Tobbe tries not to do all the things

[Tobbe]

Tobbe tries not to do all the things

 

So many things to do, so little time

 

 

My list of things I want to do is too long! If I'm not careful I'll just end up running from one thing to the next, without actually getting anything done. And that's not going to help anyone. Ideally I'd have three main things to focus on, we'll see how that goes as I type this out  I'm thinking one nutrition related goal, one fitness goal and one mental health goal. But in reality it's more complicated than that, because those goals are so intertwined. Eating well gives me energy to stay active. Being active helps with my mental health. Cooking is also a great way for me to relax and disconnect. It's almost meditative. One specific thing that's been wearing me down mentally lately is a sense of never being *done* with anything. Being able to check it off and completely put it away. I'm missing a sense of accomplishment. That good "I did this!" feeling. Anyway, enough rambling. Let's get to the actual things I want to do.

 

Nutrition

 

One of the things I missed the most when I spent two months in South East Asia and only eating at restaurants was cooking. More specifically, running experiments in the kitchen. When I cook dinner I rarely make the same thing twice, so each meal is a small experiment in its own, seeing how it turns out, learning new techniques, discovering new flavors. Then there's also the kitchen staples that I make that take a bit more labor, that I couldn't do while we were away.

 

Goals

1. Make sauerkraut

2. Make kimchi

3. Make a cashew based cheese

 

 

Fitness

 

While I was away, I did a 30 days of yoga challenge. We also did a fair bit of walking getting to the beach, the grocery store, the restaurants, etc. I tried to keep up with the yoga even after the challenge ended, but it was much more difficult to stay committed when I didn't have the daily practice of the challenge to stick to. I chose to do yoga because it was something I could fairly easily do in our hotel room. And I hoped I'd get extra flexibility and body control that I could then use in my climbing. I miss the daily walks, so I'll try to incorporate that somehow. And I'm not sure how much extra flexible, or how much extra body control I actually got, so I'll try something a bit more intense this challenge.  (Big thanks to @Mad Hatter for putting a routine together for me!)

 

Goals

1. Walk outdoors at least five days every week.

2. Follow Mad Hatter's "warm up" flexibility routine at least five times per week

3. Daily Dare

 

I hope the wrist mobility work can help with my aching, crackling, wrists that I get from working on the computer all day, every day. For fun I might also add some hand balancing stuff, like crow pose. But only if my wrists can take it and not hurt too much from it.

For the walking I'm going to aim for at least 15 minutes per day, unless it's raining. If it's raining 5 minutes will have to do. The main thing is to get out and get moving.

I set up a Darebee Daily Dare pvp challenge, because that was a lot of fun last time we had one of those. Please join in if that sounds like fun to you!  

 

 

Mental health

 

Basically I want to do things that make me feel better. As I said earlier, my "nutrition" goals will help with this too, since I'll get to spend time in the kitchen. And the fitness goals will also help. But I still have a few specific things I want to put here.

 

Goals

1. 30 days of JavaScript

2. Run 10 km

3. Sleep outdoors one night

 

To practice my ability just get shit done I'll do the 30 days of JavaScript challenge. It'll give me practice that's relevant for my work, it'll force me to do something good enough, and then just ship it. No time to polish forever and ever. And it'll give me that sense of accomplishment I've been missing. I'm not sure what kind of things they'll have me build, but hopefully it's things I can share here. If you want to play along, that would be awesome! https://javascript30.com/

I put the "Run 10 km" goal here, and not under fitness, because I mainly want to do it for the mental kick. The "runners high". I haven't run in for ever. So I'll have to work up to it. I expect to do a few 5k runs before going for the full 10.

 

 

Extras

 

As I said in the beginning, I have a lot of things I want to do!

