Safi and Daddy - Animal sounds
Dec/14/08 13:32 Filed in: sapphira
Links of the Week (December 14, 2008)
Dec/14/08 00:40 Filed in: Links of the
Week |
Links
Check it out! I’m writing a Links of the Week post two
weeks in a row! Yea!
Try watching this without recognizing some aspects of it in your favorite church/self-improvement group:
How to Start Your Own Mind-Control Cult
Broil your own pizza. These guys did it with Domino's dough and it made for some damn fine pizza. For the more adventurous types, you could make your own dough and really have a great meal!
Pizza Hack: Broil Your Own Pies
A great website about the daily routines of famous people (mostly writers). Very interesting to see how different people approach their workday:
Daily Routines
A great ad for the auto bailout:
The Big Three
More on Christmas: the most extensive treatment of the origins of today's Christmas symbols:
Origins of Christmas Traditions
Low-fat diets: all hype and no results:
Low-fat diets: not fit for purpose
Richard Dawkins (author of The God Delusion) interviews prominent magician and hypnotist, Derren Brown (you can see some of his best tricks and stunts here. My favorite is the video where he plays and beats 9 world-class chess players), about psychics and cold-reading. Absolutely excellent interview:
Richard Dawkins Interviews Derren Brown
That’s all I have for this week, kids. Just finished my last-minute online Christmas shopping, so I’ll just be sitting at the old hacienda listening to Grandpa’s old Christmas records while I drink white russians and watch the snow fall. May your holidays be as serene.
Try watching this without recognizing some aspects of it in your favorite church/self-improvement group:
How to Start Your Own Mind-Control Cult
Broil your own pizza. These guys did it with Domino's dough and it made for some damn fine pizza. For the more adventurous types, you could make your own dough and really have a great meal!
Pizza Hack: Broil Your Own Pies
A great website about the daily routines of famous people (mostly writers). Very interesting to see how different people approach their workday:
Daily Routines
A great ad for the auto bailout:
The Big Three
More on Christmas: the most extensive treatment of the origins of today's Christmas symbols:
Origins of Christmas Traditions
Low-fat diets: all hype and no results:
Low-fat diets: not fit for purpose
Richard Dawkins (author of The God Delusion) interviews prominent magician and hypnotist, Derren Brown (you can see some of his best tricks and stunts here. My favorite is the video where he plays and beats 9 world-class chess players), about psychics and cold-reading. Absolutely excellent interview:
Richard Dawkins Interviews Derren Brown
That’s all I have for this week, kids. Just finished my last-minute online Christmas shopping, so I’ll just be sitting at the old hacienda listening to Grandpa’s old Christmas records while I drink white russians and watch the snow fall. May your holidays be as serene.
Training Log has its own tab now
Dec/10/08 10:24 Filed in: News
I used to post my workouts in this blog, but I got a
few complaints about it (Hey, Jeremy! Your training log
is BORING!) so I decided to create a tab for it
instead. I still wanted to keep track of my workouts,
and this way they’ll be searchable, but you won’t have
to be bored by them in case exercise isn’t your thing.
Links of the Week (posted quarterly)
Dec/05/08 14:17 Filed in: Links
I haven’t done Links of the Week in like, forever, but
I have some pretty good stuff lined up for you this
week.
A great post from the Best of Craigslist series:
Tips for Clueless People Who Get Mugged - written by one of New York’s finest
And here’s a remarkable situation: the Wall Street Journal, the bastion for Conservatives and leading economic newspaper in America, posted this article calling for the U.S. to end drug prohibition. It’s not so crazy. Really. Read the article.
Let’s End Drug Prohibition - Wall Street Journal
Now on to the economic mess/disaster/collapse/Doomsday/insert other panic-inducing word here. Let’s face it, the mainstream media is doing a terrible job of reporting on the economic crisis because 1) its complex 2) there aren’t any good visual images of the crisis (yet) and 3) it’s boring compared to OJ finally going to prison and Christmas just around the corner.
