[The Most Loathed] learns....slowly

[The Most Loathed]

1 hour ago, Endor said:

Link pls? PM if you prefer. 

Fair warning, I actually pay for it, $50/quarter I think. Pythonista Cafe.

I decided to take the rare step of paying for a forum because I've done the Stack Overflow, Reddit, etc thing and they really aren't very helpful in my opinion. Low signal, high noise. I do think I'm seeing a ton of value from the forum but it's also a priority for me. I wouldn't advise anyone to pay for it unless they are trying to code in Python multiple times per week. 

 

1 hour ago, Endor said:

I'ma consultant so my hours are reasonably well monitored but not anally so. I have tried a few things and surprisingly to me the best method is a paper book, i just find it faster and more easily referenced to note things down and easier to see a long period of time in a quick  snapshot on paper. How granular do you need to go? We have software that will monitor to 15 min interval but generally we bill in 4 hour blocks so not had to go that far yet yet.... thankfully.

I've been using Toggl on my iPhone to try doing the "billable hours" thing. Someone suggested Day One to me. Toggl is basically a glorified stopwatch but it works pretty well for me Day One kind of works in reverse, you set up notifications for it to ask you occasionally what you're working on. I think I prefer Toggl of the two.

The thing I'm trying to work on right now is less about monitoring time and more about organizing thoughts. Somewhere to just jot down notes as I'm reading, listening, working, then come back to them and build them out. I'm imaging being able to just make a note that says "Python Click Module". When I have some down time I go to my list and start learning about the module and maybe I flesh out the description a bit more, throw in a link to the tutorial. Other times someone may mention "Clockwork Dynasty" and Just throw it in this weird hopper of ideas and when I come back to it I decide it's not for me, so I just prune the idea (I'm seeing a tree analogy in my mind) or maybe I drop it into a running list of books to get from the library. Add to all this, some amount of feed aggregation or something similar.

There's probably no killer app like what I'm describing above. I'm guessing it'll end up being a combination of somethings like Feedly, Instapaper, literal paper, Evernote and other things. I'm just trying to figure out what that looks like.

 

 

46 minutes ago, RisenPhoenix said:

 

I mean, you say that, but right now I'm not sure if any of the programming stuff really took.  I don't have much of a chance to utilize it in my new job, so I can't confirm or deny if it's a good course. >.> <.<

 

I wish I had started doing the course much earlier in my unemployment, since I could have used that time to play with things a bit more and figure out what I could use it for.  As it is, most of the time I'm just using excel things these days. (Though I admit in one of my better excel sheets I definitely used my Python knowledge to set up a thing - and grumbled the whole time that I could do in two dozen or so lines what I was taking forever in excel...)

 

Yeah, it's use it or lose it. If you do come back to it, you'll be surprised how quickly you can gain back at least half of it but some of it will be lost and feel entirely new again. Just having the exposure was probably the most important thing in your case. It changed the way you think about a lot of those tasks. I don't think that it was wasted time just because you're not a software engineer now.

[RisenPhoenix]

36 minutes ago, The Most Loathed said:

I don't think that it was wasted time just because you're not a software engineer now.

 

True.  Ultimately I think it was good because I now know what *could* be automated in my work life.  Even if I'm not the one doing the coding eventually, I should be fluent enough that I can explain what I want a bit clearer to software guys at work.

[The Most Loathed]

I'm trying to process a lunch conversation I just had that's kind of bumming me out. A guy I know and get along with, call him Roger, wanted to go out for lunch before I change roles and potentially offices. Great, he's a nice guy. 

 

Now I'm depressed.

 

Roger has always seemed really excited when I talk to him. He's always talking about some new thing he's thinking about or a concert he went to or something similar. 

As we started talking today I learn that he's dissatisfied with his job. That's not exactly ground breaking, I think the majority of adults are dissatisfying to various degrees with their job. So I started asking what else he's thinking of doing or how he's thinking of dealing with the job situation to make it better. He proceeded to describe no less than a half dozen really big, broad plans, each mutually exclusive to the others of what he wants to do with his life.

Out of genuine interest I started asking questions, trying to parse out how he thinks that these relate and what he's doing about them. The image started to come out that he has done nothing to achieve any of them and has no real plans to start working on them. He's just waiting for the stars to align and the universe to speak to him and tell him that now is his time. 

It's frustrating because the guy is nice and he's intelligent. He's not young but he's not old either. He has enough life left to do any one of these, two if he buckles down, three if things go entirely right. But he's doing none. 

