guitar player's journal

Where are you and where are you going?
Post Reply
basuragomi
Posts: 418
Joined: Tue Oct 15, 2019 3:13 pm

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by basuragomi »

No problem moving tire liners from one tire to another, it's just a tough strip of plastic. You have to cut them to fit the tire to prevent a lumpy ride, though, so ideally you would move it to a same size or smaller tire. Now that you mentioned sticking them on, though, tacking them to the tire with hair spray would probably have saved me a lot of time installing the things!

Watering mushrooms causes them to sprout fruiting bodies, that's why they appear after rainstorms. The fruiting probably means that they're well-established in the soil too.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Cool, I have some vouchers from work and didn't know what to do with them until I found out they work with one bike store so might just get the tire liners and a few other things.

Yes I know, there has to be a good environment with many variables in the right spot for mushrooms to fruit. I took a course on mushroom cultivation last year and this variety was said to be able to establish itself in the soil after just 3 months. Having those mushrooms over a year in the making, I started losing hope hence the joy of seeing them popping up. Selective memory made me forget that they were also said to be capricious in when and where they fruit (the reason for not growing them commercially).

In hindsight, very happy with trying to cultivate them. Very tasty mushrooms and they improve the soil for other organisms. There are some super weak strawberries around the house I live in, people said they did not fruit for years. DW and I took some of the stropharia mycelium and placed it under the strawberries together with sawdust. Now the strawberries have flowers so hoping for some yummy strawberries. If I'll ever end up owning a garden, I think I will do it totally no dig and spread mycelium wherever I can.

I feel like I must mention that DW is definitely the leader in our gardening and mushroom voyages.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Late mid-month update:

I has been two weeks on my unpaid leave now, I've got two more weeks. I spent time doing a few things.

I am reading Holmgren's Permaculture: Principles and pathways beyond sustainability now.

I did some major weeding on our patch in the walled garden, which makes me think, again, of no dig method if I ever end up with my private garden. That gardener in the walled garden is pretty old school so the idea would not pass for him. Plants are growing mostly nicely, though slowly as we have a cold summer.

In fact I am in pain checking the weather other places occasionally: even on the south of England most days are +20C, whereas so far in June here in the Scottish hills we have perhaps an average of 16C? It is not very much different in the Scottish central belt.

Which led DW and I to get train tickets from Edinburgh to London for tomorrow. We are going to cycle the south west of England for two weeks. The weather looks promising, over 20C most days.

We did some major adjusting of DW's bike, some of it following @GdP's advices. The lifted saddle worked well, we went for a 60miles+ cycle a week ago and it was much better. We did some more adjustments so this trip will be a test of it.

This time it was DW who planned the trip, I look forward to following DW. Thanks to that, I had time to catch up with my BSc in Maths and Stats and submit an assignment.

I did the exams of Maths 101 and Intro to Stats, the results will come in around 20 Jul. I feel pretty strong about these. I have been learning now about geometric transformations, various methods in calculus, differential equations and mathematical proofs. All this is a super exciting stuff.

I am split half about what changing jobs would do to it. Now, the job is almost the polar opposite of these studies. Maybe this is what makes studying so enjoyable? On the other hand, if I changed jobs to something more brainy, this could be a turbo boost to skills acquisition, sort of @jacob's style full immersion to hike the sigmoid curve. I am inclined to hike the curve though.

I try to do research about what mathy/sciency/brainy jobs are out there for someone like me. Maybe I will dedicate an amount of time each week to deal with this.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Monthly update

On living arrangement

I now have a housemate. He seems a peaceful 30-something introvert who is recovering from a breakup, perfect for me. My biggest worry was that a 19-20 yo would move in and do here parties all the time.

Otherwise it is super green all around, beautiful.

On gardening / food

We went on a bike trip to England and finally found a chicken of the woods (mushroom)! It is very tasty and does taste like chicken. The texture is also very much unlike other mushrooms. I will get DW send me photos from the trip and will update the foraging log.

