Chris-Tien in the House of Healing

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

For the next challenge (starting Feb 24th)

1. Fitness: Finish BW 3 (STR +3,  STA +2)
2. Nutrition goal: cut out chips, fries, and chocolate (other than very good, very dark chocolate) (CON +3)
3. Self confidence/esteem: Apprentice in HOORAY  (WIS +1, CHA +1)
4. Groom Dog daily (life side quest)
5. Fitness side quest: Reduce body fat % by 1%  .... so <= 36.62%  (CON +3,  STR +2)

Finishing BBWW 3 should not be too hard in 6 weeks.  I'm well into BBWW 1 already - but I want to have a really good base before I start doing weighted workouts.  So -- strength training 2 - 3 times per week using the NF BBWW routines.

 

I did well with levels 1 & 2 of NF diet.  Level 3 might be a challenge, however.  I'm going to cut out the obvious problems with heavily processed carbs.  But I may have to allow for pasta at dinner.  I'll work on swapping out all processed carbs, but leave myself flexibility when eating with a carb addict.  And most sweets and snacks are also off the table.  Gradual change for the next 6 weeks.

 

I'm apprenticing in the PvS group - working on positive self-talk.  So I will post something positive about myself every day!!!!

 

I will groom the dog daily.  Life side quest, aiming for taking more responsibility for my life.  It's my job to keep her teeth brushed, coat groomed, and nails trimmed.  I've been very lax in this while feeling sorry for myself.  Gotta stop.  She deserves to be cared for.

 

Body fat.  I know that measurements are only an estimate.  Maybe I'll get a proper reading later.  But for now, it will do.  It's an obvious problem - and any change is welcome .... so long as it shows that I am increasing muscle and decreasing body fat.  I will work on increasing strength and eating less junk.  And I will focus on walking rather than running for cardio.  I know that medium pace running has a bad rap right now.  I don't know if it is deserved .... since I USED to be slim and a runner back in the day.  But I'm willing to make changes and see what happens.  It's about a mile to work.  If I walk to work with my backpack full of computer etc, I'll get in a decent workout. 

 

My tracking spreadsheet is posted in Google docs  and should be available for everyone. 

[stardust731]

Love this challenge! You're going to do an amazing job! Can't wait to see how the next few weeks go!! 

[Merganser]

I'm apprenticing in the PvS group - working on positive self-talk.  So I will post something positive about myself every day!!!!

 

Looking forward to it! 

 

(And your dog is going to be ecstatic!  )

[Librarian of Doom]

Awesome challenge!!! I'm going to have to join that PvS challenge...I'm good at finding positivity, but still struggle with negative self-talk. 

[Xena]

Sounds great! I'm with you on the idea of starting with obvious diet changes. Have you worked in any rewards for yourself (other than NF points)? I've been bribing myself and find it helpful :-)

[Thom Stépan]

I am here for motivation and encouragement as always.

[Clarys]

Good goals! Walking to work is an easy way to exercise without realize it!

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

Good goals! Walking to work is an easy way to exercise without realize it!

 

Thanks.  Naturally, we now have pouring, freezing rain.  Unusual for February, when we'd have tons of snow.  It makes for icy sidewalks .... so I'm driving to campus and parking a fair distance from my office and classroom.  For now. 

 

Clarys, what guild are you going to be in for the new challenge??

[lilbichy]

Good set of goals!  I love the PvS challenge you are in and the idea of gradually changing diet.  good luck this challenge!  following for awesomeness! 

[Clarys]

Thanks.  Naturally, we now have pouring, freezing rain.  Unusual for February, when we'd have tons of snow.  It makes for icy sidewalks .... so I'm driving to campus and parking a fair distance from my office and classroom.  For now. 

 

Clarys, what guild are you going to be in for the new challenge??

Well, I've never seen snow, so I can only imagine how bad it is to walk in icy sidewalks! What I imagine isn't good, but quite funny!

 

I'll still stay with the adventurer, I'm not yet ready to move to the Rangers yet...

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

Well, I've never seen snow, so I can only imagine how bad it is to walk in icy sidewalks! What I imagine isn't good, but quite funny!

 

I'll still stay with the adventurer, I'm not yet ready to move to the Rangers yet...

 

It IS funny.  Usually.  I had to crawl across a parking lot one night because it was a sheet of smooth ice.  That's unusual, but I do have ice cleats that go on the bottom of my hiking boots when I need them. 