Me being me I gently started to ask questions that point towards "what are you doing to make that thing happen?" "What are your next steps on this thing?" and each one was met with a new idea, something else on his bucket list. He couldn't stop coming up with new ideas long enough to talk about his existing ideas.

His ideas aren't exactly ground breaking, a couple very advanced degrees, a food truck, a concern venue, stuff like that. He's unwilling to commit to one because he feels like it closes the doors of the others too much. I get that, we've all been there, but at some point, just keeping your options open is a full time job with no opportunity for advancement. I've been there and feel like it was lost time but I also understand the fear and regret that comes with saying "I will not do this thing.... because I want to do these things". It's painful but it's valuable. 

So, like I said, I'm still processing the conversation. My knee jerk is that I'm sad for him and I hope he finds a path.

[Rooks]

Oofta. That's a heavy conversation, but so true of so many people, including myself. There's a motivation speaker out there with a quote (I'm going to paraphrase it) that says if people truly wanted something, they wouldn't go home and watch TV.

 

More and more I'm finding that I have to truly fight myself to get things done. I have to tell myself to get off my ass and spend even 5 minutes working towards something on this gigantic list of things I'd like to get done. Tough to process but amazing to realize. 

[RisenPhoenix]

18 hours ago, Rooks said:

spend even 5 minutes working towards something on this gigantic list of things I'd like to get done

 

Lately I've been using the "Just 5 minutes" thing to help me move stuff forward.  It's amazing how much cleaning I can get done, how much of a language I can learn, and probably a dozen other things if I just say "just 5 minutes."

 

I totally get where that guy is coming from in not wanting to settle, but it also sounds like he's waiting for The Dream Job/Perfect Thing before moving.  And those just don't exist.  And that's a hard realization.

 

Stupid life, not being easy...

[The Most Loathed]

17 hours ago, Rooks said:

Oofta. That's a heavy conversation, but so true of so many people, including myself. There's a motivation speaker out there with a quote (I'm going to paraphrase it) that says if people truly wanted something, they wouldn't go home and watch TV.

 

More and more I'm finding that I have to truly fight myself to get things done. I have to tell myself to get off my ass and spend even 5 minutes working towards something on this gigantic list of things I'd like to get done. Tough to process but amazing to realize. 

 

3 minutes ago, RisenPhoenix said:

Lately I've been using the "Just 5 minutes" thing to help me move stuff forward.  It's amazing how much cleaning I can get done, how much of a language I can learn, and probably a dozen other things if I just say "just 5 minutes."

 

I totally get where that guy is coming from in not wanting to settle, but it also sounds like he's waiting for The Dream Job/Perfect Thing before moving.  And those just don't exist.  And that's a hard realization.

I pretty much stopped watching TV when I started telling myself to just do anything that took less than 5 minutes. I found I was spending more time and effort to not do things than it would take to do them. Things like make a phone call, send an email, move that dish to the dishwasher, etc. My logic at the time was that I would do the 5 minute thing then go watch TV again but I found that there are a lot of 5 minute things and while it is awesome to not feel burdened by them anymore, they will consume your TV time. At first that was tough for me. 

I eventually realized that in video games and TV there was a weird economy that fed only upon itself. I would play a video game that would make me want to get a thing in-game so I could play more of the video game. In TV I would watch an episode that was designed to make me want to watch the next episode. In both cases I started wondering, what if I never started? What I found is that I often just did not care. That's how I pretty much stopped watching TV.

There are some problems with this. First is that a lot of american socialization begins with "Did you see {tv show} last night?" which for me can always be answered with "No". I've had people literally tell me that I'm wrong when I've told them that I've never seen an episode of some show that they want to talk about. Second, there are a lot of cool creators of content who I would like to see get stupid amounts of money for their contributions. I contribute nothing to it.

 

Laura expressed similar sentiments to you lot about feeling like she had the same flightiness as "Roger". It's funny, I feel like i'm less committed to things than I should be but I also look at "normal" and realize, oh, I'm actually kind of the opposite. Back when I was a powerlifter I said "I'm going to try and be a 'normal person' first and a lifter second, I don't want to just be known as a lifter". Down the road I realized that this need to not be pidgeon holed had cost me a lot in terms in my commitment to lifting but also in terms of "normal" things. I tried to spread myself around too much and just did a lot of things poorly rather than a few things well. 