That means there’s a dearth of information available for my discerning audience that just wants to understand what the hell is going on and how we got here. I have good news for you, loyal reader. NPR is doing a phenomenal series of videos that explain in very clear terms just how big and how bad this could get, and just how convoluted the path is that lead to where we are.
Marketplace Whiteboard - a collection of videos of a guy in front of a whiteboard explaining what the hell a credit default swap is and how it messes with everyone’s money, as well as many other videos trying to bring light to an otherwise very murky situation.
I read about diet and exercise a lot. I also look for ways to get stronger and add some muscle, as well as getting rid of the fat that lives around my midsection. I have tried a few diets and turned my nose up at about a million others. I finally found one that I can do forever (because diets shouldn’t be temporary. They should be a lifestyle change) and here’s the best part: it will actually SAVE you money.
Eat Stop Eat - I’ll save you the $29.95 and let the cat out of the bag: pick two days per week (not concurrent) and don’t eat from dinner to dinner. So for me, I chose Monday and Friday. I eat dinner Sunday night, then don’t eat again until Monday night. Drink water or any other zero-calorie drink during the day. No juice or pop. And the other important part of the diet: lift weights at least 3 times per week. That’s it. The man who created the diet has a Ph.D. in nutrition and has all the numbers (including a huge boost to HGH while fasting) to back up the idea. I’ve lost five pounds since starting two weeks ago, which is a great pace for sustainable weight loss. I’ll keep you posted on long-term results.
I recently got a couple of old vacuum-tube radios from the 40’s. They sound great and really look good in my office. I found a guy in Alabama who can fix them and here’s the best part: he can add a jack to the radio that will let you plug in your ipod (or any other music-generating device) and play your music through them. So now I can play all my records that I inherited from my grandfather through an old tube-based radio and hear them the way they sounded to my grandparents. They sound great! Here’s a link to the magic radio man in Alabama:
The Old Radio Shop
Here’s a little shout-out to our atheist friends in Seattle trying to keep religion in perspective next to a nativity scene:
Missing atheist sign found in Washington State
And here’s a related post about all those atheist hate-speak evildoers in Colorado that had the nerve to put up billboards that say “Don’t believe in God? You’re not alone.” The nerve!
Atheist billboards now up in Denver
Some pitiful footage of Bush getting snubbed by world leaders:
Bush at G20 economic summit meeting
And this is the result of that snubbing
And finally, the true meaning of Christmas and other Christmas info:
According to a Christian website called Christian Answers
According to a Jewish website called Simple to Remember
A reformed Christian lays out a long and well-written case for ignoring Christmas altogether
Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping and here’s a movie about his work called What Would Jesus Buy?
and HowStuffWorks lays out How Christmas Works
So, kids, here’s all I have to say about Christmas: spend time with your family. Don’t buy a bunch of gewgaws from China that will just end up in closets or drawers or landfills. Listen to some Christmas music. Look at the moon. Remember that on the darkest day of the year, December 21, that tomorrow, the darkness will fade a little sooner in the morning and that the daylight will come again. And try sipping on one of these. You won’t regret it.
A great post from the Best of Craigslist series:
Tips for Clueless People Who Get Mugged - written by one of New York’s finest
And here’s a remarkable situation: the Wall Street Journal, the bastion for Conservatives and leading economic newspaper in America, posted this article calling for the U.S. to end drug prohibition. It’s not so crazy. Really. Read the article.
Let’s End Drug Prohibition - Wall Street Journal
Now on to the economic mess/disaster/collapse/Doomsday/insert other panic-inducing word here. Let’s face it, the mainstream media is doing a terrible job of reporting on the economic crisis because 1) its complex 2) there aren’t any good visual images of the crisis (yet) and 3) it’s boring compared to OJ finally going to prison and Christmas just around the corner.
That means there’s a dearth of information available for my discerning audience that just wants to understand what the hell is going on and how we got here. I have good news for you, loyal reader. NPR is doing a phenomenal series of videos that explain in very clear terms just how big and how bad this could get, and just how convoluted the path is that lead to where we are.
Marketplace Whiteboard - a collection of videos of a guy in front of a whiteboard explaining what the hell a credit default swap is and how it messes with everyone’s money, as well as many other videos trying to bring light to an otherwise very murky situation.
