war horse

This weekend I'm doing something a bit different.

Basically, the company I work for is marking its 20th anniversary this year, so the boss is kindly treating us all to a special treat. Ideas for this treat ere floated early in the year and there were a lot of suggestions from the sublime to the ridiculous. We all then got a vote on what we'd want to do and the winner was.. (drum roll)... a trip to the theatre!

Well, actually, dinner and then a trip to see "a show" up in that there London, but the show in question is a theatrical show, rather than a musical or something like that. In fact, the show is called "War Horse" and is literally about exactly that - a Horse in the first world war.

To be brutally frank the theatre is not my bag. I have enough trouble sitting in the cinema for extended periods of time (my arse goes numb and the combination of my weight and height tends to make the seating generally uncomfortable) so the idea of a three hour trip to the theatre is not necessarily up there at the top of my list. However, I'm guessing it's three hours because there'll be an intermission, so maybe I'll get a chance to have a stretch.

Also, if I'm totally honest the idea of spending quite so long with the people I work with at the weekend also isn't to far up my list. Especially since it was declared to basically be a "bring your partner" type event and I don't got one of those. Plus we've apparently had some drop-outs and some other people have been invited and I don't know them.

Is it normal that I do this, I wonder?

By 'this' I mean pre-list all of the potential negatives and reasons I might not like it. I sometimes wonder if normal people don't look forward to this sort of thing more. I mean, I don't know if it's a reflection of, as I say, the specific point that I don't really want to go to the theatre (if it was something I was keen on I'd have been more than twice before in my life, surely?) or if it's a more general pre-emption of a lack of enjoyment?

Basically, when I went to see my dad the other week he was talking to me about this new treatment he's on. Basically, my dad suffers from depression and he's been on this trial course where they basically try to altar his perceptions.

You see, one of the things with my dad is that he always focuses on the negative. It's actually one of the reasons I don't really enjoy being around him, because anything that comes up he will look at from a pessimistic, cynical or negative point of view. News is one of the worst things - I'll always attempt to change the channel is news comes on the TV, because rather than just watch it, it'll spark some rant or the voicing of some pessimistic viewpoint.

The point being for him, that because everything is always bad it has a reinforcing effect on his negative viewpoint.

And I'm wondering if maybe I do the same thing? I don't think so - my view on things isn't always negative like my dad.

Wow - that became weirdly analytical!

I guess I'll find out if this War Horse thing is any good on Saturday! Who knows, maybe I'll become a West End regular.

2 stone

This week's weigh in revealed I'd lost another 3 pounds.

I was pretty pleased with this as it was a fairly normal week. Or at least, I think it broadly represents what's going to be the norm across the winter.

The new plan is that I pretty much stick to the diet, but the exercise has reduced due to the combined factors of the freezing weather and the dark mornings and evenings. I'm still doing exercise, as mentioned last week, but it's less than it was.

My hope is that the loss of some of the exercise is not a big factor, as the diet is still very much in action. Also, I've done really quite well with my initial target, as I'm now pretty sure I've lost over 2 stone.

Since I didn't start weighing myself until I'd got my new scales and my first weigh in was somewhat dodgy, I'm pretty sure it's more than that, but I'm sticking with 2 stone as I don't think it makes sense to over-count these things.

There's a heck of a long way to go yet, but the main thing is I'm on target. I'm not bullish enough to actually reveal my starting weight, but I will say I'm on course to get my weight below the BMI level that represents morbid obesity by Chrimbo, which is my starting goal. I've also done pretty well in terms of loosing it at a fairly steady rate. It can actually be dangerous and damaging loosing weight too quickly, so I've been wanting to avoid that being an issue too.

And speaking of which, I was looking at what the minimum calorie intakes were, because I actually had a bit of an odd experience last Thursday. Basically, it came evening time and I found I wasn't at all hungry. I almost had to force myself to eat an apple and didn't then have my other bits I normally have in the evening as well.

This slightly worried me as it's not like I'd pigged out during the day, and my research suggests I did go under the minimum recommended intake, which is about 1,300 calories for a man. I therefore decided I would ensure I eat those bits in the evening, even if I don't feel specifically hungry, as such. Plus of course, I need to keep up things like vitamin and fibre intakes.

I guess what this really represents is the fact that my stomach has now shrunk. What happens when you consistently eat too much is that your stomach naturally grows in size. When you think about it this means that you get hungrier quicker and it takes more to fill you up.

But it's a reversible process - by consistently eating less your stomach shrinks down and gets used to those smaller volumes. And that's what's happened in my case.

This is actually what they effectively do when they do those gastric band or gastric bypass type surgeries. They're surgically short-cutting (pun intended) the size reduction process, which therefore means those people avoid the whole feeling ravenously hungry phase that is a big part of why weight loss fails.

the men who stare at goats

Jon Ronson is a particular type of journalist, but for the life of me I can't think of what they're called.

I don't mean that in any nasty sense, it's more that I don't know if there's a word to some it up. 'Gonzo' is about the closest term I can think of.

Basically, in Gonzo journalism, the journalist is generally a part of the actual story themselves. So the story tends to be a very subjective one and the idea is that it's effectively told through that person's experiences, but also, crucially, through what they personally thought about what was going on.

But the point is that doesn't quite sum it up with Ronson, because there's an open-mindedness that isn't really synonymous with Gonzo. Michael Moore's stuff is more in line with the aim of Gonzo (although really, he does polemics). I dunno - it's like a humanist version of Gonzo. A sort of "I actually think you're right/wrong, but I'm genuinely going to let you have your say" approach to the subjects being interviewed.

I mention this because the men who stare at goats is technically a fictional film, but it's based on a non-fiction book with the same name by Jon Ronson. And it's really rather good, except for the end.