Since that time I try to keep some spread of interests, for my sanity, but I also try and be critical of myself and how I spend my time. I can only manage so many interests at a time. I would love to take up black smithing and jujitsu and calligraphy and glass blowing and write a novel  and train for a half marathon and build my own computer from part and...so on, all of those being real interests. However, I have limited time and I don't even have kids. I have a max of 2 hours each day to spend doing something that interests me. How am I going to spend those two hours that will build to some level of satisfaction?

For me, I've settled on trying to split my free time into two part, physical and mental. The balance is never perfect but I roughly aim for and hour of physical work and an hour of mental work. My rationale is that someday I will lose at least one of those capacities and want to have the other interests to fall back. Someday i'll lose both but I won't really care at that point. For me, physical work is my workouts but it could be house fixing, gardening, long walks, martial arts, whatever thing that moves my body through the world and brings some satisfaction both in the act and in the outcome. Mental, likewise, could be any number of things like writing a novel, learning a language, programming, etc. For me, for now, it's Python and playing with my Raspberry Pis. I haven't done much electronics recently but that's still there, waiting to be reactivated.

It's not a perfect system. I don't even know if it's transferable to other people. I just know that it has made me happier and more productive with my free time than I was before I started using it. It has a lot of implicit commitments built into it and it's not going to conquer the world but that's never been my goal.

 

enough preaching.

 

Last night we hit to gym for a very short workout. 

circuit 1 minute sets 5 rounds

Long Cycle 24 kg x 2 10, 10, 10, 8, 8

rest

goblet squat 5 x 10

1/2 snatch L 5 x 10

1/2 snatch R 5 x 10

 

This was tough but it was good for a short workout.

Then we had to run the dog to the vet one more time to get her bandage off and let the vet get a look at the tumor and wound. It ended up being a really tough vet visit but, fortunately, not because of Bernie. Her tumor has shrunk (although is definitely still there) and the wound is healing nicely. She no longer has the bandage on. Although Laura cut part of a sock to put over the tumor when we're not at home to keep her, Bernie that is, from messing with it.

It ended up being a tough trip because it was a bad night for other people's pets. I took Bernie in as Laura was placing a phone call for food that we would pick up on the way home. As I was waiting for Laura to come in I saw a woman moving quickly into the office carrying a dog in a really odd way. It was kind of stiff but also kind of floppy, like a really poorly designed stuffed animal. As she came in she shouted "Do you have a vet?" The tech placed her call on hold as the woman kind of clunked this thing onto the counter around the vets desk. It was her dog and it was pretty obviously dead or about to be dead. 

Our vet raced out and without really even asking anything grabbed the dog and disappeared into the back. The tech got the woman kind of settled and got a little more info out of the woman. She had come home, the dog had been in distress, the woman ran the dog to her local vet who referred her to an unknown animal hospital. The woman had been trying to find it when the dog had, for lack of a better phrase, crashed. At that point she had seen my vets sign and just stopped and thus entered our little tableau.

Laura showed an amazing amount of compassion, going and sitting with the woman, talking to her, just trying to be a human to her. It's hard to do, at least for me, but I always think that it's great when people do it. In the mean time a guy came in to pick up his cat. He and I talked a bit as we waited for things to settle with our vet and the other dog. I learned that the guy's care was in kidney failure and they had effectively tried a poor man's dialysis on it today, pump it with IV fluids and see if it clears some of the toxicity. He was basically picking it up to take it home and watch it die. Rough.

As I said, our visit went well. The vet had to step out though to euthanize the other dog. It was past saving. They medicated it and put it on oxygen so that the woman could have some final minutes with it. They explained that there was probably no coming back from this but if she wanted they could do thousands of dollars in tests and procedures to try and give it days maybe up to months but this was undoubtedly end-of-life time for this dog. I couldn't help but feel like total jerks for even spending his time on looking at Bernie's wound one last time when there were animals literally dying in neighboring rooms.

When Bernie goes, that will be our last visit to that vet office. We really like our vet there but it's a long drive there. We used to live nearby and just kept going after we moved since they knew Bernie. Clem doesn't have the same situation. She'll be going to a local vet instead. That said, Dr. Krull is a really good vet and we'd give him a medal if we could.

 

man, wordy today. 

That's going to be it for now. I'm working on trying to write documentation for all the stuff I built in my old job. Monday I'm supposed to start my new one. 

