[The Most Loathed] learns....slowly

[The Most Loathed]

On 1/1/2017 at 6:35 PM, Sloth the Enduring said:

I tried one of those magnifiers, it didn't work for me. Sadly, I threw my unpainted figures in the metals bin. At the time I didn't have the prospect of game and didn't even know anyone playing in RL.

I totally understand this, given that I pretty much did the same with the Star Wars minis.

 

First post of the new year and I'm already running a bit behind. Ah well.

 

1/1/2017

New Year's day, also Sunday

• weight 219.7
• calories 2400
• clean eating - No, I had a single alcoholic drink and some toast with almond butter an honey. I ate well over my alotted calories for the day
• training - rowed 10 km
• dexterity - yep, I did some more painting. I really enjoy the process. I'm now working on an orc and a knight. I'm still on my first three so everything is somewhat prescribed in terms of colors and I'm following the prescription but allowing myself to make changes as I see fit. for example, I don't like how bright the green is on the orc so I'm adding a couple extra washes to try and bring it down a tone.

 

1/2/2017

• weight 217.5
• calories 1200 - I find this really hard to believe but I've checked and double checked it multiple times. We didn't eat a lot. eggs and bacon, soup + cookie and half, one bowl of homemade stew.
• clean eating - no, ate a cookie and a half
• training - Kettlebell pentathlon (6:00 work, 5:00 rest x 5)
• dexterity - none. My first day without painting. I wanted to paint (or work on drawing or handwriting) but just didn't make the time

 

It's Tuesday already so this week should fly by

Monday - already happened

Tuesday - Food should be good, I'm doing stew for lunch. Planning to row tonight

Wednesday - Same food, planning off night, hope to paint

Thursday - Same food, planning to lift

Friday - probably a bad food day and an off night. Laura's been house bound more than not the last couple weeks so I offerred to take her out for supper.

Saturday - weekend food always gets squirrely plus we're changing up the schedule a bit, Laura is going to start trying to do Saturday morning yoga. So I should get to lift but not sure how nutrition will be

Sunday - always a big catch catch up day. Planning to row, hoping to paint

 

I'm about 200 pages from the end of my current book so if I push I may wrap by the end of next weekend which would be great. This book has gotten a little tough at times. There are a ton of characters, some who I haven't really seen much of since book 1 and they're moving around and crossing paths a ton. The next book, to my memory, is the best of one. It's also the last of the series that I've already read so who know what waits beyond it. 

 

So, it's 2017. I'm 37. My 20 year high school reunion happens this year, I haven't decided if I going to go or not. 

Starting off this year, all my pants are tight. I don't like that I'm 220.So I'm on a diet and logging my food. I started working on this in December because I know that for and diets and food logging, I need a little time to settle in. At first my body rebels against the restrictions, I need time to talk over the feelings of hungry with myself and settle anxieties. and I need to get my brain ok with the tedium that is logging food. That breaking in period is done and I can diet in earnest.

200 is my go-to weight. It's a nice round number, I look pretty good at that weight and all my clothes work well at that weight. I tend to turn 200 into 198 in my brain because that 90 kg. Also, I figure if my actual weight is 198 then I'll fluctuate between 195 and 200 and when I hit 210 eventually, alarm bells should sound. I always wonder if I should push harder and go for 190 but historically, 190 is out of my grasp and desire. At 190, clothes get really hard to find because my waist would be around a 32 and my legs and butt and shoulders don't fit in clothes with a 32 waist. 

So, I'm sticking with 200/198 as my target. More important though is to keep logging after I hit it. Whenever I hit a weight goal there is a bounce shortly after that it normal for people but not accounted for and since they are usually off their program at that point, the scramble to try and deal with it. I want to try and keep logging throughout the year. That will be harder than losing the weight will for me. so that's the real goal, keep logging, let the logging control the weight.

My diet will be a lot of what has worked before, eat meat and as many veggies as I want or can. Stay away from breads, sweets, sugar and most sauces or condiments. 

 

Last year I worked on my hand writing and it improved. In so doing, I got into fountain pens. I intend to keep writing both for taking notes and to my two pen pals. I also have started doing the tutorials from DrawABox.com. I don't have a really specific plan or goal here. I don't think I'll draw every day but 4 times a week seems like a plan, call it 200 times in the year. This will complement my handwriting work as well as my mini painting. I'm sticking to lesson 1 for now. I don't have an end date for it.

