I didn't log Monday's workout and I skipped Tuesday so I could get a couple hours of sleep. So here is the quick rundown of Monday and Wednesday mornings workouts.

Monday 13 April 2015

• 25 front Squats - 65 lbs
• 15 burpees
• 25 kettle bell swings - 35 lbs
• 15 burpees
• 25 toe-to-bars - hahahaha those are fucking hard
• 15 burpees
• 25 kettle bell swings - 35 lbs
• 15 burpees
• 25 front squats - 65 lbs

Those toe-to-bars are much harder than I imagined. I'm already not very flexible so I figured they'd be hard - but they require a lot more shoulder strength than I have as well. I think I successfully touched the bar twice with my toes.

Wednesday 15 April, 2015

Two rounds of max reps - 2 minutes per set.

• situps (29,41)
• pushups (49,39)
• row machine (540m, 479m)
• inverted ring rows (16,16) - requires more shoulder/back strength than I have
• tire flips (15,13) - I used the heavier tire today; not sure how much it weighs. I think it is between 400-500 lbs.

Tonight I'm taking a class on the fundamentals of lifting so that I can learn how to do some of the lifts with the correct form. I imagine I'll be pretty gassed after that though.

When Noah first wrote all of the exercises on the board I thought "wow, this is going to be a tough workout" - then he added one word to the bottom of the board and it got much, much worse. Repeat.

• 50 Pushups
• 40 Wallballs (10lbs)
• 30 Tire Flips (280lbs)
• 20 Burpees
• 10 Hang Clean (75lbs/65lbs)
• 200m sprint Repeat :-)

Yeah, he put a smiley up there too.

The pushups were tough for me. I've never had good upper body strength, even when I was in the Army, and pushups have always been a challenge. The wallballs will, undoubtedly, provide some muscle pain for me for the next few days as well. The tire flips and burpees combined were exhausting and I still have crappy form on the hang clean. I reduced the weight in the second set so I could focus more on form. I think I did a little better but the whole motion just feels weird. In fact, when I do it correctly and incorrectly it feels the same way to me - wrong.

I will probably take a special class next Wednesday just on lifting form so I can do these things correctly. I might also take some flexibility classes - I need help with that even more than I do with upper body strength.

21 - 15 - 9. I've not seen a set of numbers quite like that before (unless you're talking about numbers divisible by 3 and a prime). Today that set of numbers greeted me on the white board in the workout room and they designated how many reps we'd be doing over the three sets. 21 in the first set and so on.

The exercises that we repeated for that count were:

• Thrusters (I did 65 pounds)
• Pullups

Then, at the end of each round we also used a rowing machine to go 200m. Initially Noah had said we were going to row 500m but he must have changed his mind when he saw how weak I am because he dropped it to 200. Thankfully!

My pull up skills have not improved yet (obviously) and the thrusters were hard to finish in the 2nd and 3rd sets. The rowing was incredibly good at leaving me sucking for breath. Overall it was a good workout which we finished with some kind of masochistic planking routine that seemed to go on forever. My sweaty forearms made the plank even harder since I was constantly fighting the slip for stability.

Today's workout only took me 20 minutes but I felt more drained than I had after any of the previous ones. I think the fatigue is rolling over to each workout. I hope not. I think I'll just do four days this week and take three days off. In fact I might always take off Friday and go for a run instead. I need to run a bit more and so far I've been avoiding it beyond what we've done in the morning class.

I wonder what tomorrow will bring.

Today's workout was much simpler than yesterdays. However, it did introduce me to a new exercise - the front squat. It works just like a normal squat except the bar is in front of your neck instead of behind it. My wrists aren't nearly flexible enough for this exercise so I had to maintain my grip on the bar or else it hurt way too much to even begin attempting the squat.

The workout consisted of 5 rounds of:

• 15 front squats (65lbs)
• 1 running lap around the block

I don't know how big the block is but it was big enough that I was plenty winded by the time I got back to the room to do the squats.

Total time was 28:30 for me to complete the five rounds. Today was also the first day of the four I've gone where I wasn't the last one to complete! More running and less weight lifting fit my current condition.

I know 65 pounds on the front squats doesn't sound like much - but the last couple sets were still tough to finish so it was plenty for me. I could have probably gone to 75 or so but Noah, the trainer, also wants me to take it slow so I can get used to the different exercises. He said that my modified grip was also going to make it more work on my shoulders so I'm glad I didn't go up any higher in weight.

Here is a video of someone doing the front squat. You'll notice how much your wrists end up being bent when he focuses on the grip.

Today was my third day of working out in the morning at the Y in a "crossfit" type class.  My arms are dead so I'm amazed I'm able to type this.  Here is what today's workout consisted of.

• 50 wallballs - I used a 10 pound medicine ball.
• 50 burpees
• 40 kettle bell swings - I used a 20 pound bell.
• 40 pushups
• 30 pullups - I used an elastic band thing on one foot to help.
• 30 wallballs
• 20 burpees
• 20 kettle bell swings
• 10 pushups
• 10 pullups

Now to be honest it took me a long time to do all of this.  About an hour.  The wallballs weren't too bad though I was pretty winded when I was done with them.  Likewise the kettlebell swings.

However, the burpees are exhausting and really left my arms dead for the pushups.  40 pushups was nearly impossible.  I know I can't do anywhere close to 30 pullups.  I do dead hang pullups and I can do about 3, maybe, right now so the big rubber band thing was handy.  However, 30 was still a ton.  I'm certain that on many of those pullups I did not get my chin over the bar.  I pulled as much as I could but my arms were pretty useless.

