Mu develops her inner HS puppy

[@mu]

the truth is that this basil came already grown, smaller but still. It has good sun exposition, I only have to water basically, it's pretty EASY  

On the other hand, we have a jasmine inside that lost all its flowers very suddenly and is not looking so hot. Maybe it got too much water + apparently they don't like to be moved, maybe the change in exposition disturbed it ...

 

Quick backlog update and I have to run. I should have more time later or during the week-end.

 

Tuesday => more guesso on the cardboard in the evening. I'm still not finished with the first layer. Little krafting fails are showing and some edges are a bit soft. I'm not sure I will be able to fix it. Maybe with decoration, or a dark base paint (I'd like to find a dark brown / coffee tone).

 

Wed => REST and the 1^st of May. I did some coding and we went out to join demonstrations. The police was using tear gas again and quite a lot. I do not know why honestly, I did not see anything justifying its use and to that extent. In Paris, the state announced that there would be an inquiry because a group of demonstrators “attacked” a hospital, a video surfaced and it turned out the “attackers” were fleeing the police and tear gas....

 

Anyway, we met a few new people there and back home, I talked with another neighbour who has a cat. Both our cats are a little stressed about sharing territory and stuff. Plenty of hissing but a lot of curiosity as well. We stayed in the courtyard for supervision, having tea with roses and saffron nabat (Iranian rock candy) and talked some more until night came.

 

Thur => P2 custom + a bit of jump to straddle HS at the end. +1 Cirque Physio.

Got 2 full elbow levers by helping myself with my chin on the other parallette but feet were up.

And more coding.

And more guesso.

 

Fri => Cirque Physio x5 + hanging raises & straddle-ups + back-bends + silks alignments with some backbending in silks. Oops I forgot 2 Cirque Physio drills, will do by the end of the week.

 

/* Challenge Log */
     last P2 cycle |Deload| #1
P2:            3/3 | 1/1  | 1/1
Press2HS       3/3 | 2/2  | 1/2
HS:            3/3 | 1/1  | 1/3
 
Stretching:    2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2
Cirque-Physio:18/18| 12/12| 12/18
Legs:          2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2
Ball-flex:     4/4 | 4/4  | 2/4
Pull:          5   | 4    | 2
 
Job-prep:     10/10| 16/10| 8/10
Drawing:       1   | 2    | 1.5

Edit: forgot to add coding points for Wed & Thurs.

[WhiteGhost]

10 hours ago, @mu said:

we went out to join demonstrations.

What is it that people are demonstrating against?  It hurts my brain thinking of a demonstration as a social event where you can go and meet new people, but I guess that probably comes from never having lived in a place where demonstrations are a thing.

[@mu]

3 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

What is it that people are demonstrating against?  It hurts my brain thinking of a demonstration as a social event where you can go and meet new people, but I guess that probably comes from never having lived in a place where demonstrations are a thing.

 

It's International Labour's day and in France as in many countries (it was actually a thing that got started in the US). It is traditional to have a demonstration of numbers in the streets. It usually includes unions as well as some political organisations and civil society groups. It's traditional but it will also include demands regarding current social issues (e.g. women's pay, social security).

On top of it, there is a social movement in France that started months ago now (Gilets Jaunes) and they want to address recent changes made by the government, for instance in taxation and retirement plans. That movement has been wide enough to spark a first response by the government (a nation-wide consultation on what people feel are problematic issues) but it's not clear yet what they will do besides collecting information.

We went first because we want to know exactly what is happening first-hand, news have been a bit contrasted. Secondly, after a few years of not having been able to publicly assert my freedom of expression in public, I certainly intend to use it and insure that right is preserved. It's not because France is tagged as a democracy that individuals should take everything for granted. Voting is one thing but I will also support collective action.

We also happened to meet a few people there because yes it is a social event of sort (as in “related to society”), there are a lot of people with at least quite a few ideas in common, it seems pretty normal to me to meet new people and have discussions in these settings.

[@mu]

A bit of guesso yesterday, finished the first layer, pfiouuu. Will need to sand a bit and go for a second layer.

+coding, I'm almost finished.

 

PressToHS + ball drill x1 + pull (hanging raises, straddle-ups, silks alignment)

HS consistency 3/5 2/5 4/5 4/5 3/5 => 16/25

 

The one jump kick is very tiring. The past months my consistency holds were between 5-10s, I'm now staying at 5-6-7s max on purpose because it's a killer. I'm discovering a whole new level of push as well with this rib story.

I'm also noticing that elevation on my right side is more consistent than my left, unsurprisingly. And my right hand tends to move a bit forward on the bar during the jump or actually the whole right parallette will move forward. I have to be careful about that.

