Hi Monkeys, I will be away until Dec. 19th or so, in South Thailand, Malaysia and then HK for a few days. Not sure I’ll be able to post from over there, but if I am I will try to. If I’m not, plenty of stories when I get back.
Have a great couple of weeks!
Countdown to the jet. As usual, scrambling to get work things situated properly or well-enough prior to departure. It really came up fast. Two days and I’m out, way over to there.
Work things have been good, just packed. Chapter done and submitted. Some filming this afternoon. We’ve entered into some of the online learning game and are trying to do some innovative things. Part of that includes making short films (instead of lecture capture) and that’s been great. More of this please.
Great training last night. Just ended up super strong, somehow. Was benching 315lbs for 8 reps, 315lbs for 15 reps on squat, and 315 for 20 on deadlifts. If I could get 315 on shoulder press, it would be neat. When doing my high rep work, I could just use 315 for everything. That’d be nice for when I eventually have my home gym… you know, when I move out of the city. My garage gym, which will be hardcore. I can just throw weights around, smash punching bags and grunt until I kiel over, my perfect state.
The reason I don’t do 1 rep max lifts is because that’s not what I’m training for. Being super-human usually requires being able to not only do the impossible, but do it multiple times, maybe even all day long. Training with higher repetitions is the way to go. I could wear a backpack with 100lbs in it when I do my pull-ups, or I could just do sets of 30. If I’m swinging through the jungle on vines, it’ll be way more useful to be able to hang out and lift myself all afternoon, than to lift myself once with 10 monkeys hanging on.
Had a great jam last night, two straight hours, calloused finger tips. Before bed I watched two episodes of Mountain Men, a reality show on the History Channel. Two of the three storylines are good– a guy and his family in Alaska, and an older guy and his wife in Montana. The guy in North Carolina just seems like a slow hick trying to find his way. A little bit of a pseudo mountain man if you ask me.
I wonder if I’ll be able to go survival trekking across Alaska some day. Not sure I could handle -50 degrees daily. But, how would I know that without having experienced it?
The best thing about Alaska homesteading would be building the always on super sauna. No matter how cold outside, can be sweating your balls off in the wood-powered super sauna. That’d be so nice.
Better get back to work. Have a great day Monkey Holes.
Hi Monkeys, back for a bit.
Had some late nights working on this chapter and got a little worn out. Combined with morning meetings on a project that we’re behind on, and I haven’t had much time for anything. Not writing a least a little isn’t good. I’ll keep it up.
Ever have someone text you naked pictures and try continually to get you to text them your own? It sounds silly, but I can understand the potential hotness of it. The problem is that unless the circumstances are mutually hot, it becomes weird and goofy. Also, your dick looks comical in a text message. Boobs, however, do not.
Despite the busyness, I have had excellent training recently, and I feel good. Nothing like a few rounds with someone punching you in the face to relieve whatever background stress you might have. When you’re actually fighting with someone, all the other stuff– work– becomes trivial. The truth is what matters and the truth is the ground and the fist, coming you at you fast. Take care of the truth and everything else will fall into place.
Another late night ahead for me. New research to incorporate into the draft. Coffee ahead. Hope it pours freezing rain outside while I hunker down to get it done.
I haven’t decided what to do for Thanksgiving yet. Home is an option, but I never really enjoy that. I really need to unwind and relax. Maybe I’ll just stay around town.
The problem with vacation now is that, next Friday I leave for a couple weeks on a REAL vacation– of the beachy, sunny, tropical, divy variety. So between now and then maybe I can hack a few more stressful days
Have a great day y’alls, talk soon.
Duck Head
Bit of an overload lately, but settling.
A few projects have converged around similar schedules, which makes managing them harder than they need be. Overlapping meetings and deadlines and milestones and reports, etc. Probably doing too much at once, but that’s on par with my usual foolishness.
Training is going well, operating mostly at peak lately. Diet is good with the Vitamix being a godsend for getting fast nutrition. Spinach, carrots, ginger, apple drinks are becoming better as I play with proportions. You’d think that it’d be gross because of all the fiber, and that a blend of vegetables would result in a thick paste. But the Vitamix 750 blends so fast it literally liquifies anything you put in there, making anything pleasantly drinkable. I do add extra water if I don’t have high-water ingredients. If I put a whole cucumber in there– the really big ones– for instance, there’s usually enough water content to turn anything into a drink.