Some of the things that didn't make it to official challenge goals are listed below. If I can complete some of the things, that'd be awesome. If not, there's always a chance next challenge  

 

* Follow Mad Hatter's "main" flexibility routine

* Wrist mobility work

* Wrist strength and balancing work (crow pose)

* Complete the flexbox zombies game. Just like Javascript 30, this would be good for my job

* Make tofu

* Make tempeh

* Make pea tempeh

* Make quinoa crisps

* Make a mueli mixture with quinoa crisps

* Finish flooring in our house extension

* Get my car running

* Couch to 5 k

* Follow a proper handstands program

* Follow a proper splits program

* Automate posting a new daily challenge in the daily dares thread

* Automate score keeping for the daily dares

* Try one or a few of the No-Code app makers to build an app for my phone

 

It wasn't easy to choose what pick for my official challenge goals and what to down prioritize. But this is what I'm going with!

 

 

 

 

 

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

Following.

[Scaly Freak]

Ambitious challenge that yet looks completely doable. Following for the food talks.

[Tobbe]

5 hours ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

Following.

 

Thanks for being here  

 

1 hour ago, Scalyfreak said:

Ambitious challenge that yet looks completely doable. Following for the food talks.

 

Yeah... I was like "Damn! I was supposed to not do all the things, and look at that list!"

I think I'll tweak my goals a little bit before starting the challenge tomorrow

[Tobbe]

I've modified my goals a bit.

 

I cut out two fitness goals, and added a mental health goal. So now I have three goals in each category. Much more satisfying  

I also tweaked my "walk every day" goal. I don't like that I would have failed the entire thing just because I missed one day. And also - what counts as "walk every day". I walk from my bed to the kitchen table to the couch. Is that enough walking? Clearly not. So I made it SMARTer.

 

I also added a list of "extras". Things that I want to do, but that I felt would be overwhelming to add to my main challenge goals. The more of those I can finish, the better. But no promises or expectations!

[Tobbe]

13 hours ago, Scalyfreak said:

Following for the food talks.

 

Speaking of which, last night we finished of a bottle of mulled wine. Way off season. Like, most people stopped drinking that stuff three or four months ago. But, we had gotten an inch of fresh snow during the night, and it was below freezing outside. So a hot, slightly alcoholic, beverage was just what I needed  

 

 

Scalyfreak, did you ever get around to making the home brewed stuff?

[Mad Hatter]

Super curious to see how the routine goes! Let me know if you have any questions. 

[Harriet]

So good that you enjoy experimenting in the kitchen. Are you trained or self taught? Where do you get ideas and recipes? I've found there are loads of recipes on the internet, but it's hard for me to tell which I'll like and which will be bland and disappointing.

[Scaly Freak]

11 hours ago, Tobbe said:

Scalyfreak, did you ever get around to making the home brewed stuff?

 

I made a form of the homemade stuff, by letting spices sit in vodka for two weeks, and then I mixed the result with red wine. It was surprisingly good. :) 

[Terah]

Trying not to do all the things can be a real challenge 

 

Following

[Tobbe]

9 hours ago, Mad Hatter said:

Super curious to see how the routine goes! Let me know if you have any questions. 

 

So I did (tried) the warmup routine tonight.

I think I did alright with the squat routine. Don't think I've ever spent so long squatting before. Felt really funny/weird standing up after  

The cossack squats were much more difficult than I thought they would be! I can not keep the foot of the center leg planted on the ground. The only way I can stretch out the extended leg is if I lift my heal and just sit on my toes. And my back is totally folded over. I tried to raise my back - straighten it a bit - but I just lost my balance and fell over. Lots more practice needed!

Went on to do the lizard pose. And here I need your help. I don't understand what you mean to rotate my hip. I'm totally locked out. There's no direction in which I can rotate any of my hips. Also not sure if I'm doing the bending/straightening of my back leg correctly. I try to activate my glutes, but it feels like it's more the front of my thigh that controls the movement. And I also find it really difficult not to move the rest of my body as I move my back leg.

[Tobbe]

Leaving @raptron's scone recipe here, so I can more easily find it when it's time to bake   Also converting it to units that are easier for me to work with.