 

Here is a short progress video with

• jump to straddle HS

• HS to straddle and back up (or not )

• push & lean drill couple of reps: I swear this I the one that makes me sweat the most, it doesn't look like anything is happening but it's HARD

 

I sent a video of my back in wall HS to Kirsty as she suggested.

[Mad Hatter]

Wow your straddle jumps look so much better already!  

 

3 hours ago, @mu said:

The one jump kick is very tiring.

Just don't forget that you're playing on hard mode using parallettes! The elevation adds a whole level of difficulty and strength required. 

 

3 hours ago, @mu said:

• push & lean drill couple of reps: I swear this I the one that makes me sweat the most, it doesn't look like anything is happening but it's HARD

Hah, it's the worst! It feels absolutely impossible and like nothing is happening and yet it makes you work so frickin' hard. But I guess it's good for you  

[WhiteGhost]

Your straddles are looking really good!  I have tried those lean things too, and man they are wicked hard.

[KB Girl]

That looks awesome! 

[@mu]

Yes straddle HS is coming along quicker than I thought, I've never really practiced it before so it's quite nice to see it coming with minimal frustration for once    Legs could be straighter but this is the general state of my legs, whether in straight legs raises, straddle ups, etc... they always have a micro-bend (at best). It had started to go away slowly with ball drills (super flexed feet), and then my ball died, and it reverted quite quickly to a bigger bend. Let's see how this progresses now that I have a new ball.

 

Sunday

More coding, got a bit slowed down by a bug in i18n message interpolation (multilingual support), it's actually a tracked bug since ... 2015 and nobody has been assigned to it yet. And the suggested way-around only works if you are using one language... ah ah

 

Practice: Cirque Physio x6 + ball drill x1 + HS endurance

 

Endurance was a bit disappointing, I guess it will suffer a bit while I work on my ribs. Best at 35s.

 

Then I did a straddle HS and it was a 54s one. It felt solid, like I could reproduce that much more easily than a straight HS. BUT it is not very useful because I don't need to fix my ribs to hold a long time in that position, if anything it could make the habit worse (losing the tilt and holding with an arch).

 

So - I went back to straight HS holds and I think I'm now feeling some new "stuff". It's pretty fuzzy but something is taking shape in my brain

 

My right side feels pretty solid and the scapula is very stable. I don't need to change the right side, it's elevated and externally rotated (I think), like when I want to fall over I feel something (the scapula I suppose) that actually prevents me from going over, or at least it's easier to catch when it's there.

The left side on the other hand does not get into that position naturally at all. At some point I felt very precisely elevation + external rotation I think – I could feel that little fall-over barrier on the left as well. But it does not last. The arm feels very wobbly.  My right side is definitely handling more weight than the left. I can lift some of the weight back to the left but it's a bit wobbly. I'm not sure what's causing that asymmetry. If it's the jump, a habit born from some kind of compensation (at some point I kept pinching my left palm, maybe I tend to put less weight on it), or something else. Anyway, something to look into. It's not huge by any mean but I can definitely feel it now that I'm holding a bit longer.

 

~ Week review ~

 

/* Challenge Log */
     last P2 cycle |Deload| #1
P2:            3/3 | 1/1  | 1/1
Press2HS       3/3 | 2/2  | 2/2
HS:            3/3 | 1/1  | 3/3
 
Stretching:    2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2
Cirque-Physio:18/18| 12/12| 18/18
Legs:          2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2
Ball-flex:     4/4 | 4/4  | 4/4
Pull:          5   | 4    | 3
 
Job-prep:     10/10| 16/10| 15/10
Drawing:       1   | 2    | 2

 

All good on all fronts and I'm working hard but I need to start applying soon. I can't quite relax properly because of that latent stress.

Drawing: nada, just cardboard and I'm slow on it.

Pull work seems to be coming down, this week I only did it on P2 and PressToHS days. Maybe I'll up that a little bit next week. But I don't want to get too sore and bum PressToHS...

 

PressToHS wee recap:

Module 1: Assessments /done

Module 2: Handstand line + Straddle HS /done

And I pass the requirements for the next level which iiis ….

Module 3: The press => Negative press chest to wall. With a new round of conditioning circuits as well. It's cool, lots of variety and new stuff basically every week so far.

 

I tried chest to wall negatives once before and I always got my bum stuck against the wall near the bottom   From the ref vid + instructions, I guess I was too close to the wall. Coach says we should pretty much balance it and the wall is only used for tracing. Let's see on Tuesday...

 

[Mad Hatter]

16 hours ago, @mu said:

Endurance was a bit disappointing, I guess it will suffer a bit while I work on my ribs. Best at 35s.

 

Which is still very good  

 

Nice little HS insights!

[Mike Wazowski]

Wow, I had never really thought about the fact that the ability to freely protest isn't universal across countries - thanks for reminding me not to take that for granted!

 

And awesome to hear on the handstands front - sounds like you're taking a temporary step "back" to take a big step forward!

[Norgaard]

Yay for passing assesment!!! 

[raptron]

On 5/4/2019 at 5:55 AM, @mu said:

push & lean drill couple of reps: I swear this I the one that makes me sweat the most, it doesn't look like anything is happening but it's HARD

THEY'RE SO HARD. But super helpful!

 

On 5/5/2019 at 3:25 PM, @mu said:

All good on all fronts and I'm working hard but I need to start applying soon. I can't quite relax properly because of that latent stress.

Ahh, yes. Good luck when the applications start going out.

[@mu]

On 5/6/2019 at 2:08 PM, Mad Hatter said:

Which is still very good  

 

Nice little HS insights!

 

ha true it's rabbit impatience

 

On 5/6/2019 at 11:11 PM, Mike Wazowski said:

Wow, I had never really thought about the fact that the ability to freely protest isn't universal across countries - thanks for reminding me not to take that for granted!

 

And awesome to hear on the handstands front - sounds like you're taking a temporary step "back" to take a big step forward!

 

Yes let's see! Puppy mode on, listening to the coach first.

 

22 hours ago, Norgaard said:

Yay for passing assesment!!! 

 

Yeaaaah!  the requirements were tucking the butt and a 5s straddle HS.

 

13 hours ago, raptron said:

THEY'RE SO HARD. But super helpful!

 

So much! It's gone this week however, it has been replaced by a sliding thingy from plank to press start position.

 

13 hours ago, raptron said:

Ahh, yes. Good luck when the applications start going out.

 

Cheers!

 

GUYS, GMB ARE RETIRING P1 AND P2 !!! AND RINGS, AND ALL THEIR COOLER STUFF BASICALLY.

 

https://meta.gmb.io/posts/sunset/?utm_term=newsletters-everyone-leads&utm_source=drip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=sunset-sale&utm_content=01-big-news-were-killing-off-some-classic-gmb-programs&__s=kydtzuuawoqw4pety1d6

 

I'm so shocked! I want to cry and/or riot badly.

 

I guess they focus on where the money is. But it's a pity really.  I never used any of their other entrance programmes. I don't know how they are, but I do know parallettes changed my life quite a bit. I was stuck because my main thing was aerial but it's heavy on requirements (security, material, rigging etc...) and I had no access to classes or a studio for a long time. And bam I discovered parallettes. I'm sure it's still pretty hard to find beginner level pbars programmes that are fun and interesting enough to stick to. I can assure you I never ever was much of a push-up person (I still don't fancy those that much) and yet so much happened in 2 years of parallettes (I started P1 2 years ago).

Bah... just shocked...

 

 

Monday

 

Cirque Physio x3 + legs x2 + ball drill x1 + hips

I managed a few full pistol squat rolls on the right (leg a bit bent on the way up), left is not catching up though.

 

Job-prep: final bits

 

1 painting in the evening!

 

Tuesday

 

Cirque Physio x3 + ball drills x1 + hanging raises & straddle-ups + PressToHS + HS consistency + silks alignment

 

Press neg chest to wall: Ok so some distance from the wall helped. I could do full ones all the way down. If I get closer, then yep, compression needs work. I guess both are interesting to practice.

I'm starting to isolate the moment when I have to roll the butt and it gives me some rib awareness because it's pretty hard to roll with ribs out. Bear with me while my brain is connecting dots

 

HS consistency: 17/25. First sets were so so but last two were very good. With a single jump, I can now focus a bit better on keeping my arms really straight + making sure the left elbow rotate & elevate. That one is a bit harder to lock but I'm getting there. I'm not sure what's up with that elbow but it rotates about very easily - maybe because it bends  a little despite my best efforts. I should take a video from my other side just to see if the difference is visible.

 

Job-prep: demo uploaded to Github. I can now focus on motivation letters! Oops no I want to add one more little feature and then yes I'm done, it shouldn't take long.

 

In the evening a bit of cardboarding, 1/2 a point

 

/* Challenge Log */
     last P2 cycle |Deload| #1   | #2
P2:            3/3 | 1/1  | 1/1  | 0/1
Press2HS       3/3 | 2/2  | 2/2  | 1/2
HS:            3/3 | 1/1  | 3/3  | 1/3
 
Stretching:    2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2  | 1/2
Cirque-Physio:18/18| 12/12| 18/18| 6/18
Legs:          2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2  | 2/2
Ball-flex:     4/4 | 4/4  | 4/4  | 2/4
Pull:          5   | 4    | 3    | 1
 
Job-prep:     10/10| 16/10| 15/10| 6/10
Drawing:       1   | 2    | 2    | 1.5

 

 

[WhiteGhost]

I got GMB Focused Flexibility but I haven't really liked the format.  It doesn't work for me for the exact reasons they lay out in their email.  I had considered something more skill based such as P1 seeing how much you liked it, but I guess that's not going to happen.  

 

Can you still keep working on the old program as it is now?

[@mu]

2 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

I got GMB Focused Flexibility but I haven't really liked the format.  It doesn't work for me for the exact reasons they lay out in their email.  I had considered something more skill based such as P1 seeing how much you liked it, but I guess that's not going to happen.  

 

Can you still keep working on the old program as it is now?

I can still work on P1-P2 programmes. No problem. But they will completely remove them from sale, which means people won't be able to buy them anymore. Eg @KB Girl has P1 but maybe not P2 yet.  It's a shame to remove access to content (even if it's older / no longer supported, they could just reduce the price and add a caveat or something).

 

I was hoping for some new parallettes stuff to come up maybe at some point. Either something intermediary between P1 and P2, or a P3  

But I guess not.

[Norgaard]

Well their elements program i Good as Well! 

[KB Girl]

hm thanks for the heads up! just completed my collection..

I think it's a big shame too.. there really aren't that many well structured programs out there.. but I do understand it from a business point of view. 

[Elastigirl]

19 hours ago, @mu said:

GUYS, GMB ARE RETIRING P1 AND P2 !!! AND RINGS, AND ALL THEIR COOLER STUFF BASICALLY.

 

https://meta.gmb.io/posts/sunset/?utm_term=newsletters-everyone-leads&utm_source=drip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=sunset-sale&utm_content=01-big-news-were-killing-off-some-classic-gmb-programs&__s=kydtzuuawoqw4pety1d6

 

I'm so shocked! I want to cry and/or riot badly.

 

My feelings exactly. I've done their Integral Strength and Elements, but the stuff I love is the skill stuff.  The email they sent out didn't really do anything to get me excited about their new programs either.  I really like the set up of the skills and videos. Maybe they feel like they've saturated the market on skills and need to branch out. I think a lot of people are intimidated to try a skill based program, so it may be hard for them to sell enough to keep the company going. Still, it's sad, because what they offered was so unique

[raptron]

I feel like they should still offer them with a caveat that they aren't supported or updated!

[@mu]

Yes what a pity really...

 

Quick backlog update:

 

Wednesday

 

REST. I spent some time on a motivation letter and sent my CV + the demo link to one company.

 

Thursday

 

Job-prep: I played with a puzzle game where you have to reverse-engineer the game rules and write some piece of code to beat the system (but first you need to discover what is success vs failure obviously). It turned out that the game is a type of pacman Not sure I can be bothered to implement the rest.  But I might.... the company developing this puzzle/coding platform is located here and hiring. So...

 

E. had his immigration meeting, I went along, it took half the day. But it went well, now he is really relieved! They even gave him contact e-mails for work because they are lacking interprets every so often for Persian / Dari

 

Practice: Cirque Physio x1 + P2 custom: quite poor, I trained late afternoon and it's not the best time for me it seems (or I lost the habit of it). Everything felt too heavy and hurt (left palm pinches again, abs complaining about elbows etc...). I had a very hard time with HS lowers, I could not even jump high enough to get into a HS most of the time. I might be a bit low on sleep and a bit high on stress... I cut it short towards the end (fewer sets on elbow lever switches and pike PU).

 

Friday

 

Got a job interview on the phone and I should go in person next week. The company is interesting. The project itself, I'm not sure yet. I have to do some reading on the topic. It involves security and EU legislation. A bit dry but I don't mind that.

 

So off studying that to prep for next week + maybe create a little Pacman AI if I can spare the time. And I have to do backbends too.

 

/* Challenge Log */
     last P2 cycle |Deload| #1   | #2
P2:            3/3 | 1/1  | 1/1  | 1/1
Press2HS       3/3 | 2/2  | 2/2  | 1/2
HS:            3/3 | 1/1  | 3/3  | 1/3
 
Stretching:    2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2  | 1/2
Cirque-Physio:18/18| 12/12| 18/18| 7/18
Legs:          2/2 | 2/2  | 2/2  | 2/2
Ball-flex:     4/4 | 4/4  | 4/4  | 2/4
Pull:          5   | 4    | 3    | 1
 
Job-prep:     10/10| 16/10| 15/10| 10/10
Drawing:       1   | 2    | 2    | 1.5

 

 

[raptron]

6 hours ago, @mu said:

E. had his immigration meeting, I went along, it took half the day. But it went well, now he is really relieved! They even gave him contact e-mails for work because they are lacking interprets every so often for Persian / Dari

Aww, yay! That's a nice outcome.  

 

6 hours ago, @mu said:

Got a job interview on the phone and I should go in person next week. The company is interesting. The project itself, I'm not sure yet. I have to do some reading on the topic. It involves security and EU legislation. A bit dry but I don't mind that.

Good luck.

[WhiteGhost]

18 hours ago, @mu said:

E. had his immigration meeting, I went along, it took half the day. But it went well, now he is really relieved! They even gave him contact e-mails for work because they are lacking interprets every so often for Persian / Dari

That must be very nice to have that behind him.  I can certainly imagine having a hard time finding Dari interpreters.  When I was in the army I was roommates for a time with one of the only 3 certified Dari interpreters for the entire US Army (this was pre-9/11, I suspect they have more now)

 

18 hours ago, @mu said:

Got a job interview on the phone and I should go in person next week.

Exciting, it sounds like you have a few job options brewing  

[@mu]

5 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

I can certainly imagine having a hard time finding Dari interpreters.  When I was in the army I was roommates for a time with one of the only 3 certified Dari interpreters for the entire US Army (this was pre-9/11, I suspect they have more now)

 

Did they have more Persian interpreters? because Dari is still very much understandable when you speak Persian. It's a bit like French vs Canadian French It's mostly the same words pronounced a bit differently and older words. Pashto (the other official language of Afghanistan) on the other hand is quite different. I can recognise some words but I would not understand it.

E. can also understand Arabic but he is used to standard Arabic. Our neighborhood has a lot of Algerian & Moroccan dialect speakers and he doesn't understand a thing Comparatively Dari is super super close.

 

~

 

Oops I did not do back-bends yesterday. I was just tired and a bit washed out mentally. I caught up a little a bit with Cirque Physio today + press HS + HS consistency + ball drill + pull (hanging raises / straddle-ups / alignment). Let's see if I can still have a back-bend session before the end of the week.

I did do some cardboard work (2^nd layer on-going) and more job-prep coding.

 

Press to HS was ok (still chest to wall negative presses). Ribs still need work.

 

HS consistency was 18/25 but no so consistent on form. I got quite a few fishy bananas. I made a little compilation of those. The last one is more of a donkey issue (jumping forward) though.

I think they always pretty much start from the ribs even if it's a tiny flare. I can counter balance lightly if I have enough elevation. But if I sink, I'll go full banana. I think that's more of less the process. External rotation will help keep the ribs in. I'm getting elevation a bit better, rotation is still a bit elusive.

 

 

[WhiteGhost]

5 hours ago, @mu said:

Did they have more Persian interpreters? because Dari is still very much understandable when you speak Persian. It's a bit like French vs Canadian French It's mostly the same words pronounced a bit differently and older words.

Ha!  Yes, they had a whole bunch of Persian interpreters but the Dari guy made it sound like it was a completely different language and no way a Persian speaker could do his job  

 

Even the fish bananas look like progress.  For the most part it seems you were able to make corrections and come back when your feet were getting too far forward.  

 

By the way, what tool do you use to edit your videos?

[@mu]

1 hour ago, WhiteGhost said:

By the way, what tool do you use to edit your videos?

 

https://kdenlive.org/en/

Scroll at the end of the download page, it has a Windows release.

 

1 hour ago, WhiteGhost said:

Ha!  Yes, they had a whole bunch of Persian interpreters but the Dari guy made it sound like it was a completely different language and no way a Persian speaker could do his job  

 

  but I guess he might be right when the dialect is stronger.  Sometimes I don't even fully understand my own uncle because he has a strong southern accent

 

1 hour ago, WhiteGhost said:

Even the fish bananas look like progress.  For the most part it seems you were able to make corrections and come back when your feet were getting too far forward.

 

I don't fall over as much as I used too. Not having the sofa anymore has made me fight it a bit more I have to say I mean the bail in bridge is ok, but it's still not the nicest thing in the world. I have more space but I'm not confident I can bail safely sideways (wall on one side, and rig on the other).