history of April Fool's

 Originally every month began with a 'Fool's'. But over time people began to tire of it and they relegated the Fools to a single day in April when everyone is generally in a good mood on account of spring time. 

Terrible. Just terrible. Bring back a Fools day at the beginning of every month!

And! Another thing. It wasn't always about pranks. It was just about being foolish. The prank thing was also a negative PR campaign to make the holiday seem more annoying than it actually is. 

Oh what's a fool do? Yeah, they just lie. They just make stuff up to trick you.

No. That's not what a fool does. You see, they took the holiday about being a fool and they made it into one where you unwittingly become the fool. And you hate it because of course you do. One must willingly become the fool.

I'm beginning my campaign to reclaim April Fool's Day. 

Pete Holmes Silly Silly Fun Boy

 q-tips bit: delightful. wonderful

shoes off bit: divided the room and divided me. I like how he had fun with it but didn't land with me. I think you should take your shoes off. The ending was strong though. Gotta give him that.

"I ate ants. The insects. Not lady-uncles."

scorpion bit: 

"I can't have my last meal be ants!"

13th floor: Not my favorite. I thought the scorpion bit was still going.

phone bit: meh

office bit: OOO was funny

I'm pretty sure he did the dad phone bit when Crab and I saw him live.

Boston bit: good story. I like the Boston fantasy accent

Parent bit: I liked it. funny voice. 

Carousel bit: funny

Last words: IT SHOULD BE YOU!

"I kept yelling I'm okay but no one was checking."

closer: fun and sweet in a Pete Holmes way

Overall: I liked it! Very well put together. He's good at what he does.

if I was a god

 Me, personally, if I was a god...I would think it's really fun when people try to tempt fate by invoking my name. I would find that humorous. And then yeah maybe if I was in a bad mood one time I would make it come true. Just to let em know. Just to keep them on their toes. But usually I would ignore it and just laugh. 

And so I think you should tempt fate. That's cosmically funny. 

I still need to watch the Pete Holmes special crab recommended

 I still need to watch it. I will. I will watch it. Tomorrow actually. And I will post my thoughts. Here!

And! I'll say this.

What if every night before you went to sleep, like your last moment of consciousness every time, without fail, a little bug would appear in your mind's eye and say 'ben'. And you would call it the Ben Bug. Every time. But only at night, when you're actually going to bed to sleep. Not for a nap. And if you wake up early it doesn't happen again. And sometimes if you're hovering between awake and sleep it can glitch and you'll get this extended 'beeeeeeeeennnnnnnnnnn'. Would your life be different in any meaningful way if that was true? For you only? 

I've got an idea for a restaurant

 It'll serve food. And the whole gimmick is that we say "We can eat as much or little as you want!"

And all the portions will be regular portions. It's a regular restaurant in every way. But all the marketing is about how much choice you have.

"You can eat the whole plateaor just eat a couple bites!"

"If your first order isn't filling enough you can order more food and we'll give it you!"

"Heck, you can eat none of your first order and we'll still make you a second order."

We just really want people to appreciate how much freedom they have at this restaurant. We don't make you eat food you don't want to eat that you pay for. 

And we also don't tell you what order to eat it in. Guess what! You can drink as much or as little of your drink as you want too!

Your choices matter. And we will do everything to not get in the way of those choices.

scene

 The stage is totally dark. The house lights are off. The room is totally dark. The light outside and the neon sign is off. The night is totally dark. The moon is out. The stars are out. 

Not "out" in the sense that they're visible but "out" in the sense that you can't see them. Keep up.

The space behind your eyes is dark. Your guts are all completely dark. All you've ever known and come to expect is dark. Your future is dark. Your past is dark. The present? Also dark. Stay with me.

The owl hoots darkly. The frog peeps darkly. The dog howls darkly. The puddle sloshes darkly.

As dark as the inside of your shoe. As dark as the oven when it's off and closed in a dark kitchen with no lightbulbs in it. A clear window pane above the sink that separates darkness from darkness. 

Will there be a spark? Will there be a flicker?

The show begins in the dark. The show ends in the dark. Somewhere in the middle it was supposed to happen. Afterwards people are sure they saw it. Or, they're sure they saw it at least one time. Or, they're sure that they know someone who is sure that they saw it a long time ago. They're sure of it. It's definitely happened. Why would we all gather and hope and cheer if it never actually happened? Why would it all be set up this way if it never actually happened even once?

I was sick on Sunday and monday

 

Depending on whether you look out of the South or North windows in my apartment you either see trees or a dystopian landscape of buildings and roads and concrete plants. 

So the other day when I startled out of a restless 30 minute congested 'nap' at 4 in the morning and saw nothing but bleak concrete and steel I thought, 'I give up. I just give up.'

But then I looked out of other windows and I un-gave up. It's really just one specific angle you have to look out of to lose all hope. As long as you can avoid that you're okay.

 where my mind goes when I think about wanting to write. Remembering watching rented VHS movies that we would get on the way to Timberville. Still seeing the building on the side of the road on Route 42. Remembering the glow of the lamps and the static fuzz of the TV and feeling safe and warm. Remembering eating corn on the cob under the big tree in the green backyard. Asking, 'did I eat all of it?' and Maw Maw saying, 'a bird could clean the corn better than that.' Remembering the smell of the firewood in the basement and the heat of the furnace in the dark corner. The treadmill and the rowing machine and being tall enough to pull the metal cord of the lightbulb. The weight of the door to the basement and the creaking of the steps. The tartness of the cherry trees and climbing on top of the new shed to left of the old metal shed. The smell of oil and gasoline and seeing spiders and wasps. The light coming through the grape vine and learning to throw a frisbee and how to hit a ball with a bat and running laps around the horse. The feeling of not wanting to leave on Sunday afternoon. The taste of ice water from the tap and the heavy blankets that I would always kick off in my sleep. Each memory is precious. Each is a step on the path I have taken. 

hyacinth

 I think words are like a costume. You say certain words because you want to appear a certain way to the people around you. You want to reinforce that image to them and maybe even yourself. I guess that's what affirmations are. 

Some words aren't for me. Some words aren't for me to use. No not that word. I mean words like hyacinth. 

Every once in a while in my life I've encountered people who are entitled to the word hyacinth. Usually women. A man who uses the word hyacinth is incredibly dangerous. I should clarify that I mean outside of its strict botanical meaning. I mean a man who uses hyacinth in a figurative sense or to evoke a specific image. 

Women who use hyacinth are usually well-read poetry types who probably had a few close friends growing up and had enough emotional intelligence to realize that other kids didn't like them or understand them but they themselves were okay with that and accepted it for what it is. 

Today my fake burger meat was like a pink puddle instead of the normal patty shape consistency but I ate it anyway and so far it seems like I got away with it.

my sister got the pharmacy residency she wanted!

 yay Erin! I'm so proud of her! She works so hard and is such a great person!!!

here's what happens to plastic bottle caps

 a plastic bottle cap is born when it is pooped out of a machine and then mechanically attached to plastic bottle. then it sits in a store for what feels like forever because a plastic bottle cap has no sense of time. but it's also no amount of time and also forever. Then the drink gets purchased by me Andy and I consume the liquid and turn it into me but get rid of most of it where it ends up in the water cycle and probably the carbon cycle a little bit too. And maybe the dirt cycle. Anyway I keep the bottle cap and put it in my junk drawer by my coffee machine to mature and gather energy.

Once it has sat long enough and the weather gets nice then I take it out of the drawer and use a sharpie to inscribe an ancient and future rune on it and put it in a bag with other bottle caps that have undergone a similar process.

Now that bag sits on my shelf until I decide to take it to the rock climbing gym where it sits in the setter's closet and gathers energy there. 

I know what you're thinking. How's he going to save the world? How will this save the world?

Guess what, idiot. The world doesn't need saving. Because the world is the world and can't be destroyed in any meaningful way. That's where the bottle caps come in. One bottle cap is special and will be cast forward into time where it will absorb energy from the sinister sun that will appear next to our regular sun out of nowhere ten thousand years in the future. The sinister sun can destroy the Earth in a meaningful way.

But because I've sent the bottle cap forward in time to absorb energy from the sinister sun, it can return back to the present and incubate inside the Earth like a vaccine. And the Earth will develop antibody bottle caps that will sprout out of trees when the sinister sun radiation hits. Those bottle caps will destroy the sinister sun and fulfill the prophecy.\

I don't really know though your guess is as good as mine.

thank you crab! I do help the children be in the sky!

For the past two weeks I've felt like I've been on the verge of getting sick but it never fully hit and today I feel like I'm out of it and more in my body and brain than I have been. So that's good.

good good good.

was coaching all weekend

 Definitely my proudest moment in coaching with the comp team. This feels like the first year where I really understood what the Regionals competitions test and was able to apply that directly to the training. The kids work so hard and care so much and they were able to do their best climbing on the day OR they've gotten so good that even having an "off" day still let them reach their goals.

It was a big moment and I think the team is only going to get better while staying true to having fun. 

a true mark of distinction

 is to wear socks adorned with the likenesses of animals upon them. For everywhere you tread you will signal to all with eyes to see that you are aligned with the beasts of the earth, and the flying things, and the critters of the deep.

I hate crowds. I like people.

I ain't down with the plague but I'm cool with the beetles and bugs.

-Jesse Welles 

here's my anti-infantilization message

let's stop acting like we can't believe it when one day it's hot and the next day it's snowing.

I know. It's a big change. It feels sudden.

But surely we can imagine more. Surely anyone over the age of 12 or so has seen enough weather changes in the Spring to know that this type of thing can and does happen.

Let's broaden our imagination a little bit to consider a world without cars perhaps. Or not paving over large swaths of land to create heat islands and useless stupid infrastructure. Or put plants on roofs and stuff. 

I don't want to keep playing the tutorial and level one every time. Let's get to level two. Maybe try out level three? I don't know. Could be fun.

crab likes the dwelling series!

 thank you, crab!

here's a little amateur zoology lesson for you all, crabs are natural dwellers.

Recently I have devised what I call the 'dwelling index' which is how far a given creature travels from its home. Crabs score very high on the dwelling index because my understanding of most crab species tells me that they like to lurk in a safe spot and then rush out when opportunity comes along. 

And that's the way to do it.

Liver propaganda would have you believe that if you want to achieve something you can't just expect it to show up on your doorstep one day.

Um, excuse me, livers. Millions of years of evolution would beg to disagree.

Look at the noble eel, for example.

How did this proud creature make it to the top of charts of the animal kingdom? How did this beautiful beast become nearly synonymous with the word animal itself? 

Oh I don't know---by hanging out in a rock until it seems something cool and then lunging out and biting it!

I feel you hearing but not listening. Let me show you a picture:

Ignore the words for right now. This is a picture of a pyramid. And everybody falls somewhere on the pyramid. A lot of people, because of delusions of grandeur think they're probably close to the CPR SCORE zone. Wrong! 

You, me, crab, and eels are all down by Gross Margins and SG&A. The eels know this. And that's why they stand to triumph over the Monthly Overheads who walk around thinking their CPR Scores in their empty chasm skulls. 

I want to be clear. I'm not saying you shouldn't strive to be the best version of yourself that you can be. You should always strive for personal excellence in what you do. That's the dwelling way. Hone your craft. I'm saying that all of history and mythology and storytelling tells that the CPR Score zone is the death zone. Look at this:

The Story of Icarus. The story of Prometheus. Any Shakespearean Tragedy. Any Greek Tragedy. Scarface. That weird little movie that Donald Glover made like 10 years ago where a bloody golden tooth comes out of his nose. It's not compatible with being a human. 

And then you say, 'well I think eels are gross and weird and I want to be a hero!' 

Not the perfect analogy but close enough.

I don't know I feel like I got too serious. I feel like a person who showed up at school one day and made a presentation you never really understood but kinda thought about for a long time after and the teachers were clearly upset because this isn't what they thought they were getting.

I fancy myself a golden buffoon

 buffoon comes from the medieval Latin word 'buffo' meaning clown. 

A clown is someone who seriously undertakes the act of being foolish. What better thing to set seriousness against than fun and silliness?

a continuation of my dwelling series

 hello welcome back to my series on dwelling where I talk about why you shouldn't be focused on living you should be focused on dwelling and what that means.

today's episode is about dwelling like you're from earth. The planet earth. You are the thing the planet earth made. Alan Watts talks about this. Like rocks and oceans and volcanoes and trees, humans are a thing the planet made. You should dwell like you are a part of the planet.

Don't be allergic to things. Whatever it is you're allergic to, stop it. What are you, an alien? What do you mean your immune system reacts to something that won't harm you. Cut that out. 

Touch dirt every day. What a gift to touch dirt. The dirt and the sky are the two most important things. 

Be thought of as a bum. Today the children I coach told me I look like I could be a hobo. I say, 'yes. this is a sign that I am dwelling correctly.' My appearance and the impression it makes matches my values. Do you think yourself stylish? Do you think yourself well put together? Then you are a slave to images and figments. Aim to appear in all ways to have risen up from the dirt with breath inspired.

When you say words, think of the earth as burping them. Because the earth delights in itself and so should you.

a toothsome meal

 Gosh em golly I could really go for a toothsome meal right now. A toothsome meal to replenish and strengthen my hamstrings for I yearn for powerful hamstrings. The time stealer has once again purloined an hour from the day and now my inside clock is jumbled and I long for a toothsome meal and might haunches. 

Yes yes. What a day to be alive. In the 16th century the word 'toothsome' changed from meaning generally attractive to tasty food.

And now it is time I go to purchase grocery store time. The time when I think about how growing up, I was always told by adults describing the past that 'there weren't grocery stores back then'. Which should say something about how much grocery stores have impacted our lives. In a good way? Who can say?!

But I must continue my journey to get powerful legs because in the words of Socrates, "Get jacked, bro."

Look it up. He really said that.

Not really. He met this guy once who was out of shape and was like, 'you should be in good physical condition so you can be useful in war. And also it's pretty neat.'

 One time I remember I was taking this Shakespeare class with my favorite professor I had in college and we were reading Othello and this guy Othello ends up lying to his wife, Desdemona, and his life kind of unravels from there. But I remember there was a specific point in the play that our professor pointed to that was the moment Othello distrusts his wife and he talked about all the implications of that moment. I ended up emailing the professor because I found an earlier example in the play, maybe the first moment Othello speaks to Desdemona, that he could be considered lying. 

And I gave him the example and he responded with something defending his point and the logic of it and I was like 'yeah okay you win.' But I'll never forget that I saw him in class and he asked about it and I said, 'yeah you made a good point.' and he said, 'you believed that?'

