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Not long after slapping in the above placeholder photo, two of those angelfish started laying eggs on the leaves of one of the Anubias plants in the tank and beating the crap out of any other fish that came close, not to mention darting across the tank to harass the other two angelfish. So I go the breeding pair out of that tank and set up a 10 gal on the fly and yadda, yadda... they ate their eggs. <sigh> But now I know I have a breeding pair of angelfish. Time to move on. ====== Hi. I am Stronkey Kong. I've been on NF ten years. Lately it's church etc, and fish tanks that are getting me off the couch and not stuffing my face so we'll roll with that. This challenge will be a combination of a lot of the usual: a nutrition goal, a bed time routine, a morning routine, an exercise routine, and a fish tank based LUYL. When does life stop getting weirder? ========== Goal 1: Bedtime Routine-- In bed by midnight. I get home from work around 10:30 pm. That gives me an hour and a half to: feed the cat feed the fish feed myself (a small snack) change clothes, wash up, brush teeth evening prayer go to bed by 12 am. I can read in bed if I don't feel like falling asleep right away, but that's it. Goal 2: The point of goal 1 is to fix my morning routine. Get up at 8 am. Morning prayer. Feed fish/tank maintenance. Exercise Breakfast Read scripture Study Ukrainian or Greek Goal 3: Exercise Mon-Sat MWF = walk or something light TRS = KB, Ringfit, or jogging Goal 4: Ditch the soymilk and fake veggie meats. It's our liturgical calendar that has brought out this one. There's a lot of fasting in Orthodoxy, mainly in the form of giving up meat and animal products. My eating habits have veered toward vegetarianism, and so I have a lot of soy products around, so much so that it makes fasting not really feel at all like fasting. I don't really have to give anything up, I'm just switching the days where I eat tofu and veggie sausages. I should feel like I'm sacrificing something, and on fasting days I should always be at least a little hungry. Also, veggie stuff can be kind of expensive, and it's debatable whether its really all that healthy cuz it's processed yadda yadda, and I tolerate real dairy well enough. And there was recently a big study on diet that found that whole fat dairy was actually protective in terms of longevity (not counting butter). So I'll eat meat, milk, and cheese and just limit myself to tofu on fasting days... tofu is not a meat replacement, just ask a carnivore. LUYL: Breed Fish, Grow Plants, Make Money This goal will practically do itself as I require little added motivation to do this hobby. But I'm at the point where i need to tune it up and turn it around so it doesn't just become a money toilet. I have a couple of orders of plants, fish, and hardware coming. After that I need to stop spending and start focusing on growing and marketing and come up with a legit plan.

Hi friends! It's been soooo long. I started a challenge in the beginning of the year and I stopped again. For some reason I couldn't follow through. But I'm back again. I missed you guys. I have been keeping up with fitness and nutrition (with varying success), but a little accountability couldn't hurt 😅 So without further ado, here are my goals for this challenge: Nutrition I've been on Noom for a bit now, following their course. I know, there are many people who say it's not good for you. And I see their point (I really don't like their color system). But there is also a lot on there that IS good for me. I've been learning a lot about the psychology side of eating. I've had quite a few aha moments. So my first nutrition goal is to continue the noom course, maybe I can even finish it within this challenge as I am over half way. Noom has been talking about different eating strategies. Like paleo, keto, and intermittent fasting (IF). I've had lots of success with IF in the past, until I hadn't. When researching how to do IF when you got a female body I stumbled across the book "Fast like a girl". And it talks on how to do fasting in sync with your monthly cycle. This should take care of the side effects I was having when trying it in the past (hair loss, irregular period etc.), and should even help fix some issues I've been having for ages but my doctor can't help me with like stiff muscles, fatigue and painfull periods. There are 2 versions: a beginner one and an advanced one. I'm going to try the advanced one, but will fall back