I've obviously gotten into mini painting in the last couple weeks of 2016. I really like this. It takes a bit more time and equipment than handwriting or drawing so it'll be a bit more limited. I feel like painting 3 times in a week is the very most I should expect and twice is probably going to be a lot more common and a sane goal. I can work on two or three minis in different stages during a painting session. Some minis can be done ins 4 sessions, some will need 8 or 10, depending on the complexity of the model and how things are going for me. In 2017 I'm so in the early stages that I think the only goal should be 100 painting sessions, come what may of them. 

I need to go add some columns to my spreadsheet

 

Unlike previous years, I'm not setting a gaming goal. I'm content with my 1-2 times a week habit right now. I do want to host a couple more gaming events. I want to do a big boardgame day in which my friends are invited to bring their favorite alcohol and I will cook up at least two different versions of beef and it'll be all about the decadence. I also really want to put together some RPG one-shot days. It's pretty clear that I can't sustain a D&D campaign but one-shots can be the most fun anyway.

[LouCarJo]

We would have been in the same school year.  There's no way I'm going to any reunion, but then again I wasn't the most popular/hence sociable at school.  I do find the amount of time that's passed fairly terrifying!

[The Most Loathed]

43 minutes ago, LouCarJo said:

We would have been in the same school year.  There's no way I'm going to any reunion, but then again I wasn't the most popular/hence sociable at school.  I do find the amount of time that's passed fairly terrifying!

I was in a weird place socially. I had grown up an unpopular, out of shape nerd. In high  school I got super fit and ended up being one of the better players on the varsity football team. I still sat with some of my fellow nerds at lunch rather than the jocks. I never went to the cool kids drinking parties or anything like that. I was kind of the sliver in the Vinn diagram between the nerds and the jocks/popular kids, not really at the heart of either group. 

The people who put on our reunions are invariable the same people who were at the heart of that jock/cool kid group. Interestingly, they all still live in our home town, where a lot of us nerdier folks spread out and saw the world a bit more. The cool kids of old still all drink together a few times a year, some are regulars at the same bar as I understand it. My best friend in high school was a cool kid in a class lower and has told me that he still sees them...he also still lives in our home town.

I would go back for a reunion if I thought more of the nerds and weirdos would show up, they went out into the world and did cool things. As it stands, I'm thinking I'll skip because I just don't care to hang out with my football team and the cheerleaders of 20 years ago. 

[Sloth the Enduring]

It sounds like you should wait for the 25th. That's the one that's has the best attendance.

[The Most Loathed]

 

01/03/2017

• weight 218.1
• calories 2033
• clean eating yes
• training no - I'll explain
• dex - worked on drawing drills for 20 minutes or so

I opted to not work out. I did this because there was a community council meeting regarding the reengineering of a pretty major site in my neighborhood. It ended up dovetailing into a conversation about putting a rail line down our street. So I did my civic duty and went and listened and talked to my city council member. I adulted. I will try to row tonight.

 

[The Most Loathed]

01/04/2017

• weight 218.3
• calories 2533 (above target though)
• clean eating yes
• training row
• dex half and hour of drawing drills

My row ended up being really fast for me, 43 minutes as I recall. That's a 2:09 500 meter split. I may have done it faster before but never so easily. I'm not sure if this is the some of the payoff of the cardio and low HR work I did this fall but I tweaked my technique a bit and was suddenly flying along at would have been a really tough pace before. I was doing 23-24 strokes a minute, which is low, but pulling as are had I could on each stroke. I was starting to tire a little by the end but felt like I had a fair bit left in me. I stuck with nose breathing throughout and wasn't super challenged there. 

A really interesting row. 

[Elastigirl]

Cool about the row. Interested to see if that happens at other workouts, and if you think the low HR work paid off.

[Sloth the Enduring]

I love when a workout like that happens. It's nice to see your patience paying off.

[The Most Loathed]

01/05/2017

• weight 216.5
• calories 2043
• clean eating yes
• training circuit
• dex wrote a letter to a pen pal, worked on drawing drills. 

Last night I did what I refer to as a Kurt workout, named for the trainer who started me on them. Each exercise is done for 10 minutes but not necessarily the entire 10 minutes but as much as you can. I usually find some kind of set and rest routine that works. 

 

• 1 arm thruster 20 kg 10/10 per minute
• TGU 8/8 total
• Mountain Climber 30/30 per minute
• 1 arm swing 24 kg - 25/25
• Lunge 10/10 - originally planned to be weighted but had to go to no weight.

My legs should begin their rebellion sometime today.

 

Today is planned as an off day from training, which is good, I'll need that. 

Additionally, while I plan to track my calories today, I don't plan to restrict them at all. I had my usual breakfast, I brought my lunch but I imagine that my coworkers will want to go out for lunch, Laura and I are supposed to go out for supper. I'll stick to clean eating but calories will likely closer to 3K. I'm ok with that. I'm planning for at least once a week bounce, a cheat day if you want to call it that. 

 

Tomorrow will be kettlebells, sunday will be rowing. I don't yet have a food plan for those days but I'll log and manage it. 

 

I won't finish my book this week but it'll be an easy finish next week. I was looking through my books and realized I've actually read one more of these than I thought, although I don't remember anything about it. I thought that the next book was the one that jumps continents, which is the last one I read, but there's one more. It'll be interesting to see if any of it seems familiar to me when I start reading. 

 

Since I went to the community council meeting on Tuesday, I didn't get to paint yesterday. I'm thinking of trying to squeeze in a session today but we'll see. I got a few more minis in the mail yesterday so I'm all set for a while. Now, I just do the painting. 

[Bearlee]

Stopping by to let you know that one of the indicators that I should get back on the Nerd Fitness forum is that cub asked when we are going to have another game night with Laura. So if you could tell Laura she made a good impression on cub I would appreciate it. But he seems to think you live on the other side of the city and not 10 hours away. And I appreciate your meticulous logging of your workouts, goals, and what your thinking about them.

[The Most Loathed]

21 hours ago, Bearlee said:

Stopping by to let you know that one of the indicators that I should get back on the Nerd Fitness forum is that cub asked when we are going to have another game night with Laura. So if you could tell Laura she made a good impression on cub I would appreciate it. But he seems to think you live on the other side of the city and not 10 hours away. And I appreciate your meticulous logging of your workouts, goals, and what your thinking about them.

Welcome Back! Laura will be delighted to hear that he had a good experience playing games. If you ever find your way back up here, you guys are welcome at our house. 

 

01/06/2017 - Friday

weight: 218

calories: 4381

clean eating: no - 4 whiskeys with supper

training: off night

dex: drawing and writing

 

I don't actually think calories are correct on this one. I planned to go high but I think that the 1200 calories that MFP thinks are in an order of ramen is an overstatement.That said, calories were high, as intended. Although, I admit to allowing a bit more latitude than I can justify (cookie I had with lunch, I'm looking at you). This is kind of the inherent problem with "cheat days. I wasn't calling it a "cheat day" but I obviously let the idea into my brain and behaved as such. So, some improvement to be made but it's ok.

 

I experienced significant DOMS for the first time in months starting on Friday. I knew that I had this coming based on Thursday's workout. I'll have some more in the not too distant future.

 

01/07/2017 - Saturday

weight: 219.3

calories: 1564

clean eating: yes

training: no - unplanned off day

dex: painting 1 hour

 

Other than not working out, it was a good day. Food was well managed, spent time with Laura. Watched the first episode of The Expanse.

 

01/08//2017 - Sunday

weight: 220.1

calories: 2015

clean eating: no - alcohol with supper

training: rowing

dex: painting 1 hour

 

DOMS was still in play so my workout was more of a recovery workout. I did 30 minutes or rowing and some mobility work

 

I question if I didn't go over my calories for the day. I really had to guess at what I ate for supper. I cooked 21/2 chickens which I then carved up and we had for supper but also prepped four lunches for me and two for Laura. I had a couple drinks while working in the kitchen which I later regretted a bit as I tend to crave bready snacks after a couple drinks. 

 

week wrap up

Last week was good but not amaze-balls. I kept my calories in check despite being a bit challenging at times. I gave myself Friday as an "ok to exceed" day but treated it more like a "cheat day" which I'm a little disappointed in myself on. Sunday, I'm pretty sure I went outside my calories target which just reminds me the alcohol and dieting don't mix on so many levels. 

I got one fewer workout than planned on the week but I'm not broken up over it. I had DOMS for the first time in a while by doing a "Kurt workout". There will be more of this.

 

week kick off

This week, during the week should go really well. Just stick to the plan and I'll be good. The biggest challenge will likely be hunger. I logged my lunch today and found that it was a little lower in calories than last week. I just have to manage that scared animal in my head that loses its mind whenever I'm not full all the time. Workouts this week should come easily as Laura is planning on grabbing an extra yoga class during the week and it's really easy for me to workout when she leaves for class. 

The challenge this week will come over the weekend. We're headed to see family over the weekend. Any family trip is invariably a nutritional disaster. Hopefully we'll get one workout in while down there. that's been a trend the last couple years that I really appreciate as it breaks up the monotony and helps us feel better for getting out and moving around.

 

Python update

This is mostly for @RisenPhoenix but anyone who wants to can read along. I've been talking about Python for several months now. RP and I were going to both work through the Automate the Boring stuff classes, website and book. For me, the intent was to automate a lot of my work and find some new things that aren't my responsibility to automate. As such I figured I'd take advantage of my copious downtime at work to learn it and bend it's formidable power to my will to serve my employer.

 

The first challenge I encountered is that per security they lock down the folders where you normally install all this stuff and block the ports used by they default installer (pip). I started a series of helpdesk tickets to try and resolve this. I was eventually linked up with the Python User Group in my company and Theo, the head Python Evangelist here. They were able to explain that they had to fight hard to get security to let any Python in the door (you could theoretically write very harmful programs with it). A part of the compromise was to agree to limit what modules were available. I could download the ones required for the program RP and I were supposed to follow. Theo was able to recommend stand in for most but not all of them. Specially, the one that takes over your mouse and keyboard for you, which I can kind of understand. I can use anything in the Anaconda package, which turns out to be a pretty good list. 

 

I pretty quickly got distracted from what's in the book by practical applications. I'm a database guy. At the time I had a half dozen reports to run on a monthly basis. I decided to do what I could to automate that. There are a lot of ways to skin that particular cat but here's a pretty linear representation of how I went after it:

• Individual reports: I already had SQL to run against my databases so I just built a python script that would run that for me then move the results into Excel and save them. Each report had to have its own script and I was telling the script how to format and name every column, which isn't very efficient. 
• Common script: I talked people on the web and just played with some things and eventually settled on a way that I could have a single script that would run as many reports as I want. I have to write SQL slightly differently than I usually do, applying formatting in SQL and naming all my columns there but in return I currently run a dozen reports with a single execution of my script. It places each report in the folder I tell it and emails the owner with a link when it is done.
• Options: I know that the next couple reports that I'm writing will not run on the same day as all the reports I currently have. Also, I have some quarterly reports around the corner (as opposed to the monthly ones I currently run). I could just make a different spreadsheet for each different timing and run a copy of the script for each timing but I like the idea of one common place housing all my code, my list of reports and my single script. So, I'm working on an interface, currently the command line. By the end of the week, when I run the script it will ask me if I want to filter on any column then give me a list of options. Once I select a column it will give me a list of the unique values and I can tell it one value I want to run or I can say all. So, next week I'll run it and it will ask what column and I'll enter "timing" since that's a column in my spreadsheet then I can enter "mid-month" since that's a value I have in the spreadsheet for my reports.
• Web scraping: Something that's heavily featured in the curriculum that RP and I are supposed to be doing is web scraping (going to a website and moving around, filling in forms and/or copying content out). I dabbled a little in this are but it's a pain in the butt. I need to do more as I have about three different web reports I run and I'd just as soon not have to do the clicks. 

 

Food update

One big thing that will change next week is I'm not going to prep any lunch meals next week. I'm trying a new experiment: Performance Meals. It's a bodybuilder who started doing food prep for other people. He offers different calorie counts and meal counts for different prices. He shops at my grocery store and lives in my neighborhood.

 

My wife read an article in our local newspaper on these guys over the weekend and thought I should give it a go. I've seen their ads around but you know that anyone cooking food will charge and arm an a leg. Except I already pay an arm and a leg for my lunches. We're thinking that it's going to be a monetary wash or possibly a slight net savings but I can cash out my habit of spending all Sunday in the kitchen, which I've done for the past decade. 

 

So, next week, after I get back from my trip to Iowa, there will be a box dropped off at my house with 10 meals, each about ~350 calories in it. I'll take those to work with me and eat two a day during my work week. This does net me 2 extra meals but I'll figure out what to do with them. Heck, we may have supper one night based on it. 

 

 

ok that's a lot of crap. congrats and apologies if you read all that.

 

[Sloth the Enduring]

I saw that article, I didn't think the prices were out of line until you said the meals were only 350 calories. Either way, it seems worth it to get your Sunday back.

[The Most Loathed]

On 1/9/2017 at 2:18 PM, Sloth the Enduring said:

I saw that article, I didn't think the prices were out of line until you said the meals were only 350 calories. Either way, it seems worth it to get your Sunday back.

The experiment starts on Monday. Just given the ordering cycle I figure I'm committed for at least two weeks. I would imagine I'll do a full month to form an opinion. 

 

01/09/2017

weight: UNK

calories: 1745

clean eating: Yes

training: Yes

dex: drawing drills

Open gym was...interesting. Kristjan showed and continued her trend of wanting to do less and less. I don't want to push her but if this continues, it's going to be hard to be convinced that this is time well spent. We'll see how it develops though. She rowed for 20 minutes then did some swings and snatches for 20 minutes. I didn't take a picture of my workout so I think this is what I did

 

Snatch 20 kg 25/25 x 2

Thruster 24 kg 10/10 x 5

windmill20 kg 1/1 x 10

Clean 32 kg 10/10 x 5

 

20:00 TRX circuit

Row x 10

Press x 10

Curl x 10

Tricep Ext x 10

 

 

01/10/2017

weight: UNK

calories: 1932

clean eating: Yes

training: not really

dex: no

 

I tried to convince myself to row at midday but was really not feeling it so I only rowed for 15 minutes. Those people who tell you that if you start to workout, you will get over whatever is holding you back and be glad you did it, they haven't done this long enough. more often than not, that is the case but sometimes working out just really seals the deal, this is not for you today.

 

I shoveled the sidewalk for the block and I got assigned someone from the shoveling network so I went over and shoveled her house too.

 

 

01/11/2017

weight: 216.7

calories: 1425 - I do believe that this is accurate

clean eating: 

training: Yes

dex: no

 

I got up and it had snowed more so I went out and shoveled again and went over to my shoveling network person's house and shoveled her walk too, she has a corner lot right by a school and I wanted to get to it before the kids walked on it. Laura also asked if I wanted to go to yoga with her so I did. It was a really nice class. I didn't feel worked out but I felt good coming out. It's the kind of thing I'd do a lot more of if I was retired.

 

Wednesday I made good on a conversation in this thread from back in November or so. I went to the dentist. It's been over a decade and my last several visits were just to get a broken tooth fixed and not the whole cleaning and so on. I was kind of dreading this experience but I knew I needed to Adult Up and go. It turns out we have really good insurance, which was nice.

They spent an hour doing pictures, x-rays and a manual inspection. My front two teeth were broken when I was 16, both were fixed up with ceramics and glue so that looked normal. However, the right one has broken three or four times, I think because of the overlap of my bottom to two teeth. The left one has stayed in place for over half my life. That's all exactly as expected. I have a cavity that appears to be because I had a cavity as a kid and the filling wasn't done right so  the space next to it continued to erode. Probably most importantly, I have the beginnings of gum disease around my molars. Fortunately, there's a fix for that.

I was also booked for an hour after to do the full cleaning routine. However, the fix for the gum disease that is caught early is an extremely deep cleaning that is uncomfortable enough that they use Novocaine when they do it...and you bleed quite a bit. That cleaning takes four hours total and leaves you uninterested in eating. My dentist likes to do it in two two-hour sessions or four 1 hour sessions. Since I only had an hour booked, they did the top right quadrant of my teeth and yep, I chewed on the left side of my mouth last night.

I'm booked for a visit every other week for the next six weeks to get the rest of the cleaning done and to get the cavity filled. It's honestly not as bad as I expected. I assume that they will want to do these super deep cleans until my gums come back up to the standard level so at least one more round but I don't know if this is a years long process or if a couple rounds will take care of it. Regardless, I now have a dentist and am going.

 

 01/12/2016

Today is my last "normal" day this week, although it hasn't felt normal. Tomorrow we're having our "Christmas Party" at work by going out for lunch then we're supposed to leave for the day from there. I need to use the extra time to take Clem to the kennel (Camp) for the weekend and get things ready to take Bernie to my parents' house for the weekend. We're headed down on Saturday for what was supposed to be a weekend with both sets of parents but my in-laws haven't felt good and probably won't be there now. So, it'll be the weekend with my family. 

In the US is Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Monday an I work for a bank so I have the day off. I'm also taking PTO Tuesday. Monday we'll travel back, Tuesday will be our day to make up for not having the weekend to do chores. 

[peelout]

Anxious to hear what the lunch meals turn out to be.  If you hired me to supply them from you, I would bring you 2 hard boiled eggs and a fruit for each meal. lol

[RisenPhoenix]

Ugh, that sucks that you kinda got blocked that much dealing with the Python stuff. >.<  And here I thought issues installing that docx module was the biggest of our worries...

 

And huzzah dentists?  I really should get my teeth looked at, it's been pretty damn long as well.  And I am not a "dentists freak me out" person (my mother is a dental hygienist, so yea, grew up with that stuff).  I'm just lazy.  

 

Good luck with the family vacation!  I'm sure you'll have fun and/or not murder people.

[The Most Loathed]

21 hours ago, peelout said:

Anxious to hear what the lunch meals turn out to be.  If you hired me to supply them from you, I would bring you 2 hard boiled eggs and a fruit for each meal. lol

This is why you should not open up a catering business.

I will definitely share how it goes. I mean what is this log if not a gigantic overshare.

 

18 hours ago, RisenPhoenix said:

Ugh, that sucks that you kinda got blocked that much dealing with the Python stuff. >.<  And here I thought issues installing that docx module was the biggest of our worries...

 

And huzzah dentists?  I really should get my teeth looked at, it's been pretty damn long as well.  And I am not a "dentists freak me out" person (my mother is a dental hygienist, so yea, grew up with that stuff).  I'm just lazy.  

 

Good luck with the family vacation!  I'm sure you'll have fun and/or not murder people.

The Python thing has been a blessing and a curse. I can't do all the stuff in the book or class but I've got an excuse to work on legit projects and a community to tap into. 

 

I have to say, I'm really happy with this dentist experience. My dentist growing up sucked, this experience confirmed that. 

 

Vacation plans changed...more to follow

 

01/12/2017

weight: 218

calories: 2547

clean eating: No - Cupcake with supper

training: No

dex: no

 

Plans yesterday got a bit nuked. Work was fine, good, in fact. The weekend plans were to travel to Des Moines, where my parents live, for our post holiday meet up. It just happened that my in-laws were also supposed to be in town as well so we were going to use it as an excuse to meet up with everyone. My mother-in-laws health has been kind of dodgy so she ended up deciding not to come. Add to that, there are now ice storm warnings for Iowa and my father-in-law decided to not to go. Ice storms plus Laura's family bailing left Laura quite upset and not wanting to go down. 
I spent the evening chatting with her. Called my family to set up a follow up date (in a couple weeks). Thus, I skipped my workout and had a cupcake with Laura

 

01/13/2017

Today is my "office holiday party". We're going out for lunch then leaving early, which sounds like a great holiday party to me. I'm hoping to make time to do a workout and run some errands when I get home.

 

Hammer Race

I forgot to mention, I signed up for the Hammer Race in April. I had said I would but when I found out that it was the same week that Laura is out of town for work I told her i'd not since it would be a day after she got back. She was slightly incredulous, "but you said you'd do it". So, at her insistence that I should, despite knowing her general mood when she gets back, I signed up. I better find some time to jog before then.

 

Weekend

so, I'm home now for the weekend. We're having friends over one night but otherwise it's just a nice, quiet 3 day weekend which makes me happy.

[The Most Loathed]

Ok kids, gather 'round old man Amos, A minor gripe.

 

I don't have kids. I'm past the age where most people have their kids but not so old that people my age don't tend to have kids in the house. My younger sister has a kid, my brother-in-law has a couple. I like kids but I'm not conditioned to them like parents are. I'm always happy to see the my nieces or nephew or some friends' kids. However, people's need for me to get shotgun blast of child exposure confuses me. 

I recently had someone want to give me "all day" with their kid because "their old enough now to get to know people" and they "grow up so fast". I really don't want to spend 6, 8, 12 hours with someone child. It's not even like I'd be babysitting so the parents can have down time, which I could justify as a valid reason to be around the kid that long. 

Like I said, just  minor gripe. If you have kids, your childless friends are happy to give you a break but don't be offended if they don't want to just "hang out" with your kid(s).

[Sylvaa]

I have kids and think that situation is weird. 

 

Honestly, and without any disrespect, childless couples are not the first group of people I think of for babysitters or people who would want to spend all day with my children. Like, it's not my business the rationale for anyone to not have children. As such, it's not my place to "force" them to be around my kids. Granted, force is too strong of a word, but it gets the idea across.

[Sloth the Enduring]

Note to self, TML is open to babysitting the slothlings.

That is a weird situation. All of our babysitters are childless older folks. People who like kids, but never had them for one reason or another. A couple hours is the max I'd ask because at that point they've gotten their fill.

[RisenPhoenix]

Yea, that's just weird.  And I like kids for the most part (and kinda want some).  It'd be one thing if you had previous expressed interest in hanging with the small humans, but another thing entirely for a parent to dictate when you should want to spend time with their kid.

[LouCarJo]

Right, catching up.

 

* Perhaps Kristijian wants you to push her?  Whenever I've worked out with others, if I or someone else couldn't be bothered, we still wanted to work out properly, just borrow someone else's motivation to do so.  Though I can see that would get a bit tiring if it was always you doing the geeing up.

* Yep, I definitely know the feeling of forcing myself to go to work out despite not feeling it and then still not feeling it after quite some time.

* Well done on the dentist.  Sounds as though it went as well as you could have hoped.

* I hate it when family let me down (a pain like few others) so sorry for Laura.

* The children/no children thing can be so weird.  I have generally been sidelined by loads of friends because of falling on the wrong side of the divide.  The request you've received does seem a little odd.

[peelout]

MIA!  Decide to spend 3 days w/ your families kids? lol

[The Most Loathed]

On 1/14/2017 at 2:15 AM, LouCarJo said:

Right, catching up.

 

* Perhaps Kristijian wants you to push her?  Whenever I've worked out with others, if I or someone else couldn't be bothered, we still wanted to work out properly, just borrow someone else's motivation to do so.  Though I can see that would get a bit tiring if it was always you doing the geeing up.

* Yep, I definitely know the feeling of forcing myself to go to work out despite not feeling it and then still not feeling it after quite some time.

* Well done on the dentist.  Sounds as though it went as well as you could have hoped.

* I hate it when family let me down (a pain like few others) so sorry for Laura.

* The children/no children thing can be so weird.  I have generally been sidelined by loads of friends because of falling on the wrong side of the divide.  The request you've received does seem a little odd.

I didn't really consider pushing Kristjian. I think it'll have to be delicate but yeah, that may be correct.

just nodding along with the rest of the bullets

13 hours ago, peelout said:

MIA!  Decide to spend 3 days w/ your families kids? lol

no kiddoes. I just don't have any habit built in my weekend that ever has me sitting down at a computer. It's a bit weird but on weekends I tend to be moving almost all day everyday. When I'm not active I tend to be doing something specific like reading or napping. I don't know if it's because I'm on a computer 40 hours a week or just my personality but I find that in my spare time I have no desire to be at a computer. I don't enjoy computer games and the internet is pretty much a pile of all the things that are the worst about people. I should find a way to build a habit to at least get in NF and check in with you lot.

 

As peelout mentioned, I skipped some days, so a slightly light recap:

Friday:

Lunch was out "holiday party". We went to a pretty high end place for lunch and I had a great steak sandwich and coffee. I headed home, thinking I might workout but took a nap instead. Dinner was frozen ravioli, which is calorically light but tasty. 

Saturday:

We decided that since we were staying in town we would invite some friends over for supper. Breakfast was in, lunch was out at our local gluten-free place (so good) and then we bought groceries and came home to do house cleaning. With the ongoing decluttering efforts, a basic house cleaning is getting pretty trivial to complete, which is nice. Laura wanted pasta for supper so I made a big batch of pasta with a couple pounds of sausage and two types of sauce. Our guests brought over two bottles of wine and dessert tarts. Wine was fine, tarts were delicious.

We finally broke out a game I got for Christmas 2015 and have been trying to get anyone to play. The Castles of Mad King Ludwig is pretty great. You're building a castle with certain goals like I had "the most square rooms" where someone else had "the most living rooms" and so on. In a round the "master builder" arranges the rooms on a price board then everyone buys, paying the master builder. You place your rooms, count points and the master builder rotates one player to the left. It's exceedingly simple but a good game. 

Sunday:

This is the first day I didn't track my calories on MyFitnessPal since I started. I sat down Monday to catch up and realized that I couldn't totally recall what I had. So a miss there. No workout. Did some reading, took a nap and did a ton of dishes from all the food I made on Saturday. Also we went to get rug samples from Restoration Hardware, decided we didn't like any of them and found one online we did so we ordered it. Also, had a fancy (read sugary) coffee. Oh, and we went by Blick art supplies and I bought some things I totally don't need but are fun, like brush pens.

Monday: 

MLK day and I work for a bank so guess way, day off. We returned the rug samples and got another fancy coffee. We did our grocery shopping for the week which was much scaled back (I'll explain in a bit). We got salads at the coop which isn't cheap but it makes for a delicious lunch. I finally got back in the gym after several days off. My weekend workout habits haven't been on point the last couple weeks so I'll need to improve that. 

 

Monday's workout

Jason joined me but Kristjian said she was home sick so I adjusted the workout a bit, do what you can in 10 minutes

• clean 32 kg 10/10 x 8
• One Arm Thruster 20 kg 5/5 x 10
• Sitout-> Mountain Climber 1/1 ->20/20 x 10, 1/1 ->10/10 x 10
• Row Twist-> push up 5/5->10 x 10

Food stuffs

As i mentioned above, the grocery trip was a little light this week. this is my first week of ordered meals. About 7pm on Monday I had a box dropped off at my house. 

Inside was a bunch of insulation, an ice pack and ten, prepackaged meals, two of five different meals

I'm on their "reduce" plan which just determines how many calories are in the meals. The average about 350 calories each. The "maintain" and "build" plans are more calories but the smallest number of meals you can get is 10 so I just figured I'd bring 2 a day to work. If I used the "maintain" plan and ate two meals, I'd be just over 1,00 calories a day, which would be ok if I kept my suppers under control, the "build" plan looks like it's basically a double portion each day. I guess if I lived alone and really never wanted to cook, it'd be a viable option.

Given that my food is delivered on Monday, this means I'll have at least two spare meals a week and will need to have enough leftovers to get through Monday under my own power. I'm trying to talk Laura into just each of us having one of these for supper some night. Otherwise, maybe I'll eat them for lunch on Saturday and Sunday. 

This week we did not see a full $100 savings on our grocery bill (to offset the cost of the meal plan). I'm still going to give it a couple weeks to evaluate then we'll see whether it stays or goes.

One of my facebook friends did point out that this generates a lot of trash and I'm a little self conscious bout that now. I did email the company to see if they would at least reuse the box, insulation and ice pack and it feels like a total waste to just throw those away.

 

This week

Tonight is an off night for training. Supper is shrimp and rice

Wednesday is a training night, probably long cycle work. I may try to get Laura do some of my meal plan for supper. Otherwise, I think it's breakfast burritto

Thursday is also a training night, probably rowing, whatever doesn't happen food-wise on Wedneday, I'll push for Thursday

Friday is an off training night. I suspect Laura will want to go out for supper. also, my coworkers will want to go out for lunch. Not sure how food management will play out

Saturday Laura is going to the local "Women March on..." protest thingie. I've offerred to shuttle people, provide food and refreshement support if neeccessary, otherwise, gym time.

Sunday, gym time, do chores

 

This week it's supposed to get near 40. I keep telling myself that I need to go out and run if I'm going to do this hammer race in a few months. will I make it this week? Time will tell.

[peelout]

5 minutes ago, The Most Loathed said:

 

Friday:

Dinner was frozen ravioli, which is calorically light but tasty. 

 

One of my facebook friends did point out that this generates a lot of trash and I'm a little self conscious bout that now. I did email the company to see if they would at least reuse the box, insulation and ice pack and it feels like a total waste to just throw those away.

 

Calorically light ravioli?  I would have thought the opposite.  Is there a way to make it low cal?

 

I was going to ask if you had to return parts of it. Probably the manpower costs of handling the returning portion, disassembling, sorting, and restocking exceeds the cost to just purchase in well organized quantities.  Shame though. Maybe if enough people call in.

Are they delivering the meals by drone helicopter yet?

[The Most Loathed]

6 minutes ago, peelout said:

Calorically light ravioli?  I would have thought the opposite.  Is there a way to make it low cal?

 

I was going to ask if you had to return parts of it. Probably the manpower costs of handling the returning portion, disassembling, sorting, and restocking exceeds the cost to just purchase in well organized quantities.  Shame though. Maybe if enough people call in.

Are they delivering the meals by drone helicopter yet?

you make it light by not eating very much  

We use Rising Moon Organics because we like the taste but if you take a look, the whole package is just over 500 calories and we split it evenly. We each get something like 10 pieces. I dress it with a little butter and grated cheese but even then it's less than 400 calories for each of us.

 

I totally agree that the business math almost certainly breaks down to it being more expensive in man hours than the cost of some commoditized parts. I mentioned in my email that if there ever did add some version of the service that reuses the containers, I'd even pay a surcharge for that. Also, we have some places around here that serve food in compostable containers, which might be a more practical solution. We have enough lefty, hippies here that I'm hoping that they at least consider it.

 

No drone, although that would be cool. No, they drove a crappy old box truck down my street and got my one box out of the back and brought it up to the door. I was really surprised that they offered Free Home Delivery, I don't think that can last. They have several pick up sites, one of which is near my house but not near enough to get to without a car. I suspect that the delivery portion of their business will see some evolution.