Adjusted Reality

I’ve been focusing much of my creative time on fiction writing, but lest we think I’ve jumped off the wagon, ’tis not the case, friendos.

So, here’s a quickie check in on April smack dab in the middle of it!

#1 – Weigh 180.2 lbs by April 30th. Progress is being made. I’m tracking on the daily (not days at a time). Using the formula of 1200+ exercise calories – I’m staying an average of ~50 per day under that. I’ve reversed the upward trends from March, and I’m making my way back towards the 170s. I’m honestly not sure I’ll make the number goal I want this month, though anything could happen. However, I will keep at it and would be stoked to see the line continue to creep on down and would sure be neat to see at least one weight in the 170s this month.

#2 – Strength Over Stamina. Well, this is a whole lot of NOT NOTHING!

I finally figured out when to swim this week (as early after work on Mondays as possible), and I found a little speed last time and brought my pace under 2:00/100yd. Woo!

Running is back on the menu, and I’m here for it. Pain free is a bit of a misnomer, but I’m running with a warmup/prehab routine, vigorous applications of my new massage gun after, and most importantly, with the blessing of my chiropractor. I’m almost back up to 5k and will hang out there again 3x week until there’s zero issues. And maybe even longer, I’m not racing anything longer than 5k off the bike.

When I’m on the bike this month, I’m doing something challenging to see if it can improve my fitness. Technically I did an FTP test already, but it was just in place of a difficult workout (and my numbers went down, actually, I wasn’t feeling it). I got a new bike Garmin, and I have a new type of test to try later this month. Excite! I’ve ridden outside twice this month, and plan to get plenty of smiley bike miles outdoors whilst camping. I haven’t run off the bike recently, but I imagine that will change soon as I have actually signed up for races!

• Cap Tex Triathlon – Sprint (May 29)
• Lake Pflugerville Tri – Sprint (June 25)
• Kerrville Triathlon – Sprint (Sept 23)

Keeping it short and sweet to stay true to this year’s focus on strength, but this will keep me honest with my cardio. I need races in my life to scare me into doing the things that I actually really enjoy once I start doing them, if that makes any damn sense.

#3 Stop Ignoring My Surroundings

Let’s move on. I’m letting Sir Joelio dictate the timeline and my involvement in helping him with his projects, and we just haven’t done much. S’okay. Other stuff is happening and it would be a shame to waste this beautiful weather cleaning things. Bleh.

#4 Relaxing Hobbies

• Continue my meditation goal of 5xweek and go camping! Ehhh, it’s close if not exact. I’m hoping camping helps me focus a bit more. Focus is a little challenging these days.
• Finish the minis by our first April play session. Hey, I did this!
• Every WFH day take a guitar break. YES! I’ve been pretty darn good at taking some guitar breaks this month. I just need to intend to do it until it’s habit.
• Finish the post on Koln DONE!!!
• Get through the first 2 full days of Paris photos. Well – I’m done with Day 1 and moving onto day 2. And day two has almost 600 to sift through. I may not complete this, but I’m moving through them. I’m motivated by impending travel. 🙂

And finally, #5 – Write Stuff.

This is going REALLY REALLY well. I’m closing in on 50k words (~49k now), which is great. But much more importantly, I know where I’m going now. One evening, the payoff at the end came to me, and I loosely wrote the ending and the epilogue to lead to the next book in my head. Then, I watched ahead and found out the ending I came up with actually goes along with the campaign timeline that actually happened! I now have progress happening on all the plots and I’m preparing to wrap them up.

I plan to do another “kindle read” at the 75% complete stage while camping, and… if nothing completely throws me off track, I might have a rough draft sometime this summer!

This has been a pretty solid month so far, and I’m enjoying the ride (especially because I’ve been able to ride outside, woohoo!). I’m VERY VERY VERY much looking forward to our camping trip coming up here shortly to play bikes, read books, and just chill the eff out.

Koln was the third of five legs of our EU journey and the last that was for work (though we squeezed every moment of play we could out of our free time!).

After a very pleasant morning and early afternoon on the train from Hamburg, we departed the Koln station to see the Dom being gorgeous and impressive right there in front of us!

Then, we checked into our hotel and found two things: one, it had a lot of character in that it was partially renovated but not entirely. So, we had this giant, almost suite-sized room with a new, nice tub and shower, and a great view from the giant windows that let out to the fire escape. However, there was also really ugly orange 60-year-old shag carpet and furniture and also a weird closet/room area.