 

 

Walnut-Feta Scones

 

280 g (470 ml) flour

80 ml white sugar

½ teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon baking powder

4 tablespoons of cold butter, diced  (how the f*ck do you measure butter in spoons? are you supposed to melt it first, scoop it out, and then chill it down so you can dice it again? crazy! If I did, I'd end up with 60 g (2 oz) of butter, so that's what I'm going to try with)

240 ml toasted, chopped walnuts

150 g (1 block) of feta, diced

180 ml heavy cream, plus a bit for brushing

 

Oven to 220℃ . Combine flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder. Whisk/mix to distribute. Using your hands, a fork or pastry cutter, work the butter into the flour  until the butter is in pea-sized chunks and the mixture is more crumbly. Add walnuts and feta. Pour in the 180 ml of heavy cream, trying to mix it into the dough until it can hold together when squeezed. Add a bit more if needed to get the crumbs off the bottom. Turn onto a well-floured surface and pat into an ~20 cm wide disc. Transfer the disc to a baking sheet that has parchment on it. Cut the disc into 8 slices with a knife or bench scraper and separate slightly. Brush with cream. Bake for 20-25 minutes until very golden brown.

[Tobbe]

2 hours ago, Terah said:

Trying not to do all the things can be a real challenge 

 

Following

 

Thanks for showing up  Have you started a new challenge yet? Didn't see a link in your old challenge thread

[Tobbe]

5 hours ago, Harriet said:

So good that you enjoy experimenting in the kitchen. Are you trained or self taught? Where do you get ideas and recipes? I've found there are loads of recipes on the internet, but it's hard for me to tell which I'll like and which will be bland and disappointing.

 

I'm self taught. Didn't used to have any interest at all in cooking or baking. I'm still not very good. Can't cook without a recipe. Tasting a dish for example I find it very difficult to know what it's missing to take it to the next level. But I'm improving   I do think I'm pretty good at picking out recipes that taste good. And I'm also good at adapting/combining recipes to make something that I can enjoy. I get most of my recipes from blogs and youtube channels I follow. Or food I taste somewhere that I then want to recreate at home. 

 

I do sometimes fail. But not very often. And when I do it helps that I'm not a very picky eater, so I can usually always finish what I've cooked. I might not want to ever do it again, but it's almost always at least edible. At least for me, even if the rest of the family don't like it  

[fitnessgurl]

Re: 4 tablespoons of butter...the butter sticks here (USA) comes in wrappers with tablespoon markings printed on them. It makes it easier to measure.

If it's not the same where you live; use a large spoon from your silverware set.

I taught myself to cook as well & had a lot of trash can treasures in the beginning. Be patient. The time will come when you'll be able to improvise & experiment. 😊

[Tobbe]

9 hours ago, fitnessgurl said:

Re: 4 tablespoons of butter...the butter sticks here (USA) comes in wrappers with tablespoon markings printed on them. It makes it easier to measure.

If it's not the same where you live; use a large spoon from your silverware set.

I taught myself to cook as well & had a lot of trash can treasures in the beginning. Be patient. The time will come when you'll be able to improvise & experiment. 😊

 

Our packages of butter are much bigger than yours (500 g, 4.4 sticks) and are marked with 50 g increments. I never use that though, I just place my mixing bowl on my kitchen scales and add pieces of butter to it until I get the correct weight  

 

Yesterday I made Mexican baked eggs for dinner. It turned out great, but only because I had a recipe to follow. I wish I could just be like "ohh, I'd like Mexican eggs for dinner", and then cook it up, without having to reference any recipe. Maybe I'll get there with patience as you say  

[Tobbe]

Monday

 

Nutrition Goals

1. Make sauerkraut ❌

2. Make kimchi ❌

3. Make a cashew based cheese ❌

 

Fitness Goals

1. Walk outdoors at least five days every week. ✔️

2. Follow Mad Hatter's "warm up" flexibility routine at least five times per week ✔️

3. Daily Dare ✔️

 

Mental Health Goals

1. 30 days of JavaScript ✔️

2. Run 10 km ❌

3. Sleep outdoors one night ❌

 

Extra Goals

 

* Get my car running

  Didn't get it running, but at least I worked on it.

 

* Automate score keeping for the daily dares

  Not done, but I worked on it.

