Training 102-103.

102
PT - 30m Rutten MMA/Thai Boxing 2m rounds
Nutrition - lg coffee w/equal, cream - 6 eggs w/chs - Starbucks Espresso - 2 diet sodas - 2L water - steak

103
Nutrition - lg coffee w/equal, cream - 2 shakes w/6 eggs, peanut butter, inst coffee, cream, equal - 1.7L water - Subway 12" club
PT - PHA circuit 3x - Set 1 - Squatsx10 Situpsx25 Curlsx10 Side Bendsx25 Neckx25 - Set 2 - Pushupsx10 LegRaisex25 BodyRowx10 Twistx25 Calfrsx25 - Set 3 - SLDLx10 Crunchx25 Pressx10 BntTwistx25 TriExx10

Solid relationship advice.

Overheard Everywhere | It'd Be a Match Made in Heaven If She'd Only Stop Stealing My Watch:

"Girl: Who are you dating now?
Guy: I don't know if you'd call it dating, but I met a stripper that comes over around midnight, gets me high, sucks my dick, we fuck, I fall asleep and when I wake up, she's gone.
Random eavesdropper: Dude, marry that bitch!

Open Bar
San Diego, California"

Nothing and no one is anything.

"Is" is a verbal construct bearing no witness to reality.

[For bonus points you can spot the logical fallacy in that last sentence.]

Rule # 13.

It is what you think it is. It isn't what you think it is.

Both of these are true. Dualisms aren't.

Rule # 12.

The best and most moving thing I've read in some time - "Experiencing Grief" by John Ostrander.

Comic book writer John Ostrander writes about the death of his wife. Extremely touching. Definitely worth reading.

Experiencing Grief, by John Ostrander

...and that's all you need to know about religion.

Overheard in the Office | But I Prefer to Think Of It As "Filled with the Holy Spirit":

"Waiter: Did you get laid on vacation?
Busgirl: It was church camp.
Waiter: So 'yes' then?
Busgirl (quietly): Yes.

Circle Centre Mall
Indianapolis, Indiana

Overheard by: Shatmandu"

The Official Watchmen Movie Trailer.

TOTAL. GEEKGASM.

Warner Bros seems to be pulling these off YouTube as fast as they go up [I don't know why WB... why do you hate impassioned fans and free publicity? Besides, small decentralized groups will defeat your lumbering monoliths. But only always.] so I don't know how long this clip will last... But it is awesome.

Watchmen (film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"In an alternate 1985 where superheroes exist, Richard Nixon is still president, and tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union are at an all time high. The vigilante Rorschach is investigating the murder of the Comedian, and uncovers a plot to discredit and murder various heroes. Rorschach discovers a far wider ranging conspiracy involving his colleagues' past which could completely change the course of history."

Watchmen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"Watchmen is a twelve-issue comic book limited series written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons. Originally published by DC Comics as a monthly limited series from 1986 to 1987... and is also the only graphic novel to appear on Time Magazine's 2005 list of 'the 100 best English-language novels from 1923 to the present.'

Watchmen is set in 1985, in an alternative history United States where costumed adventurers are real and the country is edging closer to a nuclear war with the Soviet Union (the Doomsday Clock is at five minutes to midnight). It tells the story of a group of past and present superheroes and the events surrounding the mysterious murder of one of their own. Watchmen depicts superheroes as real people who must confront ethical and personal issues, who struggle with neuroses and failings, and who - with one notable exception - lack anything recognizable as super powers. Watchmen's deconstruction of the conventional superhero archetype, combined with its innovative adaptation of cinematic techniques and heavy use of symbolism, multi-layered dialogue, and metafiction, has influenced both comics and film."

"...with liberty and justice... oh wait... not so much."

Reason Magazine - Hit & Run > The Massive Federal Criminal Code:

"...The Constitution lays out just three federal crimes, and for 200 years, criminal justice policy was mostly left to the states. That began to change in the 1970s.

Today's federal criminal code is enormous—and growing. Baker also finds that Congress tends to add more laws during election years (surprise!), that federal judges and prosecutors exacerbate the problem by interpreting federal statutes as broadly as possible (sometimes retroactively), and that new federal laws are increasingly lacking a mens rea requirement.