Another favorite is the berry mix. Container of blueberries, half a container of strawberries, and a kiwi. It makes enough for two full, tall glasses that probably have enough vitamins and antioxidants for the whole day, all in one shot. It’s been fantastic first thing in the morning when I don’t usually have much of an appetite. Sometimes I put a banana in there too, and that’s always nice.
But a daily staple is just apple. Two full apples liquified. It’s really great. You feel pretty good for the day.
Having crazy morning wake-ups where I just want to turn to my side and have my way with an imaginary woman in my bed. I wonder if I’ll outgrow this eventually. But I’m being good.
The problem with getting physical with people is that, even if there’s no hint of attachment or obligation in the heat of the moment from either person, there’s always the risk that the other person secretly wants much more, and she’s just there hoping you’ll come around. I’ve had that happen and it sucks. Hurting people sucks. It means being highly cautious when deciding how physical to get because, even if they tell you one thing and assure you, they very well might be thinking and feeling something else. I take the burden on myself for making sure it’s all in the right place. Sometimes my intuition and perception helps me know what the right thing to do is. And that prevents certain levels of intimacy because I know the risk is too high that it’ll end up hurting them in the long run. But there are people who are in the same situation I’m in, where I might find myself on the other coast in the next couple years, and starting anything serious is just not a good idea because of how complicated everything would get. But knowing when a person is truly in that state, when physical bliss is purely a healthy release and a shared moment that won’t translate into a lifelong commitment, is hard. People often feel like they want one thing but really want something else. That makes it all tough. That leads to intense night and mornings with biology having its way.
One day I’ll outgrow it. But not for now.
Hyper busy. I will be back on track soon I promise. My morning routine has been messed up for a couple weeks with a project.
Here’s part of what I’ve been up to.
Hi Monkeys,
NYC is finally cold. I like it so far. Good coffee, good jacket, good hat and gloves. Good blue scarf from Morocco.
Someone threw up on the train this morning. That sucked. I felt bad for her. Who knows what the condition was. Could have been a bad hangover, but then it again it could have been a highly contagious virus. Hell it could have been ebola. Unlikely, but it could have been. She was wearing African clothing and was black. Maybe she just arrived from the Motherland and was carrying a rare, deadly, contagious disease.
Or it could have been motion sickness from her first time on a subway.
Or maybe she was so upset about something she threw up. That happens.
I switched cars. Not because it grossed me out, but just because. Maybe she wanted to be in an empty car that point. It worked for me.
Excellent jam last night.We recorded most of it and I was on. Multiple times people looked over with a “yeah, that’s hot” look. Our new drummer seemed especially into it. We’re all getting so much better now.
The other lead guitarist wasn’t there. Sometimes I wonder whether that makes us better. Sometimes it seems that there are too many people playing at once and it’s annoying. Jam group, TDP or Tycoon Death Plunge, is supposed to be for fun– just a group of people who like to play. So I keep that in mind when we do. The other group I’m in, Sunken, is the real deal. We’re going to record our first demo in late December and we already have some excellent stuff. That’s just a trio so far, and it’s working well. We should be able to do some local shows in the early spring. When that happens I’ll be sure to announce it. The plan is to destroy every place we go into. NYC probably isn’t ready for us, but that’s not the point. We’re ready.
Ultra busy today, though the stress is somehow manageable. I have to have a meeting about a project we’re way behind on, and which I’m managing. It’s been delayed by weeks and weeks. A site with content and a simulation embedded in it. It’s just late. They’ll have to deal. There’s nothing else I can really do. I’ll be the buffer between their group, all public health faculty and researchers, and my group. That’s the role I have here as project manager. “I’d like to speak to the manager!” Well, I’m him. Sorry for the delay. Anything else?
I had weird dreams last night that woke me up twice. One was I was home, in my childhood home, bedroom. I was sleeping on the floor for some reason, and a beautiful girl came in. She had huge breasts and though I don’t remember her face right now, I remember she was pretty. She knelt down and starting touching me, and I stopped her. “Who are you? What are you doing?” And she said “Oh, sorry…” And she left.
