development corrupts

More hooping today!

Sun, 07 Apr 2013 15:26:14 GMT

I've learned more techniques in hooping, other than the basic hoop around and around and around the body, plus I'm no longer dropping the hoop (and catching it against my shin/ankle) as much, so I'm much less bruised :D

Spent Saturday afternoon hooping with enthusiasts. So many things that they made look easy were hard, but so much fuuuun. I think I've found something I can love: simple enough to do for someone without grace or physical strength, but with enough depth that it's possible to just keep learning more and more tricks even after picking up the basics.

The fact that the people I met seem to be a pretty laid-back bunch is okay too. Nooooo shaming or strong focus on exercise leading to weight loss or anything that I'm trying to avoid from home. I mean yeah it's moving around and some people will lose weight by doing it, but that gets a nod as a side effect. Meanwhile most of the focus is on the actual mechanics of movement and how fascinating it is. I am enjoying it a lot.

Now I just need to find a clear space at home where I won't break things, and I'm all set for practice ;-)

Having the hoop twirl around your waist is reasonably easy and unlikely to break anything. It's things like the hoop moving around your hands, and passing it around, that's hard. Like this!

Now that guy is good so it looks easy, but the weight distribution of the hoop is awkward when just held. I lack the wrist / arm / bicep(!!!) strength to look anywhere near that good *rueful*. but I'll get there :DDDDD Somewhere there. In the approximate area of.

And have fun trying :)

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Boxing!

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 13:17:22 GMT

Have been trying boxing again, because I really really miss punching stuff.

Today was the third time I've been to the boxing gym since I started again. The very first day I went back, I was so exhausted from the warmup, I stopped after only one session of mitts. To be fair, the warm-up was over thirty minutes long. To be fairer, the warm-up was over thirty minutes long because I kept having to stop to rest ;-)

Today, I wasn't falling over after just the warm up, and I managed two (normal!) plus a slow steady session with the punching bag (first time they've let me at the punching bag in this gym).

I love boxing: I love the motion and the punching and the running around and the wrapping of my hands and the putting on of gloves. I love putting on my gloves, okay? Grunt, ungghh, yeah. I love being so drained I swear I can't move another muscle and I'm actually opening my mouth to say so, when my trainer looks at me with concern asking me if I'm tired, and draw myself up to my short height, glare at him, and go WTF tired me are you serious?

(That gets me another couple combos before I invariably wilt, but \o/)

This all makes it sound like I might actually be competent, but I'm actually pretty bad at boxing. I'm getting better though! The days when I'd accidentally knock my glasses off my face with my fists are long gone :3

...partly that's because I took a long break from boxing BUT ANYWAY. I haven't done it recently. That is my point! Instead I've been doing more ridiculous things :D

Like today, when I flipped the jumping rope forward and upward into my pony tail, and whipped myself in the face with my own hair. NOBODY SAW, is what I'm saying.

I missed this <3

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Fri, 06 May 2011 15:28:27 GMT

Went dancing again today!

Today was hiphop abs, zumba, and ballroom. As usual, I still suck at moving around. And as usual, that just makes the whole experience that much more awesome.

We were supposed to do street dance, but it got rescheduled so I missed it. Sad.

This is the sweatiest I've ever been :D Hopefully I haven't stiffened up by tomorrow, because I want to try the Saturday classes again.

At the end of the class, as I was changing clothes and preparing to head out, someone offered to buy my hat off my head, because she'd been looking for something like that for ages.

I am tempted to sell it to her! I feel like it would look gorgeous on her. I just don't know if it's okay/how much to offer *G*

(I am really charmed by the fact that she was so enthusiastic about it ahahahha. She's a teenager though so, man, I'm not going to ask for much or anything. But still, really charmed. And fighting the urge to go "no I can't sell it because I'm no good at this DON'T YOU SEE)

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Sun, 17 Apr 2011 17:37:35 GMT

Went swimming today with my cousin. Oddly, I didn't feel tired at the pool, and my muscles weren't aching. But once I got out, I couldn't walk without wobbling. And for the next few hour (until I dragged myself up out of bed for dinner *G*) I couldn't keep my eyes open.

Have forgotten how good that feels :)

So now my cousin and I are thinking of doing dance classes. Got some vouchers for three days unlimited so we're taking a sampler plate approach: a bit of everything (so: hiphop, zumba (?), pole, belly... what in the world is belly hiphop? *puzzled*)

I'm curious, also excited, also I know that I'd be mortified to do any of this on my own, which is why it's great that I'm egging on my cousin and my cousin is egging me on.