 

 

For my 30 days of JavaScript course I build a "drum machine"

 

 

You can play around with it here: http://tlundberg.com/js30/01drumkit/

A lot of it was given to us as part of the course materials, so I only had to wire it all up basically. Super simple stuff, but still learned a thing or two since I had never done anything with sound in the browser before.

 

 

For the daily dares score keeping I got my script to the point where it can parse out each participant's score from the posts in the thread, and then update a post to insert the total scores. Right now I'm just dumping the raw data, but that can be improved later. Next thing to do is to automate it, so I don't manually have to run that script. Would have been a lot easier if it weren't for those pesky captchas 😠

 

Here's a screenshot I posted of it in the thread itself

 

[fitnessgurl]

5 hours ago, Tobbe said:

Yesterday I made Mexican baked eggs for dinner.

Ooh, recipe please!!!

I make mexican eggs in a small skillet using eggs, salsa, Fiesta seasoning (actually a mix for dip,  but never use it that way, lol), & Mexican cheese.

[Tobbe]

3 hours ago, fitnessgurl said:

Ooh, recipe please!!!

I make mexican eggs in a small skillet using eggs, salsa, Fiesta seasoning (actually a mix for dip,  but never use it that way, lol), & Mexican cheese.

 

This is the base recipe I used https://www.rachaelhartleynutrition.com/blog/2014/02/huevos-rancheros-with-poblanos-black

 

But we don't have poblanos in the stores here, so I used a green bell pepper, and a green, small, mild chili (we call them "spanish peppers"). It's also not very easy to find fresh jalapeños, so I used pickled jalapeños instead. Also, no queso fresco, so I used the cheese we had in the fridge, an Edammer cheese. And instead of serving it with corn tortillas, which we also don't have in the stores here, I ate it with tortilla chips (similar to Doritos). And a side of iceberg lettuce and mixed greens.

[Terah]

21 hours ago, Tobbe said:

 

Thanks for showing up  Have you started a new challenge yet? Didn't see a link in your old challenge thread

I'm still recovering from being sick. But I'll post a new thread in a few days.

[Tobbe]

27 minutes ago, Terah said:

I'm still recovering from being sick. But I'll post a new thread in a few days.

 

Glad to hear you're feeling better at least. Let us all know when the thread is up please  

[Tobbe]

Going to leave this here for my own convenience. So I don't have to keep going back to my old thread, find the post there that links over to @Mad Hatter's thread, and read the post there.

 

 

  

On 3/19/2020 at 5:42 PM, Mad Hatter said:

Disclaimer - I don't know what I'm doing, this seems entirely reasonable to me but I might be way off base. Let me know! You can do the warm up as often as you like, the main section I'd do 2-3x/week.

 

 Warm up

 

1. Squat routine No need to follow the reps/sets to the letter, just spend a few minutes doing the different variations

 

 

2. Cossack squats 5-10x/side, stay as low as you can throughout the movement (I haven't listened to the video I hope he's not saying anything stupid)

 

 

3. Lizard pose  rotate the hip of the bent knee 5x in each direction, chill for 30 seconds, then use your butt to straighten and bend your back leg without moving the rest of your body 5-10x. 

 

Main You can either do the whole thing as a circuit, or add in extra sets of the strengthy exercises (long lunge, step up, horse stance). The reps and sets are rough guidelines, but if it gets easy to do then you need harder variations, increase range or add weight.

 

4. Long lunge Static variation (30s) or pulses (10x/each) or both (around 19:38 - 23:20)

 

 

 

5. Pigeon pose 30 seconds/side, try to get your upper body close to the floor

 

6. Deep step up 10x starting with back knee on the floor, and the front foot on as high a surface as possible

 

7. Half frog stretch so one leg straight, one leg bent, 30 seconds/side

 

8. Horse stance - but instead of doing the finger thing in the video stand as close as you can in front of a wall. Squat as deep as you can - hold for 5-10s, repeat 5-10x

 

 

 

[Tobbe]

Tuesday

 

Nutrition Goals

1. Make sauerkraut ❌

2. Make kimchi ❌

3. Make a cashew based cheese ❌

 

Fitness Goals

1. Walk outdoors at least five days every week. ✔️

2. Follow Mad Hatter's "warm up" flexibility routine at least five times per week ✔️

3. Daily Dare ✔️

 

Mental Health Goals

1. 30 days of JavaScript ✔️

2. Run 10 km ❌

3. Sleep outdoors one night ❌

 

Extra Goals

 

* Get my car running

  Didn't get it running, but I worked on it.