By the time I "finished" my 30 pullups the rest of the group had finished the entire cycle.  So we did some abdominal exercises.  Once the ab work was done I went back and started on the next set of wallballs.  A couple guys from class hung out with me as I finished.  The second half went, surprisingly, faster than the first half however I'm glad I didn't have to do an 11th pullup.

I'm going to try to remember to post what I do each morning on here along with some thoughts.  It will be interesting to me at least to see how I progress.  I didn't think to do this last week when I went for the first two days.  We did a few exercises I've never done before such as dead lifts and a hang clean.  The hang clean was really awkward just going from the hang up to the shoulders.  I didn't use much weight but I'm pretty sure I need to get a lot better at the technique before I think of messing with any extra weight.  I think I had just the bar (45lbs) and two 10 pound plates.

I've watched a couple videos on the hang clean now and I think this one is pretty comprehensive.  It shows mostly what I was taught though I didn't do anything with jumping.

The trainer, Noah, seems pretty patient and is pretty good at explaining the movements.

If you're using Authy for two-factor authentication and the chrome extension is generating invalid tokens your computers time is probably incorrect.

If you are like me and are using a Windows 7 pc that is a member of a domain you can't be certain your PC time is accurate becuase you can't sync to a time server (why not?)

You can, however, manually set the time on your computer to match your phones time.  After you do that close and then re-open authy on your computer and it should be generating the correct tokens.

If you aren't using two-factor authentication wherever you can then you really should.  Especially on your email!  If you're using gmail it is painfully easy to setup. Check it out.

I updated my phone's launcher this week to the latest beta version of Nova Launcher.  It is all "Material Design" and is pretty slick.  I really like it but the home screen needed a little love.  That's when I discovered the Simplo Icon Pack.  Now, for the first time since I got my Galaxy S5, I'm really digging the main user interface.

Check it out:

It's just about perfect for me.  Plus thanks to Nova I can define different gestures to launch certain things.  For instance, a single finger swipe up will launch the Google Now interface of the Google Search App.

Honestly, I think this might be my favorite combination of launcher and icons since I started using Android.  Now, if only I could really get the feel of Zooper I could create some cool widgets that would really ice the cake of the look and feel.

Here are some other people's screens that I really like:

Golden with Zooper

Alpine Incline

Pink Lotus

You can see a bunch of other screenshots that people have posted in the Google+ community for Nova Launcher

I bought a Galaxy S5 the day they became available and immediately I worred about the little port cover on the bottom that was supposed to be the last guard against water invasion on the phone.

Yesterday morning that little cheap plastic flap fell off.  I don't do much with it - I only charged the phone at night; and the rest of the time the flap remained firmly in place.  

That means the shitty piece of plastic lasted less than 300 opens and closes.

I remain very unimpressed with the phones performance considerings its innards.  And now I'm equally disappointed in the exterior quality.  Here is a short list of other things I've not been happy about:

1. The camera; it is almost really good but more often than not has trouble focusing on anything and I end up having to take multiple photos to get a decent shot.  It also starts slowly so sometimes I miss the shot entirely.
2. Still running Android 4.4.2 meanwhile version 5 has been out for close to half a year and 5.1 just came out this week.  This isn't entirely Samsungs fault but they deserve a lionshare of the blame.
3. The phone intermittently just bogs down and becomes next to impossible to use.  
4. Battery use is kind of suspect.  When I first got it I was pretty impressed with the battery but now it seems to burn down much faster.  I don't use it much so I shouldn't have to worry about it having a charge at the end of the day but I do.

On the plus the rest of the outside of the phone is still in good shape.  The screen, bezel, and back of the phone all still look nice.  However, having the gaping whole at the bottom where a non standard double usb cable plugs in just looks like ass.

It will probably be the last samsung mobile device I buy.  Such are my first world problems.

Today, my step mother posted a link to a local franchise of Papa Johns hiring due to faster than expected growth. While I'm glad for the store (and the people who will be getting new jobs) it reminded me of the uproar over Papa Johns back in 2012 when he said pizza prices were going to go up if Obamacare were inacted.

He stated, in a conference call that per pie cost would go up about 11 to 14 cents:

Our best estimate is that the Obamacare will cost 11 to 14 cents per pizza, or 15 to 20 cents per order from a corporate basis

Curious, I went to look to see how different prices are now from what they were in 2012. Prices have gone up quite a bit more than 11 to 14 cents per pie.

In 2012 according to this Forbes article about the pizza magnates math a large specialty pizza was $16.  Today a large speciality pizza is $19.

The forbes article also stated that a medium pizza ran closer to $12. Today that medium is $15 (as seen in the screenshot).

I don't know how much of the price change is a result of Obamacare - or the rising cost of meat and produce (as corn became more commonly used to create Ethanol over the past half decade cow farmers have had to pay more for corn and thus meat and dairy have become more expensive). I thought it was interesting to note the huge jump in pizza costs over the three year period.

To put in perspective the $0.14 increase for Obamacare would have been a 0.8% increase in price on the large pizza while the $3 shift we've actually seen has been an %18.75 increase. There was a huge uproar over Papa John's claim of a 14 cent pizza increase when he predicted it but clearly it hasn't hurt the chains ability to sell pizza. The uproar was, honestly, pretty over the top. Papa John' is a business and it was only normal that he would pass the cost of doing business on to his customers. By boycotting the chain all the protesters would have done is to cause some people to lose their jobs. I think it is clear that pizza prices were going up no matter what happened.

The reality is that the Islamic State is Islamic. Very Islamic. Yes, it has attracted psychopaths and adventure seekers, drawn largely from the disaffected populations of the Middle East and Europe. But the religion preached by its most ardent followers derives from coherent and even learned interpretations of Islam.

From an interesting article at The Atlantic - Well worth the read.