Today (we came back last night, it is morning here now) we will be inspecting the garden to see how are our plants after two weeks of absence.

On the cycle road trip we ate tons of biscuits and chocolate and other junk, a bit fed up with these. DW want to 'go clean', I have no issue with that, we will be eaiting veggies from the garden the rest of the summer ha.

On bike touring

So yes, we went down to England to tour there a bit. Arrived at London by train, and cycled through Oxford to the Severn river, then along the Bristol channel through (steep, steep hills!) Exmoor National Park down to Dartmoor National Park, and with a train from Exeter through London back to Scotland. DW will be probably doing some summary stats, but I read that we cycled around 500 miles in around 13 days, roughly 40 miles a day (this includes one completely non cycling day). The steepest hill we pushed the bikes up on was 25%, crazy stuff!

As it often is with our bike trips, I was initially overambitious with the mileage and was thinking of something more like 60-66miles/day. I think I have now reflected and concluded that 40miles a day is the optimum daily distance for us to have cycling trips in peace and joy. So I will be planning for that looking forward.

'Around the world 40 miles a day' - allowing for meandering, this project would take about 1000 days I recon.

On health

I have been eating lots of junk food on the cycling trip, look forward to healthier diet now.

I was pondering weight and figured I will try to lean the body. I was a chubby kid and my mum would take pity on me and tell me 'I have thick bones'. So I looked up on the internet and found out it is not true (they are normal). My BMI is healthy at 24, and I still do 200 Burpees / day (okay, not on the cycling trip I am just back from). I think though I have room to go down to BMI 21-22. The main reason for this is that I imagine how (much harder) it would be to do everything in life with a 7kg backpack. So I will try to rid of the 7kg from the body and see if energy for other things increases.

My main strategy for this will be
*carry on burpees daily
*intermittent fasting
*no more sweeties from our bakery (cinnamon rolls, date slice, scones)

I will also try to throw in a long run or cycle once a week (which I often do anyway).

On reading / Studying

I got 95% from second 'Economict in Context' assignment and 99% from Maths 102 2nd assignment. Still waiting fro the exam results from the two courses I completed. I still thoroughly enjoy the study, and actually might even do some work on my confidence since I am sometimes asking myself 'did degrees got so devalued that they are now super easy?' 'why am I doing so well?' Not the right approach if I ever want to get a job on the back of it hehe.

I will need to put some effort in timekeeping this month due to catching up after the cycling trip. Also my manager will be away for 3 weeks so I will take over, and this can turn to be a time sink.

I am going to try to tackle MS Excel more formally, and also following some advice do exercises involving Excel, MySQL and Python. I am using excel a lot but in a quite simplistic way I feel.

Aside from formal education, I have read Holmgren's 'Permaculture: Principles and Pathways beyond Sustainability'. See how the succession ideas potentially fed into the ERE book. I found the book a little gloomy though! But a great read.

I am reading 'How to be a stoic' by Pigliucci, it is nice, like a massage to the brain after Holmgren's book. I still intend to read more classic stoics.

On money and financial affairs

Very strangely, DW got a refund from the tax office, something around $500.

Since we were on unpaid leave across June and July, the salaries from June were much smaller, but I think they nevertheless more than covered the expenses even though we went on a cycling trip.

So yes, the money keeps on piling up.

Some real estate engagements are finalising and I am curious to see about the financial outcome of them.

DW started recording our expenses in an app. I am very happy about it. Before I tried doing it but it was causing friction. With it recorded, I will be able to do the '12 month average' and such, and I will have data to play with.

My back of the envelope calculations from the month of June where we went on holidays indicate that £12000 / year is our realistic annual budget. Now we are normally (taken out holiday months) spending much less because of our particular living arrangements.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Monthly update

The house

Housemate is okay, he heard me playing guitar and showed me his electroacoutic - Guild made in U.S.A. Guitars made in the US are quite a rarity in Europe I think, it was a nice guitar though quite heavy. I am now very much used to my electroacoustic Yamaha made in China.

