Mistakes are proof that you're trying...

I'm so not even vaguely close to this yet.

My Spanish homework for the week was to write a story using a random collection of provided words.  So I wrote the story in English and then translated.  And yes, I know that’s not the way you’re supposed to do it, but it’s already super slow and painful – going directly to Spanish isn’t an option yet.   And the difference between the two versions?  OMG.   It was a random very short story in English, but at least it was a story.  By the time I finished attempting to put it in Spanish, it was a ridiculously bland, barely comprehensible, "See Spot Run" narrative *sigh*   Ah well.   

What impressed me the most – when I was typing in Spanish, my spell check and autocorrect were angry, but the punctuation adapted.  When I typed in an English paragraph I got normal quotation marks, and when I typed in a Spanish paragraph I got their double triangle things…    Now if only it was smart enough to switch autocorrect accordingly as well, I’d be set ;)  Of course, my phone (where I usually practice my Spanish) tries to do that and ends up doing part in English and part in Spanish – sometimes in one text ;)  Lol fun fun.

Today I learned I can't jump backwards...

Let's talk agility.  It would seem that despite excessive amounts of agile training, I have none ;-P.  Lol okay those may be two different takes on the word, but still.  It would be nice if they aligned.

So Nicole and I are into week two of Core de Force.  And we've chosen the "deluxe" version because, why not ;). Said deluxe version has several videos, mostly agility related, that aren't in the original selection and I've never done before.

Week one went reasonably well.  All the cardio was a bit of a shock to the system but my arms and legs are missing the weights.  All good - I'll do the month and then throw in another "hard labour" week.   In week one there was an agility video which used a ladder -- which I don't have.   Not a ladder you climb, rather one that lies on the ground and you step in and out of.   So I did the exercise without and then hit up Amazon.  All good right?

Suffice to say I do not look like this.   But it does show part of the ladder ;)

Then today's workout.  Ah today's workout.  First sign -- only six rounds.  Most are nine; I seem to remember some of the later ones are 12.   So seeing six, it isn't a "yeah this'll be easy" sign.  No.  Not new.  It's like walking into a jump lesson and seeing all the fences set at 2' -- you know the exercise will be nearly impossible.

But it gives me a chance to use my shiny new ladder, so that's exciting.  And this is where I learned I cannot, for the life of me, hop or jump backwards.  Lol apparently not a required skill in my world.  Because in the backwards exercises -- I wasn't even *close* to making it from one rung of the ladder to the next.  Nope, I moved maybe an inch?  It was really quite sad.  And frustrating.

Some of the ladder exercises were super fun, and I was so entertained by them I didn't really notice how gross the puddle of sweat by my feet was becoming.   But the stupid hopping backwards *sigh*. And the one with the twisty hips???  Honestly, I suspect I look very much like a drunk angry squirrel *sigh*.

You can find anything on Google ;)

While I sometimes wish there was a mirror in our workout area so I could see what I'm doing, in the agility routines I'm very glad there is not.  In my imagination I'm a fighting machine!  Lol I don't want to ruin that with reality.

Reality check ;)

Overall though, I'm really enjoying this series.  Lots of variety, the exercises move quickly, and many of them are entertaining.  I am missing the weights (who knew?) but I certainly still feel like I'm getting decent workouts.  And having a workout buddy is awesome!

I'm sorry, did I roll my eyes out loud?

Under the "once a barn girl" category -- shower this am got cut short when the hot water disappeared rather instantly; sadly this happened just after thoroughly lathering shampoo.  Ugh.  Fail.   So had the pleasure of dunking my head in the ice cold water to get the suds out, but there was no way I was doing the conditioner thing under those circumstances.

No big deal right?   Definitely very much a first world problem (my favourite kind ;).  However, my hair is very fine, very long, and there's a lot of it.   This means that without chemical assistance it's nearly impossible to get a comb through it.  hmmmmm other options?   Show sheen!   Lol well not quite, but the puppy version.   Yup, Sasha's leave-in detangled worked wonders on my hair.  For the win.