[Elastigirl]

Some great thoughts about time spending. I think your lunch friend is very typical. It's super easy to get in the rut of complaining about things and saying how you are going to do such and such, and never get it done. It's easy to have good intentions, not as easy to actually do them. I like your plan of dividing things between mental and physical. The other thing I thought about with your lunch friend is that it is the grass is always greener mindset. I've known people who were dissatisfied with their job or lives, and they worked and made the changes, but they were still dissatisfied. And then they talk about how they would be so much happier if only..... 

[Sloth the Enduring]

Yeah, I don't think you need to feel bad about your friend. He knows what his deal is. He's just engaging in some magical thinking. He might as well wish to win the lottery. I think we just live in a system where it's hard to feel satisfied.


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[The Most Loathed]

12 hours ago, Elastigirl said:

The other thing I thought about with your lunch friend is that it is the grass is always greener mindset. I've known people who were dissatisfied with their job or lives, and they worked and made the changes, but they were still dissatisfied. And then they talk about how they would be so much happier if only..... 

I have totally made changes that have made me unhappy. I've occasionally started down the road of "I should have never" but I try to remind myself, those changes never came out of nowhere. There were often months of dissatisfaction leading up to them. It's really easy to forget that though when I look back.

 

12 hours ago, Sloth the Enduring said:

Yeah, I don't think you need to feel bad about your friend. He knows what his deal is. He's just engaging in some magical thinking. He might as well wish to win the lottery. I think we just live in a system where it's hard to feel satisfied.

Emphasis added by me. I hadn't even considered the possibility that he's aware of the circle that he's spinning in. I'm glad you pointed that out.

 

Laura definitely has a cold now. So we kept things pretty chill last night. She kept saying she was going to go to choir practice (she planned to start up again this week) until minutes before when she finally relented that it might not be a good idea. I've totally been there. I didn't lean on her at all. Just tried to kept everything nice.

I headed down to the apartment gym and put my kettlebells to work. I'm not a regular down there so I got some funny looks from people who obviously were. I completely forgot how stupid people are in the gym. One guy literally laid on a balance ball and just bounced the upper half of his torso off of of (like a tiny ab crunch) for what had to be 15 minutes. Regardless.

1 minute Snatch Left

1 minute Snath right

1 minute Rest

x 10

24, 24, 24, 24, 24, 20, 20, 16, 16, 16 kgs

 

One arm Clean and thrusters 20kg 3 x10/10

 

done in about 30 minutes.

 

With some of the rest of my time I got all my Raspberry Pis imaged and physically set up. Now that they're all connected to the network via ethernet, I've IDed their IPs and setting up their SSH keys to one another. Then I'll load Apache to each follow by Hadoop.

 

I read some more documentation on Hadoop last night. I continue to be impressed and surprised by how little magic is involved. It's touted as this magic tool for manipulating huge volumes of data quickly. All of the magic is in how it distributes and stores data. After that it's a really basic tool set. It give the user very granular control over what it really looks at so that it doesn't waste a lot of effort looking at the whole line (Map). Beyond that, it just looks really quickly at every single line and does a really crude compression (Reduce). After that it's just typical data manipulation.

It may be that I'm in the early stages and like many beginners, I think I know more than I do. But this doesn't feel like that. I can explain in a pretty fine grain what's going on so I think I'm getting it. We'll see soon enough.

 

[LouCarJo]

I'll chime in and say I understand where Roger is coming from also, though also understand how it's not that uplifting for you to have to hear, especially as it sounds as though he wanted to wallow rather than engage with your suggestions to help him break through.

 

He needs a "why".  I find once you've left the school/student/very start of work life stage, the very clear steps of progression that you can just follow fall away.  Having lots of interests/options is paralysing.  Perhaps like the donkey between the water and the food, who doesn't move because it can't decide which it wants, he just needs a push randomly in one direction so at least he's taking action of some description.

 

I like your approach of half mental/half physical pursuits.  I might steal it.  My challenge to myself to deal with this kind of need to do something productive and not do nothing to appear on my battle log shortly!

[The Most Loathed]

8 hours ago, LouCarJo said:

I like your approach of half mental/half physical pursuits.  I might steal it.  My challenge to myself to deal with this kind of need to do something productive and not do nothing to appear on my battle log shortly!

By all means. Steal away. Fair warning, once you get the dual thread down, the tendancy is to want to split it further, in the mental you want to read some books and also solve some puzzles, in the physical you want to lift and also do mobility. As far as I can tell there is no rational end to this and thus, it can become overwhelming. 