On gardening / food

Lots of veggies in the garden, peas, broadbeans, broccoli, greens, mushrooms, potatoes. There was a mass of poppies around that DW planted, and now we are enjoying sunflowers.

A great year for strawberries, raspberries and courgettes this year, they grow huge and sweet.

I am making lots of yogurt from the biodynamic milk we get from the farm here. There is this one autistic guy working there milking the cows - every day, 6am, for decades now. The power of autism.

Our bakery went full on sourdough, I stopped baking bread now. They turned really experimental, we get bread with dried tomatoes, olives, apricotes and walnuts, cheese, garlic and chives.

Work

It has been a tough month! My line manager was away for nearly a month and many things that could go wrong did go wrong. He has been back fro about a week now, I took 4 days off (that I did as overtime in the past month) to recover from this.

On health

DW and I did go clean, mostly dropping sweets from the diet.

Still doing 200 burpees a day most days.

"My main strategy for [lowering BMI] will be
*carry on burpees daily
*intermittent fasting
*no more sweeties from our bakery (cinnamon rolls, date slice, scones)"

The above is from the last update, I have been doing this, my BMI is 23.3. DW got on board with this as well. I anticipate to get down to BMI ca. 21 by 2022.

On reading / Studying

Because of work I had a really hard time focusing on this, had to ask for an extension on the 'Economics in Context' assignment no.3. I have it written now and will review tomorrow. It's good to read about it all, it is a good course, taking the systemic approach (as much as a level 1 course can). The offspring of this is me thinking about central banks and the growth of the economy, and I got a book 'bluff' which I started reading today. Pretty fascinating stuff and perhaps a good foundation to finally read the economics curriculum from the ERE blog.

I passed the first two modules with distinction, cool.

I am going to try to tackle MS Excel more formally, and also following some advice do exercises involving Excel, MySQL and Python - this is still on the agenda.

I finished 'How to be a Stoic' - it was a good read when my manager was away and things at work were crumbling. DW recommended 'Your Money or Your Life' to some family members so I found myself reading it now, too. I prefer the ERE book, though YMOYL has some nuggets.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Mid-month update

On gardening / food

Mushrooms are back.

Work

I asked not to be a manager anymore. I thought, I am not going to progress to senior management in the care sector, not happening. Also very much enjoying studying Maths and Stats and getting seriously into the swing so might as well focus my mental efforts on it.

This means that give or take £2500 / year is the price to pay for not dealing with a bunch of people (care team, nurses, psychiatrist, social workers, senior management) always wanting something (different things at once) done; this I will exchange for focusing on the residents here, cycling to a pub with someone, driving to the cinema, going for walks, playing music, cooking and cleaning (and similar).

Let's see where it will all lead!

On reading / Studying

Tomorrow I will come up with a schedule for getting ready for the two exams due end of Sep and reading a couple of books I have in the pipeline.

hiking

The weather will be great this week, tomorrow we go to a wee forest some 10miles away, beautiful old trees and a waterfall to swim in, I think there should be masses of mushrooms there. We will camp a night or two.

ETA: The hike was great, we found some penny buns, but they are very deformed and some half eaten by slugs. I will wait for better specimen to post on the foraging log. We walked about 12-14km there, camped and then walked back the next day. Swam in a pool under a waterfall, and also in a water reservoire on the way back, ate bilberries and raspberries, also Yew berries for the first time (careful with these as all but berries flesh from the tree seems to be deadly poisonous). It was good exercise for the body, we normally cycle places and that involves different muscle parts. I might set up a routine of running with a hevyish backpack, cross-country skiing style like @jacob described somewhere, starting perhaps with 5kg, in order to strengthen the trapezius muscle, or at least get it used to carrying weight.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Sep 2021 Monthly update

On living arrangement

Not much changed here, I still live with one other guy and DW is in my house most of the time. We occasionally use her quarters when we start working at 7am because it is slightly closer to the workplace. There is finally a superfast fibre broadband being pulled all the way to our village and the senior management ordered faster Internet, which will be a change I think for many people living here. I have a pretty fast internet for which I pay myself in the house (the previous tenant moved here with a contract and made their Internet provider pulled some faster cables to the house), but in the rest of the community struggles so it should be uplifting for them.