[T2sarahconnor]

Just read your post in RPG thread. What a great story teller you are. I am assuming you teach?

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

Just read your post in RPG thread. What a great story teller you are. I am assuming you teach?

 

Thank you!!!  I used to teach 2nd grade accelerated math, and I'm now teaching at the college & graduate student level in education and communication departments. 

 

But I learned to write run-on collaborative RP stories from playing D&D and writing Star Wars fan fiction.  It's fun - although it can kinda eat up your time and attention.  I have to remember to actually DO the workouts instead of just describe them .....   I love to write when I don't HAVE to. 

 

Yesterday was a quasi-vacation day ... but I still improved on the between-challenges "norm" a bit.  I enjoyed my favorite peanut butter flavored cereal for breakfast (I'm finally getting a little tired of eggs ....) and enjoyed a few glasses of wine while playing World of Warcraft with my hubby.  But instead of going out for Friday fish fry (practically a religious obligation in SE Wisconsin), we baked fish at home.  It was breaded, but still a long way from the greasy fillets served at all of the local restaurants and pubs.  AND NO FRIES!!! 

 

I had more cereal this morning - it's the classic "healthy" sweets trap.  Made by a health foods company, but I never noticed how sweet it is until I'd gone 6 weeks without it.  It's going to the back of the cupboard for another 6 weeks - I don't even want to know how many grams of sugar there are in a serving!!!

 

With a chest cold, I'm not sure how good my workout will be, but I'm going to hit the gym in a bit and see how far I can get doing easy intervals for an hour.  Gotta finish my Zombies, Run! season. 

[T2sarahconnor]

Math and creative writing? Your brain is balanced! My artistic side is way under developed. I'm going to try though. If all else fails at least I will be funny.

Fish fry in Wisconsin.....oh how I miss. Lived in Milwaukee for 4 years in the late 90's.

[ravnos]

  I love to write when I don't HAVE to. 

This. I write for a living and at the end of the day I'm so burnt out from it I never write on my own (I'm an aspiring horror author), so I never get any personal work done. It sucks.

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

This. I write for a living and at the end of the day I'm so burnt out from it I never write on my own (I'm an aspiring horror author), so I never get any personal work done. It sucks.

 

Ouch!!  Any chance of doing some on the weekends or before work?

[ravnos]

Ouch!!  Any chance of doing some on the weekends or before work?

 

Eh, I spend my weekends spending time with my fiancee, catching up on video games and doing things with friends. It's a habit I'm trying to get back into, it's just difficult with little motivation because I'm burnt out from writing for work.

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

Eh, I spend my weekends spending time with my fiancee, catching up on video games and doing things with friends. It's a habit I'm trying to get back into, it's just difficult with little motivation because I'm burnt out from writing for work.

 

Oh yea.  I didn't write anything for a year after I finished the dissertation.  Just sick of sitting in front of the computer all day trying to express myself.  I hope you keep notes of ideas - I'd love to read a story written by someone I know.  I do have a fantasy writer friend, but she hasn't written much lately. 

[Teros]

You feel like taking a stroll around town to get some fresh air and get rid of the queasy feeling that's in the pit of your stomach. There has been talk of small green monsters scampering around at night. Townsfolk are required to keep to themselves and stay in their homes at night. The issue is 'under investigation.'

Yeah, okay.  Last night you overheard a drunk man babbling about 'Surdermuz coming back.'  Whatever that means.

While on your stroll you see a man with a scraggly beard and nearly shoulder-length frizzed hair spouting like a madman.  He's yelling at the local salesmen and you're intrigued.

The man yells, "EVERYONE KNOWS THAT THE EVIL ONE- SODAMUS HAS RETURNED!  HALF THE CALORIES?  0 GRAMS OF TRANS FAT?  THOSE ARE SALES PITCHES BUT ALL YOU NEED TO DO IS LOOK AT THE PRODUCT ITSELF TO SEE IT'S A LIE!  IF ANY OF YOU ARE BRAVE ENOUGH TO GET TO THE ROOT OF THE PROBLEM HERE, I WILL BE AT THE ADVENTURER'S TAVERN AT 5 P.M. TONIGHT!"

That was all the man said before the guards grabbed him by the arms and threw him to the ground.

