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I recently completed my personal training sessions, so I'm feeling a little Lost In Space.. Ooh, switched series, whewps. Goals: STAY THE COURSE "*I* don't know. Fly casual." I've set up an exercise schedule since going solo, I need to A. learn how to stick to it, or how to make it up if I don't, and B. Come up with a regimen. I'm going through the Nerd Fitness Academy workout paths, but they've been feeling insufficient, so I'm working on building more around it. PARKOUR! "I didn't know they were looking for somebody to *lead* this crazy attack." So, I signed up for an online Parkour 101 class. Issue one: I suck at online classes. Issue two: I don't know how to parkour. To combat these, I've assembled a team of (wait no sorry I'm jumping movie series again) local friends that will meet me on Saturday mornings to practice. That means I need to do it AND I need to prep practice facilitation. MAINTENANCE MODE, ACTIVATED "Without precise calculations we could fly right through a star, or bounce too close to a supernova and that'd end your trip real quick, wouldn't it." I hit my side quest of weight loss - cool, not my main priority though. Now that I've hit it, I need to learn how to maintain it. I've been really good about tracking my food (nearing one year of daily tracking on MyFitnessPal), but I've increased my calories for maintenance, and now I need to see if it was a correct balancing or if I need to adjust it up or down. And try not to freak out, as I'm totally okay with increasing weight as long as it's in muscle. LIFE GOAL: TIME MANAGEMENT "Even if I could take off, I could never get past the tractor beam." Facebook takes up A LOT of my time, and I've been unhappy with that for quite some time. However, part of the reason I can't quit entirely is because I end up doing a lot of (non paying) work and social there. So for this challenge, no facebook feed. I can look at status updates, mentions, I can post, and I can view groups, but no scrolling on the feed.

So I will try not to ramble so much as to quash all entertainment value from this but be detailed enough to be useful to me for further trips lest I forget what I learned. This trip planning had a fair amount of hubris. I always felt like I could really pound mileage if I had a light pack and quick meals. So I picked this trail http://www.hoosierhikerscouncil.org/adventure_hiking_trail_aht/to do solo. In fact I was a little concerned I would finish it in one day and not camp. Part of this trip was to see what it was like to camp solo. But life has been crazy and I spent little time planning and made several last minute decisions. I went with an outdated map. I had added labels to one version and lost it so I had the 8.5x11 listed on that website with no labels on shelters or any of the roads. I got up late and when I got to the area discovered my truck's GPS showed no roads visually or any names. I have no reference to where I am actually entering the map (I later found out the road I thought I came in on has ceased to be). I drive around trying to figure out where I am or where particular access points are. I finally drop water at 2 places marked as "ADVENTURE HIKING TRAIL" and park at another one. It is now 10 local time and I am hours behind schedule. I take off with my view of Fluffy Butt. I had previously looked at backpacks for dogs but wasn't sure I would ever take Atlas. That is two nail aprons jury rigged to his life jacket. He carried his own kibble and water. Probably 4# total on a 75# dog. This was a trail that connected to the AHT at a place where it was simply blue blazes for the trail I was on and Green Blazes for the AHT. I repeat, the Blazes were Green or green and white. Bark White and Moss Green So when the floor is covered in leaves and you navigate thin trails by blaze, it's hard to spot this from a distance. Many places were VERY WELL blazed. Close and using reflective markers. But some was not. Anyway, I had walked past this crossing and hit another trailhead and had to backtrack. Pretty dry with some streams only a bit of a trickle. Did I mention I had misplaced one water drop and the dog lost half his? Or that in my obsessive weigh cutting I hadn't grabbed my filter sock and chlorine dioxide tablets (at less than a quarter once total) Made some slow miles and stopped for lunch. I call them Krab doobies Started making decent progress but got lost in the Timber harvest area. Lots of other foot traffic makes it hard to stay on trail especially looking for green blazes. SPend about an hour off trail and pick it back up. Now it is after 4 local time. Light is getting sparse and I am needing to find the shelter or just make camp on the trail. In an effort to cut weight I have no shelter. Finally made it Make some dinner of Shrimp ramen, dehydrated seafood and bonita strips. I am now down to less than 1 liter of water. I know exactly where I am but not where my truck is and therefore not sure how far I have to travel on 1 liter of water after amking oats and coffee in the morning. Time to evoke bad trail mojo and take a pot of water out of the fire water buckets and boil it. Bottle up a liter of green water with drink mix and set aside enough for coffee and oats. Boiled rain water is typically safe but between tannins and algae it's best used mixed in things. Up by 5:15 and waiting for enough light to leave Find another shelter with poor former occupants. Bad trail joo-joo Restoring my good trail magic. I dropped this off at a later shelter on paved road. I believe it was around 8 miles. On to some neat ruins of a fireplace at the next shelter Atlas stopped carrying his own gear. I left on the lifejacket since it's deer season. Atas follows my trail like an ant. Exactly. He could have moved over three steps but instead he got stuck. THe life jacket has a handle so I lifted him over a dozen logs. This is dragging out, so cutting it short. I still didn't know where my truck was and got lost in poorly marked river bottoms. I only packed through breakfast so returning to my truck at 5ish local time was rough. I still had water but no caffeine and finished my last emergency munch once I was on an actual road to my truck. I had tried to return on original trail but it all started to look alike. Due to an achilles tendon injury during a trip on the Knobstone Trail a month or so ago I feared to wear my hiking boots or trail shoes and opted for the only boots that hadn't hurt it when it was at it's worst. All leather, padded, unvented leather Craftsman workboots not designed to do 22 miles of trail in a day. Especially when it rains the last 4 or 5 hours of the day and you don't don rain gear because you are almost there.