So we have a bewildering federal criminal code that no one person could possibly completely comprehend, the fact that you can be charged for breaking one of those laws even if you weren't aware that what you were doing was illegal, and increasingly leeway and discretion afforded to prosecutors to interpret all of these laws as broadly as possible. Throw in the problem of selective enforcement (there aren't nearly enough resources to prosecute all the crimes on the books), and you have a system where everyone's a potential criminal, but prosecutors can pick and choose whom to target..."

Ha-Ha, I say - Catholic Elementary School Principal in Homosexual Group Romp.

Of course. You wacky, repressed Catholics.

[With a name like De Jesus, it has to be good.]

wcbstv.com - Catholic School Principal Caught In Gay Tryst:

"A Westchester County Catholic school principal is in serious trouble after he was arrested for allegedly going on a naked sexual romp with two other men in the backyard of a vacant home in the Orchard Hill section of town on Sunday.

Gabriel De Jesus, 41, of Ossining told police he was the principal of Sacred Heart School for the Arts, a Catholic elementary school at 71 Sharpe Blvd. in Mount Vernon.

DeJesus was still running the elementary school Monday when he was reached for comment. He would only said he made a mistake..."

He finally wins one.

Overheard in New York | Hey, Wednesday One-Liners Can Dream, Can't They?:

"Old man: Hah! I fell asleep at her funeral!

--3rd Ave, b/w 10th & 11th

Overheard by: j"

Training 101.

Nutrition - lg coffee w/equal, cream - 3 shakes/10 eggs, cream, peanut butter, equal, inst coffee - 2L water - 1 diet soda

PT - DB bear complex [clean/press/squat/press/squat] 60x10 70x5/4/4 - One arm DB snatch 52.5x8x3 - One arm full range swing 2x25x10 - 2 arm DB 1/2 swing 2x35x20 - Calf raise x50

Indeed.

Sinfest: The Webcomic To End all Webcomics

This is brilliant - "Video made from results of Google query for "biggest regret.""

Video made from results of Google query for "biggest regret" - Boing Boing:

"Chris Blake says:

For my latest music video, I compiled some of the weirdest, funniest and most touching real-life regrets I found on the Web. Then I set them to my new song 'Someone Else' about unrequited love."

The correct answer to the question is "The Iran-Contra Affair."

Of course Reagan may have been going senile/Alzheimer's by then [though I doubt it] so he might not have been lying.

Balloon Juice:

"At what point did it get this bad that the people in the Tillman case knew they could just get away with saying “I don’t remember” to everything, and no one would do anything about it? The Bush administration has been lying at will for years, and no one cares. How did it get this bad? When did it happen? How did it happen?

Should we get lucky and Obama wins the General, this will be my headline:

“Obama wins. Republicans and media rediscover Constitution, rule of law, limits on executive authority.”"

Balloon Juice:

"...this attitude that people who knowingly broke the law should be protected from consequences because that would be, like, crazy man, is exactly what the powerful white guys planned when they broke the law."

If anyone comes to my eulogy, you should totally bring a beach ball.

Man did I go to the wrong high school.

Overheard Everywhere | Power Corrupts, Short-Lived Power Corrupts Immediately:

"Teacher: I'm leaving for a few minutes. Ted*, you're in charge.
Ted*: Alright, everyone get naked.

High School Classroom
Englewood, Colorado"

From the country that brought you the samurai and the kamikaze.

Man scared of Chihuahua kicks it to death - Mainichi Daily News:

"A man has been arrested for kicking a Chihuahua to death because he was scared of it, police said Tuesday.

Yoshiyuki Tanaka, 44, a company employee from Chikusa-ku, Nagoya, stands accused of destroying property.

He admitted to the allegations during questioning. 'I was scared of the dog,' he was quoted as telling investigators. Police have already referred him to public prosecutors."

What a jackass.

*Updated* New earth shattering, breaking the paradigm, internet-y way of producing media = same retarded, heavy handed, corporate media BS.

*Update* And now, it works. And it is here - http://www.drhorrible.com/act_I.html And it is hilariously brilliant. And all that makes the following seem a little dick-ish. But I think the point still holds, mostly. Whether this was an overlooked hiccup, or something circumvented in post, it never should have been an issue. And to repeat, it is teh awesome. Easily the funniest superhero musical you'll see this week. You know what I mean.*

So, Joss Whedon, during the writer's strike, brainstormed up a new internet superhero musical thingy - "Dr Horrible's Sing Along Blog." Looks hilarious.


