with these. THAT WILL CHANGE. Challenge #4 - Core Meltdown The picture is only tangentially related. Planks, and side-plank shifts. Maybe baseball slides, as well. Core, abs, obliques, lower back. Lotta repair work to do. Bonus Challenge - Wibbly-Wobbly Timey-Wimey Flexibility Wall splits. Pigeon stretches. Heel to butt stretch. I stiffen up easy, especially the hips and legs. I'm just using this challenge to sort of get me up to the level where I can set some REAL challenges for the NEXT challenge. I hope that's all right! Howdy!

So... my ridiculous weekend. Just had to share with you all. Feel free to laugh at me! I know I did. https://lasvegassun.com/photos/galleries/2018/aug/26/0825EllisMania15/#/18 Good times.

*twirls*

Ditto. I'm trying to bash down some ideas that have been clogging my head in order for me to focus on the next section of my serial, and TRY to finish the first draft of my contribution to the Collabor18 Anthology.

Context will be forthcoming. The first... chapter or two-ish is going to be an anachronistic mess, MOSTLY on purpose, to sort of throw you into Oscar's shoes, disorient you, show you snips of the past and present (1916 up to 1933) and his mostly-sensible world suddenly falling apart. Also, the very first scene with Baram I KNOW is missing la mot juste to make it clear. It's clear in my mind, but my descriptions are perfunctory now while I just TRY AND FINISH A WHOLE DRAFT FOR ONCE. Thank you!

Trying out a little something. STARTING a story is always super, super hard for me, since I always feel like I NEED to cover EVERY preparatory base, when I really just need to... start the story, and maybe explain some stuff later. So, quick question... does this mostly make sense? (CW: violence)

... this ended already! WHERE DID JUNE GO

Been away a while. SO... sleeping has been up and down, exercise has been up and down. More sparring and bagwork, less weights, more sleep (sometimes), much less sleep (other times). I would say I am sticking to my plans more than 50% of the time, but it's the end of the school year, and my wife is working more than full time, so there's some days where at no point between waking up and going to sleep do I get more than 10 minutes of time to 'do something'. NEXT WEEK, school is all done for all of them, and most of their extracurriculars are done, so we'll be settling into a new routine. AND...! When I get back from visiting the in-laws at the end of the month, I start construction on the first part of the Ninja Warrior playset!

Good, hard workout on Saturday w/ bagwork. Good, hard sparring with my son on Sunday. I focused on boxing and covering, he padded fully up and was throwing kicks. He's 6'0" and closing in on 200 lbs, so he's a pretty good sparring buddy for now. However, I've had a cold since Friday and that's totally thrown me off whack. Down on sleep, but still making all of my dog walks and other appointments, so I'm kind of zombified right now.

Can we post various chunks on here, if anyone cares to read or offer feedback? I'd like to see what y'all are up to.

My opponent is shorter than me, but considerably larger, but from what I can tell from his video, he doesn't know how to throw from the hip. It's ALL arms. So, as wierd as it sounds, I MAY actually be able to beat him with technical skill. Hey, there's a first time for everything!

Define 'technical'... ? I have my heavybag set up in my garage. I'm going to be going through all my old routines, focusing in particular on head movement and triple-jabs. In July, I'm going to be going to striking nights back at my old MMA gym, just to get the ring rust off of myself. Other than that, I'm largely focusing on FITNESS and CARDIO, and repairing my knee. I know I've got sufficient skills (IE, the bare minimum) to be at an event like this, and I know that I'm tough enough to take whatever my opponent can dish (and I just saw my opponent's submission video, and I will admit to being a LITTLE intimidated), so my goal is just to get my body in the best shape that I can so I can last all three rounds and, if it happens AGAIN, the sudden death fourth round.

And... it's official. OK! There's a lot of junk happening right now.

I just found out that Lord & Miller were the original directors of Solo, and were replaced by Ron Howard because 'they weren't sticking to the Star Wars feel'. ... THAT WAS LITERALLY WHY I WANTED TO SEE IT.

Spent about an hour last night with my son's thera-bands, just doing one-leg resistance extensions. Stretched a lot this morning. It feels a lot better, but even just sitting for two hours at work I can feel it starting to get sore. Gonna be a LOT of office walks today!

2182 words on Saturday. 300 today. Bout to get into it.

OK, so... now I have a pulled / sprained / otherwise damaged MCL. This is going to put a crimp in things for a little bit. Maybe I should paint that side of my knee gold, in keeping with this challenge's theme.

I'm the same way. I put off writing more than anything else. I need to START... and thankfully I've started for tonight! Catch me! 633 words so far!

Actually, I've got some new plans for the morning. If I get up as early as I am, I am going to take my dog to the meadow early in the AM, when no-one else is there. She can go off-leash and chase mice and foxes all she wants, and I can just jog back and forth and work on my speed and my cardio (bottom of the meadow is about 1km long). I can manage some jogging a lot easier than I can manage weights and bag work. Hoping that jump starts my metabolism, or... something, to wake me up.

Yeah, working on diet and just 'the new habit' of getting up early and doing stuff. I've removed a lot of things from my phone, actually, so rather than spend half an hour in bed when I wake up, I just check Twitter and head downstairs. So that's something! #smallvictory