to the beginner one if necessary. (The beginner one is in parenthesis) So this is going to be my fasting schedule according to my cycle. Day 1 is the first day of my period, and I have a 28 day cycle (more or less). Day 1-5: 15 (13) hour fast Day 6: 24 (15) hour fast Day 7-10: 17 (17) hour fast Day 11-15: 15 (13) hour fast Day 16: 24 (15)hour fast Day 17-19: 17 (15) hour fast Day 20-28: 13 hour fast (no fasting) Fitness I found a zumba class that's a 5 minute walk from my house! So I'm going there once a week. I even got a punch card instead of a subscription, which is so perfect for me. I'm never leaving there. Next to this I've been trying so many different workout schedules and styles. Now I'm doing ringfit (nintendo switch) for an hour twice a week. I had been having trouble with hitting a wall 30 minute into my workout. Then I came across a video about pre-workout. I thought that was just for body builders, but apparently it's for when you want to workout longer. I found one without cafeïne or other stimulants, because I can't sleep if I have more than 3 cups of coffee a week (yes, a week you heard me right). And the stuff is epic! No more wall. Sure, I get tired and sore from the workout, but there is no block that makes it feel I'm standing in quick sand while trying to workout. I have no side effects. I researched the ingredients and everything I found says the stuff is save and you won't develop a dependence on it. Enrichment I should read more. I want to. But my phone and pc are such an easy distraction. So my goal this challenge is to read 10 pages a day. Of any book. I think that's it. I'm going to find some Doodlies now to say hi to. If they're still around here that is. And if you want to be friends, just drop a message below. It's fun meeting new people here 🙂

Yup. Just look at it. It's sticking out way too far. Even for an innie. It is winter and I am generally irritable and all this holiday food is everywhere. I just had my annual physical and talked with my doctor about weight loss, etc. I'm right where I was last year at least, so I haven't gained. But that cholesterol is still high, and we talked about medication and bariatric therapy (not surgery, just physician supervised weight loss). And in pondering all the options before me and looking more at my lifestyle, I'm realizing how far I've slid into general laziness and inconsistency farther than ever in my adult life. There is still so much more that I can be doing. 1) Fix my diet -- I have been running some numbers through some calculators. TDEE, body comp, macros... and oof. I'm not doing what I need to be doing for my metabolism and activity levels... both of which are low. I need to hammer out a feasible set of eating habits. 2) Create opportunities for Exercise/Activity -- work has me spending most of my 10 hours/day there sitting at a desk. While I've had nights where I get up and walk a couple laps, the occasional an sporadic. I need to create a daily routine for physical activity. I'm not in the situation where life is gonna just throw it to me. 3) Keep doing what I love to do, namely writing -- every minute scheduled toward word and exercise is one less that I have to write and finish these novels and stories. I need to create a robust, daily reading and writing routine. 4) Take better care of my shit -- the house and yard. The last year kinda got screwed up because I got sick in the spring, put off a lot of projects, then summer heat was relentless (or it was storming) and I got way behind on a lot of things. Again, I need to figure out a workable routine and stick to it. Notice the trend? Scheduling is needed. This helped a lot a couple of challenges ago. I need to get back to it. Some things I'm working on: 1) Eating plan: meals, timing, portion sizes, macros, etc. 2) Setting up a powerlifting routine: assessing training maxes, days/split, assistance lifts, etc. (Greyskull) 3) Coordinating 1 & 2 -- A mistake I often make is cutting too many calories while adding too much activity etc., and that creates burnout. 4) Plan and schedule meals and workouts. 5) Create intuitive and simple plans for execution. 6) Stick to my evening writing schedule. 7) Work in some additional reading and writing time... write/read during workout rest times. 8- Other? I bolded #5, because that's what needs emphasis here. This won't work unless I can accomplish that. Otherwise, I'm just building another elaborate plan that will fizzle three weeks or less into it. Anywho... Happy Ho Swolidays!