And, it being Joss Whedon, I'm sure it's genius and I'll watch it again and again. And buy the DVDs. And the soundtrack. But I can't say for sure if it's any good [okay, I can, because Whedon is that damn good, but I digress] even though it's LIVE and out - Whedonesque : Comments on 16893 : Act one of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is live! - because... drumroll, please... I can't fucking watch it.

Apparently the brand new, earth shattering, breaking the paradigm of studio and corporate control, shaking up the establishment, internet-y way of producing media is as amazingly fucked up and retarded as the old way.

I go to check it out, earlier, and I get this message from the amazingly annoying site HULU -

"We're sorry. Currently our video library can only be streamed through the United States."

New boss, same as the old boss.

Yes, you can do all sorts of hiding-your-IP workarounds but the whole point is you shouldn't freaking have to!

This is why people 'steal' things with torrents. Because corporate culture and legalistic morons always manage to take the work of even the best and well meaning - like Joss and crew - and create nothing but roadblocks and difficulties.

Whedon responds to the complaints of lack of international viewability at the link above, in the comments, with his usual wit and self effacing aplomb -

"I Can't tell you what a thrill it was for me and Jed and Zack and Maurissa to gather round the comp-fire and await the launch of our musical... and find out it wasn't playing in many many places. And get slammed. And slammed. Yay team! Team of slamming!

The fact is, we're dealing with big companies that have moved more quickly on this venture than they've ever had to. We've always been clear about getting this out to everyone, but that just isn't as simple as we'd like."

And that's true, and I'm sure it's not simple. And they are working to fix the problem. But this is BASIC. This is the future of how media should work. How it could work. This was gonna finally be a positive step in the right direction that could finally show the dinosaurs and the hacks that open source entertainment and intelligent marketing [not to mention talent, loads of Whedon talent] could carve a new path in how they do business. And as quick as they may or may not get this problem resolved, this never should've been an issue to begin with.

You know, it's pretty much a given I'm the "target audience" here - I've all the season DVDs of Buffy, Angel, Firefly - and I'm sure I'll get this when it comes out. And I'm sure it's funny, and witty and brilliant and smart... but I can't tell you so, because I can't fucking watch it.

It's the same stupidity when I try to go watch the Venture Bros when they post an online episode over at Adult Swim. They too have a cute "sorry, don't we suck? - we can't stream overseas" message. I own both seasons on DVD, want to watch them "legally" but they won't let me. And they wonder why nobody possibly cares about downloading, P2P, or non-creative corporate entities possibly losing $$.

Frustrated now.

Training 100.

Not so fitting that on today, day 100 - triple digits! - I'm gonna wimp out and skip on the PT. Just an absolutely brutal headache the last day - some weird postural stiffness/strain/pull in my neck, I think - screwed up my sleep, my concentration, still hurts... blah, blah, blah... I'm a weak loser who can't hack it and we'll leave it at that, kay?

[That's all that positive reinforcement from my Marine Corps training. Or is that my mom I'm thinking of? Doti demo ii...]

Anyways, day 100 seems a fitting time for a pause, a progress check, a "let's see how all this not being a lazy fatbody thing" is going. Been avoiding any kind of time frame/check off/goals thing, because in past, having done 12 week programs a couple times, I ended up becoming so fixated on the duration and the end point, that afterwards, despite doing well, my training ended up just fizzling out.

So better, I think, to approach this as something I'll be doing, in one form or another, from now, until I... well... die, I guess. So there's your cheerful optimism for the day.

So anyways... overall... not too horrible. I guess.

I mean, I've made some decent progress, and I should appreciate that - and I'm working on it. But it's just frustrating. I mean, as recently as 5 years ago, I could bust my ass for 12 weeks and at the end be in spitting distance of the kind of shape and condition I wanted to be in. Now, after a hundred days of sucking wind and working pretty hard I find myself within spitting distance of being... about halfway to where I'd like to be. To start.

So yeah, realistically, I was in far worse shape starting out this time than last time. And yeah, I'm five years older and these things take time. But dammit, I'm a child of the late 20th century and I demand my results and instant gratification right now!