I read about diet and exercise a lot. I also look for ways to get stronger and add some muscle, as well as getting rid of the fat that lives around my midsection. I have tried a few diets and turned my nose up at about a million others. I finally found one that I can do forever (because diets shouldn’t be temporary. They should be a lifestyle change) and here’s the best part: it will actually SAVE you money.
Eat Stop Eat - I’ll save you the $29.95 and let the cat out of the bag: pick two days per week (not concurrent) and don’t eat from dinner to dinner. So for me, I chose Monday and Friday. I eat dinner Sunday night, then don’t eat again until Monday night. Drink water or any other zero-calorie drink during the day. No juice or pop. And the other important part of the diet: lift weights at least 3 times per week. That’s it. The man who created the diet has a Ph.D. in nutrition and has all the numbers (including a huge boost to HGH while fasting) to back up the idea. I’ve lost five pounds since starting two weeks ago, which is a great pace for sustainable weight loss. I’ll keep you posted on long-term results.
I recently got a couple of old vacuum-tube radios from the 40’s. They sound great and really look good in my office. I found a guy in Alabama who can fix them and here’s the best part: he can add a jack to the radio that will let you plug in your ipod (or any other music-generating device) and play your music through them. So now I can play all my records that I inherited from my grandfather through an old tube-based radio and hear them the way they sounded to my grandparents. They sound great! Here’s a link to the magic radio man in Alabama:
The Old Radio Shop
Here’s a little shout-out to our atheist friends in Seattle trying to keep religion in perspective next to a nativity scene:
Missing atheist sign found in Washington State
And here’s a related post about all those atheist hate-speak evildoers in Colorado that had the nerve to put up billboards that say “Don’t believe in God? You’re not alone.” The nerve!
Atheist billboards now up in Denver
Some pitiful footage of Bush getting snubbed by world leaders:
Bush at G20 economic summit meeting
And this is the result of that snubbing
And finally, the true meaning of Christmas and other Christmas info:
According to a Christian website called Christian Answers
According to a Jewish website called Simple to Remember
A reformed Christian lays out a long and well-written case for ignoring Christmas altogether
Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping and here’s a movie about his work called What Would Jesus Buy?
and HowStuffWorks lays out How Christmas Works
So, kids, here’s all I have to say about Christmas: spend time with your family. Don’t buy a bunch of gewgaws from China that will just end up in closets or drawers or landfills. Listen to some Christmas music. Look at the moon. Remember that on the darkest day of the year, December 21, that tomorrow, the darkness will fade a little sooner in the morning and that the daylight will come again. And try sipping on one of these. You won’t regret it.
My new dog, Supi
Nov/23/08 16:13 Filed in: dog
Here’s the new
dog:
I adopted her from the animal shelter in the next county over. She’s four months old. They told me she’s a border collie/Jack Russel Terrier mix. She definitely has a lot of energy and can run for four miles straight without opening her mouth to breathe. Let’s just say she’s in better shape than me right now. We run every morning, though, so hopefully I’ll be able to challenge her more effectively over time.
Her name is Supi. I originally wanted to call her Suki because of this commercial. Go ahead and take 30 seconds. It’s one of my favorite commercials.
So her name was Suki. I told Sapphira, and Sapphira called her Suki about five times, then started calling her Supi. I thought she must know something I don’t, so we call her Supi now.
Turns out Supi is a Finnish word that means “raccoon dog”. Good job, Sapphira.
I adopted her from the animal shelter in the next county over. She’s four months old. They told me she’s a border collie/Jack Russel Terrier mix. She definitely has a lot of energy and can run for four miles straight without opening her mouth to breathe. Let’s just say she’s in better shape than me right now. We run every morning, though, so hopefully I’ll be able to challenge her more effectively over time.
Her name is Supi. I originally wanted to call her Suki because of this commercial. Go ahead and take 30 seconds. It’s one of my favorite commercials.
So her name was Suki. I told Sapphira, and Sapphira called her Suki about five times, then started calling her Supi. I thought she must know something I don’t, so we call her Supi now.