Michaelmas is coming 29 Sep, leaves starting to fall, first signs of Autumn.

On gardening / food

There is loads of different mushrooms around, I post sometimes on the foraging log. We got into the habit of drying foods in a dehydrator for hikes, but I am a bit worried about the money/environmental impact of it. We don't get the right feedback because we have a flat, very low rate for utilities.

On bike touring

I got a bicycle fork stem extender for DW for her birthday, she loves it. Basically, it lifts the handlebar 10-15cm which makes a huge difference in terms of comfort while riding. Today is meant to be 25C, I think we are going to go on a cycle ride to test it.

On health

Non-religiously aiming for BMI 21 by the end of 2021. I do intermittent fasting, exercise daily and do adventures like the one above.

[EDIT 11.01.2022: I went down to about 21.7-21.9. Still aiming for 21.]

I am going to visit a dentist in the end of September.

On reading / Studying

Getting ready for exams in 'Economics in Context' and 'Essential Mathematics 102' in about two weeks, I did very well with most assignments. DW got first books for her BSc in Cybersecurity, I might have a read through if I find time.

I still want to improve my MS Excel skills and get more digital skills.

I am also reading 'Bluff: the game central banks play and how it leads to a crisis' now.

On money and financial affairs

DW keeps on tracking expenses, otherwise we I think have designed a lifestyle conductive to saving a lot of income; I am contemplating various ideas of changing fields of work which can but do not have to lead to a higher income.

Now that I asked to be demoted to a support worker role (see below), our savings will plunge down to an estimated 70% of earnings.

On work

I asked to be demoted from my middle management position to a much more easy-going support worker position. I am still in my management role but rarely sitting in the office anymore and instead being around with the adults with learning disabilities we support. Funnily enough, recently I watched a random video from a channel @jacob posted a link to about 'coasting fire' and it might well be what I and DW are doing now.

It is hard for me to justify leaving the place where we live and work just now, the arrangement is very well designed for my liking. DW is however mentioning moving on every now and again, so probing various scenarios on the forum and outside as well.

I suspect me moving down from mid-management role to support worker role might prolong our joyful existence here as I will be thinking less about work after work. That being said, there is a requirement to go through a certain training to keep on working in this field and DW needs to have it done by August 2023. She does not want to spend time on that course, which provides us with Aug 2023 being a sort of deadline for moving on. I think she will appreciate our living arrangement more when she starts her BSc - living and working here is a huge time saver (maybe a bit like @ViktorK teaching in China and learning programming) and allows one to do really well with learning.

It will be fine anyway, so many avenues open.

Emergent Renaissance Ecology

On Monday I took part in a strategic planning meeting where we were discussing ideas for our community for the next one or two decades. Dropping out the content which is irrelevant for the forum, we used the following diagram:

Image

Demands and constraints put pressure on slack, you want to extend the slack (ERE1 (early retirement extreme) in a nutshell?).

ETA (14.09.2021): the donut model of the economy as explained in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7unE1SkpHc at 36:08 seems to have reinvented the above diagram, too.

We also used the standard SWOT analysis (think about an entity, such as community / nation / world and fill out the below)...

S - Strengths
W - Weaknesses
O - Opportunities
T - Threats

S|W
____
O|T

...as well as PEST analysis (macro-environmental scan: think about a change and its consequences in the following)

P - Political
E - Environmental
S - Social
T - Technological

P|E
____
S|T
Last edited by guitarplayer on Tue Jan 11, 2022 11:55 am, edited 3 times in total.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Oct 2021 Monthly update

Holidays

I had two weeks off in September. In the first week took two exams (still waiting for the results). In the second week went with DW for my mum's birthday in continental Europe. Saw extended family, managed to get a few things sorted, tried to permaculture many things into this expedition. Overall happy with the break.

On gardening / food

We will be reducing our gardening operation next season because now both DW and I study (she started Cybersecurity a week ago). That being said, we will still do some gardening to maintain skills + it is a nice and relaxing activity.

Meanwhile, we found some huge parasol mushrooms that I will post about in the foraging log. Also a beautiful penny bun and lingonberries. There are loads of Hawthorn berries around now, my mum told me that she used to make a tincture/alcohol from it and it was good for something health related.

On health

Still doing intermittent fasting, but the week with family was a deviation from general food habits. Admittedly, they really tried to accommodate our preferences, so hats off for that!

Still doing 200 burpees/day.

I became a fan of nutritionfacts.org.

Went to the dentist and fixed the tooth I was so worried about. She managed to fix it with a regular filling but said that it was close to root treatment. I will try to be mindful eating so that the filling stays in place until I die; I don't want a root treatment, learned that t brings lots of troubles in the aftermath.

Music

@jacob mentioned the 'kennen' in one of the youtube talks and it somehow reinvigorated my interest in Scottish arts. So I am trying to learn by heart the lyrics and chords to these two songs.

Folk music can be beautiful, when I was in Austria my German teacher would take me for Saturday night folk music playing. Nice when there is maybe 20+ people all playing the same tune, sense of community, being a part of something bigger, just beautiful harmony and meaning.

On reading / Studying

Started 2nd year of Maths and Stats with the Open University. It is going well, I notice a considerable jump in the level of difficulty (or communicating material, they assume I know a bunch of stuff now which is true) in 'Mathematical methods, models and modelling' compared to the Essential Mathematics courses I have been taking last year.

DW is just starting Cybersecurity, she made her bedroom into a little study/studio, there is Aisle for painting and a lot of countertop space for studying. Looks nice.

I have reading on Stoicism in the background, as well as decision making and probability (this one also for studies). I listened to Jacob's newest appearance on youtube and my tangential takeaway was to target reading the book 'Thinking in Bets' by Annie duke; this should be a good read.

I am also reading this http://wfhummel.net/index.html#4 to get an idea what money is about (this is a kind of continuation of my module Economics in Context) and reading 'Bluff' about central banks and how they regulate money supply and demand.

I still want to improve my MS Excel skills, VBA. I have been chatting with a cousin who has a PhD and working in pharmaceutical industry the last 5 years; she was telling me that python is the way to go if one wants to travel and work remotely. I chatted with her and her husband about FIRE which was quite nice to be able to talk to some family members about my (broadly) interests.

On money and financial affairs

DW keeps on tracking expenses in an app.

On work

It was a great decision to step down to care practitioner; much more head space to think about studies, books, future moves etc. while at the same time keeping many nice things related to the job.

Life general

Generally life is good!

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Nov 2021 monthly update

Anyone has ideas about a holistic and comprehensive set of headings to cover life in updates?

Wooden wedding anniversary

Yesterday was 5 years of us being married. I got 10 oak saplings and we planted them today in a lovely sunny though cold afternoon. The idea is that hopefully at least 5 of them will make it. Some of the trees are in iconic places in the community, one on the corner of the entrance, another one where one big old tree used to be and not there is only a rotting stump. Some trees are on a hill in front of the central building of the community. We planted three on the way that we most often take to work, to have a look at them. One has been planted also on the way to work, near a beech that had been cut down after a huge chunk of it collapsed on the track - we were there at the time, literally 15m away from that big branch, what a sound it made.

We foraged for the tree guards as there are many laying around. Maintenance man cut us some support poles from scraps of wood.

Learning

Got 100% for the first assignment of the 2nd year of Maths and Stats, DW is submitting her first assignments for cybersecurity. She also got involved in some work related course sponsored by the NHS, it is to do with improving the digital side of workings within out community/organisation.

I am reading 'supermodels' again and watched the talk Charlie Munger gave to students at Harvard in 1995 I think. I actually have a degree in Social Psychology so this stuff speaks to me, pleasant to read/listen to.

