Introducing the numi by Kohler:
As if the amazing design itself weren’t enough, imagine:
Not impressed yet? How about a touch screen remote where you can personalize your experience?
Maybe you just need to see it in an appropriate setting:
Are you starting to understand how rich, modern, and sexy you need to be to have one? Not yet? Then watch this video:
It’s only about $6000. When you’re rich, even dropping a deuce should be luxurious.
I’ve been setting new personal records lately.
My personal best (set sometime last year) on pullups was 19 in a row, an improvement of 6 over my previous best. It seemed like a fluke, because after I did the 19, I was nowhere close until last week. I came home after a long day, still in my jeans from work, stepped up to the bar with no warmup, and pulled 20. The 20th rep looked terrible, as I practically threw myself at the bar, but I was too excited to not count it. The next morning, I pulled 21. 2 days later, I pulled 20 again. No fluke this time. (Now updated for 5/27: 22 in a row)
I’ve been running for most of the last year, and most of my runs are along a beautiful trail near my house that happens to be exactly 2.5 miles. I run with my Blackberry in my pocket so I can track my stats with the built-in GPS. Back in September, I ran the course in 26:07. Last week, after months of continuous improvement, I set a new personal best at 21:33.
When I do strength training, my favorite style is Crossfit. And, one of the common workouts that I do, because it requires no equipment other than a pullup bar and a timer, is Cindy. Cindy is an AMRAP (As Many Reps/Rounds As Possible) lasting 20 minutes where each round is 5 pullups, 10 pushups, and 15 squats. My previous best had been 18 rounds. Last week, I hit 21 rounds.
And, as of this morning, I hit another personal best with Crossfit’s Fran workout. 5:57 for rounds of pullups and 95# squat thrusters of 21, 15, and 9 reps. 45 reps of each, under 6 minutes total. My previous best was 6:35.
So what’s been happening?
I’d have to say the greatest contributor to each of these improvements has to be weight loss. From January 31st until now, I’ve dropped 22 pounds – 20 in the first 6 weeks. And, despite the stall on total weight loss of only an additional 2 pounds, I’ve continued to lose fat. Clothes that couldn’t be worn with a 20 pound loss could be worn with a 22 pounds loss – a clear indication of additional fat loss.
How did I do it? Simply following the eating principles of Tim Ferriss’ Slow Carb Diet as outlined in his book The Four Hour Body.
Now I’m ready for the next step in the body experiment: The Sugar-Free Summer.
I’ve already essentially eliminated sugar for 6 days a week just following the Slow Carb Diet rules. 7 days a week is a huge step, so why would I do it? For me, the challenge is simple: It’s entirely possible that I could eliminate taking a daily medication if I eliminated fructose from my diet. Dr. Robert Lustig explains the science behind it in the following long but extremely informative video.
Somewhere around the 56 minute mark, Dr. Lustig explains the body chemistry that takes place when sugar hits the digestive system, making a strong argument that fructose is actually a toxin. Around the 58 minute mark, he identifies the reaction in the liver as the fructose is metabolized, which results in an increase of the waste product uric acid.
That’s the part that put me over the edge to wanting to try going sugar free. I take a daily medication, allopurinol, to control my body’s output of uric acid. Left uncontrolled, excess uric acid settles in my joints, causing an extraordinarily painful arthritic condition called gout. If I could solve the problem at the source instead of taking a medication to control it, wouldn’t that be a smart thing to do? After all, if I were diabetic, I would surely change my eating habits to avoid insulin therapy. Why not do the same thing with gout?
So, this week I started on the next phase of sugar elimination with 2 goals in mind:
1. Eliminating gout without the aid of drugs. Allopurinol has helped decrease the gout attack frequency, but it certainly hasn’t eliminated the disease. I’ve already cut my dosage in half and will stop taking it altogether after a couple of weeks of ramping down.
2. Additional fat loss. The leanest I’ve been in at least the last 15 years has been 218 pounds, and that was aided by a bout of the stomach flu. But, the goal is fat loss, not necessarily weight loss so I guess I’ll have to have my wife take some awkward pictures to see if it made a difference.
Here we go…
Saturday afternoon, I received a text message:
“Can u please take a look at 7-8 [the location of the computers] 1 doesn’t have Internet 
can u take look it Txs”
This sounded simple, especially since it worked the day before so I replied:
“Sure. I can plug it in to the internet.”
The user said:
“Funny”
By the time I had received the reply, I was on the scene looking at the computer that wasn’t connected to the internet. I had spotted the problem from 20 feet away as I walked up: There was no ethernet cable plugged in to the ethernet port. I sent back:
“True. It’s not plugged in. I’ll do that now.”
“OK I saw 2 blue wires ? Mmm”
“Yeah, the key is making sure they connect to the computer.”
“Lol”
If you like logic puzzles, tech support is for you!
“King Turd of Poop Mountain” is a spectacular insult. As is “weiner.”
Tripp and Tyler have launched trippandtyler.tv for their videos. This one features their deleted scenes from We Were Soldiers. I can’t imagine why these didn’t make the final edit.
I once worked with a guy that had the nickname of “The Biscuit.” On a regional tour with the boss and his peers, he farted in the van, earning a lifetime nickname. Now kids get suspended from school for farting on the bus.
With over 24 million views, you’ve probably seen it, but it still cracks me up.
Perfect for your next group: The Openly Shallow Small Group.
No one edits my work on rickknowles.net. That should be a surprise to no one. Well, occasionally my wife will point out a misspelling or a missing word, but that’s always after I’ve already posted material. I do have an editor when I write eDevotionals for EastLake Church, and it’s not always comfortable to have material cut or adjusted.