Something to that effect. It never occurred to me until that moment that I could've been right or that I could have challenged his response. 

The other thing I loved about that professor is he would give very short quizzes on tiny slips of paper about the assigned reading and he would ask about the tiniest, seemingly trivial, details. Stuff you would never think of as important. And then during the lecture he would show how these tiny details were actually crucial to the themes and messages of the work. I remember it was annoying at first but then I took it as a challenge. He also loved to talk about etymologies and ask about obscure words in the text. 

He was a cool guy. Professor Savage. One time a student used the word 'savage' and he immediately interrupted them and said, 'that's an unfortunate choice of words'. Like he was really hurt by hearing it used in its normal context. 

you're like an apartment with plants inside of it

 One way to approach being a human is thinking about yourself as an apartment with plants inside of it. 

The apartment is your outside body and the plants are your inside body aka your spirit, your soul, your internal experience, your organs, your innards, and your viscera.

Isn't it kinda crazy that there's a little electrical current or spark or whatever that keeps your heart pumping and makes your brain work. electricity?? in your body? how'd it get in there? how do we pass it on? Electricity comes from a wall outlet not from your body. 

Anyway you gotta arrange your plants to get the proper amount of sun. Too much sun, plants get sunburned and shrivel up. Too little sun, plants don't grow as good. 

Are your blinds shut? Has the roof of your apartment been torn off and is completely exposed to the elements? Have you completely blocked off all entrances and exits to your apartment so nothing can get in or out? Do you have the right kind of plants for growing indoors? And let's not even start with watering. 

Andy why do you think you make so many analogies to plants and why do plants play such a large role in externalizing your experience? 

You'd probably think it's because I take care of them and there's a clear relationship between what I do and how the plants are doing but you'd be wrong because that's not the reason. The reason I do it is because it's correct in an absolute Kantian sense. 

But don't you think self-help is a kind of bankrupt genre of writing that is trying to put a band-aid over atomization and the loss of community and shared cultural experience? It's just another example of putting risk and responsibility on the individual. In what world does it make sense that a person born into a world and community without their consent be judged insufficient and denied community and food and water?

Growing up this idea of personal responsibility was very important and I agree that it makes sense in a lot of ways but I have this memory of it being set against the idea of 'you can't just give people things without making them work for it or testing them some way.' Society is a pyramid and the people at the top are at the top because they're the best people. If you tried to make it a square or a rectangle or whatever it wouldn't work. And it's so blatant and undeniable now that the excesses we were warned about are all at the top. We didn't filter power and responsibility to the most deserving. The most powerful hoarded it all for themselves. None of this is new, obviously. I think part of me wanted to be in denial. 

One thing I'm trying to process is the difference between personal responsibility as it relates to being a productive part of a system that lets a complete idiot become the richest man in the world and personal responsibility that participates as much as needed to still have a life that is meaningful to me. 

I got called 'a shiny light of happiness' today at work

 And where I come from THAT'S PRETTY GOOD!

A favorite bit I like to do at coaching is saying 'that's pretty good where I come from!'

And they say 'where do you come from?'

And I say, 'Harrisonburg.'

Responding to Crab's Comments:

March 2nd: I can fix you. The blog can fix you.

February 26th: I'll check out Caligula's Horse, specifically In Contact!

February 23rd: This guy is still doing BAD.

February 23rd: I think they're cancelling taxes this year on account of the government actively casting off any possible credibility and legitimacy.

every season can be split into two distinct halves and the halfway point is a holiday

Winter: Early winter starts after Thanksgiving and is before Christmas and New Years. Late winter is after and runs until roughly St. Patrick's Day or Daylight Savings starting.

Spring is split by Easter and runs until Memorial Day.

Summer is split by July 4th and runs until Labor Day.

Fall is split by Halloween and runs until Thanksgiving.

For Summer and Winter, the early part is a fun time of transition and change. 

As I'm writing this I'm also realizing that the solstices and equinoxes also play similar roles to everything I'm describing but I would argue that those are slightly off and the real noticeable changes happen around the holidays. 

Late half of Summer and Winter is where they really go whole hog.

Is this anything? Season commentary? Talking bout how late summer feels? 

Here's my new idea. If you've stuck it out this far. 

Early Winter- everybody works. We've gotta get ready for the holidays. Commercial activity has to take place. Whatever we can get done from Thanksgiving to New Year's. That's working time.

Late Winter- No working. Work shuts down. It's too cold. The days are too short. You have to rest and recover and sleep.

Early Spring- No working. The weather is too fickle. You've gotta wake up slowly. Maybe a little bit of work. Maybe. 

Late Spring- Working. Nature is reviving. Blooming. The world is green again. Full of energy. The sun has returned. Time to be passionate and thriving.

Early Summer- No working. You've gotta have fun. If not now, when? When will you have fun? 

Late Summer- No working. It's too hot! Are you kidding? No way. Keep having fun. It's growing season.

Early Fall- Working. Harvest time. It's cooling down just a little bit so you can think again. Be productive.

Late Fall- You could make a strong argument for working here BUT you gotta remember that we already committed to working in early Winter and so if we work in Late Fall that's three working periods in a row and that's crazy. Maybe you can choose if you would prefer to work Late Fall or Early Winter but not both.

Anyway so that's my 8 blocks of the year: 3 of which include working and 5 of which don't. I think if we implemented this system everyone would be more meaningfully productive and happier and everyone but the bloodsucking demons would be better off.

today I learned about professional wrestler, Ryusuke Taguchi

 AKA Masked Horse

His origin story is that he was abandoned by his parents and raised by horses. Then, he was abandoned by those horses and raised by a professional wrestler.

And isn't that really the story of everyone's lives? At some point you move out and leave your parents and work and/or live for some thing and then eventually you have to leave that thing and be with some other third thing. 

Baker Mosquito: guy who was taken in by mosquitoes and then abandoned and taken in by Baker mosquitoes.

Croc Fisher: Guy who was used as bait for gator fishing gets eaten by gator and ends up fishing for gator bait in gator's stomach.

Whale Salesman: Guy who sells whales ends up being sold to whales to sell guys to other whalesman.

Bird Porch: Guy builds a porch for birds on his regular porch but the birds build a bigger porch on the bird porch and rebrand his porch the man porch.

Italian Werewolf: Guy is bit by an Italian and cast out from society for his transformation and falls in with a werewolf commune who use him to help invade the were-italian base.

I met a woman today who was mad about the state of the world

 but she also wanted to be mad. she would've been mad no matter what state the world was in.

I am sometimes reminded by the world that you can never go 'full bitter'.

opera used car salesman

I just saw this video of this guy standing in front of a Corvette at a used car lot and pitching it while singing opera

this used corvette

it was a dream to drive

it can be yours

for the small price

come here now

ask for Andrew

It was really good, the guy can actually sing. And it's funny because of the contrast and all. And someone in the comments was like 'Shame that this guy has to sell used cars instead of singing.'

Which is true and I agree BUT, at the same time, it is also absolutely true that if that guy was just straight up singing opera in a opera house, opera-style that same person wouldn't care. Not nearly as many people would care. 

It's why T-Pain sang with auto tune even though he can actually sing well. No one cares about another guy who can sing well.

It's why I put paintings on craigslist free stuff. 

The juxtaposition is more important than the parts themselves.

Don't be a big fish in a small pond. Or a small fish in a big pond. 

