Phase 1 done, from 4*8 to 5*5. Pain ahead!

The first phase is supposed to last just 4 weeks, out of 12 total. It is the phase when all your 4 prime movers get a 4x8 volume. You are supposed to build some muscle mass here, and some muscular endurance before the actual strength work begins. I made it in 7 weeks, with a few interruptions, a few "just conditioning" workouts, and definitely one extra week of "let me try again that overhead press top set....one last time" to see with what numbers I would have to enter phase 2.

Too much, and I set myself up for failure and injury. Too little, and I am wasting time and not growing. A fine balance!

Anyway, phase 1 was tough but rewarding, although there is nothing like strongman training for a beginner to make you feel worthless, from time to time. You just cannot help but think, on the tough days when the barbell does not want to move, about all the years spent doing body-building type of work, without a real target or goal in mind, just "stay in shape". Sure you do look better, and you get a bit stronger, but the day of reckoning is only postponed, until you pick up some real barbell training. Then all your weaknesses are brutally exposed, and your brain spontaneously withdraws to the crocodile area and fires up thought like

"if this was a beam trapping a family member, could I lift it just ONCE?"

"if I was pinned down by a tiger, could I press her away?"

"if I was to carry a mate to safety, could I bear that weight on my shoulders?"

"if I had to throw something heavy as far as I can, how good would I be?"

and then you realize that you are just a weak city slicker, who runs out of gas way sooner than your body was designed for.

and then you power through, crappy workout after crappy workout, until things do get better.

Now I am a bit worried, because the 4x8 volume was intense, and now it is time to go 5x5. The progression is that if I hit "100" in my last and best top set for week 4 (week 7 for me) x 8, then I SHOULD be able to hit 115 x 5 in the second phase. That, for me, is scary. The last top sets were at the very cusp of what I could reasonably move without a spotter or a coach or ...anything really. We will see how it goes, I am looking forward to epic pain and hopefully some gains.

What I am sure I will take home is a ton of humility (never hurts) and a ton of mental fortitude (also not too bad) for which I have to thank both Brian Alsrhue and Alan Thrall! 

Syria

This is a silly blog. I rant, and sometimes I try to say something deep, but all in all I try to be witty and smart. We all do that on the internet, it is our window, and a good deal of us (I suppose "us bloggers") are too narcissistic to take a step back and try not to sound so damn smart every time we post.

This is, mostly, why I have been so silent on this blog. It is a fun thing to do, its purpose to let the words amuse (me, you, whoever) or just come out and relax me in the process. I cannot find the energy to do that right now, not with what I read in the news.

I have always felt a connection to what happens in Palestine, for example. The Gaza siege put a dampener in my enthusiasm and my will to blog, but did not kill it entirely. I was going to post something, at some point, what with all the travelling I have done, but lack of time and other priorities prevented me form doing it.

Now there is a deeper reason. Much deeper. It is Syria. It is a hot hot hot debate, but to me the core of the matter is as simple as its outer layers are complex. Those are meat and mead of analysts, fuel for (interesting) geopolitical debates. They have a merit, I suppose, as they illustrate the conflict to us, crassly clueless European, framing in context what happens just next door.

What matters to me is that for the last 2 years people have been suffering, fearing and dying over there. Normal people, ordinary people. People I could relate to. The death of an illiterate shepherd on the Tora Bora hills is not less dramatic, his life just as valuable, but I have to acknowledge to myself that there are other levels to relate to people, beyond that of just "being a human like me". I go through the gory, unsettling, disgusting images that the internet is flooded with. Before-and-after pictures of places that used to be beautiful, peaceful, or just "normal". Places where people of all ages had their trade, their everyday dramas, their jobs, their exams, their hopeless crushes on that girl/guy. When destruction hits people I can relate to, with similar dreams and aspirations, it all gets a lot scarier. To know that those people are no more, wiped away but the tug of war between their government and a bunch of thugs, to know that their existence has been shredded to pieces by the war-game of far way nations, is simply too disgusting to ignore.

But I can go deeper than that. I will. Syria, in a way, is family to me. It makes bleed the hearts of the people I love most, the ones who mean the most to me. I am not Buddha, I am not an enlightened soul. Certain wars will mean more to me than others. Certain events will tip the scale in favor of at least trying to say something, to articulate a thought.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/01/2013115135151522535.html

This is just the last in a long line of brutalities. This one robbed us of 87 (as of now) people and shattered the lives of those who knew them. It hit them where it hurts, where they thought it could not, would not happen. Because the parties are their own government, or a militia that allegedly, supposedly, theoretically took arms to overturn a corrupt police-state.