There was also no AC, just one teeny fan from 1980, and the weather was unseasonably warm (upper 80s, pushing 90). So, the first thing we did was take a team building trip to Ikea in the suburbs via U-Bahn and we boughts some really high-powered fans. After returning to the city, we saw a Mexican restaurant and decided to see what German Mexican was like. It was… interesting. Not bad, but definitely not the same as any Mexican food I’ve had anywhere in the US.

Then, we went to the convention to get set up. It took a few hours, so when we left at 10pm, nothing was really open for dinner, so we hit the Doner shop.

This did not make me sad in the slightest. I’ll take a Doner for any meal, any time. 🙂 I figured the fans would just barely cut the heat, but they were pretty breezy. Also, the white noise made it so easy to ptfo. Best sleep of the trip so far and woke up feeling refreshed the next morning!

We had a great day meeting current and future partners, talking to press, and meeting some more of our German coworkers.

After the show closed, we were invited to a team dinner at a traditional German restaurant on the waterfront. I got my first schnitzel of the trip and man, it was AWESOME. We enjoyed good food, good drinks, and good company for the rest of the evening and into the night.

I have no pictures but good memories of the paragon of confidence walking out of a bar with an unauthorized drink like he owned the place (and I tried the same and got stopped, heh). I talked with a girl from France that gave me all sorts of travel tips, and the departure home was interesting. The most adventurous took a scooter, the least adventurous took an uber, and the rest of us hiked through the city like little baby ducks following the leader in the wee hours to arrive back to our hotel and have another night of white-noise induced great sleep.

Thursday was another excellent day at the convention. After the evening before, I definitely made use of the free cappucinos and free food to counteract the debauchery, but this is how these things go. 🙂 Afterwards, we tried out the steakhouse in the host hotel and it was pretty darn yummy. However, more fries. Always fries. In Europe, everything comes with fries. I was hoping for some other sort of potato but… fries.

Afterwards, we let one of our coworkers pick the rest of the evening’s plans, and they chose these crazy large rainbow fruity drinks at the Mexican restaurant. Ok, well, fine. Let’s go! We finished the evening with a trip to get said coworker “chicky nuggies” (hell, I wanted chicky nuggies too at that point) and they came with this delicious side of jalapeno cheese bites I honestly still dream of to this day. Looking on the McDonald’s website, I think they’re widely available but, in my mind, (and for the sake of my waistline), they’re a German thing.

Friday, we were up and at it again, and closed out the convention successfully. The team decided to do dinner together and ended up at the same steak place. To switch it up, I got a burger (and fries, sigh), and sadly, the Hamburg-er will be the best one of the trip.

After the crazy few days, we didn’t want to go out and party with people again, so we sipped a glass of wine in the trippy pre-renovated basement lounge on the cushy brown couches and prepared for two days of aggressive sightseeing.

Saturday, we slept in a bit and then took a trip outside of town to visit a palace! We walked the grounds and took a tour of Schloss Augustusburg. It was very, very cool. It was also apparently a popular site for weddings and wedding photos, as we say many, many bridal parties around.

The inside was so ornate and beautiful, and the grand staircase (one of the only places they allowed photos) was one of the most awesome sights, though I loved the Summer Dining Room. It had tile all over the walls to keep things cool (and holy cow, it really did!). This event took most of the day, so after tromping all over the exterior and interior and then a long trip back, we ate pastries, took a quick nap, and then got some delicious Indian food to close out our Saturday.

Sunday, we finally got the word that the hotel had breakfast (!!), and we partook before we headed out for the day. First, we toured the Dom.

It was also awesome and ornate and gorgeous and beautiful.

After touring the ground floor and then the catacombs, we left our group to go climb the 600 stairs to get the view. It was a rough climb on a very very narrow winding staircase, but the scenery was totally worth it.

Then, we got a salad. Because OMG, after two weeks of eating junk food, all I wanted out of life was a salad.

After resting at the hotel a bit, we went to climb the Triangle building at sunset so we could get the iconic Koln picture. I really wanted to go at sunset and wait until dark to get the city all lit up, but they close early on Sundays, so that will be on the list next time for sure!

We strolled over the bridge and looked at all the love locks, and wandered into a street performance of a guy juggling fire balancing on a balance board. As one does.