 

 

For my 30 days of JavaScript course I built an analog clock

 

 

See it tick in real time here: http://tlundberg.com/js30/02clock/

 

Not part of my listed extra goals, but I've had this banana cookie recipe I've been wanting to try for a while. I've bought bananas for it, but they've always been eaten before I've gotten around to baking 🍌

Today I baked the cookies!

 

 

I've been wanting a convenient snack that's not just fruit. Something with protein, complex carbs and some fat. These have it all with protein from eggs, oats and vanilla protein powder. Complex carbs from the oats and some fat from the egg. Perfect!  

This was the recipe: https://masonfit.com/banana-breakfast-cookies/  But I didn't have enough protein powder, so I added some course ground whole wheat flour to make up for the missing dry ingredients. And I think they tasted better because of it. Too much protein powder and they'll just taste like protein powder... First time I tried that recipe, but 10/10 will make again!

 

Did the flex routine tonight again. And it was just as difficult as last night   The first exercise make the periosteum at the front of my shins hurt. The cossack squat is just impossible, and the lizard pose I don't understand  But I'm enjoying it anyway! I asked my wife if she wanted to join me in stretching. And she said she did! I was pleasantly surprised  She joined in on the warm up, but then she realized she couldn't even sit in a squat, so she gave up  She can sit in a squat on her toes, but if she tries to get her heels down to the floor she falls over. Just like I do when I try that in the cossack squat.

 

For dinner today we had spatchcock chicken. It's actually one the very few dishes I can cook without a recipe   Today we cut potatoes, carrots and onion in wedges and placed on a baking sheet. On top of that we placed the chicken that I had rubbed down with butter and spices (both underneath and on top of the skin). 200 C, 50 minutes. The drippings from the chicken as it cooks flavors the potatoes and veggies. Super tasty!  Ohh, and we had green beans on the side as well.

Tomorrow I'll make Vietnamese chicken fried rice with the leftover chicken for lunch.

[Mad Hatter]

7 hours ago, Tobbe said:

Did the flex routine tonight again. And it was just as difficult as last night   The first exercise make the periosteum at the front of my shins hurt. The cossack squat is just impossible, and the lizard pose I don't understand  But I'm enjoying it anyway! I asked my wife if she wanted to join me in stretching. And she said she did! I was pleasantly surprised  She joined in on the warm up, but then she realized she couldn't even sit in a squat, so she gave up  She can sit in a squat on her toes, but if she tries to get her heels down to the floor she falls over. Just like I do when I try that in the cossack squat.

Ok ok, this is not supposed to be brutally hard! Let's modify a little bit.

 

For the squats, try elevating your heels and see if it helps. You can also play around with the width between the feet, sometimes a slightly wider stance and/or more turned out feet can feel more comfortable. For your wife, I hope she'd like to try again. (The squat is such a fundamental human movement and it's worth working on. She might not feel the need for it now, but it will make a tremendous difference to be able to say get up from the toilet or the floor if she falls over when she gets old.) If she does she can start by holding onto a piece of furniture in front of her, and just go down as deep as she can. Also for both of you, you don't have to stay in the squat for several minutes. Feel free to get up when you need to, shake out and do a little more. Gradually build up time per "rep" and accumulated time.

 

For the cossack squat you can absolutely put your hands on the floor, or hold onto something in front of you, and don't go down as deep as you can in the beginning, but gradually increase it. I'd also move it to the main training session if it's absolute killer.

 

How are you doing lizard pose now? If you're on your elbows now, try with straight arms instead.

[Terah]

13 hours ago, Tobbe said:

 

Glad to hear you're feeling better at least. Let us all know when the thread is up please  

Here you go: