Jarric

I never really watched The Office, and clips like this make me question that choice

more or less. We've been here 6 months without a working gas meter (we have gas, just no way of knowing how much we're using), and they've been sending me payment chasers and threatening to call in debt collectors for a bill that we're paying (even though every time I call them they say to ignore the chasers). It's getting a bit much! It took me far, far too long to remember that pants does not mean the same thing there than it does here. To be clear, my shorts were ripped, my underwear wasn't (though I guess is was very much on show ) Instagram isn't embedding right now, but if you look at the third picture here you can see just how bad it was: https://www.instagram.com/p/CTr48bAojWF/ Thanks man! It was great fun.

Not gonna lie, I'm real excited about these two goals in particular. Also, you've reminded me that Inktober is a thing, so now I'm looking forward to that. And I too agree with the others, and would add that you have better arms than Starbuck.

Yesterday was a good day. I had a lie in in the morning, and WW cooked a mini fry up for us which was lovely. I had an argument with British Gas about their horrendous service, wrote a letter of complaint, and then delivered that on my way to climbing. Climbing was fun. I was knackered from Saturday's race, so I only did about an hour of relatively straightforward stuff. Then I fell off the slackline for a while before heading home. I spent a good chunk of the afternoon playing Majesty - an amazing, classic RTS in which you build a kingdom, set up heroes guilds, and then recruit heroes who may or may not feel inclined to kill monsters and protect your realm. Alternative popular options include stealing from your kingdom, in the case of rogues, gambling, in the case of elves, or, in the case of wizards, dying every time they get near a stiff breeze. In the evening WW did roast chicken, and we watched some more Go 8 Bit until it was time for bed. I went to sleep relatively early, a little after 10pm, but I still feel like I need more to catch up with last week and the weekend. Update counter: 4/8 (3/7, 1/1)

I'm here man, hoping to keep up with your challenge (and your narrative!) better this time.

Thursday was a good day. Work was a bit disjointed with lots of meetings, but I got some stuff done. Left early as we had our team summer night out (basically the company had given us £30/head to go to the pub). It was amazing to catch up with everyone in the team, some of whom I haven't seen for 18 months as we've been split it to two groups for social distancing. We met at 4pm, and I was one of the final three people still in the pub at 10pm. I felt fine, drunk, but fine, when we left, and it was only when I got halfway home that I realised I was very drunk indeed. Ended up spending half the night asleep on the bathroom floor, which was not very restful - I haven't over-indulged like that in quite some time. Friday was a good day. The morning was a bit of a write-off thanks to Thursday night - I logged into work for urgent things but I wasn't that productive. I felt better by the afternoon though, and had a fairly good day. Yesterday was a very good day, as it was another race day. This time Nuclear Blast, a 5k lapped OCR where you aim to get as many laps as possible, and have 2 hours in which to start your final lap. I would have loved to have got 4 laps of this, but I knew that that would be a tall order, and when the first lap came in over 45 minutes it became pretty apparent that that wasn't happening. Still, I had a really good time, and managed to take a few minutes off last year's result: 2020 results: Lap -- From Start -- Lap Time Lap 1 - 00:52:20 -- 00:52:20 Lap 2 - 01:43:29 -- 00:51:09 Lap 3 - 02:37:12 -- 00:53:42 Yesterday's results: Lap -- From Start -- Lap Time Lap 1 - 00:46:27 -- 00:46:27 Lap 2 - 01:35:01 -- 00:48:34 Lap 3 - 02:28:53 -- 00:53:51 My energy totally tanked in lap 3, as you can see by my time dropping off quite a bit. Unfortunately whilst I managed 3 laps, my shorts gave up after 1.5, and I ran the rest with a huge hole in the back of them After some food and a beer I headed home for a nice long bath, more food, and more beer. WW and I watched a bunch of Dara O'Briain's Go 8 Bit, in which minor celebrities play a bunch of classic computer games - it's very good. Update counter: 3/7

Thanks man! That's certainly the plan (though it's not going that well so far!). I did, it was great, thank you. I knew where the photographer was for all of them There's a few pictures where I was looking away from the photographer, but I haven't shared those! Well our GM uninvited him, which made things easier. Basically I think he just said that we didn't feel it was a great fit, and that we didn't think the kind of game we were playing was the kind of game he was looking for. It helped that we met him for the first and last time at session zero - easier to deal with it up front than after weeks of play. Practice ? . Seriously though, I'm having fun, and I'm very deliberately trying to smile for the camera. I wouldn't say I was particularly photogenic. Thanks man! You should, they're a lot of fun, and in a normal year you have a lot of choice to help find the type of race you enjoy.

Near where I live (in England) there's a maize maze, and it never occurred to me that that's what would be called a corn maze in the states. Important question - were you attacked by a bear shortly after writing this?

So lets talk about the week so far. In fact, lets start with last weekend. Last weekend I ran Nuts Challenge, a local OCR. It was a fun little race, doing two laps of the 7km (4.35 mile) course. I ran it with a mate from work, who hasn't run a race in a few years and is a bit out of training, so we took it fairly slow. It was nice to be on course with someone, rather than running solo, and to take things at a more leisurely pace for once. The pictures have come out for it too: So that was fun. On Sunday I finished off a short D&D adventure I've been running over the summer whilst our normal Ranger D&D game is on hiatus. I failed to kill any of the party, and I didn't even get to turn anyone to stone, but the paladin killed the last basilisk but fighting it from the reflection in his shield, Perseus style, and that was pretty cool. They were a fun group, and it was interesting to run something that had a time limit and a defined end. At the gym on Monday I hit another new deadlift 5RM at 142.5kg (314#). I'm feeling like I can keep building this to 150kg over the next few weeks, all being well, and that'd be pretty cool. Tuesday evening I had a session zero for a new Pathfinder 2e game I'm going to be playing in, now that our Mummy's Mask game has finished. We're mostly the same group, with a couple of new players (one of whom we decided pretty quickly isn't going to work out, due to an immature attitude and lack of personal hygiene, but such is the way with inviting new people to the table). We're going for a fairly monstrous party of lizard folk, kobolds, and tengu, with me playing a Gnoll bard, whom I think I might describe in more detail once we've had our first proper session. Yesterday evening I packed up my car and took it over to my parents house, and then signed the paperwork to sell it to my sister. For the first time in 12 years I now officially do not own a car. It's a weird feeling. At the moment the plan is to be a one car household, as WW and I both walk to work and we rarely, if ever, need the car at the same time. We'll see how it goes, and if after a few months we don't like it I'll have at least saved a few months' worth of tax and insurance. Update counter: 2/4

Thanks man! Oh thank you, that's really sweet! Given that I missed yesterday I'm not of to the best start, but hopefully I'll get back into the habit over the next few weeks. Thank you Looking forward to having you. Good to have you Tank.

Love the cake Yasha! I also love how oddly specific threatened species bake off day is

It's not! But it still feels like a good thing. Also, hi!

Right, I'm going a bit more low-key this time. Lets start with the wrap-up from last challenge: So this challenge I'm not ready for a lot of goals, and I just want to make sure that I'm staying here and staying accountable. To that end, I have one goal: Update here ever day. That's it, it's that simple. Which isn't the same as it being easy, but it is simple. There's no restrictions on what I can talk about, so it'll just end up being a general blog about stuff I suspect. I meant to post this yesterday and didn't, so I'm currently 0/1, and posting this today puts me at 1/2.

Love the plan man, 1kg/month sounds infinitely sensible (sorry for using a bad word ), and I'm sure you'll smash it. If this is a thing, I might be game

Thanks man! I made it 142.5kg yesterday as well. I'll be looking up your new challenge now.

August challenge wrap-up, such as it is! It's actually been a good couple of weeks, so here's some stuff that happened (which I may or may not have mentioned already): New Deadlift 5RM at 140kg (308#) - which pleasingly is 3 big plates on each side New Squat 3RM at 107.5kg (237#), and 5RM at 97.5kg (215#) (and probably a new 7RM at 87.5kg (193#)) Yesterday I ran Nuts Challenge! We took it pretty slow, as I was running with a work colleague and he wasn't quite as quick as me over the distance. Still, I had fun for 14km (8.7 miles) and for 3 hours and 25 minutes. I may do a fuller report in my next challenge. I had a week off work, and used it to paint the bathroom, do a bit of DIY, and spend quite a lot of time relaxing. I finished the D&D mini-campaign I've been running online today, and had a lot of fun with that We have some new people who've started at work, and though it's going to take me a lot of time to train up the guy I'm mentoring, I'm optimistic that there's light at the end of the tunnel from a workload point of view Goals-wise I haven't been doing great, other than exercise which is always a pretty easy win. Still, whilst I haven't been hitting my goals, I don't feel like food and drink have been too disastrous. Overall, I'm ready to move on to the next challenge, which I'm going to really strip back and just make about being present here.