 

For my local nerds ( @Sloth the Enduring, @Rooks, @Jittersthe.Clown, and anyone else). Anyone free to do an RPG a week from Friday (on the 22nd)? Laura's out of town and I've made plans to entertain myself over the weekend but had hoped to slot and RPG somewhere in there. It's be at my place (Loring Park). I'll GM unless someone else really wants to. It'd probably be D&D but I could be talked into StarFinder. I'm happy to provide food that meets whatever dietary qualifications.

[Elastigirl]

14 hours ago, The Most Loathed said:

 

On ‎9‎/‎13‎/‎2017 at 5:32 PM, Elastigirl said:

The other thing I thought about with your lunch friend is that it is the grass is always greener mindset. I've known people who were dissatisfied with their job or lives, and they worked and made the changes, but they were still dissatisfied. And then they talk about how they would be so much happier if only..... 

I have totally made changes that have made me unhappy. I've occasionally started down the road of "I should have never" but I try to remind myself, those changes never came

 

I was thinking more of people who are always unhappy no matter what changes they make. But you're right sometimes we make changes hoping it will be for the better and it doesn't work out. Sometimes the fear of that is what paralyzes me and keep me from making changes. I'm getting better about that as I get older, though I'm still pretty change adverse.

[Sloth the Enduring]

I may have a different game that night, but it isn't settled yet (DM has new family responsibilities and hasn't negotiated a different night away yet).

[The Most Loathed]

9 hours ago, Elastigirl said:

I was thinking more of people who are always unhappy no matter what changes they make. But you're right sometimes we make changes hoping it will be for the better and it doesn't work out. Sometimes the fear of that is what paralyzes me and keep me from making changes. I'm getting better about that as I get older, though I'm still pretty change adverse.

I would describe myself as ""change adverse" but experience is teaching me that it may be a a misconception of myself.

8 hours ago, Sloth the Enduring said:

I may have a different game that night, but it isn't settled yet (DM has new family responsibilities and hasn't negotiated a different night away yet).

No sweat. I know this is an odd time and short notice. Just thought I'd see what people's availability is. 

[Rooks]

14 hours ago, The Most Loathed said:

For my local nerds ( @Sloth the Enduring, @Rooks, @Jittersthe.Clown, and anyone else). Anyone free to do an RPG a week from Friday (on the 22nd)? Laura's out of town and I've made plans to entertain myself over the weekend but had hoped to slot and RPG somewhere in there. It's be at my place (Loring Park). I'll GM unless someone else really wants to. It'd probably be D&D but I could be talked into StarFinder. I'm happy to provide food that meets whatever dietary qualifications.

 

Didn't we tentatively already scheduled something for then back a few pages in the Log? I thought I remember reading something about a space version of D&D that we were going to try. Maybe I'm making stuff up though as I don't have anything on my calendar. I will talk with Danika and see what she says. 

[The Most Loathed]

2 minutes ago, Rooks said:

 

Didn't we tentatively already scheduled something for then back a few pages in the Log? I thought I remember reading something about a space version of D&D that we were going to try. Maybe I'm making stuff up though as I don't have anything on my calendar. I will talk with Danika and see what she says. 

I mentioned it as a possibility but didn't make any firm plans. This is my attempt to do that. Starfinder in the D&D in space thing. If it works, you're welcome, if not, no sweat.

[Rooks]

Just now, The Most Loathed said:

I mentioned it as a possibility but didn't make any firm plans. This is my attempt to do that. Starfinder in the D&D in space thing. If it works, you're welcome, if not, no sweat.

 

For sure. Danika has a party she's doing Thursday night and Saturday we are heading to my sisters for the day, and Friday, Sloan has an appointment, but I think it'll work.  But again... I just gotta go through the work of making sure.

[The Most Loathed]

Friday 9/15

the plan was food trucks with friends then games at the house (no workout). Laura wasn't feeling well so we cancelled our plans and ordered in pizza and just lounged.

 

Saturday 9/16

My massage therapist had closed his office for the weekend on account of a conference he was going to. The conference got rescheduled so he called a few of his client to see if anyone wanted a massage. We did. Otherwise, a quiet day.

 

Sunday 9/17

First thing in the morning, Laura grabbed some cold medicine out of the closet as she was tired of feeling crummy. Unfortunately it was PM medicine and her day was tanked by being place in a drug induced haze all day. 

