Three things a man won't admit . . .

1) He's wrong: "It's not the most right I have ever been . . . "
2) He makes a mediocre chili: "Ah, it's only so-so, most folks don't like it, and the ones that do have no taste anyway. . . . "
3) He does a bad Elvis impersonation: "Thank yah very much Uh huh, Hunka hunka burnin' love!" You could be curling up both sides of your mouth like some picture in a Dentist's Magazine and you'd still be all insulted if someone told you that wasn't all that good . . . then again, is there such thing as a good Elvis impersonation?

I've stolen each one of those from different sources. My genius is in the aggregation . . . .

Wanted to post this yesterday, but fell asleep at 7:30 . . . .

Kettlebell workout, three sprints:

for time, with a 30 min. cutoff (subs in parens):

200m sprint
12 KB thrusters (2x16kg)(25lb dbs)
3 clapping push-ups
9 KB thrusters
6 clapping push-ups
6 KB thrusters
9 clapping push-ups
3 KB thrusters
12 clapping push-ups
200m sprint

-2 min rest-

20 Russian KB swings (32kg)(24kg)
15 pull-ups
10 pistols (unweighted)(assisted)
5 KB presses (30lb dbs)
2 rope climbs
5 KB presses(30lb dbs)
10 pistols (assisted)
15 pull-ups
20 Russian KB swings

-1 min rest-

50m broad jumps
10 HSPU (pike)
20 squats
50m broad jumps
20 squats
10 HSPU (legs over bar)
100m sprint

22:16

Even 5 minutes later I wasn't recovered. I also believe I have invented "kipping" pushups . . . . .by whipping my butt into the air hard enough to whipsaw my shoulders in the air so I could get a clap right before my face crashed into the ground . . . necessity truly is the mother of invention . . .

A proud graduate!

Of the Troy and Little Chris Rope climbing school!!!

And here's my diploma!!

Beach Assault

"Beach Assault" (subs noted, did porch scale)
Row to shore:
1000 meter row
Climb the cliff:
5 rope climbs (3 on regular rope)
Assault the Target
100 burpees (75)
100 wallball shots 20lb (75)
Carry the Wounded:
200 meter Farmer's Walk, 2x32 kg kb (did 24kg kb)
Descend the Cliff:
5 Rope climbs (3 on regular rope)
Extraction:
1000 meter row

31:36

Compare with 01/05/08 at 30:29

So, my takeaway is this: 25 more burpees, 25 more wallballs, regular rope, only cost me 1 minute more. :-) I like.

It was tough deciding the correct scale. Last time I did the pack scale, so I had a choice of sticking with that, and seeing a decreased time or upping the scale. I don't like to jump scale too much because then it's harder to tell what, if any, improvement you can make, so I stuck with going up one. But, I figured I could finish the rx'd scale and now I'm sure I could have, but I don't know if those extra rope climbs, burpees and wallballs would have punched me to the 40 minute mark. Probably.

Crossfit CS

Has been added to the blogroll. I know some of you are visiting, so I figured I'd return the favor.

And I'll be picking up that Scottish-English dictionary any day now . . . .

HEEEELEEEEN!!!!!!

Odd day at the gym . . . It was a skill day, ropes and kte.

Learned how to do my feet with the unknotted rope. Good stuff that.

Then, we were supposed to do a team farmers carry/sandbag carry, 400 meters. Me and Francisco ran that using 125lb sandbag, 2 32kg kbs, in like 4:23. I think had we really pushed we could have come in under 4 . . . next time . .


Troy was also giving an intro class, or a group of friends or something, checking out the gym and skill days aren't enough to show someone the special brand of pleasure that is crossfit so he ran them through Helen and I stuck around for that:

3 rft

400 meter run
21 kb swings 24kg
12 pullups

Last attempt: 10/15/07 (has it really been that long . . . ) 16:04 . . . This time . . 12:46 as rx'd . . . so I'll take it. :-D

Double Play: Crap Grandparenting with a side of Sister throwing you under the bus . . .

In the car on the way to school this morning:

Girl: "All (name of brother) eats at Grammy's is potato chips . . . junk."
Me: "Well, he has popsicles too, right?"
Girls: "Yeah, sometimes."