Then, we spent our last night in Germany getting a smorgasbord. This was entirely too much sausage and we did our best, but could only eat about half of it. You know your meal is heavy when the fries are the palate cleanser and the least greasy thing about the plate.

Finally, we took one of our last U-bahns back to the hotel and I ruined my Bloodbowl opponent 3-0 to finish out the evening (my dice were on fire).

In the morning, we woke up in time to get one more German breakfast, and caught the train to our next destination. Tchuss, Germany et Bonjour, Bruxelles!

March. OMG. What a month.

It takes me by surprise every time. January and February have not historically been my favorite months, but I’ve come to appreciate them lately for their relative calmness to the rest of the year. Usually there are fewer things going on, more time at home to relax and be productive, and they have great running weather to boot.

Then, there’s March that brings with it all the crazy. We celebrated half a dozen birthdays, entertained people who came to town, went to many social events and work events. I love all of these things individually. I am a social creature. However, all of this packed into one month is a lot and isn’t conducive to a focus on health and weight loss.

Compounding this – I was out on a lovely morning run and had a twinge in my hip. It wasn’t terrible, so I kept running (I kinda had to, I was running to the gym for a weights session) and after the workout, it was sore, and then later I was limping around. I figured it was a random ache that would go away… until it didn’t. I saw the chiropractor a week later and she said it’s nothing serious and gave me some rehab but it’s still taking FOREVER to get better. I spent much of the month watching the really nice running weather slip away running only SIX miles total in March and frankly, pouted about it. At least I’m now back to 1 mile at a time every 2-3 days (I’d say it’s pain free but still feel a little muscle soreness and tension at the end of each run). I’ll keep doing that until it feels like nothing.

More food and less running? This is what happens…

As you can see, I didn’t meet goal #1 – weigh 180.2 lbs. I am exactly at the same trendweight as I was when I wrote the last blog (184.2), so I’ll just keep this as the goal for April.

Looking at my April social calendar, it seems to be slightly less challenging than March, but much more than the winter was. I’ve got about 2 social/food related events per week on average. I just need to make sure I go into each one with a strategy. I’m okay maintaining through March, but I need to get back on track this month. No bullsh*t. I’m back to living calories in vs calories out. If I want to eat more I need to move my arse more even if that means an after-dinner workout.

The whiner in me wants to make excuses about how much more difficult this is without much running in my life, but I have biking, swimming, lifting, walking, yes, even the elliptical. It is not as if I was completely idle in March…

…but in the early month, runs became walks and it took me a while to shift my thinking from pity party to making gains in other places.

However, there’s not all sad news on the workout front.

I continue to get a gold star for 3x week strength training – I’m at the six month mark (minus ONE day for surgery in October). It’s working. The squat witch tells me to grab weights that I doubt (15 lbs for 3×10 lat raises, really?) and then get through the exercises no problem. Not only are my numbers going up at the gym, but I’m also noticing functional fitness too. The 40lb bags of salt that go in the pool that I could barely lift in 2021? Yeah, carrying those jerks with one arm now. It’s useful to be strong!

When I realized running wasn’t going to be back to normal for a while, I turned to my old friend, the bike trainer. I did not one, but TWO MORE FTP tests in March. The first on in February, remember, I got an abysmal reading (139 watts), and I realized that I probably screwed up the test but also found it was a great excuse to do a hard workout. I tried again a few weeks later and yet again, it screwed up – starting me at WAYYYYY too high of a reading – which meant the test part was the easiest part. That test was also invalid, though 156 watts was a pretty decent improvement. Finally, the next weekend, I got it right (mostly – my power blanked out for a minute). I aimed for 170 watts and ended up with 167. That feels legit, though I think I still have some HTFU gains not related to fitness (aka, remembering the pain cave and what it is). My best test ever is 190, and it’s nice to think I’m starting to approach the same zip code.

I also started swimming – just 10 mins/500m, but it’s nice to be back in the water. While I really want to go swim in the nicer pools at Lifetime, it’s just so easy to walk half a mile to LA Fitness and swim there. I’ll be much more motivated to get to Lifetime when it’s time to go play in the lake and the waterslides are open.