"THEY'RE SODAMUS' MINIONS!  THOSE GREEN RAT-BASTARDS THAT ARE SNAKING AROUND AT NIGHT!"

"Pipe down or you'll get the ax," yelled a guard.  "Off with ya. It's too early to be hitting the pub with your drunken ravings."

"THE TAVERN! TONIGHT! I HAVE PROOF!" the man yelled as he fled.

The man wasn't staggering around or slurring his words. He didn't seem drunk, just really panicked. Maybe you should check out the tavern later...

 

more TONIGHT

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

Chris watched thoughtfully as the man fled down the street.  So the rumors might be true.  Many tales reach the ears of a bard and most were not worthy to retell.  The drunk in the tavern had almost ruined her grand tale of Staci the Great and how she slayed the Pudge with an iron bar, but Chris had been spinning tales a long, long time and knew how to hold an audience. 

 

Still, this sounded promising in an 'Oh my gods, we're going to die' sort of way.  "Better double the order," she murmured as she turned back to the blacksmith's shop.  She needed to be ready if she read the signs right.  "There's nothing more dangerous than misinformation and marketing hype."

 

Oh yea, this will be fun. 

 

I finished BBWW 1 yesterday afternoon.  Slightly modified, but each workout, I'm pushing just a bit harder.  One exception is with arms.  I'm being a bit careful since the elbows sometimes flare up - darn tendonitis!!

 

So, I'll be ready to do 16 workouts in 6 weeks to get through BBWW3.  I even have enough equipment here now to workout at home.  Scrounged up some dumbbells, kettlebells and a jumprope.

[Teros]

Scrounged up some dumbbells, kettlebells and a jumprope.

Nice.  Did you just dig around and find out that you had all that stuff at home already, or did you make any of that?

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

Nice.  Did you just dig around and find out that you had all that stuff at home already, or did you make any of that?

 

Just stuff that I had, although now that you've gotten my head out of the "buy it" box, I may make my own stuff for easier progressions of weights.  Sometimes, a 5 pound jump is too much for my arms. 

[Teros]

Just stuff that I had, although now that you've gotten my head out of the "buy it" box, I may make my own stuff for easier progressions of weights.  Sometimes, a 5 pound jump is too much for my arms. 

Well I know that you can make little 'sandropes' to drape over the barbells that can be varying amount.  It's basically taking a really long but thin bag (like those smaller bags at grocery stores that you use for meat/produce.  Then you tape the ends left to right, so that makes it even thinner, then you can fill the baggy with sand and tape the top to the bottom.  That'll make a little donut-looking bag of sand that you can throw onto the bar as additional little weights.  Also, since it's just sand, if it accidentally slips off, it's not like anything is going to break.  Literally no cost to make unless you have a supremely tight tape budget.

 

Once I eventually  decide to make dumbells/barbells, I was going to invest in makes a bunch of those little sandropes.

[Chris-Tien Jinn]

I added setting up my own home gym a side quest for next challenge.  Hopefully, by April, I will also have a good sized yard (1.6 acres) for gardening too.  That always results in a good summer with muscle definition at the end. 

 

I don't remember getting mini-challenge points for the last set of Ranger mini-challenges.  Maybe I didn't read thoroughly enough......  At any rate, I'm looking forward to a change of pace with the RPG story and don't really care if those don't turn into attribute points here.  I think everyone is excited for it because of the unpredictability of the challenge.  NF is good in that we set our own goals and assessments and grading.  But a major aspect to a successful gamification strategy is stochastic reward system - people often react much more strongly to probabilistic rewards (like drops in videogames) than to predictable ones. 

[ravnos]

I added setting up my own home gym a side quest for next challenge.  Hopefully, by April, I will also have a good sized yard (1.6 acres) for gardening too.  That always results in a good summer with muscle definition at the end. 

 

I don't remember getting mini-challenge points for the last set of Ranger mini-challenges.  Maybe I didn't read thoroughly enough......  At any rate, I'm looking forward to a change of pace with the RPG story and don't really care if those don't turn into attribute points here.  I think everyone is excited for it because of the unpredictability of the challenge.  NF is good in that we set our own goals and assessments and grading.  But a major aspect to a successful gamification strategy is stochastic reward system - people often react much more strongly to probabilistic rewards (like drops in videogames) than to predictable ones. 

 

Rangers do it differently from other guilds, we only get 1 extra point at the end of the entire mini-challenge.