Fish Oil Burps

Had one yesterday . . .

They were everything they were held out to be . . .

I've had hangover breath that was actually better . . . .

Update: I've had time to reconsider . . . ever go to a lake, and there's a dead fish in the water, and say you're about 10 years old, so poking the dead fish with a stick seems like a good idea?

But when the fish breaks the surface of the water, that icky rotty fish smell comes up and you reconsider the wisdom of your dead fish poking?

Yeah, that's a fish oil burp . . . . .

Arrggg, more nicks and dings . . .

Been having an odd pain in the knee . . .

Normally, my knees are rock solid. They've never been the injury prone part of me, even if I ran 45 miles a week . . .

I've had one slight knee issue, which cleared up in about two weeks of some quad strengthening exercises.

But about two weeks ago, I rolled over in my sleep and had a sharp pain in my knee. Really odd, but went back to sleep. Next day, I've got a numb spot on the side of my left knee.

It didn't seem to do much, so I just left it, under the familiar observation that about 99% of your aches just fix themselves.

Looked around on sports injury websites, but couldn't nail down what the problem was.

But after being stable for a week, it's acting up. Yesterday's hopping on one foot at crossfit really made it more sore than anything. I'm thinking it's a combination of things:

1) My double under work where I was pounding into the ground. My technique is really crappy and my achilles tendons would smart the next day.

2) I don't wear my running shoes as much as I need to during crossfit. I've got some trainers I use, but I'm sure they don't have the cushioning I'm used to. From now on I'll use those unless I know we're not running.

Ah well, I'll go "viking" for a while. This'll work itself out. I'm thinking some light swelling is putting pressure on a nerve and that's causing the numbness. The ache is slight but travelling to the front of the knee . . .

It ain't heavy, it's my pullups . . .

Weighted pullups:

1-1-1-1-1-1-1

10-20-30-40-50-55(f)-45

Still good for a PR at 50lbs.

Then played with other pullup type things, did some weighted kipping pullups at 30lbs, which I got 5-6 good ones.

Still felt frisky so I pushed through on some more pullups and got a new pr of 21 pullups before hands gave out.

Zone Update

Troy wanted me to post recent pictures because even in a month he says he can see a difference:

The first picture is a month ago, the second was yesterday.

Update: Note that the first picture is after my first month in the zone, where I lost about 8-9lbs, and the second is where I'm down 12lbs or so lbs from my starting weight of 180. So the second picture is actually end of the second month, roughly speaking (from a starting date of 2/28/08).

Hell's Kettlebells . .

Crossfit Plano, TX Kettlebell Class

W/U tabata pullups/situps 4 rounds

roughly: pullups 12/12/7/7 situps 14/15/10/10

Workout:

3 RFT
5/5 kb clean and press 16kg
20 burpees
30 Russian Swings 24kg.

12:13

That was collapse on the floor sucky . . .

But I'm comin' for you HELEN . . . . I will get that 10:00 . . . .

I Am Legend-A Review

"I Am Legend"

I saw this a couple weeks ago, and it's been rolling around in my head, so I thought I'd put down some of my thoughts on the matter.

Lotsa spoilers below . . . don't read any further if you don't want to know how things turn out.

Overall, a good fun, movie. But, there are things that I thought were funny and I'll go into those.

First, a brief history of "I Am Legend"

It's based (loosely) on a book by a guy named Richard Matheson.

Here's what you need to know about Matheson: He's written some of the most famous TV horror/fantasy episodes ever: including "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" featuring some early overacting by William Shatner, as well as Trilogy of Terror, staring Karen Black (still one of the best creepy TV shows ev-ah!)

Furthermore, the movie was made previously, as "The Last Man on Earth", and "The Omega Man" (get it, alpha and omega? last man?). The leads in those movies were Vincent Price and Charlton Heston, respectively. Note: LMOE is probably the closest to the book, but it's been a long time since I've seen it, so that judgment may be suspect. Same with Omega man.

Anyway, basic plot: A plague sweeps the earth, infecting everyone but our hero.

Of course, Will Smith gives his usually great performance, but I think there are structural issues that kind of bugged me.

