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The last two months have been busy, busy busy and I've completely fallen off the wagon. Some was amazingly fun, some less so, but either way the traveling, the stress, the eating and the drinking has taken a toll on my body and I feel like a mess. But now I'm done and can settle back into a nice, steady routine and start taking proper care of myself again. Goal #1: Make stuff work nice I've injured my finger climbing and messed up my hamstring (again) and the rest of me feels pretty wonky too to be honest. So I feel like I really need to start taking prehab/rehab more seriously. I can't play if I'm broken! The first part of the goal is 15 min of daily TLC for whatever body part that needs it the most The second part is to sort out my mobility underpants collection and come up with a routine that I can use as a morning routine (hopefully in the next challenge) Goal #2: Get back to basics Since climbing and handstands and (leg) flexibility training are all on hold or at least at a much lower intensity, this is a good time to focus on basic strength and work on the things that I don't like working on. Strength train 3x/week including core, push and leg and particularly hamstring/glute exercises to see if that can help my injury. Goal #3: Something about diet My eating has turned rubbish, I have constant cravings, I've gained weight and it sucks. I need to fix it, but I'm honestly scared of committing to a diet goal. So I'm going to set daily or weekly goals instead and try to make them more difficult as we go along. I'll announce the first goal tomorrow. Goal #4: Get off the computer I've spent a lot of time procrastinating on the computer lately, but not even doing fun stuff like hanging out on NF! I need to stop that and start doing actual stuff. The worst thing is that I've been feeling very scatterbrained as I've constantly been checking social media while reading five different articles, watching youtube videos and solving online puzzles, all at the same time. (I haven't done any puzzles in the US so I really hope I've detoxed from them at least.) The goal is to stop using the computer at 8 pm, and if that's too hard right now then try to do better each week. If I'm watching a movie or something I can go over the rule, under the condition that I'm not multi-tasking. Fun quest: Walkovers! Because I need something fun to look forward to! I'm not going to grade this goal, but I want to put in some work towards walkovers and try and get rid of some of the mental hangups I have towards them. For back walkovers I'd like to be able to kick over from a bridge For front walkovers it'd be awesome if I could go from a handstand to a bridge Yep, that's a challenge. Feels good to be back!

This will be a multi-part challenge, spanning at least the first 3 challenges of the year. I'm keeping the first one simple, and will focus on some good foundational stuff. Like Lara Croft, parkour, climbing, combat, and outdoors exploration are all totally my jam. I even have a passing interest in ancient civilizations, and will likely be scrambling around some Mayan Ruins in the early spring. Main Quest: Parkour all of the things!!! Climb all of the things!!! Balance in mind-bending ways! Play with weapons! Look like someone who could compete on ANW. 2015 and how we arrived here: Major goals for 2016 My overly full schedule: Goals for this challenge: I'm keeping things very simple and foundational this challenge, as I already have an overburdened schedule. Goal 1 - Be agile like Lara (fitness) Lara can balance on challenging objects, pull up easily onto things, and perform flips without breaking a sweat. My goal is to collect an average of 10 minutes of skill work/day, the skill work divided between: Kipping pull ups, Rail walking, Front walkovers, Back walkovers, Forearm stand/scorpion, and weapons play. Right now, I can do kipping pull ups, but I get nothing at all from the kip as my technique is poor. But kipping is much more efficient in parkour and will also lead me to a muscle up much sooner. Forearm stand and scorpion will help with the core and shoulder engagement needed for handstands. Rail walking is important for parkour, and I constantly need to improve. I'll post a video of my current status with the walkovers. And weapons are fun! ungraded sub-goal: I'm horrible about prehab and foam rolling if I don't force myself to do it. So, the goal for this is to also average 10 minutes/day. Goal 2 - Proper fuel for exploration (diet) Surviving in the wilderness is impossible without proper fuel. This goal is simple: Track protein, and manage 110 g/day (I'm open to suggestions on the number. I weigh 145 lb). ungraded sub-goal: minimize soda and alcohol. Goal 3 - Stay mentally sharp in the wilderness (life) Lara had to be mentally sharp to explore, find new artifacts, do tons of parkour, and thrive in the wilderness. And this requires excellent sleep. For me, sleep is the foundation for improved productivity, good muscle recovery, and reduced anxiety for me. The goal is to set a solid bedtime routine, where I stop eating food after 8:30 pm, I drink some calming herbal tea, electronics are turned off by 10:00 pm, and I read after that until falling asleep. On weekends, everything can shift back an hour. The goal is 6 days/week of compliance with this plan. ungraded sub-goal: Make at least 2 animated graphics for Xcode apps. Continue working through tutorials and messing around with some of my partially finished apps.