Holle enters, quietly, Jedi shields up, so no one will see her. "What are you doing here?" she mutters to herself, looking around nervously. "I've got a really bad feeling about this," the Raven on her shoulder mutters. "Shut up!" she snaps, a little too loudly. People turn to look. "Now look what you've done!" she chastises the bird. He cackles a laugh, almost falling off her shoulder. Feeling him shift, she gently puts her hand up to steady him. Holle sighs, then swallows hard as a dark haired woman glides across the room towards them. In silence, the two watch her close in on them. "Welcome," she says, quite pleasantly. "I didn't know if you were going to show up or not." Holle paused, trying to find words that wouldn't make her sound too stupid in this uncommon territory. "uh, neither did I." * fail * "Relax, have you formulated a goal?" Holle sighed, nervously, "To start making goals," she shrugged. "All my life I've just been doing what I was told.. I think it's time to start thinking for myself, and actually WANT something. " The woman laughed, "Don't you want anything?" Holle shrugged, "All my needs are met. But I cannot help but wonder... The Herald cries that I should level-up my life, not just "settle."" "Are you ready to grow, then?" she smiled. "I.. I don't think I have a choice." "Very well, then. Do you have a physical goal?" "To not be so pathetic.. I'm not very strong, and I get out of breath too easily." "So you wish to begin with strength and endurance, perhaps.?" Holle nods, grateful that she could put it into words for her. "So how is your eating?" "Well, it could be better. I think I will try to cut out more of the sugar. I usually avoid it pretty well, but there is still room for improvement. And no more butter or cheese." "So, you want to cut out sugar & dairy, how about allowing 1 carb item per day as your maximum?" "That sounds like something attainable." Holle nods in agreement. "How much exercise do you get?" "I am on my feet all day..." She tried to tuck in the exasperation she felt at that response, but Holle could feel it. "I'm sorry, I was whining, wasn't I?" Holle regrouped, "it was my New Years resolution to stop whining. I stretch in the mornings, but I wouldn't call it a workout. I have lots of routines left by The Herald, but I never seem to actually do one." "So, can you try to do a full work out, say, once a week?" she offered. Holle thought about it. "That sounds so lame.... " She shook her head, gently, "Once is more than zero." she offered. "Very well then. Actually work out once a week for 6 weeks. Maybe then I will see that it's not as big a deal as I'm making it in my head." "We are making progress! One more goal for now, to make it 3. What would you like to work on?" Holle shifted & looked around the room. There were a lot of people, with a lot of different conversations going on. "How about if we get you in here, about every other day, and you make some friends!" "Friends?" Holle squeaked. She nodded, "yes Ma'am. You need some accountability." "Very well... actually talk to other people.." "It's not as dangerous as it sounds," she soothed. Holle was emboldened by her new friends' straight forward attitude. "And you know what, I think I'm ready for a career change. I'm going to start looking around for something a little more fulfilling than my hum-drum just-settle line of work." "There you go! You're thinking higher already!" "Now if I can just maintain this.." Holle thought to herself.

Greetings, fellow nerds. Happy to join, don't much approve of death stars and the like. Too high taxation. I'm Sythez, and I'll be joining things around here starting today. Moved into a new place, starting a new year of University in the great city of Edmonton, and decided that, despite not being overly unhappy with the way I look, I am not happy with living a life that I grew up with, on processed crap and poor exercise habits. A bit about myself; 210 pounds, 5'8", turning 20 and 2nd year universityAvid fan of Starwars, LotR, and Jim Butcher's series The Dresden Files (think bad ass modern wisardry in downtown chicago)Practice a chinese martial art I guarantee you've never heard of (Ba Ying Quan, northern family style)LoL silver 5 (currently)Massive sucker for any girl with a great laugh, awesome smile, and/or great gaming skills What I'm hoping to achieve with NerdFitness and the challenges: Target weight between 170-185 of muscled healthy weight, ideally within 6months - 1 yearA committed routine of activity, balancing flexibility, endurance, and strength over at least 4 days a week.Ditching soda, eating amazing tasting food that is not processed to plastic and gives me the nutrients my body needsSpartan like physique and attitude, although I'll settle for just plain damn sexy ​ I know that its pretty much impossible to get that on my own, and am really happy to have found a group of people who are like minded! Thanks in advance for the help I know you'll be, and as for the message in the intro; Han Solo is a bit of a hero for me, in the sense that he honestly is a bad guy who has a heart of gold. He had no qualms about shooting a gangster straight up, yet despite being a jerk, still risks his life to save a princess. In my case, my fat is the bad guy, im shooting it before it shoots me, and the princess... is in the works, I hope... (just need to ask her out for that dinner...) Hoping to join the rangers! Peace out all, thanks for reading, and I look forward to supporting you guys with your goals and being supported by you as well!