After some bits of intro where we see they've cured cancer, only to have the virus mutate and turn into something a lot worse than that, we're treated to Will trying to hunt deer while driving a Ford Mustang . . . talk about product placement.

Okay, if the deer are so plentiful . . . use a scope and wait for them on top of a building. Sheesh.
Not that it wasn't cool to chase them in a car, but really people . . . . Deer are fast. They have big ears which they use to hear people/carnivores coming . . . you wouldn't get within a city block. But if you set out some corn . . . . and he has a garden and sat on a rooftop . . .

Second, the plague/virus turned most of the people in the world into zombies. The original had everyone turn into vampires. Of course, our modern zombies are not content to use numbers to win, they are also fast. Now, I suppose there are some differences between zombies and vampires, but really, one only wants the juice, the other likes the meat off your bones. Whatever. Now these zombies, can't stand sunlight. But they want to chew you up. Okay, so they're Zompires . . .

Okay, so here's where it gets funny.

The zompires, sleep during the day . . . I guess. They do hide, but what about sleep? Now, unless they are somehow different than every other carnivore in the world, they gotta sleep sometime. But the first time we see them, they're all awake eating a deer that Will Smith accidentally chased into a building. Man, if I were him, I'd figure out a way to carry an ultraviolet flashlight . . . . he is a scientist after all.

Secondly, sometimes, I get confused by the ecology of these things. Why don't they turn on each other? What happens when they run out of food? Strictly speaking, carnivores are usually very infrequent compared to say, whatever their food is, be it gazelles or deer. How do one zillion of these things survive? I'm pretty sure it's not on chef boyardee ravioli . . .

Also, at one point, WS needs to capture a zompire . . so he rigs up something using a tarp and a car as a counter weight, so that when the zombpire gets on the tarp, down goes the car, and viola, he captures a zombpire. However, while doing so, the leader zompire sees him through and open doorway.

Later, the zombpires do something extremely clever: They take a mannequin that Will talks to in a video store, put it at the end of a street, and rig up the SAME TRAP WILL USED early. Think about it: At first, we're shown the zombpires as some sort of animalistic pack animals . . . then they set up a very sophisticated trap. I mean, these things tear a deer apart with their hands, but moments after that, they figure out: how to use something WS will recognize, that they could have only known if they either made the connection between the mannequin and WS at night when WS was in bed, or somehow they saw him during the day . . . . when they're supposed to be sleeping. Then! They hook up a trap using a rope tied to a car as a counter weight to pick WS up off the ground. Meaning they would have had to measure the rope, tie it off somewhat right, several of them would have had to move the car into place, knowing what the outcome would be.

I mean, if they could do that, why couldn't they drive a car? AND the zompire who saw WS's original trap would have had to figured all that out and then communicated it to the others.

I mean, the problem is that you've got two movie ideas: crazy zompires or smart zompires. Now I don't see a problem with both of them, but the smart zombpires would be more like the previous two movies and the crazy ones more like all the other zombie movies.

But of course, the final piece is the zombies attacking en mass. But of course, are they clever? No. The clever psychological and physical trap set earlier was just a ruse. They're brutes again.

I think that had they followed the clever part out to a logical conclusion, it would have been a more interesting movie and you might have had fewer "oh my god, that's CGI" moments.

Now, this isn't to say the movie was bad, just not great. It was a lot of fun so long as you don't get caught up in some of the logical problems.

But then that's most movies . . .

Zone Diet: recap

If you're visiting from the forums on "The Pound" website, go to the zone diet link on the right, under "stuff I yak about". Yeah, it's probably the last one down there.

Feel free to comment or ask a question.

Suffer on Saturday: Frelen

Yep, the bastard love child of Fran and Helen . . . yeah, I don't know the biology either . . . just go with it . .

5 rft

800 meter run
15 dumbbell thrusters @ 45lbs (used 35lbs)
15 pullups

36:00

That was kinda sucky. ;-)

The runs were fine. I may get a watch to figure out what my splits are so I can keep more consistency.

Pullups were good, 5/5/5 for most rounds, 2nd round did a 6/6/3, which is good, but last round I think it went 5/4/4/3. But still good recovery between mini sets. Troy even said I was flying around the bar.