So, for goal #2 wrap up for March:

• Swim once a week – uhhh, I have a strategy now, it’s just enacting it every week
• Bike speedwork/FTP tests – check, if I ride indoors, I’m doing intervals or FTP tests
• Weekly bricks – not check, but this isn’t my fault (the whole injury thing)
• Keep up with strength – hell yes
• Pick my races and sign up – I have picked them (CapTex, Pflugerville, Kerrville) but want to make sure I can run and they don’t conflict with travel

For the next month, I will:

• Swim once a week
• At least one FTP test in April, at least 1-2 bike sessions per week with some speed/intervals
• Run one mile every other day until it’s pain free. Then run 1.5 miles every other day. Then 2, etc (until we get back to 5k).
• Sign up for races. If I don’t sign up, I won’t go, and there’s only a very small chance of travel.
• Ride a few times outdoors, once a week if possible
• At least 2 bricks/Practice tri (either indoors or outdoors)

All in all, in terms of health and fitness goals, this is not the worst place from which I’ve reset, not by far. I took a pause to enjoy me some March, without any significant effects, and now it’s time to get back to progress in April.

Moving onto personal goals, spoilers, there’s some good news incoming!

For #3 – paying attention to my surroundings, I can happily report the office is completely done, and everything fits where it should. Could we possibly clean more out of the closets? Sure. But we actually have extra space to store things now, so I’m super content with this.

We didn’t get to the guest room closet, but that can go to another month, organizing where I spend my workdays is more important.

For April, our “around the house goals” are:

• Get the pool ready for the summer.
• Speaking of organizing where work days are spent, Joel helped me with my room, I’d like to help him with his. So we will organize and clean out the game room storage (and maybe come up with a label system)
• If there’s time, we’ll start on the bathroom/vanity area. I think my strategy here will be spending 5 minutes doing it as many days as I can, not with the intent to finish but doing a little each day.

For #4 – Relaxing Hobbies – I was about 50/50 here

• Continue meditation 5x+ a week – I’d say more like 4 days on average. Not bad, but I can do better. 🙂
• Finish the fish pictures and start Paris – Check! I have edited an image of la Tour Eiffel and have about 500000000 more to go.
• Get some paint on a canvas before the end of the month – Nope, attention has been elsewhere
• Finish friends’ D&D minis I promised to paint – Also nope (sadface)
• Play guitar 3x week – I have played a handful of times but definitely not that often
• Write a post on Hamburg – Check! I even started Koln!

The level of social activity this month meant I prioritized that vs hobbies. S’okay. We’ll allow it.

In April, I’d like to:

• Continue my meditation goal of 5xweek, and also go camping for 4 days and truly defrag my brain (no work Friday through Monday)
• I will finish the minis by next Friday when we play. There’s no excuse for this taking so long.
• Every WFH day take a guitar break. There’s also no excuse why I can’t take 10 mins and this also helps focus my brain
• Finish the post on Koln
• Get through the first 2 full days of Paris photos

And finally, #5 – Write Stuff – I took that big goose egg with the novel in February and turned it right around around. I wrote 15k words that I am reasonably happy with at a first draft stage. Not surprisingly, I stole some of this time from time I would normally spend writing here, but I think it was a worthy sacrifice. I’m becoming a little more adept at writing even when it’s not super quiet as long as I’ve gotten started and am flowing already.

My goal for April is to continue. I’m not going to put a super detailed goal here, but next step is to watch the next session or two, take notes, and then write. I’ve found that the closer I can put these two things together, the more I remember, so I may watch partial sessions or at the very least, just one, and then work on writing instead of trying to binge watch.

This is producing a very interesting method of novelization – I have no plan on where this one ends. I know probably in ~30k words (twice what I wrote this month) I’m going to need to wrap things up. I’ll be interested to see if the sessions help me get there or whether I need to make some stuff up or at least shift events around so I can have a climax and a resolution of some sorts of “Volume I”.

So, all in all, while I spent a lot of March frustrated with lack of progress towards my goals, it’s not as bad as it seemed. Progress happened, just not as much as I’d like (story of my life). Surprising to no one but me, I can’t do all the things I want to do, but I can do MANY of them. 🙂

So, let’s summarize. In April I will…

• Resume strict attention to 1200 calories + activity calories daily as my top limit.
• Swim once a week, do vigorous cardio (not walking) five times a week at 30mins per day minimum, work running back into my life as I can, push myself on the bike with an FTP test or an interval workout once a week
• Prepare for the next race by riding outside, doing a few bricks, and signing up 😛
• Help Joel get the pool back in shape
• Help Joel organize the shelves in his office/game room/dining room
• Start chipping away at the bathroom/vanity 5 minutes at a time
• Koln blog post and Paris photos
• Finish the minis. This week.
• Destress by meditation, WFH guitar breaks, and going camping
• Make forward progress in the book

Sounds like a great month to me! Let’s go!