Be the right fish in the wrong pond. 

what do you want to run a business?

 you want to run a multi-national corporation? or be in charge of a bank or large sums of money and assets? Is that your aspiration in life? To command respect and power through capital? To exploit the weak and people who have enough sense to know that they have to share this planet with everyone and to take what they need and be grateful for what they have? None of that appeals to you? Your just want to grow and grow like a tumor and have conspicuous wealth and bankrupt the environment and make the world a worse place for everyone who comes after? You want to fill with pus like a festering sore and create the conditions for atrocities to take place on the daily like a well-oiled machine? Constant growth is an aberration. And its fruits are on display for all to see. 

Assembling Raw Data into a Storyline

 I run the climbing league at the gym and the main challenge is taking the data from the climbs people do and converting that into points and then taking those points and crafting a story out of it. You want people to be invested and excited about the outcome. There's not much inherently exciting about it because you don't see the action as its happening. It's like narrating a sporting event where you only ever see the scores instead of the home runs or touchdowns or alley-oops themselves. 

And so as part of that narrative I've crafted a persona as a fraught and capricious commissioner who is fast and loose with wielding his authority and intentionally stirs the pot. I try to incite as much drama as possible because the worst thing people can be is bored.

The problem is when people want to participate in the bit and accost me and call into question the validity of the whole operation and do the very same dramatic narrative crafting that I'm trying to do but I get overwhelmed and defensive and, on the whole, too sensitive about it.

But that's okay. 

The test of a true rabble-rouser is that even he grows to fear the rabble he hath roused.

what did I make on this day in 2015?

 

I made this comic when I was 23 years old, in the middle of student teaching which I often tell people was the worst time in my life but at least I made this comic. 

mark my words

 I will do my taxes this year. As I have done every year since I was born.

And I will bring you along for the ride.

What new awful things will TurboTax do this year? 

Stay tuned and find out.

Vote in the comments for when you think I should do my taxes.

The top comment will be considered unless I don't want to do my taxes that day. 

I'll negotiate with the top comment for when I do my taxes. And then ridicule or ignore the lower comments.

this is going to be a pretty boring post about sprint training

 BUT stick around until the end and I will pay my electric bill and renew my vehicle registration!

got back on the track today after about a month-long hiatus. took video of myself.

times were not great so I was frustrated in the moment BUT I also got video and upon watching it back a few times and comparing it to older videos I realized that I'm doing a much better job of extending and straightening my leg as it's coming down into the ground. So that's good. Even while being moody and just trying to run 'hard', my form still noticeably improved.

my big goal for the year is to break 12 seconds in the 100 meters and the biggest form change I'm going to focus on is keeping my leg straight while landing. that's going to make me run 'taller' and also my center of mass will pass over a straight leg faster than a bent squishy leg which equals faster running.

Steps to straighten my leg while sprinting: mentally cue it and practice running with exaggerated form. straight leg one legged hops for distance. sprinting while trying to keep my legs straight. doing can-cans. modifying the speed drills I already do to focus on keeping a straight leg. 

I'm pretty sure the need to bend my legs comes from having weak hamstrings so I'm going to continue strengthening my hamstrings with deadlifts and hamstring curls. also banded kicks.

I'm confident the strength training and drills I'm doing are helping me improve and it's a matter of continuing that work and getting used to sprinting on the track again which I'm confident will come back fairly quickly.

alright time to pay my electric bill...

done

alright time to renew my vehicle registration...

done

I thought I was going to write more about sprinting but I'll end by emphasizing how gratifying it was to see a noticeable improvement in my form. Sprinting is fun but it does feel like beating your head against a wall sometimes trying to figure out how to get better and so for me to take video of myself and identify something worth changing and then actually finding a way to change it feels really good. If I hadn't taken video today I would've been pretty disappointed with my performance even though I can tell just by feel that I'm running differently and have gotten stronger. 

I ran 6.60 for my first flying 50m sprint and I thought to myself 'you're washed up old man. you're done. hang up. it was nice while it lasted but looks like this it.' And I knew that wasn't true but I did think it in the moment. 

 

there's monsters. there's real flesh-and-blood demons and they hide behind power and prestige

 does nationalism or the nation state as a concept help to serve the interests of common people or does it help powerful people further consolidate power?

something about knowing you need to drink more water and then drinking more water and feeling better feels humiliating

 'drink more water' is like the 'do unto others' of health advice.

you need to be reminded of it because you aren't doing it enough but you get reminded so much that it stops feeling necessary so it just becomes background noise until you remember, 'oh yeah. it actually IS super important.' crazy

I take some amount of pride in thinking that I took good care of myself and then you find out you aren't drinking enough water and it's like 'well shooooooot' that's really like step one isn't it?

another simple joy in my life

 people notice something I'm wearing or holding and say, "is that new?"

And then I say,

"HA! New to YOU!"

It's a pretty needlessly rude thing to say to someone who's just trying to make a friendly observation but I like to imagine that I have all sorts of esoteric knowledge and wisdom that I've known for years and is only just now apparent to wide-eyed green-horned first-rodeo individuals.

Maybe don't do this one. It never gets a laugh or a good reaction.

I will keep doing it though.

actually, go HARD

 One piece of running wisdom that I've accepted for a long time but recently started to question is the idea that most of training should be done with a controlled approach. If you watch videos of athletes and their coaches doing workouts you'll often hear the coach saying that the most important thing is that they stay relaxed--"RELAX! RELAX!!" The whole video is them screaming "RELAX!!" They'll say that the only time they want to go 100% is during a race or maybe a few key workouts leading up to a big race. 

"RELAX! RELAX!"

The idea is that going too hard too often can fry the nervous system and slow recovery between sessions. It's like there's a continuum between Low Intensity, High Volume that Produces Little Stimulus for Adaptation and High Intensity Low Volume that Produces  High Stimulus for Adaptation. And most training plans seem to want to aim for like 80% Intensity. That seems to be where most people can train the longest without breaking down and still get a fruitful response. 

It all seems very sound and there's plenty of anecdotal and clinical evidence to support it but something really irks me about coaches preaching RELAX! and DON'T PUSH in workouts. Yesterday I was reading this tweet from Steve Magness about how the way the brain and body perceive discomfort is super subjective. If you tell an athlete to relax and go easy, then you're priming their system to notice any discomfort and it tends to make the reps feel harder. By the same token, races where athletes push as hard as they can can feel relatively easy. You're priming the body to ignore as much as discomfort as possible for the sake of performance. 

Caveat: it is absolutely the case that you can assign 4 reps in a workout and an athlete goes way too hard on the first one and can't run the last 3 reps with any quality. But I would argue that thinking about relaxing and staying controlled and patient isn't the only way you can achieve smart pacing. You can try hard and still pace well. 

my favorite use of social media is giving my mom kudos on her runs on strava

 that's a simple joy of my day

I think you should buy a heated blanket

 if I had to guess the percentage of people who own heated blankets I'd say confidently that it's not enough. you need a heated blanket. those things are good. don't believe me? ask me!

Um, yeah, I'm right about that. Heated blanket best sleep you've ever gotten in your life kid don't even question about thinking it. Regular blanket no heat from the blanket whatsoever heated blanket heat from the blanket makes all the difference.

feel like the club kids have been throwing me a lot of curveballs lately

 Things have just felt a little more hectic than usual. I blame the cold and how much school they missed. Everybody's routine is off. I'm proud of myself though for how I've had patience while still maintaining boundaries and structure. I like that working with kids can still be challenging and make me question how I can be better. I know I'm a better coach than I was a year ago and two years ago.