Turns out Supi is a Finnish word that means “raccoon dog”. Good job, Sapphira.
Les Paul
Nov/21/08 18:04 Filed in: music
I watched a
documentary last night called
Les Paul - Chasing Sound
. It's about Les Paul (surprise!). Phenomenal documentary. I knew Les Paul was instrumental (sorry, had to do it) in creating the electric guitar. I didn't know that he also pioneered (actually, invented) multitrack recording. An artist and a genius, with a good sense of humor to boot.
After watching the documentary I downloaded this album,
which is very enjoyable. It fits in nicely with my
recent obsession with all things 1940's.
Read
More...
. It's about Les Paul (surprise!). Phenomenal documentary. I knew Les Paul was instrumental (sorry, had to do it) in creating the electric guitar. I didn't know that he also pioneered (actually, invented) multitrack recording. An artist and a genius, with a good sense of humor to boot.
After watching the documentary I downloaded this album
,
which is very enjoyable. It fits in nicely with my
recent obsession with all things 1940's.
Read
More...
Still Alive, Still Here, Still Writing
Nov/21/08 17:59 Filed in: News
Well, kids. I
was shocked, SHOCKED to see that it had been over a
month since I had written anything here. Most of you
have written me off by now, I’m sure. I just didn’t
have anything to say. Now I do.
I have some tasty, juicy blog posts in the works. Some really good stuff coming up. Stick with me. I won’t let you down.
I have some tasty, juicy blog posts in the works. Some really good stuff coming up. Stick with me. I won’t let you down.
CrossFit Total
Oct/11/08 10:25 Filed in: Crossfit
| Weightlifting
Yesterday we
headed to our local CrossFit affiliate for what is
called the CrossFit Total workout. The workout consists
of working your way up to max reps in three lifts:
squat, press and deadlift. This is intended to be a
benchmark for overall strength. I’ve only been barbell
lifting since the end of August, but my numbers landed
firmly in the Intermediate range, I think in part
because of all the kettlebell lifting I’ve done
previously.
My squat max was 265 (probably should have tried for 270, but 275 wouldn’t go up). My max strict press was 130 (tying with my brother, Ryan) and my max deadlift was 315. So my CrossFit Total score was 710 (the three lifts added together). There are a lot of strong guys in my class, so I have a lot of work to do if I want to keep up!
Here are some photos from the workout:
My squat max was 265 (probably should have tried for 270, but 275 wouldn’t go up). My max strict press was 130 (tying with my brother, Ryan) and my max deadlift was 315. So my CrossFit Total score was 710 (the three lifts added together). There are a lot of strong guys in my class, so I have a lot of work to do if I want to keep up!
Here are some photos from the workout:
Magic Sword of Grayskull
I was talking
with my wife today while my 20-month-old daughter was
watching old He-Man episodes (the same ones I watched
as a boy) and I said, "You know, it took me a long time
to understand that there's no magic sword that can
transform you from being Prince Adam the Douche into
He-Man, the most powerful man in the universe." I used
to think that just by being intelligent and talented,
that I would be rich and never have to worry about
money. I thought that being smart was just like
He-Man's sword, just hold it aloft, say "I have the
power!" and you would become He-Man, the most powerful
man in the universe.
It took a LONG time for me to figure out that even though I was smart and talented, I still had to WORK. I'm still pissed off about it. I didn't realize when I was young that if I wanted to be the most powerful man in the universe, I needed to pick up a barbell and drink a lot of milk every day. For me, the hardest thing in the world is to do a small step toward a large goal every day over a long period of time. It's so hard for me to be patient with a process. I have this delusion that because I'm smart, everything should just be easy and should just work for me. So anything that takes time, or a lot of dedication, or a lot of consistent effort, I just get frozen up and say, "Aw, fuck it." I have so many unfinished projects, I don't even like to think about it.
And writing that last sentence reminds me of an insight I had recently. I had a clean office for awhile (I work from home) and recently it was junky in a bad way for about six weeks. I slipped into depression and just ignored it. I felt more frantic and anxious, and it got to where I just kept the door to my office closed all the time, and I just went upstairs to the t.v. room, and took my computer up there to work.