So... okay... in the last 100 days I've managed to drop 8kg/16lbs and 5.5" off my waistline. So, yeah, progress. Good. Fine. Great. But I still want to drop about another 10kg/20lbs and another 5.5" off the waistline.

[And that's the closest thing the internet is getting to actual #'s until I actually get where I want to. Because, honestly, the for real honest to god #'s are still too embarrasing.]

The calendar informs me that the next 100 days'll be up in October, around my birthday, so we'll see how it looks then.

Work in progress. Ongoing.

Nutrition - 2 coffees w/equal, cream - 2 steaks w/mayo - 2 diet sodas - 1.4L water - cheese slices/mayo - tomatoes w/salt, pepper

Brutal summertime in Japan.

I agree with Mike - Adventures in the Not-so-Orient: oh gods... - the heat is getting ridiculous.

Standing still in the classroom [no AC for students, builds character!], absolutely stock still, with sweat just rolling off. Back to the teacher's room for a brief respite, personal fan a flapping, sucking down some ice water... still sweating.

Couldn't believe it was only 31 degrees [that's 88 for us USA types] according to the internets, but after some clicking around and about the truth was revealed and it showed the heat index as 36/97 with 62% humidity. Which is about how it does feel, so I'm not going crazy. Were it only in the eighties, I might've offed myself now, as August is usually a bit worse.

On the bright side, since I only had morning classes today, during lunch, since I live close enough to home to head back for a few, I was able to snag a midday cold shower - thank gods - and slip on a pair of shorts for the remainder of the day [like a half dozen of the other teachers. Shoot, at least I don't go to classes that way.] Ah well, one more week till summer vacation/class break.

Sandy will be sad to know that my brief 1/8" growing out my hair flirtation is over - too damn hot. How you folks with full heads of hair simply don't burst into flames is beyond me. I'ma stick with the smooth, perspiration reducing shaven pate until further notice.

[It's been 8 years I've been shaving my hair off... Jeez. If I ever do try to grow it back, I'm probably in for a rude awakening.]

And now I've been reduced to typing about the weather on the internet.

Screw it.

Man, it's hot.

Training 99.

Nutrition - 2 shakes w/6 eggs, cream, peanut butter, instant coffee, equal - 4 scrambled eggs w/cheese - 1 diet soda - 1 cup coffee w/equal, cream - 2.2L water

PT - One arm db swings [full] - 20x10 30x10/10 [partial] 20x10 30x10/10 - 2h DB swing 30x10 - Chins 6/5/4/3/2/1/2/2/3/1/1 - One arm DB snatch 30x10 40x10x2 - Overhead press 60x10 70x10x2 - Shrug 105x15x3 - Side Bend 52.5x15/10/10 - Bridge

"Mahalo bitch!"

My wife cracks me up.

Training 97-98.

97 - Free/Rest/Carb day

98 - Nutrition - Free/Carb
PT - 30m Rutten MMA wkout/Thai Boxing 3m rounds

Inspiration: Bodybuilding.com - Over 40 Transformation Of The Week - Over 40 Bodybuilder Of The Week - Ed Cook!:

"Name: Ed Cook
Age: 54

...If I were to give advice to someone who want to transform their body, I would say one thing, "Intensity, with consistency, brings density!" You have to be disciplined. The days you feel the worst about yourself, the days you feel tired, worn out, out of it, what ever it is that's bringing you down, you get up, get off your butt, and train like h*ll! I don't believe in "over training." I believe it is a myth. I believe it is nothing more then poor training, poor diet, and laziness."

Never fall in love with your plan.

Rule # 11.

A subset of the - ubiquitous in the Marine Corps - quote "No plan survives initial contact with the enemy." Which Google tells me should actually be:

“Therefore no plan of operations extends with any certainty beyond the first contact with the main hostile force.”

- from Prussian Field Marshall Helmuth von Moltke in the mid-nineteenth century.

Regardless. Applies to everything. Plans don't mean anything.

Man, ain't that the truth.

What I've been trying to say | Wise Bread:

"Figure out what you really care about and live in accordance with those values. This is the key enabling step for living frugally. If you don't know what you want, you'll try to fill the gap with stuff--and that never works."