I like having tough times because it reminds me why I do what I do.

another story from the comp a week ago

 this kid I coach was on a slab climb where he didn't have anything to put his hands on and he was balancing on this really slippery piece of textured wood and his foot pops off and as he's sliding down his shin brushes against what he was standing on and takes off a good patch of skin. And immediately on his face I can see he's in so much pain and he's hobbling away from the climb and the judge asks if he wants his score card back and he musters up politeness from deep within himself and very calmly says, "no thank you" and takes the card and goes back to wincing and limping. I was amazed at the composure he was able to summon.

We were running out of time fast in the comp and he had another climb he wanted to try and so to cover his raw shin he takes the band-aid he'd placed on his bloody knuckles at the beginning of the competition and moved it to his shin. Not a sanitary move whatsoever but it demonstrated is drive and determination in a way I have rarely seen.

everything has a quality you can cherish it for

 you can cherish something for being big

wow! I just made a BIG mistake!

you can cherish something for being small

my W2 form came on such a SMALL paper! I feel like they're not normally that small. Why is it so small?! I cherish that!

you can cherish something for being yellow

yellow M&M. you're the dumb one. and the red one is the angry one. but I don't think dumbness is a quality inherent to the color yellow. I cherish you all the same

Sometimes when I feel like using fancy words I like to get in people's faces about it and ask them if they know what the word means because I think they probably don't and then I tell them what it means by using simpler words and then they'll say "WELL WHY DIDN'T YOU JUST USE THAT WORD' and then I smile because they've fallen right into my trap and then I say "Because the human experience is endlessly vast and varied and occurs and infinite detail so why would not want as many colors as possible to paint with?!"

Which is true. If you give all the burden of being understood to the speaker and none to the listener then yes you should be as specific as possible BUT it's just as easy to put the burden on the listener and say 'I like the painting because it's BIG and YELLOW' and as the listener if you dismiss that as trite and banal it's because you didn't take the time to consider how cherishing something for being big and yellow is actually a beautiful thing to do.

big pile of snow outside of sign making business had sign on it that said 'FREE SNOW'

tell on myself

 "Maybe you should tell on yourself more," he says to me.

"What's that?" I say back.

"Well you keep doing things you're not supposed to do and then someone goes and tells on you and get in a lot of trouble. Why not skip the middle step and tell on yourself instead of waiting around for someone else to do it?"

"Won't I just get in trouble faster that way?"

"No. No. No. It's a brave and honorable thing to admit your own faults. Everyone is doing something wrong all the time so it's very honest to confess."

"I don't think it works that way."

"Sure it does. If you do something wrong because it's convenient for you in that moment and then admit to doing it--all you've done is exert your will without shame. It's much worse to not act at all or to act but then have someone else talk about it--you'll seem a coward."

I rip out the Tree of Life by its roots and throw it into the Sun. The world freezes and burns as it ceases to turn.

responding to a conversation I had this weekend

 To some extent I understand the logic of, I'm going to give people I care about a hard time or challenge them or antagonize them because I want to inoculate them against the people out in the world who are going to do that. But I think the emphasis should overwhelmingly be placed on caring and understanding. I'd put it at ratio of 9 parts understanding and support to 1 part teasing. 

Yeah I'm sure if someone only ever received support and never got any push back, they'd probably be overly devastated when some stranger tried to antagonize them. But I think the inverse is way more dangerous. If you teach someone that the people who care about you are supposed to be mean to you, you're gonna end up drawn to horrible people OR you're not going to know how to assess someone who decides to show you support and they could be genuine and you don't trust them or they don't have your best interests and you can't see that because they're telling you things you've always wanted to hear. 

Priority number one should be being safe, stable, unequivocally supportive and that's your baseline you can work from. But if you don't have that then all the other stuff gets really screwy. 

ipad doodles

random bit of word thinking

 I was looking about the etymology for the word 'saint' and it was pretty boring. It was just some Latin word for sacred that sounds like saint.

But then I found the Old English version 'hallow' which shares the same root as 'holy' and basically in Old English the word for holy, 'halig' was derived from the word for 'whole' which was 'hailaz' and so a connection is made between things being sacred and divine and things being complete and healthy and whole. 

That's kinda cool I think. The Greek word 'hagios' also means divine and sacred but its connotation is 'different' or 'set apart from'. 

I think that's a very different sense of divine and I think the Greek sense is how most people interpret the word holy. The Old English version feels much more earthy and worldly. 

Which would you prefer? A divine that is separate and set apart or a divine that is healthy and complete and whole?

story from coaching at a climbing comp

 Today I was standing with this kid I coach and he's a great kid who got into climbing a little over a year ago and now he's competing in his first season and today was his third competition and it was at a gym that tends to set notoriously hard climbs. So we're standing there in front of this climb watching other people do it and making a plan and this kid I'm coaching is a good climber and he works really hard and I know he's going to be great if he wants to stick with it but there are still some moves that he's not as comfortable with and this climb looks like it's going to be a challenge for him. But he's got a great attitude and he's open to failing at things because he knows it's going to make him better in the long run.

This other kid is right in front of his, about to get on the climb, and the kid looks back and receives some directions from his coach and then he walks up to the start and sends the climb with relative ease. He looked good. He drops down to the mats and gets his scorecard from the judges and calmly walks back to where we are and his face immediately turns red and he begins sobbing uncontrollably. He sits down right in front of us and pulls his shirt over his face and keeps bawling. His coach walks over to comfort him and me and the kid I coach both kind of tastefully look away and act like we don't notice and after about 10 to 15 seconds of us standing in dead silence the kid I coach says, dry as a bone, 

"Well, that was encouraging."

I lost it. But then I had to quickly regain it because it looked like I was laughing at the crying kid which I wasn't.

one month of 2026 DOWN!

ha! easy work!

I could handle 11 more of these before this year gives up

just like all the others

Years I've Felled:

2005. 1998. 2013. 1994. 2020 AND 2021!

1994 was so easy for me I don't even remember anything from it. Barely a challenge at all.

I also still contend that I have a strong case to be considered The Baby That Toppled The Soviet Union.

All it took was exactly 8 months of me being alive and it was officially dissolved. 

"I am a time fish that swims through time at a rate of one second per second"

 when I was a kid I would go down the street to the neighbor's trampoline and jump around for what felt like hours and have really elaborate daydreams about what the world would be like if it was all snow and ice all the time everywhere. In the daydreams I would slide and zoom around and hang out in these cool underground snow tunnels. 

Today I got to live out that fantasy in real life and like most things my stupid child mind came up with, it was actually terrible. I couldn't take two steps without almost slipping and busting my entire self. Took me like an hour to do my normal walk. You see all the car exhaust on the snow and think 'dang we really live like this huh?'

No but actually it was pretty fun. I've never seen a large clear field of smooth shining unbroken ice. 

things that played on repeat in my head while I was digging my car out of the ice yesterday

 he has songs of wildebeests and angels. he has soared on the wings of a demon...

are you really letting a MAN block your shine right now? a MAN block your shine?

don't pop your tire with the chisel don't pop your tire with the chisel don't pop your tire with the chisel

and if you don't love me now, you will never love me again, I can still hear you saying I would never break the chain

One way you could think about the weather is that every day there's a new weather-related challenge for you to overcome but usually in Central Virginia the challenge isn't very hard. nearly non-existent even. So it's not a very good way to think about the weather.

who named the school buses?

 the age old question. which came first? the school or the bus?

let's ask the answer to all of life's questions: ETYMOLOGY!