For one reason or another, I finally decided to clean the damn office. I told my wife, "I am going to..." and she said "clean your office. Blah blah blah." I realized that I had said I was going to clean my office about half a bajillion times in recent days, so I said, "if my office isn't clean by 10 pm tomorrow night, I will give you $100." I wanted that deadline to be painful. It worked! Office is now clean.
And now the insight: a part of me actually likes the stress feeling that comes from clutter. I feel like I don't deserve to enjoy what I'm doing, so I distract myself from enjoying it and being fully present by leaving a bunch of junk around that makes me feel guilty for doing something I enjoy. I look around and say, "I really want to read a book, but I can't really because I should clean. But I don't want to clean." So I read the book, but only for a minute, because I feel guilty, so I go watch t.v., but only for about 20 minutes, because I feel guilty and feel like, boy I really should be working right now, so I go read reddit.com. I click a few articles, read a couple, and think, "Man, I should clean right now." and this goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on until I can't keep my eyes open at night. I wake up at 3 am and think about what I should do tomorrow, so I get up and make a list, then I'm awake, so I go on reddit, read a few articles, watch a South Park episode, then it's 7 am and I'm exhausted, so I go to bed, sleep for an hour, then everyone's awake and I feel guilty for sleeping, so I get up, exhausted, and start the stupid procrastination process all over again because I LIKE torturing myself. I don't know why yet, but I have figured out that there is a part of me, a powerful part of me, that feels like this is the life I deserve, so I keep myself here. Distracted, not really enjoying anything, surrounded by clutter with a calendar full of missed deadlines.
It took a LONG time for me to figure out that even though I was smart and talented, I still had to WORK. I'm still pissed off about it. I didn't realize when I was young that if I wanted to be the most powerful man in the universe, I needed to pick up a barbell and drink a lot of milk every day. For me, the hardest thing in the world is to do a small step toward a large goal every day over a long period of time. It's so hard for me to be patient with a process. I have this delusion that because I'm smart, everything should just be easy and should just work for me. So anything that takes time, or a lot of dedication, or a lot of consistent effort, I just get frozen up and say, "Aw, fuck it." I have so many unfinished projects, I don't even like to think about it.
And writing that last sentence reminds me of an insight I had recently. I had a clean office for awhile (I work from home) and recently it was junky in a bad way for about six weeks. I slipped into depression and just ignored it. I felt more frantic and anxious, and it got to where I just kept the door to my office closed all the time, and I just went upstairs to the t.v. room, and took my computer up there to work.
For one reason or another, I finally decided to clean the damn office. I told my wife, "I am going to..." and she said "clean your office. Blah blah blah." I realized that I had said I was going to clean my office about half a bajillion times in recent days, so I said, "if my office isn't clean by 10 pm tomorrow night, I will give you $100." I wanted that deadline to be painful. It worked! Office is now clean.
And now the insight: a part of me actually likes the stress feeling that comes from clutter. I feel like I don't deserve to enjoy what I'm doing, so I distract myself from enjoying it and being fully present by leaving a bunch of junk around that makes me feel guilty for doing something I enjoy. I look around and say, "I really want to read a book, but I can't really because I should clean. But I don't want to clean." So I read the book, but only for a minute, because I feel guilty, so I go watch t.v., but only for about 20 minutes, because I feel guilty and feel like, boy I really should be working right now, so I go read reddit.com. I click a few articles, read a couple, and think, "Man, I should clean right now." and this goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on until I can't keep my eyes open at night. I wake up at 3 am and think about what I should do tomorrow, so I get up and make a list, then I'm awake, so I go on reddit, read a few articles, watch a South Park episode, then it's 7 am and I'm exhausted, so I go to bed, sleep for an hour, then everyone's awake and I feel guilty for sleeping, so I get up, exhausted, and start the stupid procrastination process all over again because I LIKE torturing myself. I don't know why yet, but I have figured out that there is a part of me, a powerful part of me, that feels like this is the life I deserve, so I keep myself here. Distracted, not really enjoying anything, surrounded by clutter with a calendar full of missed deadlines.