Kristjian came over and we did kettlebell juggling for a hour. Last time she and I talked, she was looking for some kind of workout she could do at home that wasn't weight centric. I pointed her towards GMB. She had since visited their website and it recommended the Elements program. I'm always a little skeptical when any site seems to recommend that literally everyone start with a program but she seemed pretty convinced.  After talking to @Elastigirlabout it, I am too. I'm seriously thinking about getting the program for myself too......and bought.

 

 

This week is my transition week at work. It'll be slow this week. I'll be wrapping up some documentation and getting invited to new meetings. I've changed jobs a few times (more recently than I would have expected) but never in the same company. My old boss had a minor panic attack about me leaving and leaving her short handed but she seems to be over that. Otherwise things are going pretty well.

One weird hiccup is that one of my contingencies of taking the job was that I don't want to drive to commute everyday. Most of the team is 20 minutes drive south of me. It's not a terrible commute but I like not driving. The original assumption was that I'd just stay in the same cube but that wasn't allowed. So now I'm trying to get a new cube assigned but I don't have on. So, I'm cubicle-homeless right now. I'm using it as an excuse to work from home

 

Monday 09/18

I went down and did my morning treadmill and then repeated it at 11. Food was good, I ate some left over beef and buffalo burgers and some coconut rice I made. Breakfast and supper were each and egg sandwich.

 

Tuesday - planning to hit the treadmill again and start working on the Elements stretches and warm up, deadlifts in the evening

Wednesday - treadmill and maybe gym. This will depend on what Laura wants to do in the evening. She wants to start going to choir again but also she's flying out on Thursday so I see a high likelihood that she'll table her evening plans, in which case I'll end up staying around with her

Thursday - Laura is out. May end up meeting Brian for games for the first time in a long time. If not, gym time

Friday - maybe Starfinder or something similar otherwise....not sure.

Saturday - I'm double booked for a good chunk of the day. I signed up for "hackathon" but I also need to do both of our weekend chores and we have a dog trainer coming by at 4:30 for Clem.

Sunday - kettlebell juggling at 8, long walk with my massage therapist at 9:30, also booked for the hackathon this day too. I also need to figure out when Laura is due back. 

[Elastigirl]

I think you and Kristian will be happy with Elements.  We have an accountabilibuddy group for it, which I'm too lazy to link now.Maybe tomorrow I'll put it in my signature, but just look for Elements in the accountabilibuddy section.

 

Always good to find an excuse to work from home.

[Rooks]

On 9/15/2017 at 9:15 AM, The Most Loathed said:

I mentioned it as a possibility but didn't make any firm plans. This is my attempt to do that. Starfinder in the D&D in space thing. If it works, you're welcome, if not, no sweat.

 

Finally get back to you on this. It's not going to work sadly. Life is just crazy hectic this week. I forgot about 4 different events that are going on and it's just chaos. Sorry man.  

 

I'll be curious to hear your overall take on GMB. Seems like it has a lot of the same intent as Gymnastics Bodies so I'm curious which one is the better approach to overall movement goals / routine.

[The Most Loathed]

On 9/18/2017 at 10:50 PM, Elastigirl said:

I think you and Kristian will be happy with Elements.  We have an accountabilibuddy group for it, which I'm too lazy to link now.Maybe tomorrow I'll put it in my signature, but just look for Elements in the accountabilibuddy section.

 

Always good to find an excuse to work from home.

I will have to look for the group.

I was surprised by the amount of material in Day 1. I haven't actually done day 1 yet because there's quite  a lot to consume before you start. I did the couple of movements that I could recall this morning during am stretching. I plan to go through it all and genuinely start this weekend. 

 

15 hours ago, Rooks said:

 

Finally get back to you on this. It's not going to work sadly. Life is just crazy hectic this week. I forgot about 4 different events that are going on and it's just chaos. Sorry man.  

 

I'll be curious to hear your overall take on GMB. Seems like it has a lot of the same intent as Gymnastics Bodies so I'm curious which one is the better approach to overall movement goals / routine.

No worries. I didn't have a third lined up and honestly didn't pursue it hard because I had a vibe that things might not come together. I think I'll be ok entertaining myself. 

What I've seen of Gymnastic Bodies, yes they are very similar. Probably more alike than different. I really dig the GMB guy's style. Think middle aged, surfer, ninja. He's so chill all the time I keep waiting for him to tell me to hang loose at the end of the session.