It’s been six months since I got back from Europe, and quite a while since I posted this, but I figure it’s worth recapping for posterity.

Friday morning walked like baby ducks in a row following the one person who knew the way from the hotel to the office. We had a full day of work and meetings, but the CEO wanted to welcome us to his home, so he went to the market to get meat to grill and threw us a party. His EA forcibly removed me from my temporary office at 5pm, yelling that I’d be late for my own party. Who am I to argue with that? Their big conference room has a patio with a grill on it, and we all mingled and ate good food and drank beer. It was super nice!

We had planned to meet up with a group at a place on the waterfront, and then go hit up the Reaperbahn after. Instead, we found two of our coworkers getting a happy hour drink on our walk home, so we joined them, and everyone else joined them, and that’s where we stayed all night.

Drinking in Germany is interesting. Everyone just grabs drinks from a bar and hangs out on the street. You purchase both the glass and the alcohol, so you may do whatever you want with it. Most folks stack them up on the street. Some people are thrifty and collect them to get the glass deposits and drink for free. Some people, usually later in the evening, just throw them in the street and wait for the sweeper to collect them. We watched everyone do a combination of the three and had an excellent evening making friends.

We slept in a little bit after a late night, but after some cappucino, we headed down to the waterfront. Our first item on the agenda was lunch. I had some excellent spinach dumplings and Joel had some bacon and cheese spaetzle. The “small portions” of EU? Yeah, definitely not in Germany. We were full after half our plates.

Our afternoon plans included perusing the Maritime Museum. Apparently, there’s quite a bit to say and show about the Port of Hamburg. In modern times, they lead a lot of the innovations in revolutionizing the shipping industry. And… back in the day, Hamburg was a center for pirates. There were nine large floors of the museum, and one was entirely dedicated to pirate weapons. We spent four hours gawking at everything until our feet hurt too badly and moved on.

Next, we meandered around the harbor and got some gelato. I got to visit an amazing building on the bucket list (The Elbphilharmonie) and pick out where my apartment would be in one of the buildings downtown. Of all things, we found a very fancy Asian restaurant for dinner, and had some great General Tso’s chicken with these delicate wisps of saffron on top of it.

After dinner, we walked through the city a bit and then met some other coworkers at the Minatur Wunderland just as the sun was setting.

We entered the building and holy cow, it was a spectacle and a half. There were rooms and rooms of miniature replicas of cities and scenes with moving pieces and day/night cycles. We also did this VR experience with the whole group and it was super fun and got the adrenaline going when we were “walking” high above the scenery.

After we couldn’t walk one more step we got a quick currywurst snack on the way out, and then we ended up walking many MORE steps to get lost on the way to the u-bahn. We got a chance to check out the Hamburg Harbor lights from afar, though, so it worked out. We crashed hard when we got back to the hotel.

Sunday, we woke pretty early and wandered out into the morning sun to rent a bike. We had intended on renting a road bike to participate in a race, but they were all sold out. Instead, we tried to rent a city bike for transportation, and couldn’t figure that out either. Failing all means of two wheeled transport, we just walked over to check out the cyclists for a while and found some cool fountains and parks on the way back.

I then required a pretzel for breakfast so we split one with butter and chives. Germany, I miss your twenty million amazing bakeries.

We grabbed our travel companions and headed down to the harbor again to see the sights. We wanted some fresh seafood for lunch. We stopped at a lovely little place and thought we were getting a fish hamburger, but instead we got Fish Hamburg, which was three different types of fish in this delightful dill mustard sauce. Once again, I couldn’t finish the whole plate.

Then, we embarked on a harbor cruise. It was a gorgeous sunny day and perfect for sightseeing, as well as checking out my favorite building (the Elbphilharmonie, which I referred to many times as the Elphaba building) from another angle. They do sunset cruises as well, and that is definitely on the bucket list next time.

