Five Things for February 23
Blah blah something blah.
- I was targeted for the Joon app and decided to give it a 6-day free college try. The kids…they need some external motivation to do chores. It started off pretty well, but Ambrose eventually lost interest after a few days. I also created an account for Theda, after she wanted to play with Ambrose’s doter…in any case, it’s an interesting idea, but I canceled the app subscription because I’m not about to spend $80-something on a failed attempt at wrangling the children. I do like the idea of giving them daily tasks to check off, with an assigned point value that can later be cashed in for rewards like, say, a donut date with Mom.
- I **finished** Caroline Girvan’s Iron series on Thursday evening! After just picking it up as a means of continuing to weight train during Christmas break. Y’all. I can now do 5 non-knee (but not wonderful, let’s not kid ourselves) push-ups in a row. I can do dips with my legs straightened in front of me. I can shoulder-press using 20-lb dumbbells in each hand. I don’t have the same passion-filled hatred for lunges as I did two months ago. For the first time in my life, I’m actually seeing progress toward my strength goals. How cool! The end of Iron means…
- It’s officially Week 1 of Epic Heat! Eep! Going well — the pace of the workouts is quite a bit faster, so I’m doing the best I can. I found some others via the Caroline Girvan Facebook group who are also on Week 1 of Heat, so we all got connected in an accountability chat, very fun. I am also attempting a diet overhaul, because if I made so much progress in 6 weeks of eating pretty meh, how much better could I do with increased protein, fewer processed foods and sugar, etc? It will be interesting, though, going into Great Lent in…what, 3 weeks? 4? It’s a slow slide into it, but next Sunday is the Week of the Publican and the Pharisee, followed by an entire, beautiful, fast-free week. Then maybe one more week of regular fasting before Meatfare week and Cheesefare Sunday? (Yes, I checked.) In any case, I don’t really want to track macros during Lent, because it will only stress me out and make me sick of shrimp. So I’ll probably track pre-Lent just for data’s sake, and then continue focusing on eating some sort of protein with each meal + continuing the good habits I will have established up to that point. (I WILL HAVE ESTABLISHED!)
- Thinking ahead to March, the Winter Quarter is about to end and the Spring Quarter (SpringQ?) is beginning. So. Time to start some intentions! A Formation mentor I adore recently posted on his personal blog about a planning method he’d come up with that’s really a lot different than anything I’ve ever seen before, and it’s really made me start thinking differently about all my goals. I won’t give it away now, but the hint is: campgrounds, peaks, and horizons! I’ll do a full post when I plan out March-May. I’m excited to dive in!
- I started Redwall this past week, one of my three allotted re-reads for the year. To copy-pasta what I wrote in the VCFA BookTalk email thread: I remember the series was hugely popular when I was in middle school, and I read the first book and enjoyed it but never read further. But I didn’t really remember any further details…it is way different than I thought it would be, man. For some reason I thought there was a big snake or perhaps a giant bird threatening the abbey? But no, it’s an evil rat. (I mean, there is a creepy snake but so far it’s just kind of off on the sidelines whispering the name of the devil.) A little bit more political intrigue and battling than I generally prefer, but the hunt for Martin the Warrior’s sword is fun.
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