Nicole and I are starting Core de Force tomorrow -- if you've any interest in joining us, let me know! Anyone welcome!   To kick this off, I did half an hour on the rower this eve -- I should be sufficiently sore to start tomorrow.   Lol ah well.  Not my best plan, but it's the kind of mindless exercise I wanted tonight.

Finishing out the week

So just to finish off the story -- I did, in fact, complete the "Week of Hard Labour" successfully.  The 3rd day was core, and I really didn't think too much of it.  Compared to Core de Force or P90X type core workouts it didn't seem nearly as bad.  Until the dreaded day after the day after.  OMG.  I literally couldn't sit or stand straight.   It wasn't the usual muscles, but the ones on the side.  It was like they just collapsed in so all of me wanted to curl into a ball or slouch in a chair.   Absolutely brutal.   Was three - four days before I felt like a functional human being with reasonable posture again ;)

This was followed by an arm day, and then "full body".  I'm not actually certain which of the two did me in, but the following day I was trying to talk on my phone, and after about 30 seconds was having trouble holding it all the way up to my ear.   I also couldn't handle washing my hair after the full body workout.  So yeah.   The workout itself was incredibly boring and repetitive -- if you're going to try it, have a TV or something playing for background interest.  It's certainly not like any of the others I've done where you have to pay attention to keep up.  But it was very definitely effective.

Since then I've done a couple X3 videos but nothing serious.  I'm thinking maybe I'll finish out the remaining weeks of X3 and then decide what I'd like to do next.  May try 21 day fix extreme again -- I liked those workouts just not the trainer...   Alternately Core de Force.  Or maybe a mix of week of 1, week of the other?   We'll see...

Today's dose of psychobabble...

So years ago I did the full on Myers Briggs thing and was INTJ. The only things that stuck of that assessment was that the I was Introvert (lol no surprise there) and that it was supposedly a fairly rare combination (maybe I’m not imagining it when most people don’t seem to see the world the way I do?). The J stuck with me because young me didn’t realize how judgmental I actually am ;) Slightly more self-aware me acknowledges that’s actually pretty accurate ;-P I remember nothing of the N or the T other than that they were the letters assigned.

I know that given time, it’s been mostly shot down and promptly replaced with other equally shoot-down-able theories ;) People do use it at work though – I’ve been asked a few times if I knew my letters and what they are. Lol regardless, yesterday this random quiz popped up on my FB (you know how reliable those are eh?) but it was super short so I figured I’d give it a go, and sure enough it gave the same combo of letters. Hmmmm okay. I didn’t agree much with the description though so I went digging through old stuff and Google until I found a more in-depth review which is so many ways was bang on. And the ways that weren’t at all a fit (specifically – I’m known at work for my people skills, but it’s decidedly not a trait of this type) I realized after thinking about it were things that I worked very hard to cultivate and mostly learned the hard way – not things that necessarily came easily.

I was chatting with a mentor at work and she, having only known me for the last couple years, wondered if I’d actually get the same results if I did the test again. Well I’m not committed enough to go pay to do the whole intensive thing again, but I did find a middle-of-the-road freebie version; I think maybe 15-20 questions? I resisted the urge to tweak my answers and went with what actually was. And…

Yup, exactly the same result. The T/F is right on the borderline – which intuitively strikes me as correct. I could go either way with that one. I don’t remember the percentages I had way back when, so I can’t say if they’ve shifted at all. But still the same letter combo. Although looking at this chart – it has an extra random letter ;) Lol but it didn’t show in the results, so I guess they’re just expanding their analysis.