Then, we had a laundry party with our coworkers. Most everyone else was smart enough to just bring one small bag. We brought a large bag each and a small bag. Next time, no way I’m lugging that much around again. Laundry parties for the win.

Our plan was to check out a cool cathedral and then grab dinner. We spent about an hour taking in the sights of it, and our group took some time to facetime/facebook call families there.

I was warned that everything shuts down early on Sundays, but what I didn’t realize was everything shuts down early and Yelp also lies about the time. We tried multiple, multiple locations of things we wanted to eat and nada. Eventually, we just started looking for a restaurant period, no matter what type of food. Still nada. The one place we found open was only serving drinks. I was considering a dinner of bar garnishes at this point.

My companions kindly put up with me taking fifteen minutes to grab some Hamburg Nights pictures around the water since it was mostly on the way before we caught the U-Bahn back to the hotel. Thankfully the Turkish place across the street was still open at 11pm, and we gorged ourselves on another giant plate of awesomeness. I would seriously be okay eating there once a day for a week. I might gain 5 lbs, but I wouldn’t mind the process.

Monday was once again full of meetings and work, though we were taken out for the best burger I had all trip by a coworker who frequented the place multiple times per week. It was kind of a divey bar, but the food was totally on point.

After work, we found an excellent Indian restaurant down the street from the hotel and shared a nice, relaxed last dinner in Hamburg with our full travel crew. Indian food isn’t super pretty, but the walk sure was.

After we all retired to our hotel, Joel and I found ourselves in that weird space where we were exhausted but also weren’t ready to sleep. So, we grabbed a bottle of wine at the corner store and sat at the U-bahn right outside of the hotel and watched the trains come and go sipping some vino to unwind a bit. Unlike the US, this is something that doesn’t get you arrested in Germany, no one batted an eye.

Tuesday morning, we woke early, finished packing and caught our train with no stress. We enjoyed a very productive and pretty four-hour ride from Hamburg to Koln, and that’s where we’ll pick up next time!

Sure, we have two days left in February, but I’m sure it’ll be a minute before I get back here, so let’s recap.

Goal #1 – be 184.2 by March 1st. CHECK! My trendweight as of today is 184.1

This is what a proper month should look like. At this point, I’ve now officially shed the lbs I put on in 2021 and 2022. My trendweight is 8 lbs down from the highest it reached in October, and from the tippy top to the lowest lowest low recorded on the scale in that time, I’ve lost 14 lbs. They’re tight, but the jeans I was wearing in 2019 button again. The pants I bought in 2022 are downright roomy. All of this is very encouraging, and to say I feel better is an understatement. My body is starting to feel like MINE again, instead of this foreign meatbag it became during the pandemic.

I’m not really doing anything outside of just following the routine I’ve established since October. I eat primarily snap kitchen and factor meals, which makes things easy. I keep snacking to a minimum. When I do go out to eat, I stick to things that aren’t completely awful calorie-wise or consciously make them into two meals. If I decide to have some drinks, I cut my food intake (or make sure it’s on a high activity day when I can accommodate both).

My goal intake in My Fitness Pal set to 1200 calories + exercise calories. This last week, I was 717 under that, just by virtue of two longer workout days, eating about 1500-1700 calories per day. I’ll probably eat… pardon my pun… into this deficit a bit today, tbh, and probably finish about 500 calories under for the week. Last week, I finished 169 calories over, which was close enough, by doing largely the same thing (with one 2000+ calorie day because of two social events on the same day, one with amazing homebrewed beer #worthit).

So, I can now revise this goal to – Be 180.2 lbs by April 1st. I’m very much looking forward to my first weigh in at 170-something. I should get there regularly by the end of this next month unless I screw things up!

#2 Strength over Stamina

Here is a place I am both here and not here.

I’m still continuing to lift 3 days a week and increase my weights/reps. This week I’ve had to squeeeeeze it in due to life stuffs, and lift two days in a row (Monday, Saturday, Sunday) which I don’t prefer but we’re getting it done.

The last two weeks, I haven’t been running quite as much. Life got busy and I got stressed out about some stuff, and my sleep sucked and the runs I did do were tough and slower. I lost a tiny bit of fitness per my garmin (the equivalent of 3 seconds on my 5k time). Not great, but I think I can get back on track this next week.

