Jarric

Hope Little Bit feels better soon, and class isn't closed too long for her.

Wednesday - week 2 day 3 Yesterday was a good day. I laid in bed longer than I should have (sound familiar?), but did get up to go for my run. I tried to do running drills, but the ground was too soggy for that, so I ended up doing walk/run intervals instead. It was nice to get out. Work was exhausting for some reason. I'm trying to get stuff sorted before a few days off and that isn't going too well. Ah well, I shall do what I can. Que sera sera. In the evening WW slow roasted a celeriac, and we had it with fried halloumi and something that was almost, but not exactly, nothing like pesto. We had a few beers and watched the snooker, mainly because I'm going up to London to see the winner of last night's match play tomorrow. I also did some drawing in front of the TV. Our album of the day was Sam Cooke Live at the Harlem Square Club, and WW mentioned that she used to think a line in one song about "chicks in slacks" was about "chicken slacks". Inspired by that I drew a very stupid cartoon character called Chicken Slacks (or possibly Chkn Slax, I haven't quite decided yet). The album, incidentally, was excellent. Food was on track, and beer day is now at 800/2400kcal. I ended up going to bed quite late after the snooker finished, and didn't brush my teeth. No revision today.

Tuesday - week 2 day 2 Yesterday was a good day. Crossfit was rope climbs and farmers' carries, which are two of my favourite things. I ended up practicing rope climbs with the opposite foot locking to what I normally do, because the graze on my left shin from last time hasn't 100% healed, so that was a fun challenge to try and climb left-footed. I worked up to 169kg (~372#) for a 100ft (~30m) carry - it felt heavy as fuck but I got it done. After that we had a 5 minute AMRAP of 5 kettlebell swings (Russian swings, for the Americans) and 10 burpees. I deliberately went for a heavy kettlebell so I wouldn't have to do as many burpees, and managed 5 rounds and 12 reps with a 32kg (2 pood, ~68#) kettlebell. Work was ok, still plenty to do but nothing too stressful. Working from home means I can have the snooker on in the background of an afternoon, which is nice. In the evening we chilled in front of Jonathan Creek, and then watched a very cool program about owls that WW had saved for me. I did some drawing in front of the TV for my creativity goal. I was running late first thing, so had cereal and a banana at my desk for a 600kcal breakfast. Lunch was a pork sandwich, a carrot and an apple at 600kcal I guess. Snacks were on track, but dinner I went well over. We had pork ribs and macaroni cheese bites, which was nice but highly calorific for its size. Teeth done, no running or revising today.

Is it the working out what to buy that you find stressful, or more general worry about shortages? If it's the former, would it help to see it as a challenge? i.e. what can I make with whatever random stuff I can find today? If you like creative cookery that might be fun. Awesome job on the bench press! Keep up the good work.

I love this as a collective noun.

That's funny, your workouts usually sound like an awful lot to me ? Today's workout was 5 minutes long, so far more manageable than Monday's nonsense (even if I did have to do burpees!)

Good luck with the changes at work, it sounds like a really positive direction you're trying to take the place in. I love this analogy. Wise words.

Monday - week 2 day 1 Yesterday was a good day. Crossfit was pretty brutal. First we had 4 rounds for time of 20 dumbbell lunges and 20 pressups to dumbbell row. 80 pushups in about 15-16 minutes is a lot for me; I nearly gave up on round 3 but pushed on through. Then 5x5 squats, which I was knackered for. I worked up to 80kg (~176#), which isn't particularly heavy for me but it felt it at the time! I couldn't tell you if I did 5 sets or just 4. Work was ok. In the evening we watched some more Jonathan Creek, and I started some prep for a Pathfinder 2e one-shot I'm going to be running next week for my creativity goal. Food was good. Had the standard 600kcal breakfast, though I had to make an omelette as I didn't boil my eggs on Sunday. Lunch was a pork and chutney sandwich, a carrot, and a nectarine; about 600kcal. Dinner was a sort of pork and egg noodle soup, with the noodles replaced with rice. It was really nice, and I'm guessing about right calories wise. Snacks were about 600kcal, being two glasses of milk, a Tony's Chocolonely bar, and packet of Space Raiders #thingsonly90skidswill remember. Teeth were done, no revision or running for the day, no beer.

Nice one rebels! Always good to see success shared!

That's gorgeous! So much better than my little scribbled one. I love the honeycomb calendar particularly; I may have to pinch that!

Ok, so if you're looking at 2-3 days per week, I would probably just have two different workouts and alternate them. Options would either be lower body day and upper body day, or pull day and push day. If you're going upper/lower split, then each day should include a push and a pull (e.g. OHP plus pullups, and squats plus deadlifts). Vice versa is your splitting push and pull each workout should be full body (e.g. squats plus OHP, deadlifts plus pullups). And example might look like: A - Squat variation (squat, front squat, or overhead squat) - Horizontal push variation (bench, pushups, dips) - Shoulder to overhead variation (OHP, push press, jerks, handstand pushups) B - Ground pull variation (deadlifts, power cleans) - Horizontal pull variation (any kind of dumbbell/barbell row) - Pullup variation (rings rows, banded, strict, kipping, weighted) If you wanted you could add some skill work to each - I'd probably do that at the start before you wear yourself out with the heavy stuff. I think @Starpuck uses an app to track her lifts, so she may have an answer for this?

I don't think I've actually had Clipper, for some reason. I'll have to add that to the 'to try' list.

I've never come across it, but I'll give it a try. Doesn't look like it's particularly cheap over here, but I'm intrigued. Will let you know what I think. Yes! I do remember! I must have been on one too many binder benders between that conversation and now, but I'm with you now. Yeah, the Arte & Zayne tins are really good - really solid. I seem to remember the Seven Sisters being good. My favourite so far is the Maria's Choice - that's lovely. Yeah, Pukka is nice, it's not the same as a real tea, is it? Especially as I don't drink any coffee, I really do need a decent tea in the morning.

When I turned 30 I started to feel a lot more like I had my life in some semblance of order. At 32 I'm stronger than I ever was in my 20s, both physically and mentally, and I think I'm a better person. It's not all bad That's a tough one. It feels like a big time commitment, but if you have the time I feel like it'll probably get easier if you stick with it. What lifts do you want to work on, and how many sessions per week do you have to do it in? That's probably going to dictate your programming. Nothing wrong with keeping notes in your phone though - as long as you're tracking progress and know what you did last time. I've not used any, but I understand there's some good apps that you can track lifts and Crossfit workouts in - might be worth a look if you're using your phone anyway.

Binders? I'm not sure what you mean by that? That's a thought on the payout. I'm not sure if that makes me more likely to stick around because of the added risk, or more likely to drop off the challenge so I don't transfer any money at all.

Oh, that's interesting. Thinking about it, I've had the lightheadedness woth a few other things (very rarely), so maybe it's a stress response for me too. So for tea, depends what you want to spend and what you're after really! The best tea I've ever had is probably from Arte & Zayne - they're a shop in Amsterdam but they deliver internationally. It's not cheap but it's great stuff (it's cheaper if you buy the refill packs rather than the nice metal tins). They will also do a selection box if you want to try some things. Similarly on the unnecessarily decadent front, D&Tea do dungeons and dragons themed teas. They're US based, so shipping is a thing. Currently I've got packs of Elven Bazaar, Underdark and Chill, and Tavern Brawl. A more sensible choice for nice tea, Whittard do some good stuff, and they've got shops all over the place. It's a bit hit and miss; I'd avoid stuff described as 'flavoured tea' in favour of tea with actual herbs/fruits/whatever to flavour it. All of the above do black, green, and white teas. For non-tea infusions Pukka do some good stuff. Twinings do a nice one called Focus that I quite like. Oh, and finally, there is a company called Tea Bloom that do fruity green teas that start as little balls you put into a teapot and after a few minutes grow into little flowers. It's 1000% a gimmick, but they're pretty fun.

Week 1 scores So first point, I'm stealing an idea from @deftona and putting some money on myself this challenge. I'll put £40 on each week, and for the percentage of my goals I complete I get to keep that cash. For the percentage I miss I'll pay that money off my mortgage, so it'll benefit me long-term but I won't get it now. I've done this a few times in the past, but the fatal flaw is often that I drop of the last week or two of the challenge and then don't total everything up at the end. So this time I'm going to make payments on a weekly basis, so if I drop of the challenge I'll still have paid my dues for the first few weeks. Run: 2/3 - I should have run on Saturday, but it was chucking it down with rain and I was tired (blah blah, excuses, blah blah). The runs I did do were also shorter than I wanted. Room for improvement Calories: 7/8 days - this went well, and I was well under on beer day which can only be a good thing. I need to weigh in, but I feel pretty good about this. Creative: 2/7 days - this dropped off far too quickly; I need to find a better way to incorporate it in my days. Revise: 0/4 days - total failure; I need to get cracking on this Teeth: 4/7 days - it's better than nothing. I started the week well, dropped off in the middle, and came back at the end. Average goal completion was 47.97%, meaning I get to keep £19.19 this week, and will transfer £20.81 to my mortgage now.

Sunday - Week 1 Day 7 Yesterday was a good day. I got up and procrastinated for far too long, which meant two things. Firstly, my 90 minute run was reduced to 40 minutes. Second, my hitting the road at 10am became 10:45. I went up to London to see the opening match of the Snooker Masters. It was a brilliant match, so despite the 2 hour drive each way I had a lovely time. Got back fairly late in the evening. I did attempt to do some D&D prep but I had a splitting headache when I looked at my laptop screen, so I ended up just watching TV until bedtime. Food was weird owing to how the day was split. Big bowl of Weetabix first thing for 600kcal. A banana before I hit the road, then a ham, cheese and pickle sandwich at the snooker which was only about 450kcal. On my way back I stopped at a service station for a chai latte. I do love a chai latte (whilst simultaneously objecting to paying £3 for a 4p teabag in some boiling water, which tends to lead me to getting something more extravagant), but it's a ton of calories. When I got home WW had cooked a massive roast pork dinner, though a fair bit was veg. All on all I'm calling this a pass, based on a lot of things cancelling each other out.

Saturday - Week 1 Day 6 Saturday was a good day. I went climbing first thing, which was pretty bloody hard having gone to bed at 1.30am and got up at 7am. Still, it's all a bit of fun. Most of the rest of the day was spent playing Northgard whilst WW watched Jonathan Creek. I did have to go out to Tesco, sans WW as she's still isolating, and that's about all of the productivity I managed for the day. Food worked out well. Small breakfast, but WW made a big old fry up for lunch which balanced it out. Dinner was Thai-style hat yai garlic fried chicken with rice and Thai-style salad (from a recipe box, because I would have no idea what this was otherwise). It was lovely, and spot on for calories. Snacks were two glasses of milk, a cupcake, and a handful of smarties. Not a productive day goals-wise, but I had a really lovely day so there's that.

Yeah, my 5G signal is strong AF. Weirdly my own workload isn't too bad for the end of the financial year. I'm sure I'll end up picking up stuff for other people though; it is generally a busy time. Oh, that's interesting, I didn't know that. That would go some way towards explaining it then. Thank you! ?

4/5 is pretty good for week 1. If you weren't tracking this, how many more takeouts would you have had? D&D stuff:

Friday - Week 1 Day 5 Yesterday was a good day. Crossfit was 4 intervals, each for time, of 5 squats, 3 deadball loads, and 100m ski. I hit 90kg (~198#) on the squats, and did the deadballs at either 60kg (~132#) or 75kg (~165#) each time. I'm about 75kg, so it's nice to know I can load myself onto a box. After that we practiced pistol squats - I feel like with a bit of practice I could really nail those. Work was ok - I'm definitely more on top of things that I have been in a while. In the evening we watched Critical Role, and I had a few beers. When WW went to bed I stayed up watching a Twitch stream called The Basic Lich. Basic Lich is the female alter ego of Mark 'Sherlock' Hulmes, who DMs the High Rollers D&D stream. I had an amazing night just getting leathered and chatting with people on the stream, so much so that I stayed up until half 1 in the morning. Album of the day was The Stranger by Billy Joel. I'm not a bit fan; it's not the kind of music that really does anything for me, but it was ok to have on in the background. Food: standard 600kcal breakfast. WW cooked bacon and Brussels sprouts for lunch, which I had with a carrot and an orange to bring it up nearer 600kcal. For dinner WW made feta and prawn orzotto, which was lush - that came in around 460kcal so I had a pot of gelato to get up to 600. I can't remember the snacks now, but I know they were about right. Beer day is at about 1,900 kcal now, so room for a couple more pints this week if I want them. With the beer and late night I opted not to do creativity, studying, or teeth brushing. I need a plan to get on these a little more.

That is interesting! I've never got to the bottom of what causes it, and I don't have enough injections for it to be an everyday issue, but it's nice to know I'm not alone. And yes, I guess it was too much to ask of Gazza Think of how many thousands of professional footballers there have been over the years - it's good that there's finally one with some principles they're willing to stand up for, but man that's rare. Excellent track! Though this is the song that that word conjures up for me: I've been really fortunate with the vaccines, ironically given my reaction in the moment. The first one made me feel absolutely amazing for a couple of days, and I didn't get any side effects off the other two, not even really a sore arm.

That's an excellent question. I don't really know. Certainly since I was a teenager I have felt lightheaded and sick, like I'm about to pass out, whenever I have an injection. The first time it happened the doctor noted I had low blood pressure that day*, but I don't generally suffer with low blood pressure and this happens with every injection. There was also a time when I would feel sick just talking about injections/giving blood, although that doesn't happen as much any more. I don't get particularly worked up or anxious going in for injections (although I don't look forward to it, because I'm pretty resigned to the fact I'm going to pass out). I'm guessing it's mostly psychosomatic, but I'm really not sure. *That day was around the time that I figured out the best use of my free school meals voucher was 6 chocolate chip cookies; the vouchers weren't really adequate to buy real food. By the time I had my injection after school I guess I was on a huge sugar crash.

I love how you've thought this out. There's some really good thoughts in there. If I might suggest something, I would reframe this: I would call that 'Current hurdles to overcome'. I say that, because I think this bit should be called 'Why make changes': Really, I think your 'why' is because you want to live life to the fullest. You don't make changes because of an issue you have, you make changes because of what that issue means, fundamentally, to your way of life. It may be different for you, but I would find it more motivating to bring that stuff to the core, if that makes sense. Also, I absolutely love the bujo stuff. You're right, it's not about being an artist, it's about having fun with it and finding something that motivates you. I think that's a really good habit to stick with.