In the eDevotionals, the target for the entire piece is around 300 words. I almost always exceed that, so it’s up to the editor to find places to either cut back or decide that the extra words are worth leaving in for the reader. My last piece came in at about 350 words, so the editor had some evaluating to do.
Here’s my original text, from a piece talking about the encouragement coming from my mom:
Growing up, she would give me huge hugs and tell me how proud she was of me. Through college, she did the same. When I got married, she brought the same encouragement to my wife. When I used my bachelor’s degree in hospitality management for a career in fast food, she was cheerleading for me. When we had kids, she arranged special days to spend with her grandchildren to enjoy them and encourage them. When I left the fast food business to pursue something completely different, she was on my side. She wasn’t perfect, although I do make her sound pretty awesome, but she carried that theme of encouraging others throughout her life.
That was edited to this:
Growing up, she would give me huge hugs and tell me how proud she was of me. When I got married, she brought the same encouragement to my wife. When we had kids, she arranged special days to spend with her grandchildren to enjoy them and encourage them. When I left the fast food business to pursue something completely different, she was on my side. She wasn’t perfect– although I do make her sound pretty awesome– but she carried that theme of encouraging others throughout her life.
After seeing the edits, I really felt like some depth was missing, so I replied back:
Thanks for the edits. I would change this:
“When I left the fast food business…”
to this:
“When I left my corporate management career…”
I think without the context of the original set up sentence about my job coming out of college, this change will flow better.
The editor replied:
I actually left it that way on purpose — I like the richness of the specificity even without the other line.
OK, I could see where the editor was coming from, but I still didn’t like the change. So I gave it one more shot:
No problem. I’m sure that the point about my mom’s support across different parts of life will come through for the average reader. Here’s my last plea, in the event that you have time to adjust it:
What mom wouldn’t support their kid getting out of the fast food business?
See my point? I wouldn’t have requested the re-edit had I been an accountant or a mechanical engineer or even a chef. All of those suggest specific careers that speak to a level of success that would want or warrant support from a mom in the event of a significant job change. Here’s a story to help illustrate:
I worked for Pizza Hut for 12 years, finishing my time there as an Area Manager in charge of 9 restaurants in Seattle, then left to take on a role as an Area Manager for Jack in the Box. Better pay, opportunity, supervision – all the typical reasons. In my initial training, I had to learn all of the hourly positions like grill, fryer, drive-thru, and so on. One day, my wife was talking with some friends about what I was doing that particular week at work. Her friends knew that I had made a job change, they just didn’t know to what. She said that I would come home smelling like a deep fryer because I was learning to work the fryer that week. Some of the ladies didn’t know how to respond, wondering what kind of lame husband my wife had. She could see the puzzled look on their faces, so she explained exactly what the job was and why I was doing hourly training. They were relieved after she explained.
The average person or reader doesn’t think of someone in fast food as a corporate-level, above-store manager. That’s why I had to ask for the change again. Maybe that’s just my pride talking. And fortunately for my pride, I got my change.
Scenes that were seen this week…
What kind of monster would put break room candy up on the break room scale?
And do it again later in the week? That person is terrible.
I don’t know what my wife has planned, but it looks pretty hot.
What you get if I set up your laptop.
What I get for a desktop if I leave my Mac unprotected from my wife and daughter.
The variety of things for sale is astonishing. I’d like to meet the person that buys a sexually provocative toad. Never mind. That’s not true at all.
Even at 16, my son is not too old for a horsey ride. And I’m not too mature to play along.
I don’t know if Edward Cullen actually protects cars, but this definitely scares me away.
Last Friday, May 6th, EastLake Church hosted “A Night to Remember,” a prom for special needs kids around San Diego county. Rather than write my own material on the facts and figures of the event, check out Ashly McGlone’s San Diego Union Tribune article here: Church Couple Give Special Students A Night to Remember
Photographer Erin Kelly of Silent Stories Photography chronicled the event in this touching slideshow video:
Another volunteer, Meerm, created this fun video of the event:
And, EastLake Church’s volunteer photography team took about 1600 pictures and posted them here.
From my perspective (and every single volunteer, parent, and honored guest that I talked to), this was an absolutely amazing event and a joy to be a part of. The experience inspired me to write this eDevotional for this week:
Reflect:
A young lady arrived for the prom, dressed in a beautiful green dress and shyly asked one of the volunteers where the makeup table was. He responded, “Makeup? You don’t need makeup. You already look like a princess!” Her eyes lit up as if a switch had just flipped in her heart. She smiled brightly and began to twirl around in her dress, showing off how beautiful she was.
400 volunteers came out in support of last Friday’s “A Night to Remember,” a prom held at EastLake Church in honor of 150 students with special needs around San Diego county. As scene after scene of joy, huge smiles, and fun played out for the honored guests, I kept thinking about what a wonderful example of Christ’s love the event was.
1 John 3:18 says, “Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.” From the first honored guest’s arrival to the last one to leave for the night, the kids were buzzing with excitement about how awesome the night was. In the May 8th talk, Pastor Mike described a first responder as one who rushes into the fire, when everyone else is running out. Friday night, I saw 400 people rushing in to support 150 great kids and their families to make it a special night to remember.
React:
Is there a situation that you’re aware of where you could be a first responder and respond with Christlike love?
Pray:
Lord, you gave all for me. Put me in places where I can serve my brothers and sisters in need.
If you’ve been referred here by another site, I’ve removed the posting. I sent a message to the author of the referring site, requesting to not be associated with their hateful tone. In fact, the author of the referring site replied to me with a similar hateful tone. The author chose not to remove the referring link, so I’ve simply removed my post.