I don't expect to be good at anything, but hopefully this should be fun! (If nothing else even if I'm the worst dancer in the class, my cousin is approximately as bad so we can be the worst together)

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Wherein I learn why runners are early risers

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 04:35:49 GMT

I am trying the ~~Cough~~ Couch to 5k again (Cough is accurate given how much I have been sneezing lately). I don't want to devote time to daily exercise but committing to thrice a week sounds doable -- or so I tell myself.

Last time, I scheduled my runs in the afternoons, timing it to just before sunset. The problem with this was that I'd lose track of time if I got caught up in what I was doing, or I couldn't afford to pull myself away when I was coding or talking to someone, so that attempt faded away by the third week.

This time, I promised myself I'd do it as soon as I woke up (and had a little breakfast, maybe triaged email, but not yet coded). Problem: I wake up at almost noon. Problem with running at noon: everything.

By the end of the run, I knew where every single shade tree was in our neighborhood.

Thank you shade trees!

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Numbers, exercise, and levelling up

Fri, 11 Jun 2010 15:36:01 GMT

Note, so you can decide if you'd like to skip ahead: I'm going to be talking about exercise in this entry. I'm not going to be talking about weight or food or anything similar, just exercise, and I don't see this becoming a regular feature in this journal.

Okay, so when I was in university, I got hooked on an MMO. It was pretty bad! I'd play a minimum of four hours a day (probably reached six hours even most weekdays). I'd start playing as soon as I got home and stop a bit after midnight. I was very happy when finals week came along, because the lack of classes meant I could come home earlier and play more :D.

I kept up my grades and stuff like that by finishing as much as I could while I was at school and then fitting in the rest whenever I had to regen. Occasionally, when I was feeling very responsible, I'd go to places where I'd definitely need to regen, so that I'd have lots of time to do my homework. And, one semester where I arranged my schedule to make sure I would be able to go online during non-peak times so the lag wouldn't be so bad :D :D :D

Now! Unlike a lot of people who played to hang out with friends, or who played to get a good level or a good build or good armor, mostly I played so I could count numbers while killing stuff. It wasn't strategic: I wasn't crunching the numbers to get good stats, or trying to figure out how I'd need to allocate stats/resources for armor in order to get the optimal build. I just wanted to do stuff, and count stuff while doing stuff.

:D

At some point, I wanted to stop but couldn't. So I stopped this way: I got a Powerbook, which OS didn't support MMO client. And that was that.

Fast forward years and years to two months ago: I was catching up with a friend of mine, and he brought up WoW (which was not the MMO I'd been obsessed with btw!). He also mentioned that he was trying a "9000 exercise points in 30 days" self-program to challenge himself (1 point = 1 rep of any exercise = 100m run/walk/jog). And I realized how much I missed counting stuff while doing stuff in order to reach stuff.

Two weeks ago, I was at my grandpa's condo, and I realized that summer was over and I hadn't gone swimming. I had my swimsuit with me, it felt like a waste not to try out the water... I set myself a goal of 30 lengths of the pool (it was a small pool!), and to my complete surprise, I managed to reach that goal. By the end, I even kinda looked like I was swimming *G* (I don't know proper stroke or style or whatever it's called, but I can happily splash along in the water)

And at the end of that day (okay, the next morning. I was very contentedly exhausted and too sleepy to think that evening), I decided that I wanted to do something that involved counting towards something concrete.

( talk about exercise )

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I would offer cake, but all I have are bullet points

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 03:01:39 GMT

Got triggered in a horrible (and horribly embarrassing) way last night, so I hopped offline while I was still able, then took the night off for my sanity

On the good side, I managed to catch aveleh, pauamma, and idonotlikepeas online. It's been rare that I've been able to touch base with all three in the same evening

Timezones, and timezone differences suck! I am looking forward to starting on Dreamwidth officially. I'll be able to adjust my time to align with other people's peak times, if I need to, instead of trying to steal an hour of their time just before they head to bed, or staying up an extra three hours past midnight when I should be asleep because there is still dayjob the next day (it is embarrassingly obvious where my priorities lie *G*)

I have a lingering cold and a lingering aching shoulder. I consider this ample excuse for the next thing:

I left my bag with all my important things at home this morning. No cellphone, no wallet, no hard drive, no earphones, no key to my work locker (which contains my laptop), no house keys. It is scary how much of my life is in that one small black bag!

I managed to borrow a spare set of keys, though, so at least I managed to set up my work laptop.

PS. I'm not really fuzzy-minded enough from the cold to actually be able to blame it for this

So far, QA has not found any big issues with my latest (last!) project. Since there's nothing I need to code for work, I've been spending my afternoons picking up tiny DW bugs. I feel less guilty picking up tiny bugs than more involved ones when I'm at my dayjob -- even now that there's really nothing else for me to do here. I can drop them any time in case I need to fix something for dayjob :-) (again, it is embarrassingly obvious where my priorities lie. But there is literally nothing for me to do, unless QA finds a bug, so I refuse to feel guilt)

Coding is therapeutic

So is going through dw_news and basking in the DW love in the comments.

Last night was a kickboxing night. I love kickboxing nights, especially when my trainer tells me that my punches are took weak, giving me permission to go wild. (He asked for it)

This evening, I plan to try out the track at Ultra, where I have never been. It should be fun *g* And I need to do something to work off my frustration at myself for what has been a really scatterbrained day.

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To fail or not to fail? etc etc

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:37:34 GMT

Today, I forgot my gym clothes, but I was already at the gym and the trainer was waiting for me, so I went kickboxing anyway.

Verdict: not very comfortable, but not as much chafing as I'd feared, as long as I didn't try to knee anything. Normal swivelling and rib-level kicking were okay.

I miss my boy-jeans, a pair of worn hand-me-downs from my older brother. I wore them until they tore one day in the university cafeteria. They were probably about twelve years old by then (thank you iruka11 for the jacket, still and again! You saved my butt -- literally :-))

==

I've been thinking a bit about the need to fail -- or rather, the need to have room for failure. I don't think it's coincidence that I had my greatest bursts of productivity when I wasn't afraid of the consequences of failing.

I promise myself to fail more is probably not the best resolution in the world, ehehe.

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Python, etc

Fri, 08 Jan 2010 11:04:03 GMT

Oh dear, foxfirefey is seducing me over to the Python side.

Anyway, busy evening tonight. Planned to do some kickboxing, but forgot my gloves (DAMNIT). I do at least have my sneakers on so I can do other stuff. Then it's home, and if I'm not zonked out by the exercise, I shall code, and if I am zonked out, then I shall zonk.

My plan: it is simple. Nothing can foil it!

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80 whu and 80 wha?

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:37:01 GMT

Kickboxing today! (or, well, last night). Trainer must have noticed that I had something on my mind, because he made me finish the session with 80 consecutive right-side roundhouse kicks followed by 80 consecutive left-side roundhouse kicks.

He actually tried to make me do a hundred each, but I was so visibly faltering by the end of the 80th, that he took pity on me.

So tired, I fell asleep almost as soon as I got home, so I missed doing the stuff I planned to this evening. Oops.

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Bed early

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 16:05:29 GMT

Bought a punching bag!

I kinda felt frustrated and idea-less, so I punched the punching bag around a bit until my frustration was gone and my mind was empty. Then on the way home, I figured out the framework for my talk while half in a stupor from tiredness (which means it's either going to be good, or going to be really really bad :-D)

I should be doing the slides, but my eyes are closing on me. Ah well, it's simple enough I could probably go without slides if I don't make it in time (I hope this is not necessary, though!)

But for tonight, rest is more important. Mmmm, rest.

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Settling into a pattern

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 16:29:10 GMT

Life has settled into a pattern: work in the mornings and afternoons, gym thrice a week in the evenings, daily IRC chats/email conversations with the ones I love. Work itself is a bit less settled; lots of changes that will affect me personally. Will see how it settles down.

Not much time for reading, but occasionally I drag out a paperback for the treadmill. Have finished a couple of books that way, and I actually seem to run longer with books than with music -- pacing of the book balances out against the rhythm of my running. Evenings, when it gets late and I force myself off the computer, I try to find a little spare time to go through Programming Perl (makes me happy, so happy ^_^)

As for DW, when I'm tired or when I know I am working with a limited timeframe, I go on a commit run. It's more bite-sized; don't need to worry about getting into, or regret having to break out of a coding zone. When I have more time or energy available to invest for that evening, I code.

Weekends are for planning/hopefully starting on a new big project if I finished whatever I picked up the week before.

So far it's been working out well. My days are falling into a pleasant rhythm; I rather like it. (Have a few things I need to do; just need to gather the focus/energy to give them the love and attention they deserve)

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Backlog cleared

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 19:55:36 GMT

Tonight, I finished the last two of the bugs which had been hanging around in my queue, taunting me for weeks. This means that of the seventeen bugs assigned to me, fourteen have patches which are now awaiting review, one (mood themes) is a placeholder where I'm taking no action at the moment, one is awaiting discussion or a final decision so I can either patch or resolve WONTFIX, and only one is actually awaiting investigation/patch -- and that last one I just picked up tonight.

Bugzilla has no reason to whine at me anymore. ~~Except for how I signed up for Zilla to email me my outstanding bugs every Saturday~~. Feel so light!

Hmm, I should pick up something new soon.

Also, also, I'm finally making some headway into my backlog at work -- enough so that I had energy after work to spare to go to gym (making up a bit of what I owe to my body).

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