Some of my favorites from the description (which this site calls Architect):

• “Architects form just two percent of the population, and women of this personality type are especially rare, forming just 0.8% of the population” -- sweet, normal is boring.
• “Architects are simultaneously the most starry-eyed idealists and the bitterest of cynics, a seemingly impossible conflict” -- I’m pretty sure I said something like this in the “This is Me” post a few days ago.
• “Architects are often given the title of “bookworm” as children.” -- ummm yes.
• “Architects radiate self-confidence and an aura of mystery, and their insightful observations, original ideas and formidable logic enable them to push change through with sheer willpower and force of personality.” -- I don’t know if this is true or not, but it sounds good ;)
• “Architects use their creativity and imagination not so much for artistry, but for planning contingencies and courses of action for all possible scenarios.” -- pretty sure this is my job description
• “Authority figures do not impress Architects, nor do social conventions or tradition, and no matter how popular something is.” -- This.  I always used “all the cool kids are doing it” as a sarcastic joke.   Until I became friends with someone who is the extreme opposite and hugely motivated by them; I will never be able to respect this, but I try to understand and trained myself to bite my tongue.
• “If something piques their interest, Architects can be astonishingly dedicated to their work, putting in long hours and intense effort to see an idea through.” Well.  Have you read the blog?  ;)
• “When presented with unfamiliar territory, such as alternate lifestyles, Architects tend to apply their receptiveness and independence, and aversion to rules and traditions, to these new ideas as well, resulting in fairly liberal social senses.” -- Yup
• “Architects will keep up with just a few good friends, eschewing larger circles of acquaintances in favor of depth and quality.”  Quality over quantity.  
• And of course at work: “As their careers progress further and their reputation grows, so will the complexity of Architects’ tasks and projects. Architects demand progress and evolution, new challenges and theories, and they often accomplish this by pushing into more active strategic positions.” Lol says she who’s actively seeking a strategy position.   It also suggests PM as an appropriate role fit.

Anyways – just amused me so thought I’d share. Have you ever done one of these? How did it resonate with you?

May the odds be ever in your favour...

Yet another year that I am not planning to play the Nanowrimo game (National Novel Writing Month - to the uninitiated; it's pretty amazing).  It's the first year in a long time though that I could potentially have made the time to do so, so I'm considering that a step in the right direction :).  It's just that I'm choosing to direct that time to Spanish lessons instead.   And no, I don't spend nearly as much time on Spanish as I'd spend on Nanowrimo, but I spend enough time on it that there's no longer sufficient time left over for writing -- at least, not if I want to remain gainfully employed ;).  I will aim to up the blog posts and maybe get in a few flash fictions though in the spirit of the month.

Re Spanish -- I have a new teacher due to the fact that my previous teacher has left indefinitely to backpack around South America.  Lol he's super excited about it and has never travelled anywhere so I'm happy for him and appropriately jealous ;).  But it meant I needed to find someone new.  This was quite the search -- I'm amazed how many online instructors don't teach on weekends?!?!?   And most of the teachers in Spain are out because the timezones are prohibitive.  The teacher I have now does a much better job at getting me to actually speak Spanish (win!) lol but is not as good a teacher or as prepared for the lessons.  However, given that *anything* is progress given my current level, and they lessons are super affordable, I'm giving this brute force immersion method of learning a try ;)

Duolingo's claims are a little overambitious ;).
By 51% I'd expect to be able to have/understand at least basic conversations in Spanish.  Sheesh.

In unrelated news - I finished the Fusion Fitness program.   The last week wasn't nearly as exciting as the first three, but overall I'm glad I did it.   Was an interesting variety and I got to try some new exercises.   This week I'm doing the "Week of Hard Labour" -- which is entirely weights (no cardio) and with a different instructor.  I don't really like the instructor but it's only 5 days.  The exercises are all very standard type that you would find at the gym with the average trainer.  I figured that was an okay thing to do for a week.  Then I'll find a new insane program next week.   Debating between finishing the last month of X3 or doing something entirely different.  Lol stay tuned ;)

Hmmmm or on second thought, maybe I *should* do Nanowrimo....   I just looked it up and last time was 2010?!?!