DW is doing a deep dive into Michael Greger resources, reading 'How Not to Die'.

I am now reading about medical statistics and this with conjunction with Dr Greger tickles my neurons, even with no coffee (see more in 'Health'). I look forward to finding out more about Bayesian Statistics in a couple of months.

Foraging

Every time I go out with one of the guys I support for a cycle down the fields or country roads, I come back with some mushrooms. Today I found a field of shaggy inkcaps and a pine bolete. So many mushrooms we eat, two or three jars of dried ones in the pantry too.

Health

We are turning very much to plant based diet. I experimented with veganism and was a vegan for at least half a year I think. This time it is very much based on nutritionfacts.org and DW drives the change. So we front load on veggies and water, use barely any added fat, lots of fruit, black cumin seeds, turmeric, hibiscus teas, barely any salt, still learning. It feels good, anyway.

It is a bit challenging to let the food at work go to waste, like for example a leftover prawn paella and such. Until now we would hoover the leftovers (perk of the working arrangement).

Turns out, drinking two cups of cold water evokes a body response equivalent to smoking two unfiltered cigarettes or having two and a half cup of coffee. I gave up on coffee (again).

We are still doing intermittent fasting. A couple of months ago I set on to getting my BMI down to 21 by the end of the year. It is 22.4 now, my norm up until recently was 24.6. I am a bit curious and a bit unsettled about 21, I never weighted that little in my adult life.

DW is now at 21.7 I think.

I keep on 200 burpees everyday, with the body fat loss I now look like never before.

Madrid

We are going to Madrid for 5 days in a week and a half. I will meet for the first time one of my sisters-in-law who travels there as well, also a cousin of DW lives there. We'll be visiting museums and I might just look up the Madrid marathon route and try to run it with DW casually one day, on a nice day. Marathon routes usually lead along landmarks for the city to shine.

Other

We are pretty sure we will be aiming for the UK passports, and I think after we get them would like to do a year cycle around Europe. I like Europe with its diversity, perhaps because I like languages. DW likes Europe because it is/feels safe. Those passports, paperwork is usually slow in the UK, I would expect us having them in 2023 the earliest.

Money!

I gathered the numbers, we are nearing 200k USD, maybe will reach it in January or February.

Maths tutoring/teaching/career

I have been approached to help one teenage girl with maths. Looked up what the fees are and offered the lower bracket price due to no experience. I think the mother might be now talking to the daughter about it. It could be a good experience, especially since I was thinking about teaching. Another work colleague with a 16yo son told me that there is a real shortage of tutors and when people find out I am offering tutoring they will flood me with request. I take it with a pinch of last.

I am looking for a sort of low-key career that could be done on and off throughout life. I queried here on the forum and elsewhere about teaching, and am still entertaining the idea of going into teaching. I really have no ambition to climb any ladder, always go laterally. So, for example, with the degree in Maths and Stats, be able to teach it, but also would completely embrace episodes of teaching abroad, maths or a language.

I read that accounting is a good seasonal gig, but I think this is rather US based where everyone does their own taxes? Don't read about it much in the UK context.

Was reading about software, but this seems to be either nothing or a fast paced thing, I vastly prefer slow pace. That being said, someone at work told me that Scot Gov is apparently paying fees for software development / data science bootcamps with one bootcamp provider. Might apply for this and see what happens.

But then Stats is also interesting.
Last edited by guitarplayer on Sun Oct 31, 2021 11:26 am, edited 2 times in total.

