Today’s score: Asthma 1 – Fitness 0

The weather today was hovering at around 54 by the time that I stepped into my back yard to work out. This is roughly equal to what it was during my previous, very good work out. The difference is that the ground is still damp from the rain that we had, and the air is much cooler today.

The cool air definitely has triggers my asthma. Compared to my previous work out I done maybe half as much jump roping and only just touched on one of the katas. I’m still lightly wheezing as it is.

Not good at all.

So today’s work out was significantly cut short, and to top it, the mud – of course – done a job on the lower area of my gi’s legs. Nothing a good washing won’t get out, I hope, it’s just irritating. Today’s attempt at fitness was terrible.

~bleh

Protesting To Be Outlawed In The U.S.?

Read about it here. Is protesting going to become illegal in the U.S.?

What next, arresting news crews under pretext of national security for filming or airing dissenting opinions?

Smatterings of A Dream, with a touch of CSI

Last night’s dream was pretty interesting, and had a fairly nice plot. As far as dreams go anyway.

The setting is something like London in the 1800’s. The buildings, clothing, and technology about matched that time period and setting. This was something of a vaneer, however, as the world had modern technology; it simply didn’t use it in day-to-day life.

I had the profession of a brick maker, or was otherwise something like a mason. This was a pretty good profession to be in and I was well respected in the community for the job that I done. Of course, I didn’t work alone: there was a slightly older fellow with unkempt white hair (think Einstein) that worked with me as well. He, too, was very well respected in the community.

You have to have a tragic occurrence to have CSI involved, and tragic it was.

George Bush and Tony Blair at The Gay Bar

This has to be one of the most amusing political videos that I’ve seen in quite some time. The editing is really great, and the way that both Bush and Blair look at each other, well, it didn’t need editing to make it fit the song. Whoever made this video are my heroes for tonight.

Click here to watch the video. As always, I recommend d/loading the iPod version since the quality of the Google Video stream is as terrible as ever.

~Mysk

Rainy Today

The rain fell in gentle sweeps, soaking the dust that had threatened the stainless white appearance of my karate gi just yesterday. Little puddles pitter-pattered, and the grass that had become parched yellow no doubt greedily soaked it all up.

I stood by the door and looked out the window at it all. There would be no working out today.

This rain was supposed to come yesterday. I guess everyone’s late now and then.

~Mysk
this post is a more interesting version of the “note to self” that was going to post.

Yay! New CPU Fan / Heatsink Installed

I am soooo glad to be rid of the buzzsaw sound, it was driving me nuts. The thing was so loud that I could hear it grinding / buzzing from two rooms away.

This evening I replaced it with a no frills Masscool fan / heatsink that has grease pre-applied. Excellent. This is especially useful because I have no Artic Silver at the moment.

The most beautiful part of this is that it’s so very, very quiet compared to my buzzsaw block. It’s something of a whisper, and I’d hardly be able to tell that the system was turned on if the side of the case was on. I have so, so much <3 for this quite quiet little thing.

….. this post being cut in half is brought to you by the character < . Unfortunately for you, you don’t get to read my rant about UPS. I’m sure that we’re all disappointed. *hears the massive “awwww” sound from here*

~Mysk, the sarcastic one.

All dressed up and no one to throw

For today’s work out I decided to get a bit nostalgic and put on the under armour shirt, the karate gi, and the belt. I miss going to the dojo, and wearing it was a bit more incentive to improve my physical condition.

I done the usual but I’m mixing it up a bit. I was told that jumping rope for about a minute or two and then walking quickly for one minute, then returning to jumping rope and repeating this process would burn calories faster than what I was doing. We’ll see, I guess, but this did make the work out a little more interesting.

This process did help prolong the work out, so I’m sure that I burned off more today than I normally would have simply out of excising longer.

After finishing with that, how could I resist going through some of the kata and such? I wanted to see if I could still do them, and… er, I think that I did. I wasn’t sure if I had a step or two of the katas correct, but I completed them fine otherwise.

It was very tiring, hah.

In all, the work out lasted for (I’m guestimating) an hour. That’s considerably longer than the 20 minutes that I would normally work out for. So combining the two seem to be a good method for working out, and I may do this more often. Additionally, the dojo outfit was relatively comfortable to work in.

I forgot to mention that it was about 54 degrees F. This is relatively cool. The under armour shirt done wonders, as always, and the rest of the gi helped keep me at a comfortable temperature.

Unfortunately, I was reminded about the ‘ol hip issue. Bah. Yes, still. I done side kicks from “horse stance”, walking to the side, and I could feel how it just wasn’t right in the hip. That really has to get fixed…

The push ups and sit ups were forgotten this time around, but I can always do them some time tonight.

Anyway, a very good work out aside from the pain in the hip.

~Mysk

Bananas And Tea

What a breakfast, eh? Two bananas and a cup of tea. I’ll probably have some oatmeal in a short while from now for something a bit more filling.

It was beautiful out yetsterday, at least before 5:00 PM or so rolled around. I managed to work out with the jump rope and get some speed walking in. It felt great to be exercising again, despite my asthma forcing me to quit earlier than I’d have liked.

Some push ups and sit ups were tacked on after the work out as well. The dog sticking his bum in my face as I’m doing my sit ups really adds a whole new dimension to things. First you want him to move, then you just hope that he doesn’t let loose a dog toot; those things are terrible!

Hm, the tea’s still a touch too hot to drink..

I really let my fitness go south during the winter. I’m very disappointed in myself for that, I didn’t have enough resolve. Doing exercises in the house, like those alternative jumping jacks that I found I could do in here, is a bit strange, but it would have been better than nothing.

As it is, I don’t expect to hit my fitness target in March. Bugger.

….hm, it’s almost drinkable.

Well off I go. Good morning all.

~Mysk

A Balance: Magic, Shmagic

In my previous post I proposed that a thought form of a fictional character could exist. In this post I’m going to go in the opposite direction and put the blog’s feet back onto some solid ground. This post could also be viewed as a bit of venting.

For awhile there, so-called “spell books” were pretty big sellers. It seemed like everyone was publishing some sort of “book of shadows” filled with rymes and suggestions of silly behavior that was supposed to make the person get their way. There was so much of it, in fact, that you can’t really take anything that you read today seriously.

What 99% of it boiled down to was being nonsensical self help books. These were books that were written to help people improve their self-esteem and their willingness to go out and do something. There was nothing “magicy” about them.

Page after page would have “spells” to get lovers, to get a job, to “glamour” others so that they respected you more. It’s nothing but mental masturbation.

Thinking About Thought Forms, and Belldandy

I’m going to kick off my new “Metaphysical Madness” category with something that I’m particularly fond of and lends itself well to this topic. In this post, I’ll be talking about “thought forms” and the much beloved character Belldandy.

If you’re familiar with the subject of thought forms then you no doubt already know where I’m going with this post. This is very much a 101, if even that, but it’s a very good example of the type of posts that I’ll write for this category. Of course, you’re free to read over this and then offer your own thoughts on the subject.

Let’s all have a little fun with it.

First, let’s take a look at a thought form that many of us have experienced at one point or another, and what exactly a thought form is.