Holding to a schedule is sort of laughable at the moment. I do need to get there, but I think it will take locking my race schedule in and feeling some impending pressure. And maybe that will get me to the pool once a week. Or a month. At least sometime!

I did do an FTP test, and it was pretty abysmal. In 2019, it was 192 Watts. I set it for 150, figuring that was something I could meet and surpass. I ended the test at 139W. I think part of the problem was a misconfiguration thing, and also, I just can’t remember how to work hard on the bike. Cycling is for the days I can’t bring myself to run right now, and I use it as recovery while watching Bloodbowl games. I suppose I need to change that if I want to change that number.

In the next month, I need to start changing over from winter base training to pre-season for triathlon. This means:

• Try to figure out how to swim once a week
• Do some sort of speedwork on the bike
• Weekly bricks
• Keep up with strength (normally I’d start tapering this but this year I’m not)
• FTP test again before the end of March
• Pick my races and sign up for the ones I know I’m doing

I’m doing *okay* with recovery – I fit in at least 2 things each day, sometimes all 4. I need to make sure I don’t completely ditch stretching and rolling, but I think I can probably back off and do those every other day instead of daily now.

#3 Ignoring my surroundings

Not as much progress here as I’d like, but not nothing. We took a lot of stuff to goodwill and the office, but I still have things in the home office to deal with (not as many but still stuff). I haven’t had a weekend without a bunch of other stuff to do yet this month, and one full week of this short month was eaten up by losing power. All excuses, sure. But that’s how it’s been. I hate doing this stuff with a passion, so… yeah. Difficult to make time for it when I’m already busy. Let’s try again next month.

March goals:

• Actually do the rest of the office stuff
• Clean out the office closet
• Clean out the guest room closet

#4 Relaxing Hobbies

I’ve been pretty consistent with meditation (skipping 1-2 days a week), so I’m cool with it. We also just got a massage chair (happy birthday to us!) so I’m going to see if I can move some mediation there for full zen factor. February has been a very Bloodbowl-y month. I made it to the final game in KIBBL, then lost (we #2!!!), then Bloodbowl 3 launched, and I drafted a new team I haven’t played much (Amazons) in our Bloodbowl 2 league, so this is where a lot of my hobby time has gone. And it probably will through March. However, Bloodbowl is not a relaxing hobby so I need a little more creation in my life to counterbalance the destruction. 🙂

March Goals:

• Continue meditation 5x+ a week
• Finish the fish pictures from May 2022’s cruise and decide whether I start the next cruise or Paris. Maybe alternate between the two.
• Get some paint on a canvas before the end of the month
• Finish friends’ D&D minis I promised to paint
• Play guitar 3x week
• Write a post on Hamburg (I have really slacked on EU travel blogging and I’d like to do it for posterity)

It’s a lot, I’ll be happy if I get some of this done.

#5 Write a book

Well… yeah. Goose egg here. This is not the thing I can knock out between other things or while socializing or watching TV. I need some dedicated time to do this where the house is quiet and I’m not locking myself in my office while Joel’s waiting for me to be social or do stuff, and I don’t have that right now. Sucks that I got such a strong start, and I was really enjoying it, and now I’m kinda stuck. I feel it becoming something that I used to do, not that I am doing now. I can see why authors go escape somewhere alone for a month so they can write their books. I don’t want to do that. So, what instead?

I need to schedule time to work on it. My goal is to make myself four two-hour appointments in March, and the time is for my book, and my book alone (shut down everrrrrything else, no discord chat, no work, no web surfing except for research, no social media, etc).

So, my to do list for March besides continuing to do the normal stuff (in the order of importance):

• Figure out race schedule and commit
• Add a few swims and bike speedwork this month
• Retest FTP at the end of the month
• Four two-hour appointments with my book (either editing or taking notes on sessions)
• Dealing with the office closet and the handful of boxes that are left
• Guest room closet cleanout
• Relaxing hobbies
  • Finish the D&D minis
  • Get paint on a canvas
  • Play guitar 3x week
  • Photo editing
  • Hamburg Blog

Does it feel like a lot? Yep. But let’s give it a go. First priority is just to keep going with the strength and weight loss and should that be the only thing I can do this month, I can’t be too mad. Becoming more of an athlete gets easier when I’m smaller and stronger, I can wing it early season if needed. The house is in better shape than it’s been for a while, I just need to keep the momentum going. This is the year of momentum, after all!