The word bus, surprisingly enough, is a shortened version of the word 'omnibus' which is latin for 'for all' and means a collection of stuff published all together that was previously published separately. An omnibus was also a horse-drawn vehicle--the precursor to the modern bus, some might say. Google traces the first uses of 'omnibus' to the 19th century. 

It is not too far of a stretch, in my opinion, to say that the word 'bus' is a shortened version of a phrase that essentially means, 'THE FOR EVERYONE WAGON'

And I think that's really great.

Meanwhile, the word school comes from the Greek word for leisure?! Like the ancient Greek word referred to where you would go after working to discuss philosophy and hang out with the boys.

MY DREAM! MY DREAM! If only we lived in a world where 'school bus' meant 'the for everyone wagon that takes you to where you can hang out with the boys after work'.

See what they've stolen from us!? See what they've done. 

Not the metal tube that takes children to the place where they're molded to provide value for shareholders and/or end up in prison. Not that! Not like that!

aw geez. aw geez.

I'll tell you who named school buses. The wrong people. How could you take those two words that are great in their source and nature and make them into what you did. Oh geez.  

this is a new character I've come up with

 one time, my father came home very late and he told us that while he was at the 7/11 a man hit his truck with his car and drove off. for he was possessed by the great googly mooglies. and he did not know what he was doing. I was glad my father was okay. My mother was mad that my father had been out so late. Why were you out so late anyway? Searching for googly mooglies?

And then later, years later, I went to that 7/11 at three in the morning with my friends. And we went inside and no one else was there. The door was unlocked and we walked around for a few minutes and no one came out and we got scared and left. There were googly mooglies out and about that night for sure.

My father doesn't go out at night anymore. The only time he goes out is when my sister is home and can drive him. He says he is going to see "the night people." The people out at night. 

The one time I saw night people was in college when my friends and I tried to drive to Richmond but we went the wrong way on the interstate by accident and drove to Virginia Beach instead. Walking along the boardwalk. Those were night people. They moved on a different plane of existence and we could see them but they couldn't see us and we didn't want them to see us. 

In the Bible Adam gives names to all the livestock, the birds, and the beasts of the field. But he never named bugs or shrimp or slugs or school buses. 

as someone who hates the bypass by my apartment

 it gave me no small amount of joy to see it rendered useless by the snow and ice we were visited by today

another thing I was thinking about was how in college it became this thing during the study period before finals for people to flood the library and make a show of how much time they were spending there.

but you know that they weren't actually studying. they were just going to make a show of it. it was a mass emptiness. I've done it. Everyone's done it. 

Everyone's gone to the emptiness where nothing really happens and you can look around and see that everyone else is at the emptiness and it's safe because no one is doing anything or experiencing anything. everyone is there and there's nothing for you to not get or miss out on because there's nothing there at all.

"oh were you at the thing?"

"yeah I was at the thing. I saw the thing just like you."

"oh yeah me too I saw the thing."

I don't know. Rah Rah Rah! I don't like the thing everybody else likes! I'm unique. I'm so special. But it's still true. You need to be DWELLING.

DWELLING I SAID!

watching the snow fall and listening to fully retractable by soul coughing

 I do indeed and shall continue

dispatch the shiftless man to points beyond

 one thing I yearned for today was being a person who hasn't heard about all the snow we're going to get. It probably is important that people know about it and are able to prepare but in my experience it won't affect my day-to-day life that much and I like to imagine how it would feel to experience a big snow without any prior warning and also would it be like to live outside of information like that. In many ways it would probably be isolating and alienating. 

today I thought about birds and how they can probably tell the big snow is coming. that's so awesome for birds. 

another victory for birds. just like always. they keep winning. 

most beautiful animal- birds.

most bestest flyers- birds.

lays the most delicious eggs- birds.

sings the most beautiful songs- birds.

collector of shiny trinkets- crows. which are birds.

they refuse to stop winning and respect it so much

"he's never met a room he was able to read"

I love Cat Clyde so much

 Found this song today. Everywhere I Go. link to YouTube here

reminded me of Maw Maw and Paw Paw

I think of you everywhere I go

I hope you know I hope you know

And as the rain it turns to snow

This heart that beats under the fold

It shifts it shape like tides that roll

But keeps the rhythm fast and slow

Time it beats to and fro

As thoughts of you like April snow

Linger in my heart so deep

That piece of you I always keep

There goes my skin

Shedding again

I keep walking on a path that never ends

As birds fly by the moment too

Rides on the wind and passes through

Above the earth above the clouds

Above where strangers stand in clouds

Fire licks the wood to ash

Telling me that nothing lasts

But of the seeds that died and grew

Everywhere I carry you

There goes my skin

Shedding again

I keep walking on a path that never ends

There goes my skin

Shedding again

I keep walking on a path that never ends

I think of you everywhere I go

I hope you know I hope you know

who cares if you're living or not?! the real question is ARE YOU DWELLING?!??!

 Me. I am dwelling. I am a dweller. One who lives by being in a place. Where I dwell.

The definition of dwell is to "live in or at a specific place." 

It comes from the Old English dwellan meaning 'lead astray, hinder, or delay' and in Middle English meant 'tarry or remain in place.'

You get the sense that it's a place where you lingered on your way to something else.

And is that not life?! Is it not?! A place you ended up for a time on your way to something else? Dwelling.

I am going all in on dwelling in 2026 and maybe for the rest of my life.

This blog is now a dwell blog. Where I will expound upon the differences between living and dwelling. 

Living? Ephemeral. Fleeting. Chasing around one illusion after another. Like if you've ever been out on flat water and seen up ahead some shimmering shiny water and then when you get there and look down it's the exact same water where you were before but now the shimmering shine has moved further up ahead. That's living.

Me? I'm dwelling. I'm staying in the spot of water I found and when I wait for a moment the fish come out of hiding and a whole underwater world is revealed to me because I took the time to remain still in one place for a while. That's dwelling baby. 

You're just gonna chase the shine your whole life? A fool's errand. A Seward's folly!

I'm dwelling. There's only one place. Right here. There's only one time. Right now.

one time in 6th grade they had us watch this like CNN for Kids news segment

 we'd watch it every couple of weeks in the middle of the day and I remember they had this story about this 'wacky' new charismatic leader of Russia called Vladimir Putin and they were like 'ohmygosh look at this guy! he's so popular! he has pop songs about himself!' And then they cut to these Russian women singing

something something in Russian Vladimir Putin 

And our teachers were like, wow. look at that guy, huh?

And then another time the teachers felt the need to tell the whole class that it was good that the US was invading Iraq. And it was something that needed to be done and we were doing it for the right reasons.

Fast forward like ten years and I would go to this open mic at this diner in Harrisonburg and there was this guy I really liked who would sing songs and he had this song called "Don't Trust the Government". I've written about this before. He also sang the first version of Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left by Andrew Bird I ever heard. 

The verses in Don't Trust the Government were about all the sneaky corrupt things the government does and then for the chorus he'd sing in kind of a low spooky voice

dooooon't trust. the goooooovernment.

If you'd asked me at the time I probably would've said something like 'well yeah, sometimes the government lies. Or some people are corrupt, obviously.' But also, Obama was president. Clearly there were at least some people in charge who wanted to do the right thing. Or, at the very least, most people in the government have relatively boring jobs and are making decisions that most people in the same situation would make. 