After she left I got up and was like, what the hell did I do that for? And I proceeded to look for her all throughout the house. I found her back in my room. I went in and sat down in a rocking chair, and took a phone call. While talking on the phone she came over and sort of reached across me to retrieve something from the floor. As she did, her giant breasts were right there, and I gently grabbed one of them, and she stopped reaching for whatever she was trying to get. I was just putting the phone down in order to have two hands when I woke up. Highly upsetting. I tried to fall back asleep right to that part, but it didn’t work. Instead I was surrounded by small animals that really wanted to cuddle. They were too small to be dogs, but acted like dogs. I let them sort of cuddle up, and that’s all I remember from that one. I’m thinking maybe I found a good spot of my blanket or something and felt like 10 puppies pushing around me.
Tonight Compressorhead is playing a free show in Union Square. Should be interesting though I know it’ll be swamped. Compressorhead is an all metal band– literally. The players are all robots. Stickboy, Bones and Fingers.
Fairly awesome if you ask me. Not sure I’ll make it tonight but will give it a try.
OK that’s all for me for now. Time to get back to it. Coffee in hand. Scarf on neck. Boots on feet. Jeans on legs. White collar shirt on torso, black leather jacket over the top. Feel good. Let’s go.
Monkeys, I’m sorry for the delay. I typically update in the morning, but mornings this week have been unusual, with a daily meeting uptown. Normality should now be restored, thanks for not giving up.
Fall is here in full now. Sleeps are getting deep and sound and cocoon-like. Long-Johns? Hell no. Give me them cold sheets on me legs that I might warm them.
As the air gets crisp, the coffee begins to taste extra nice.
I’ve had a full house for two weeks straight, so I feel a little burnt out. A project partner came back with me from a trip and stayed for a few days waiting for his next flight back to the motherland. It was excellent to spend some time with him– we did a hike in Cold Spring and then watched some movies in the theater, the first for me since I saw the Avengers, whenever the hell that was. The day he left, my new friend and bandmate came. We’re working on some new music. He left on Weds because one of his bands, Ashes of Ares, was headlining down in Maryland. Obviously because of work I couldn’t go. He’s back today so I have to rush home in the afternoon to let him in. I normally wouldn’t, but he has all his guitars with him.
I have a B-day party for a good friend tonight, but I’m in training right now so I’ll keep it at 1-2 pints total. I invited a bunch of graduate students to join and it looks like most will. Hope that’s OK. Gio will join too, and hopefully we’ll up down on LES later in the evening.
Tomorrow will be dissertation during daylight, jam in the evening. Sunday is advisor meeting, book chapter meeting, and then we’re moving some amps and cabs from my place down to our new music studio in Brooklyn. It’ll be nice when that stuff is out of my living room so I can have the big empty space again.
I’ve been making smoothies every day on my new Vitamix 750 (red) super machine. 2.2HP, 27,000 RPMs. Turns anything drinkable. It’s been good for fast nutrition. If you put a bunch of fresh vegetables in there and turn it to “soup mode”, it’ll make hot soup. That’s been good. But mostly I throw in fruits and berries and spinach or something. Sometimes ginger, that’s been good. I just have to remember to keep a fresh stock of those kinds of produce.
I know fruits and vegetables are healthy, but I wasn’t expecting the energizing feeling that’s accompanied the new smoothy routine. A couple classes of whatever I seem to put in there really leaves me feeling good, like my body has been missing that kind of nourishment. It’s been great for training.
Submitted a proposal to give a talk at a conference called: “The Teacher is Dead. Long Live the Teacher: Embracing the Anti-MOOC.” A little controversial. We’ll see what the committee thinks.
That’s it for me. Off to the races. Hope you have a great fall Friday and I’ll update tomorrow.
I’m back. Just getting re-situated. Will be updating soon, don’t worry.
Total race around. Was in negative time all day yesterday and currently remain in that state. I sprinted home from work for jam, left early to go train, shower, back to the office to finish a presentation until 11 or so. The fact that the Red Sox completed one of the greatest comebacks in championship baseball history on Sunday night didn’t help my scheduling.
They were down 5-1 in the bottom of the 8th after having been nearly no-hit two days in a row. I was about about to turn the radio off– but all the sudden, magic happened. Bases loaded, Ortiz at the plate. First pitch, Grand Slam homerun to tie the game. They won it in the 9th. The announcer was so ecstatic he nearly lost his voice. I was standing on my bed at that point.
Anyway, still in negative time. Will have you catch you all up more later, lest I get buried here.
Have a great Tiews.
Alien Duck.