All I can do now is pose myself, and those around me, a simple question. Is it worth it? No. It is not. It cannot be. Do not come to me ever saying that this is a "necessary price", that "transitions are always bloody", that there are "lesser" or "necessary evils". There are not. We screwed up, big time, all of us. The dictator refuses to budge, refuses to bend, refuses to reform, cracks down on his own people, and what do we do? Do we help the citizens find a voice? Do we pressure said government to pull its head out of its ass? No, we do not. We flood the country with weapons, we arm militia groups. Ignorant, bloodthirsty thugs who love their sects more than they love their country. People who are prepared to die, yes, but also people who will do so no matter how many more they drag down with them. We bless these groups, and even anoint them with legitimacy, while what happens (legally speaking), is a Head of State who is refusing to go simply because "well...because Ben Ali and Ali Abdallah Saleh did". Is the government power hungry? Sure. Is it corrupt? I don't think anyone can object to that. Were there no alternatives to all of this? Of course there were.

But pitting Shi'ites against Sunni, crippling an enemy for good, forcing new markets to (eventually) open up to western goods, pulling all sorts of strings and stacking up all sorts of credit (to be exacted, no doubt,  at usury rates) seemed and seems more important than asking Syrians if they did not prefer to go through a political battle, rather than being engulfed in a full-on war, fought by a bunch of barbarians, in their streets and in their houses, with a dreadfully cold winter upon them, with no international help, and very little recognition, no information, surrounded by states that are at best paying lip-service to their plight, when they are not downright hostile to them or trying to exploit them as a negotiation tool (see the case of refugees).

But most importantly, and I don't give a flying shit if it sounds egoistic, it robs my loved ones of sleep, it makes them dread the future, it makes them worry sick, and I cannot just look the other way and keep to myself. If it is only to say that I am infuriated and disgusted, I will use this web space to do so.

Deadline

It is baking hot in the office. A bloody heat-wave which makes thinking straight almost impossible. Still and stale air, nowhere to hide from it.

We have been running against the clock for the past 2 or 3 weeks. Two (important) hands left the deck and workload is increasing, not always with maximum efficiency in mind. Something like "while you save the Future of Mankind, could you pick all the green smarties from the tube and stack them neatly to the side? Then you can move to the red smarties...". And it is not like we had a good idea in the first place of how to complete our task. Plus, the "target" is so into paper pushing and filling forms that I do not know where to start describing it!

So far we have experienced: drop outs, a diplomatic struggle, a VISA nightmare, meetings after meetings, a financial revision, the preparations for an audit, too many / too few contributions from partners, one team member M.I.A. due to the living hell which is organizing a conference in a certain country south of Turkey (just go due south along the meridian...).

To make things easier (sarcasm here) the World Cup is going strong and we hear the cheers coming from all around the office. Neat. This hell is supposed to give us a break in less than eight days.

More updates after the final of the Cup.

Over and out.

...where I start ranting.

Which is what I am quite skilled at, apparently. Yes, I am a whiny bitch like no 70 year old aunt Telma who sees you just for Christmas asking why you still do not have a girlfriend can ever hope to be. I blame it on the stress though. I AM A STRESS-BALL. Live with it. I do, at least.

I have been musing over what to write for the first post. There is this Blog virginity issue, which makes you want to start it with a spectacular one, something memorable, witty, funny yet with a core of food for thought. It will not happen. I am way too focused on the moment I will sit back at my desk in Berlin, and the tide of amphibious organic matter will flow neck-high. The dreadful "to-do" list is visiting my nightmares already, with all the tasks that were left pending when I hastily departed for Italy, just before the last solstice.

Last-minute rounds of salutations are stacking already, eating away at the little time left for me in the island of Sardinia (from time to time I shall refer to said island as "Atlantis", the full reasoning behind this choice being more fitting for another post). One good thing to flag: it is so warm and sunny here. The downside is that I will be back to -20°C in less than 72 hours.

So, enough of the above, let us just get this over quick. My name (if you do not already know) is not important to you. My age? The number is high enough to vote for the ludicrous farce-country I am a citizen of, and small enough to still kick enough ass to sooth my ailing ego. My interests? You would call them geeky stuff (but please, see above for my age before you do). Whatever feeds the imagination, basically. Movies, books, music, games (loads of board games and role-play games) and all the encoded nonsense drivel that keeps Comics Convention packed with visitors all the time. I also like astronomy, though I kinda suck at math, and I love being near the sea.

This will be a blog where I will mostly rant about whatever drives me insane, and I will mean every word you shall read. Blogging away I will try to zero in on the causes of my distress and generic unhappiness, and probably do nothing to fix the problem.

I guess this is it for now. Moody Bastard to Earth, over and out.

M.