That was probably the biggest counter in my mind to any sort sensationalist claims about the government or how the world worked-- well it's actually more boring than that. If you're getting really upset about anything, well, that's just being overly emotional and you should just let the machine roll on because being upset doesn't accomplish anything anyway and also it's fine. 

And then I was 34 and the president was a senile 79 year old man saying he wants to take over Greenland because he didn't win the Noble Peace Prize. And my whole life the message has been let it happen. you can't do anything about it. if you're upset it's because you don't understand. it's going to happen anyway.

one thing about me: I love being thought about when I'm not around

 I think that is one of my fundamental motivations in life. To exist in the minds of others while not physically around them. It's a feeling of like, "Yes! I did it! I beat death! I transcended space and time!"

One thing I also love doing is I've reached a point where people ask me to write recommendations for them and that's so fun and great. People I love and think are great ask me to tell other people how great they are. And I'm all over it. This is the easiest thing in the world.

That's me bearing my soul to you for the day. 

Stay tuned for tomorrow where I will think of something else to say.

 One time I gave my best friend in high school a ride home and we were hanging out and he goes, "Hey. You want to see something?"

And then he took me over to his barn and there was a whole entire golf cart in like the hay loft area. 

And he was like, "Yeah, the Russians in the neighborhood stole it from the high school and needed a place to hide it so they hid it here." 

do you guys think the whole financial system and also the government is just a criminal organization with good marketing?

 like the whole thing. all of it. 

 I had this moment today where I was like 'why is everyone talking? why does everyone keep talking? why is everyone talking and no one is saying anything? no one is saying anything and they just keep talking.'

And that was an anti-social moment for me. 

but!

The lady at the bank was kind of flirting with me today. And that was very fun. So that is what I will choose to remember from this day.

what seems to be is always better than nothing, nothing at all

 Many of you-- all of you, in fact-- will recognize this line as the end of the chorus of the immortal Doobie Brothers's song What A Fool Believes, sung by Michael McDonald and cowritten by Michael McDonald and Kenny Loggins. 

The song goes, guy and a lady used to be together and then they meet back up and the guy thinks something will happen and the lady knows nothing will. 

And it should be obvious to the guy but he's a fool who believes and so no wise man has the power to reason away his belief.

What I'm trying to say is

AI Psychosis has made liars out of Michael McDonald and Kenny Loggins. No, it can actually be really dangerous to believe something in spite of all evidence to the contrary and you should listen to smart people in your life who know things. Or, just accept you don't know. 

The world in What a Fool Believes is a world where two people can have a significant disagreement and yet at no point are they threats to each other. They live in different realities but how they treat each other in this is never questioned. 

oh here comes ol' bingle basketball

 Ol' bingle basketball bringing a big ol' casserole.

that's it. we got it one.

that's the post. everybody go home early today we did it.

Pastamole. Like a Pasta Mole. Like a subterranean mammal whose body has undergone radical transformations to thrive while burrowing through enriched macaroni product. 

horrible horrible awful nightmare creature. if you leave out spaghetti too long this abomination will end up making tunnels in it to eat worms. But the worms are the spaghetti. So it's an inverse situation where it's eating dirt?

What's the dirt?

Ground beef in the red sauce. Duh! 

Here comes ol bingle basketball bringing a big ol' bowl of pastamole casserole.

 Back in like 2018 I bought this little device that looked like a portable radio because it was a portable radio but it also had an option where you could plug in an aux and use it as a speaker and you could record anything that you played on it. Great device. I put 143 songs on it over the course of like 5 years and then one day it stopped being able to record songs to it and I stopped using it.

But anyway today I decided to use it again because I've been trying to pay attention to how I feel before working out and doing things and I thought the music would give me a boost and the songs made me so happy. It was like seeing an old friend. Remember my brockhampton phase? No. Of course you don't. I forgot about my Brockhampton phase. But hearing the opening to GOLD. So good. SO GOOD.

And I know it doesn't even seem worth remarking that music made me feel good. But like, the older I get the more I think I deprive myself of music in a way. Or more so that I don't feel like I need music to regulate my mood. I'm baseline okay. Pretty good even. I don't know what I'm saying. Deprive yourself of music, I guess. 

Few things will make you happier than hiding parts of yourself for you to rediscover later.

my ring finger on my left hand is way weaker than the ring finger on my right hand

 why would that be? I dunno. But I bet if I strengthen it my left hand will stop being weaker than my right hand

more adventures in RPR

 So way back at the end of September, on 9/30, I tested my finger strength using a 20mm edge and loading plate and with my left hand I briefly lifted 125 pounds and with my right hand I lifted 130 pounds. I also held 105lbs for 7 seconds and then 8 seconds on my left hand and 11 seconds and 10 seconds on my right hand. 

My finger strength has not improved since that day. Twice a week for months I've been doing the same tests and sometimes it's been a little worse or a lot worse and some days it's been about as good. Nothing has moved the dial.

Today I did a full RPR warm-up, or at least my understanding of it. I did the belly breathing. I activated the diaphragm. I activated my psoas and my glutes and my lats and shoulders and all the places. I thought about my sympathetic nervous system and tried to put myself in a performance mode. 

Left hand held 105lbs for 9 seconds and then 9 seconds again which is only a 1 second PR but lately I've been lucky to be around 5 seconds. And normally if I get a longer hold, like if I get 7 or 8, usually my second attempt will go down to like 3 or 4. To hold 9 seconds twice was huge.

Right hand held 105lbs for 21 seconds! Crazy. Absolutely bonkers. One time I did 15 seconds and lately I've hovered right around 10. To jump to 21 seconds was crazy. And then I loaded up 135lbs and just barely hovered that off the ground. But that was huge. I've been stuck at 130 for a long time.

Also my legs feel lighter and bouncier. The psoas and glute activation is definitely real. 

I haven't been able to find any information about any spots that would activate the forearms. I just guessed it would be around the bicep. There's like this spot on the inside of your elbow where a lot of nerves and muscles meet so I messed around with that. I didn't send my moonboard climb which would've been the icing on the cake but I made some small progress so that was good too. 

I'm bought in. This horse has wheels.

RPR and belly breathing

 A year and a half ago, so April 2024, I began a journey to try to get better at sprinting. That very quickly led me down some Youtube rabbit holes where these guys are talking about the philosophy of speed training and all this sports science. Most of the information out there I think is pretty useless but a couple guys I found really seemed to know what they were talking about and made sense to me. 

In addition to all the speed training stuff they were talking about, they had this thing called RPR which involved a lot of belly breathing, relaxation, and activating different parts of the body like the psoas and the glutes by touching different parts of the abdomen and the back of the head. Initially I tried it because the claims they made about its effectiveness were pretty incredible and then very quickly I was like, 'yeah this is too out there for me. I just want to run hard and get fast.' 

Recently though I've come back to it because I'm starting to feel like I've gotten as far as 'just run hard' will take me and it's time to start trying some stuff that I initially thought was too weird in earnest. 

I spent a lot of time today belly breathing and watching videos about how to do it and it felt like it had more of an effect this time than I remembered. 