 

Tuesday - Monday night going into Tuesday our old, sick dog kept us up. so when Laura wasn't really feeling the gym on Tuesday I didn't mind. We scaled back supper plans and I went to bed a little early.  It rained so I slept like a baby. 

 

Wednesday - today I'm in the office and eating like a little piggy. I have been really disciplined the last couple days but getting back into the office setting has me wanting convenience foods. Still unsure about workout situation tonight.

 

I have a guilty pleasure, I love marital arts movies. I'll watch old, Chinese, Kung fu flicks, pretty much anything with Jean Claude Van Damme, definitely anything with Tony Jaa (although Skin Trade was a let down), and Super Definitely anything with Jackie Chan. When I work from home I frequently stick a fighting movie on in the background. I tend to stick to English Language movies at those times just because reading subtitles does not mix well with coding. 

Yesterday Netflix suggest to me a movie called Lady Bloodfight, which sounded horrible. It was. Don't watch Lady Bloodfight. The choreography (my favorite bit) was awful, the plot was awful. I hope that everyone involved with that movie thinks less of themselves because I definitely think less of them, not that I recognized anyone.  I'm pretty sure that the "Russian" fighter has been in some stuff. As the villain, she was the best part of the movie.

After that disappointment Netflix recommend Boyka: Undisputed. This is weird because there is a movie called "Undisputed" that has three sequels. In it there is a character called Boyka. Fight franchises have a tendency to go on too long if they have even a modicum of success. You can tell when they overreach because the plots get thinner and thinner but also the titles just stop trying. This felt like that. However, I think Undisputed is one of the best western martial arts movies of the last decade or so. So, I watched it.

I was blown away. It was definitely still Scot Adkins and Boyka. They appear to have kept the same fight choreographer and cinematographer or at least they kept the aesthetic that works so well for the franchise. For a franchise about a guy who literally fights his way out of prison, it's hard to figure out how to up the ante one more time but they did it. 

Spoilers ahead for anyone who cares:

Now out of the corrupt prison system that exploited him, Boyka is trying to go straight but he has one talent, fighting. As a result he's trying to become a legitimate fighter. He also found God while in prison and is trying to wrestle his violent profession and his commitment to his faith. 

Boyka gets offerred a fast track to stardom. He has to do two, totally legit, qualifying fights and then he will be a part of an sanctioned organization. In his first fight he knocks his opponent out and is excited as he's well on his way. Later he learns that the guy had to go to the hospital, where he died. Heart broken he seeks out the man's widow to give her his apology, ask forgiveness and give her his take from the fight. To do so he must cross back into Russia, where he is still wanted. 

In Russia the plot gets a little schlocky but it's still worth watching. The dead fighter borrowed money from a the mob to build a community center. He was going to pay it off with his winnings. Instead the wife is forced to work for the mob and there are heavy implications that if the movie goes poorly she will be forced into prostitution but it isn't actually said until the very end. In the meantime she's a waitress.

The Russian mobster runs a club that includes a fighting right because - movie plot. Boyka says he'll take on three fights to clear the woman's debt. He trains, the mobster tries to throw everything at Boyka he can including a 2 on 1 match and a slightly ham-fisted turn at the end where he brings the current prison champion out to fight him. Because he's Boyka, he wins. However, he has to get back to the Ukraine both because he's wanted in Russia and his second fight to get to the big time is literally hours after his final fight in the Russian club. 

The mobster attempts to go back on his deal so Boyka brings some action movie style vengeance. It's not really his thing but it works. However, he ends up shot and the police are coming. I'm thinking, how are they going to play off him getting to his final fight and actually winning, this is going to be dumb.

This final twist takes it from a decent boyka flick in a franchise that should be over to "mind blowing". Stop now if you are ever going to watch this movie.

The final twist is, they don't even try to get him to the fight. He gets arrested. I haven't gone back to confirm but I'm 90% sure that the final minute of the movie is a shot for shot recreation of the first shot of the first movie. He is back in prison, going back to the fighting ring. In the process they manage to convey that he is home. This is where he belongs. It's amazing. The whole movie is worth watching is you can just catch that feeling. 

 

Ok. enough talk. go do work.

[The Most Loathed]

Yesterday was a pretty good day. I got my am walk/run in and some stretching. I ate like an asshole but I forgive myself. Laura did end up going to choir practice so I went to the gym. Not having someone waiting on me, I gave myself the go ahead for a slow workout. It'd be a while since my last one so I wasn't expecting much. At the last minute I decided it was time for deadlifts. 