I have free time at work... so I'm using it write the new post. Work = Rec and Park Internship where I get to try out the "manager role/admin duties". I'm a Rec and Park undergrad finishing up my degree with this internship. Will be working until Fall, but getting my degree in August (yay!) Internship is going great, like seriously "perfect Internship I couldn't even dream of level". Especially during crazy pandemic still continuing. Downside, I'm no longer in a physical job. Upside I am taking advantage of a normal job routine, and live in a place where its quite a bit less stressful. So taking advantage of the situation as I'm getting this groggy after work, continuing weight loss... I just passed the 20 lb milestone, for 2021! This challenge is definitely going to be a grind on creating habits (may finally have to read the habits book...) Keeping at if even if my job blew out my brain a bit... Routines: This is a hate/love relationship right here... Morning and Bedtime routines. Hoping to find a good "routine" to check off of every morning and night. No screens after 8: Find I tend to go to bed faster or finish things up when I put the phone away at 8. YNAB: Doing something on the app once per a day gives me a point. A budgeting software I tried on and off for years. I was on the fence for this goal, but honestly this is a goal to get handled where I hope to master. I have some money habits I would like to get in check, especially as of the many unknowns after graduating this August. No Screens with meals: This was on top of my list from my Naturopath... I can do this, it is not as hard as it was 5 years ago (where my mind was my enemy). I just need a reward... Going to add eating and driving, since I realized eating a pack of nuts and lara bar before driving home might do me better than driving home. Bonus: Working out: I have Ring Fit, I have trails I need to walk on my own time... just making the time to do it will help. Meal Prep: I'm actually giving myself a point for every meal I prep in advance. Allowing myself frozen dinners, but getting this in would hit my goals better. Myfitnesspal: I don't hate it as much as I used to, find it less stressful then YNAB actually. Right now using it for "checking in" tool. ' Since I'm earning full time pay, my hope is to turn my goals into points... that I can cash out when I hit a goal. First goal: Oats Overnight... started eyeing them for breakfast or a bed time snack. Will see if I like them.... Also I actually need to watch this show.....

Hi Nerds! I'm Merrin. I haven't done a proper challenge for over a year at least. It may look like I have a lot of goals, but all of these fall in line with my daily schedule. I was going to Culinary school but had to withdraw last April. I need structure to thrive, so putting my goals down along with writing a daily schedule with my partner is really going to be good for me. We just bought a house! We drove 1100 miles across the country to move into a house built in 1900 (yes it's 120 years old) and used to be a funeral parlor! It's old and spooky and sometimes bats get in. It needs a lot of love and attention. (We spent most of October re-plumbing the entire basement.) I love sewing! I taught a Cosplay 101 class at Nerd Camp 2016. I don't have any LARP plans until January of 22, but that doesn't mean I can't sew a pile of things until then. Mercury: There's always something to be studied, and right now, that's language. 1 chapter Duolingo each day. Learning Japanese in the hopes that Duncan and I can go back in 2023. Venus: all hobbies in moderation! 1 hour social media, 1 hour video games per day. No old games. No Animal Crossing. Moon: Usagi's favorite thing is spending time with Mamoru. Ifrit and I were enjoying a more regular date night. 1x a week for games [Firefly, Lovecraft, Villains] Mars: keeping the home clean is an act of duty and an act of love. 2x weekly, including house painting, hanging art, repairing windows/treatments, laundry, floors. Jupiter: Mako-chan loves being in the kitchen. She shows her love for others by feeding them often. Cooking 3+ times a week, opposite chore days. Baking counts. Saturn: Silence is a necessity. 2 hours downtime daily, reading, stitchwork. Finish pumpkin set, gem poster. Castle poster? Uranus: No time for slacking. Ringfit, 1 section daily. Neptune: Deep Submerge! Daily skincare, hydration goals. [Oops it's like they go together on purpose.] Pluto: Cosplay work, 3x week. If I feel like there are other areas to improve, I'll branch out the challenge to the Starlights.