Got called skinny by one of the trainers too. Ha!! Three people in two days! Ha!

Thrusters: oh lord. Okay, I got through them, but need much better form. Used Kempie's advice and came up slow, but popped my hips to get some momentum. Troy kept on my form for what seemed like, oh, hours.

Things to work on: flexibility to go deeper in the squat and keep weight/back balance.

Crap Parenting: Van Halen I

In church, when son starts singing:

Son: "Runnin' with the Devil . . . . "

Me: "Uh, um, not the time or the place . . . um, how about This little light of mine . . . "

Up up and overhead!!!!

Missed this a week ago at the gym, so here goes:

5 rft

Overhead lunges, 50ft, 45lb bar (2 x 20lb dumbells)
21 burpees

18:45 = 2:46/3:53/4:24/4:05/3:37

Hmm. Went out too fast, sloow middle, last two rounds, pickin' it up. How on earth is my last round my second fastest? Oh yeah, there was the "lack of character" break in round three . . .

If there was a problem, it was that due to space constraints in the gym, I'd hit a turn around, which was a pain . . . trying to pirouette with 40lbs shrugged up.

This was also as rx'd. ('cept the 5lb difference between the overhead bar and dumbells . . . )

Of further note, is the only thing suckier than burpees are burpees AND lunges, and the only thing suckier than a lunge is a weighted lunge, and the only thing suckier than a weighted lunge . . . is yeah, holding it overhead the whole time . .

But when you get done with this one, you're the Trapezius Monster, I had like muscles comin' out my ears!! Ha!

Murph . . . the 3/4 story . . .

39:04 . . .

To complete (Rx'd in parens):

1 mile run
75 pullups (100)
150 pushups (200)
225 squats (300)
1 mile run

Now . . . let's compare, shall we?

3/4 Murph on 10/14/07: 61:44 . . . .

Boooya!!!!!

So yeah, a

Long time gone . .

Anyway,

Since I've been posting NOTHING, here's SOMETHING:

I did 50 pushups last night:

2:02.

Now, the funny thing is this: if I do 100, the second 50 take over four more minutes. Ha!

Also, I know this is a recent personal best, but is probably nowhere near my best all time. That would have had to have been in the Army. I nearly scored a 300 on my pt test and I think the only reason I didn't was either pushups or the run. I usually maxed the situps. I think the pushups were 60+, but can't recall.

Crap Parenting . . chickens coming home to roost

Daughter: "Daddy, I love momma twice as much as you and both of you twice as much as each other".

Me: "uh, I love you too sweetie."

Me, to son: "Buddy, would you turn on the light over the table please?"

Son: "Yay! We don't have to save money anymore!" (In reference to my admonition to turn off lights so we can save money for fun things, like disneyland . . . . ).

Angie (Less)

Angie Less Overhead:

100 pushups
100 situps
100 squats

13:56

Splits:
pushups: 6:36
situps: 10:54 (4:18)
squats: 13:56 (3:02)

Highlights: The 100 pushups were 14 seconds faster than 3/22.

Double under practice: 22 consecutive . . . ;-)

I'm pregnant!!

April Fools!!!

. . . . funny, when my wife did it, it was actually surprising . . . . . um, ha?

Crap Parenting, Blue Ribbon Edition

Wife: "Mom just said that The Girl(tm) won a Blue Ribbon for her art project they sent to the school district!"

Me, thinking, hmm, yeah, her mom told me that yesterday . . . "Um yeah, she said something about that . . . . "

Note to self: Be more enthusiastic about Kindergartener art . . . . .

While ten cups of green stuff is hard to eat . . .

I'm pretty sure that I've had at least that much in beer . . . . maybe once at a sitting. But certainly no more than that . . . that I recall . . . .

And if I'm off on a rant, remember: Binge Drinking (as defined by prudes) is 5 drinks in any one sitting . . . so yeah, the five glasses of wine you had over the course of Thanksgiving dinner/day.

Binge!!!!!

That wedding reception?

Binge!!!!

That time in the bar watching the game?

Binge baby binge!!!!