Thanks for checking in guys, I have been busy and extremely bad at keeping track of my challenge and updating here. It's actually been a good couple of weeks, so here's some stuff that happened (which I may or may not have mentioned already): New Deadlift 5RM at 140kg (308#) - which pleasingly is 3 big plates on each side New Squat 3RM at 107.5kg (237#), and 5RM at 97.5kg (215#) (and probably a new 7RM at 87.5kg (193#)) Yesterday I ran Nuts Challenge! We took it pretty slow, as I was running with a work colleague and he wasn't quite as quick as me over the distance. Still, I had fun for 14km (8.7 miles) and for 3 hours and 25 minutes. I may do a fuller report in my next challenge. I had a week off work, and used it to paint the bathroom, do a bit of DIY, and spend quite a lot of time relaxing. I finished the D&D mini-campaign I've been running online today, and had a lot of fun with that We have some new people who've started at work, and though it's going to take me a lot of time to train up the guy I'm mentoring, I'm optimistic that there's light at the end of the tunnel from a workload point of view Goals-wise I haven't been doing great, other than exercise which is always a pretty easy win. Still, whilst I haven't been hitting my goals, I don't feel like food and drink have been too disastrous. Overall, I'm ready to move on to the next challenge, which I'm going to really strip back and just make about being present here.

How is your knee with cycling? Obviously that takes the leg through a fair range of motion, but it's much less impact than running.

I'm just messing about. Honestly I'm more worried about people not knowing what the hell I'm on about. If I was embarrassed by using the term I wouldn't have mentioned it in the first place.

Just caught up with everything! Exciting news about The Boy; I hope things go well there. I said it on Discord but I'll say it again here - that dragon is awesome! Genuinely, I absolutely love it. Rest well, and I hope you feel less tired soon. Glad the workouts are helping your mood, if not the tiredness - I always find exercise helps me mentally.

Tuesday - Week 3 Day 2 Yesterday was a good day. I got up a little late, and went out for some running drills. Got all of my drills done, but had to cut the actual running short due to the late start. I've signed up for a ton of races recently, so I really need to get on this. Work was quite nice - I was in the office so it was good to see everyone. I don't feel like I was necessarily that productive given the amount of time catching up with people, but I felt better for it. In the evening I got back, and WW had bought us a couple of saltana scones as a treat. We randomly had some strawberry jam and clotted cream in the fridge (neither of which are normally there) so we had a very nice little snack. I hadn't planned for this, and I'd already had a double chocolate cookie with lunch, so that blew my snack goal. It was a rare treat though, and 100% worth it. In the evening I did some stretching, started working on some Buffy flip kip up drills, and did a little drawing. All of that got me to bed a little late, around 11pm, but not before brushing my teeth.

I love that that's the case ♥️

I can only think of one thing when I see the word armoire, thanks to you and a certain adventure path This place, and the food you got served, sound absolutely incredible! Good job on the mindful eating by the way mate - there's a couple of times I've seen you recognise that you'll be going over on one meal, and you've balanced it by cutting another meal, rather than just letting everything be more.

Thank you! And me too - I'm sure there's a webapp or 10 for it, but then there's also the issue of trawling around to find the YouTube clip in the first place.

Monday - Week 3 Day 1 Yesterday was a good day. I hit a new deadlift 5RM at Crossfit - 140kg (308#) . Then we had some heavy (32kg/70#/2 pood) kettlebell swings and some weighted chinups (bodyweight plus 10kg/22# for the heaviest set). Finished off with some hammer curls at 15kg (33#) each hand. Overall a very fun session. At lunchtime I had to pick WW up so we could both get our second COVID jabs. I nearly passed out, and had to be helped to a bed by the nurse and WW, but that usually happens to me with injections so at least it wasn't a surprise. Within the 15 minutes observation period we would have had to wait anyway I was back on my feet and able to go home. Work was ok, apart from the big gap in the middle to get stabbed. In the evening I cooked gnocchi with roast beef, cheese, tomato, courgette, yellow pepper and garlic, and we watching some Questing Time. We both decided an early night was in order so I was in bed by 10, but not before doing some drawing and brushing my teeth.