User avatar
Bankai
Posts: 986
Joined: Fri Jul 25, 2014 5:28 am

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by Bankai »

Good progress across the board! Dr. Greger's website and youtube channel are the best resources I found for diet (although Fuhrman's 'Eat to live' is also good). At one point a few years back we watched all (hundreds) of his youtube videos but we don't follow him that closely anymore as the knowledge is pretty much internalized. It can be boiled down to: eat a wide variety of whole grains, beans, veggies, fruits, nuts & seeds; the less processed the better; drink water and teas (I believe his agnostic about coffee, so might add some to the mix); choose whatever variety/type/cooking method suits you best (better to eat more of slightly less antioxidants-packed veggie than less of the more antioxidants-packed one).

theanimal
Posts: 2627
Joined: Fri Jan 25, 2013 10:05 pm
Location: AK
Contact:

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by theanimal »

guitarplayer wrote:
Sat Oct 30, 2021 4:13 pm
I keep on 200 burpees everyday, with the body fat loss I now look like never before.
That’s impressive. I once did a stint of 100/day for 3 months, but by the end I found it to be more of a chore. It is an amazing workout though and I am sure you are getting shredded. If I could only do one exercise it’d be burpee pull ups.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Thanks @Bankai! I'll look up Fuhrman's Eat to live. About coffee, this is a personal matter, I cannot find balance with it, a manifestation of my struggles with stoic temperance in this department. Maybe I need to grow up a little more.

@theanimal thanks, I've been doing that for over two years I think, and maybe a year 200 straight with no breaks. It's just a neat way to keep the exercise habit going, takes about 17min and is almost like taking your vitamins. burpee pull ups - this sounds good, though requires infrastructure = getting to a place = takes more time. I like that I can do it anywhere, sometimes when the weather is nice I run to the top of a nearby hill and do it there, enjoying the views and taking the sun. I've been thinking about stretching, DW does yoga maybe I will join her sometimes.
Last edited by guitarplayer on Thu Nov 25, 2021 10:46 am, edited 1 time in total.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Just back from Madrid. A great city, very clean and pretty. We had solid 4 days of sun and blue sky, this does not happen in Scotland, ever. I met some of DW's family and generally had a good time. Visited museums and parks, got a good feel of the city. Would like to move to Spain for 2-3 years in the next decade for DW to fast track for an EU passport (Latin Americans in Spain get them that quickly).

I really don't like arguing over who pays the bill in a bar, just find it silly. If anything, I would by default be suggesting everyone paying for their stuff. Found a great way of overcome the hurdle. DW's cousin insisted to pay the bill. We slipped 20EUR into her bag but she found it and refused to take it, saying that we should 'give it to someone who needs it' . Earlier in the evening she mentioned volunteering with the Spanish Red Cross. We donated the money to the Spanish Red Cross and sent her a screenshot, she was very happy. In the future, whenever someone insists on paying the bill, I will do just that.

[EDITED, there was an enthusiastic paragraph here on getting a property and renting out rooms. This is a bit of an obsession of mine, the topic comes and goes. I think I was still on the hype of a few days of walking nice places and taking the sun in Madrid. The idea of buying somewhere to live is still on my mind, and I might allocate some defined time to research it.]
Last edited by guitarplayer on Sun Nov 14, 2021 10:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

Jiimmy
Posts: 137
Joined: Sun Jan 03, 2021 12:28 pm
Location: Nevada

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by Jiimmy »

Credit Card Roulette is my favorite way to settle the debate :-)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_card_roulette

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Heard about it, but with my lifestyle I wouldn't have enough opportunities to ride the variance.

Western Red Cedar
Posts: 1205
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 2:15 pm

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by Western Red Cedar »

guitarplayer wrote:
Fri Nov 12, 2021 5:35 pm
We donated the money to the Spanish Red Cross and sent her a screenshot, she was very happy. In the future, whenever someone insists on paying the bill, I will do just that.
That is a creative solution. Well done. One thing I've worked on over the years is to simply accept gracious offers to pay for a meal or other small gestures. Sometimes it makes people feel better, and it is easier than the back and forth. A sign for them that the relationship is more important than money. I usually offer to pay for something the next day in exchange, at that works out well.

---

I have a group of friends that like to play credit card roulette and I hate it. I'm usually drinking one or two $3 pints, but in a group of 10 other guys drinking higher end stuff. The bills are always over $100. At least the servers find it entertaining.