In case you don't know, the specific men who did the goat staring where part of the US military's attempt to explore the potential that new age type thinking offered. In other words, it involved attempts at things like remote viewing and invisibility.

Now the point that was emphasised in the film was that this was clearly daft, although the nature of the daftness doesn't really come from the actual psychic powers themselves. The comedy is derived more from the idea that these people seemed to genuinely believe that they could develop these sorts of powers.

I've not actually read the book, but one of the commentaries is by Ronson and he suggests that this wasn't really true. The man who's idea it was had a more pragmatic approach - that by trying to reach these goals, they might be able to develop something that was actually doable.

Also, while the idea of developing psychic soldiers might seem daft from a purely rational point of view, you have to bear in mind that this is going on at the height of the cold war and also in the shadow of Vietnam. Given the mode of thinking that gives rise to policies such as Mutually Assured Destruction, you can kind of see how it becomes a kind of self-reinforcing possibility.

I mean, what if it was possible and they hadn't tried, but the Russians had?

Anyway, the point is that the film is very good - it's very funny and yet at the same time makes some interesting points. I wasn't a particular fan of the end, because for me, it represented a bit of a step too far (I won't spoiler it), but you can see where it's coming from. But apart from that, it's very worth your time watching it.

my achy, breaky legs

I hadn't really intended to bibble on about the grand prix for so long yesterday, but I wrote the blog out and then realised it was quite long, so I thought I'd save the rest until today.

When I write these blogs I do so in Word, before cutting and pasting them into the new post ting on the blog. I do this partly as it allows me to pre-write and edit them (and yet still all those typos get through!), but also because it's easier to judge the length. I like to try to make them about a single A4 page long or just under. I figure much longer than that and they'll take too long to read through.

Anyway, the other thing I wanted to mention was how my shed sorting plan had gone.

It went pretty well.

Well, that was easy.

I kid. The essential plan of action was for me to take all of the boxes out of the shed on Saturday morning. I was then going to spend the rest of Saturday going through them, with the idea that I could finish off sorting them out on Sunday morning and then put them all back in the shed Sunday afternoon.

It didn't entirely work like that, because there were so many boxes I found it difficult to really sort them out in a practical sense. I therefore brought them all into my bed-sit Saturday morning and started sorting, but discovered I needed more room and put half of them out in the corridor that connects me and my landlord (which was the type of reason this seemed a good time to do it, while he's on holiday).

Having done that, I sorted the half of the boxes I had left and then took these back out to the shed (although in a ramshackle way - I left the stacking order until I'd sorted the other boxes) on the Saturday. I then moved the corridor boxes into my bed-sit and sorted those. y that time it was late and I was tired, so I went to bed.

When I got up on Sunday I discovered that Saturday had really been too much and I was really tired and I also had a lot of aching muscles. So, after a slow start, I moved the rest of the boxes back out to the shed and stacked them all up in what I consider to be a reasonable efficient order.

What I've tired to do is compensate for the problems I discovered when I put them out the first time.

Problem 1 was the order the boxes were in. They were pretty random and I'd put a lot of stuff on e-bay, but not in a sensible way - some boxes had e-bay stuff and non-eBay stuff and where buried under other boxes. Problem 2 was that I hadn't kept a record of what was where. And problem 3 was that e-bay stuff had to go in the shed, which was a pain in the arse.

This time I've therefore kept a load of e-bay stuff in the kitchen. I've also numbered the boxes and kept a note of what's in each box. I've also stacked the boxes in what I believe to be a sensible order.

I also have the advantage that I've gotten rid of a lot of stuff, so quite of the boxes are actually half empty, which gives me more room to put other stuff in and also makes them lighter and therefore easier to shift around.

Anyway, the real upshot was that Sunday afternoon I was really tired and so didn't have the energy to do a great deal of e-baying. I put a few on and took photos and weighed things, but I ran out of steam, so there's quite a lot left to do. In a way, that's better as the last time when I had nearly a hundred things on at once was an absolute nightmare, although it did mean I didn't take full advantage of the free listing day.

rain stops play?

So this last weekend it was the South Korean Grand Prix.

Eventually.

You see, it rained and they decided to delay the race. When they eventually got going they set off behind the safety car, but they considered the rain and spray to be so heavy that they stopped the race.

So everyone lined up back on the grid and waited for the rain to ease, which took ages. Then it started to become apparent that unless they got the race under way, there was a severe risk of the sun setting. And F1 cars aren't fitted with headlights. Indeed, most tracks aren't even fitted with street lights, let alone the mega powerful lights they use when they have a proper night race a la Singapore.

That meant they had to start the race and again it got going under the safety car, which they followed around for ages. When proper racing finally got going the race was quite good, but it was apparent that it wasn't really any different to a normal wet race.

Now there were some extenuating circumstances. First off, the circuit was only just finished in the nick of time, which meant the tarmac was really new. And new racing tarmac can be quite slippery anyway, so adding rain may well have made them a bit too cautious.

Secondly, the pit lane entrance was really rather dodgy, with it forcing cars to slow down on the racing line. Add to that that section has concrete walls right next to the circuit (apparently, it's going to become a street circuit, because they're going to build a city around it :/) and you can see they might have wanted to be more cautious because adding spray into the mix might have been a bit dangerous.

But then the problem with that is that racing in the dark without lights is really dangerous and they let the full race length run, despite the fact that it meant they really were in the dark. Sunset was apparently 6:15 local time and the race finished later than that.

So if they were trying to minimise the impact of a wet race for safety, why then let it run full-length into the night? Especially when stopping it after three-quarters distance would still have given everyone full points.