While I was setting up a coupe friends came out of a class that was just wrapping up. They take a ton of classes there and really seem to enjoy them. They knew the trainer and were chatting him up. I had to interrupt to ask where one of the heavy plates was, explaining that with it . missing I can't load the bar enough to do my deadlifts, so way to play into the stereo type that the trainers have of me there. 

So I start pulling and find that I seem to have boundless strength. I'm was double checking my math each time because 315 flew off the floor for five reps while I was still in warm up mode. I kicked it up to 365 for my actual reps. I could feel 400 in there, just wanting to come up but made the choice not to pull it. In the end my grip failed me but my back felt like it could go on for days. It's been a long time since I wished for straps but I wished for straps.

While deadlifting the trainer came over to me and asked if I wanted to join some new classes that they are pushing. He had some free passes in his hand. Sure. They have a new trainer and he wants to teach and Olympic Weightlifting class and a Kettlebell class. I passed on the kettlebell class but I took a pass for the weightlifting class. There are really good odds that I'll do it once and never again but maybe, just maybe I'll like it.

 

Deadlift 365

3, 3, 2 - tried to reset my grip on that last one but the spell was broken and my hands were not going to give me anymore

Band Assisted Pull Up 5x5

Barbell Clean 135 5 x5

Barbell Snatch 95 5

 

I went into the basketball court and did my animal crawl assessments for Elements. I recorded them but my phone seems to be sucking at uploading them. In my experience, in a month I will realize that even the things that I think I see in my assessment today aren't the real problems. As a newbie I don't even have the mind or the eyes for the real problem. That said, here's my assessment of myself (videos to follow if I can get them to upload)

Bear - the primary cue given is to lift the butt as high as possible, I could definitely do better at this. During the movement I could feel considerable tightness in my calves. This is a problem area for me so that's unsurprising. 

Monkey - In my opinion this is the best of the three for me I have the trunk rotation to make this easy. The tightness in my calves and posterior chain in general translates to my squat being very high. You can tell I'm an office worker because I squat exactly like I sit 6-10 hours a day

Frogger - Probably my worst one. It combines some aspects of bear and monkey that I'm not great at plus I'm just less familiar with it in general. This one I'm just marking down as "needs improvement".

 

Today Laura flies off to Nebraska and I'm working from home. I don't get nights at home by myself very often so it'll be an odd experience but I hope to to make the most of it by doing some computer work, a bunch of clean up, grilling and so on. Not that she really stops me from those things but sometimes it just easier to do some of that with no one around and no one else's schedule to worry about.

[Elastigirl]

On ‎9‎/‎20‎/‎2017 at 6:51 AM, The Most Loathed said:

I really dig the GMB guy's style. Think middle aged, surfer, ninja. He's so chill all the time I keep waiting for him to tell me to hang loose at the end of the session.

This is a perfect description

Way to go on the deadlift.  Hope your phone cooperates and uploads the videos. The frogger is the one that tires me the quickest.I do pretty good with the monkey, it actually feel like a good stretch. And my calves in the bear are super tight. They've  loosened up a bit, but still pretty tight.

[Rooks]

On 9/20/2017 at 8:51 AM, The Most Loathed said:

I really dig the GMB guy's style. Think middle aged, surfer, ninja. He's so chill all the time I keep waiting for him to tell me to hang loose at the end of the session.

 

8 minutes ago, Elastigirl said:

This is a perfect description

Way to go on the deadlift.  Hope your phone cooperates and uploads the videos. The frogger is the one that tires me the quickest.I do pretty good with the monkey, it actually feel like a good stretch. And my calves in the bear are super tight. They've  loosened up a bit, but still pretty tight.

 

That sounds a lot better than Coach Somner from the GB stuff. He's kind of annoying in some of his videos where in one minute he's talking about making sure to listen to your body and take it easy and in the next minute he's telling his students to go harder and don't be so weak.  

[Elastigirl]

10 hours ago, Rooks said:

 

 

That sounds a lot better than Coach Somner from the GB stuff. He's kind of annoying in some of his videos where in one minute he's talking about making sure to listen to your body and take it easy and in the next minute he's telling his students to go harder and don't be so weak.  

I've listened to Coach Somner on podcasts. He sounds very knowledgeable. But when I looked at deciding between the programs, I preferred Ryan's style. It makes me feel more at ease, and reminds me that I can enjoy my training.