JollyScot
Posts: 212
Joined: Thu Feb 26, 2015 3:44 am

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by JollyScot »

My wife and I may well do the similar thing and go to Spain for the fast track EU passport. We are wavering between that and Portugal. As Brexit kinda scuppered the easy path for us. By the time we realised there was a quicker route for her we had already moved to France.

If we do decide to go, we would just be "students" for a couple of years until she can apply for her passport. Its not easy to find the special treatment. Not advertised well.

I liked Madrid. The air is cleaner than it was 10 years or so ago. Back then when I first went I didn't like that much. Recent trips were much better.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

Lots of new green spaces, Casa del Campo is full of trees planted 10-20 years ago by the look of it. I said to DW it will be very nice looking in a couple of decades.

Yup very fortunate to have the EU passport myself so moving there for us would not be an issue. Though in a year we'll both be able to apply for British passports so will get that done first I think.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

I will be choosing a Maths module form my BSc, starting in October 2022 and worth 300 hours. There are a few options and I am undecided hence posted a thread seeking advice, please go ahead and chime in! Constructive input much appreciated.

guitarplayer
Posts: 1299
Joined: Thu Feb 27, 2020 6:43 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: guitar player's journal

Post by guitarplayer »

December 2021 monthly update

DW's away

DW went to Italy to see her folks a few days back, partly to be on par with my folks whom we visited in September. It was also the birthday of her nephew. We rarely are apart these days, I look forward to DW coming back tomorrow.

Made a CV template

I've learned to make a pretty neat CV in LaTeX, basically watched this and copied the code. I will probably change the colour to blue. Or was also playing with the idea that if I ever start systematically apply for jobs, I would change the colour to whatever the colour of the employer was.

Making this template made me realize how unusual the path I'd taken was. I did two degrees, published a scientific paper, volunteered full time for a combined 2 years+, did market research, been in care field for the last 6 years, managing people in three of those years. 2nd year of Maths and Stats now.

If I start applying for jobs, I think I will need to hit an area of dire demand in order not to have to explain myself. Or what work areas are there where people don't ask questions ?

A podcast and a documentary

I have now a routine of listening to the podcast by Steven Pinker produced by the BBC. An episode every Thursday, last week it featured Charlie Munger. In fact I will play this week's one after I'm done with the post.

I watched the 4 episodes Century of Self by Adam Curtis, it was pretty impressive and took some time to digest. A very subjective view of course, I had to read something stoic afterwards.

Health

We are full on with plant based diet, vegan basically, for the past month or two maybe. Still have some occasional cheese or butter very seldomly, we eat at work so sometimes something of this sort slips onto the plate. DW is now reading 'How not to Diet', and generally we're taking in the knowledge. Sprouts brewing on the kitchen table, lots of kale, broccoli, legumes, vinegar, berries, no added fat. We got a year supply of B12 and munching on vit D in cloudy Scotland.

I feel good. My BMI came down to the lowest on record at 21.6. I decided to address the body being stiff. So now when I do those 200 daily burpees, I pause for a second when bent down and stretch. Makes the routine last 20min instead of 17min, but after a week or two I already see progress.

Coffee is the thing of the past at this point. I know that coffee is okay health-wise, but man I just cannot do it in moderation.

Foraging

To cold now for foraging, there are some mushrooms to be found but few and far between. Actually we had a beautiful blanket of snow a few days back (melted now). We get snow here more often than say Edinburgh because it's in the hills.

Maths and Stats

The tutoring gig did not work out, not sure why but I suspect the daughter perhaps did not want? Whenever I see the manager, she is quiet about it. Recently I have heard that she might be moving with her family so maybe that's that.

The course going well.

Work

A while back we were chatting with DW about work plans. She doesn't have the right training to keep on working in care (and does not want to do the training), so we have a sort of natural deadline for her being able to work and live where we live, it being June 2023. So if nothing changes on the work front, this is a kind of natural deadline for us moving on.

Post Reply