I want to write down what it felt like so I hopefully don't forget as quickly. The first thing I noticed was that it felt like my abdomen was able to expand more while breathing. I was able to take deep breaths. Especially in the climbing gym when the air is cold and dry it feels like I can only take shallow breaths. Another I noticed was how strange it felt to touch my ribs and stomach area. I was like, 'wow. I really never do this.' After a while when I took deep breaths I felt like I was more aware of my hips and the breathing kind of extended my awareness into my hips, back and legs. When I went for a walk I felt like there was a warmth in my legs and my walking gait was smoother than normal. I felt energized and if there was a good flat stretch and no one was around I would do a short run and try to pay attention to what my legs and hips were doing. Sometimes I would build up into close to an all-out sprint and I started to feel a float between when my back leg pushed off and when my front leg made contact. Almost like a very small quick bound. That's a feeling I want to hold onto when working on sprinting.

I also think it helped my mood overall and my brain. It's the kind of thing where I'd really like to make it a habit. I feel like I do stuff like this and then inevitably life or something dumb gets in the way and then it falls by the wayside and then months later I'm like, 'man I feel kinda awful. I wonder why?' But I'd really like to make this a habit. It also seemed to help my shoulder a lot which I've been feeling some discomfort in for close to two months now. 

We're optimistic on belly-breathing in 2026!

Also matches are the devil. And you should only use your oven and stove on the lowest possible setting. 

best tool to have on your person if you were trapped in a graham cracker head cage

 Your head has been placed in a cage made entirely of graham cracker. Your arms and legs are restrained. What tool could you use to escape. See if you can figure out the riddle before reading the answer

Answer: Before you have the graham cracker cage put on your head, leave a trail of highly addictive Doritos crumbs from the entrance of an ant colony to your open mouth several yards away. One by one, eat the ants until you reform the colony in your gullet. After the cage has been placed on your head, you can simply open your mouth and the hungry ants will crawl out and make quick work of the cage. Afterwards you can do whatever you want. 

Or like, something that makes your teeth grow out. Like a narwhal horn. Put Patented Goodstein Narwhal Sleeper DNA in your pituitary gland that you can call upon to make your tooth grow out and then gouge a hole through your graham cracker tomb.

What else? I guess you could just vomit and then that would make the graham cracker soggy and then you could thrash your head around violently until the compromised structure breaks loose. That's probably the worst option.

Other things. Other things.

Oh instead of vomiting you could just have a mouthful of water or milk when they put the cage on. Same process as before but much less gross.

One time I was scrolling and I saw this post from tumblr telling a story about a time a cousin fell in a blackberry bush and later they found a blackberry vine growing under his skin and I never bothered to look into the truth of that until now but it turns out: not true. Plants can't do that. 

And another thing I'll say is this: it doesn't sit right with me that things on Earth can be brighter and hotter than the Sun. That feels spiritually wrong. The Sun should be the limit on brightness and hotness. Anything else: devilish behavior.

Is the sun bigger than the sky?

 Yes. But it doesn't LOOK bigger than the sky.

But then you could say, well what if you just took a graham cracker and held it right up to your face and then it took up your whole field of vision or if you locked yourself in some kind of graham cracker cage that went over your head and everywhere you could possibly look was graham crackers. Does that mean graham crackers are the biggest thing you'll ever see?

I mean, just think about how that sounds. Just think about that for a moment.

Not implying that Crab would make that argument. No. He's too good for that. He would never.

No the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see.

And the tiniest thing you'll ever see is the shift in someone's face when you unknowingly do something that makes them realize you aren't the person they thought you were.

They'll hit you with the

o__o

o__o

You won't know. But it's there.

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

 the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing you'll ever see

the sky is the biggest thing that you will ever see in your whole entire life

here's a William Blake poem for you

 The Clod and The Pebble

"Love seeketh not itself to please,

Nor for itself hath any care,

But for another gives its ease,

And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair."

So sung a little Clod of Clay

Trodden with the cattle's feet,

But a Pebble of the brook

Warbled out these metres meet:

"Love seeketh only self to please,

To bind another to its delight,

Joys in another's loss of ease,

And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite."

holy BUCKETS! what a poem! what a difference in perspective!

In the first stanza the speaker is the Clod of clay who is malleable and all day cows step on his little Clod face. But guess what?! The Clod believes that love is the power to give ease to another. Love is selflessness and wanting to make life better for someone else. Isn't that nice?

Then in the last stanza we hear from the Pebble of the brook. Probably has a pretty good life. Being a Pebble. Living in a brook and all. Way better than being cow stomped 24 and 7. But the Pebble he says that love is selfish. 

Is it like the inverse of the Clod? Like the Clod experiences what it's like to give love to someone but the Pebble describes what it's like to receive that love? I don't know.

I guess you could say the poem is talking about how some people view love as selfless and some people view love as a selfish act but that feels like it doesn't give Blake enough credit. There's gotta be something else at work.

I don't understand the Pebble. The first line makes sense. Love is to make the lover happy. Oh I love how much this person is in love with me. 

"Joys in another's loss of ease,"

I guess it's like, 'oh look how desperate this person is for me. they're so miserable because they're obsessed with me."

Does that give anyone joy? That seems extremely sadistic. I guess that's the point. The Pebble doesn't have a very interesting perspective to me. And I guess the Clod is pretty boring too. 

I think most people would argue that they like to make others feel happy because that also makes them happy. It's nice in a "selfish" way to know that you gave someone joy. And I would argue that most people who act in ways that would be considered selfish in a relationship are usually more interested in the idea of someone loving them and because of that they don't really care about the other person which can be harmful but in most cases it probably doesn't extend to taking pleasure from seeing someone hurt.

The more I think about it the more I think the Clod and the Pebble are perfect for each other.

The Clod wants to be miserable. It doesn't want any joy and somehow it thinks that's going to make someone else feel love. If someone was truly torturing themselves for you, you would probably feel pretty uneasy. Only someone messed up like the Pebble would find joy in that. 

This poem is about how when you try to give love to inanimate objects like Clods and Pebbles they mess it up and aren't any good at it. They lack basic social and emotional reasoning skills. The Clod loves that cows step on it and that it's worthless as if that lack of any respect somehow proves the purity of its love. Meanwhile the Pebble is a classic bully who thinks that putting others down automatically raises itself up.

I take back what I said about William Blake and giving him credit. He's wasted our time by imagining two idiots sharing perspectives that almost no one would want to hold. 

I've got a poem called Book and Sourdough

Food only exists to create hunger

never eat food

you should starve yourself

that's what makes food taste good

said the Book

who was an old dusty book

but then a loaf of Sourdough

also had something to say

eat as much as you can all the time

the purpose of food is to make yourself explode

never stop eating food

gorge and engorge yourself forever and ever

Just as good. Just as good as William Blake. 

 

an all-time bit

 one time in college I joined a running club that no one was on but people used to be on it and this older guy Matt told me about this guy George who used to be on the team who was a compulsive liar and he said he was from a school called Oakton Township and they were the Oakton Township Cougars and they had a fight song that went

Oakton Township Cougars

we are a real school

we actually do exist

we are a real school

And Matt sang me that song one day and yesterday in the shower I thought about how I am very likely the singular keeper of the Oakton Township Cougars Fight Song. Passed down to me secondhand as an afterthought. A school that does not exist despite its protests to the contrary.

There is a school in Norther Virginia called Oakton High School and their mascot is the cougars but Virginia doesn't have townships.

Anyway it's an all time great bit.

Right up there with this time we were playing capture the flag at camp and we told this 8 year old, "your luck will run out eventually" and he replied "no it won't! it'll run UP!"

new year = repotted plants

 thanks so much to my mom!!