Hello comrades and welcome to the first improvement megathread of June! It's the beginning of the month, great time to set your goals and priorities for this month.
As usual, some discussion ideas:
- Do you want to share something you've done in the previous week? Everything counts, nothing is too small.
- How was your May?
- Do you have any goals or priorities for June?
- Do you have any streaks? For example, "sober for one day." Feel free to post your streak every day in this thread.
- If you don't have a continuous streak, did you manage to abstain from something for a day or more?
- Did you come across some useful information or resource that might help others?
Poster caption: Glory to the first cosmonaut U.A. Gagarin!
Good luck with your goals! 
We went on our yearly vacation a week ago, and despite eating and drinking a lot, I didn't really gain any weight. I'm hoping to drop some weight this summer. I got a more physical job, and I'm eating better.
We had to put our dog to sleep right before the trip, and the lead up to that was very stressful. We quit doing yoga, didn't have time for ourselves or motivation to go hiking or anything. I also had a really bad bite on one of my fingers, so my hand was unusable for a few weeks. I'm sure I'm forgetting some other BS.
Anyway, all this is to say, we plan on starting yoga again tomorrow, and I'm getting motivation to start doing things that need doing around here. That's my short term improvement plan. I'm not at rock bottom, but it's been a while since I've slacked off this hard.
We had to put our dog to sleep right before the trip, and the lead up to that was very stressful.
My condolences. Putting a pet down is never easy
Thank you. It was really hard watching her go down hill and having to decide when it was time. I miss her, but she's not struggling anymore, and our relationship is improving.
I'm running a couple times a week. Far and away from the obsessive distance runner I used to be, but it feels good to have some level of regularity again.
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been working out almost every day this week. Tired of always putting improving my health off out of laziness.
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finally did my alpha release of my browser game last week, which i've been super happy with. It was delayed a few months when my wife went out of town and my working schedule got all messed up. Working on getting it to beta version and releasing it to r/incremental_games.
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Computex is this week, looking forward to the new amd cpu announcements; Going to buy a new rig with them and finally do watercooling for the first time, which i've wanted to do since i was like 10. Super excited to work on it.
Congratulations on the alpha release! Hit us up with the link if you wish so that we can check it out
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roll call:
@SeventyTwoTrillion@hexbear.net
@TraschcanOfIdeology@hexbear.net
If anybody else wants to be added to the roll call, just let me know
Please add me to the roll-call, I will answer the call of self-improvement for the sake of mastery of self and advancement of communism through bettering myself to be fit to help others.
self-improvement for the sake of mastery of self and advancement of communism through bettering myself to be fit to help others
That's why we're here!
Welcome onboard comrade, we're happy to have you with us
Mokey Drum:
Technique
Ankle Technique, I can do the ankle technique with my left foot from 210 down to 130BPM. I might have to spend extra time getting 100-120. The technique changes at that tempo and becomes very closed. After I get this down I'm going to move away from feet technique and focus more on learning songs, listening and transcriptions. I do about 15 mins a day on this.
French Grip Left Hand Stone Killers on a Moongel Pad. Just trying to get my hands stronger and more resilient. 75BPM for 10 mins.
Trad Grip Left Hand Stone Killers on a Moongel Pad. 75 BPM for two sets of 2.5 mins. The wrist rotation motion is not meant to go fast clearly but I need to build the muscles up more.
Brush Technique
I said I was going to work on this for awhile now and i'm finally getting to it, my teacher showed me his system and I'm very pleased with it. One thing i noticed is that in your left hand, you obviously have to comp with it while still keeping the circle going and the goal should be: extremely smooth circle and as little gap between the slap comping sound and the continuous swishing motion. I spend about 20 minutes on this a day.
Microtiming
So there's macro time which is keeping big portions of time consistent and then there's microtime which is keeping your subdivisions consistent, I've never really worked on it and it shows. god, there's so much to work on.
Click on quarter notes, no swing beat, play directly on the beat I do 6 sets of 2.5 mins. Comp on snare drum on beat 3, + of 3, ah of 3, 4, so on. 80 BPM.
Click on middle triplet Just play ideas over it and try to flow over it. 100BPM 10 mins
Click on last triplet Play ideas over it, try to flow over it. Doing a lot of KKLLKKLLKKLL and LKLLKLKKLKLL 130BPM 10 mins.
Click on upbeat sixteenth notes 140 BPM. Playing grooves and fills and trying to keep it all in the pocket. I felt like keeping sixteenth notes on hihat felt good so I'm working on just doing 8th notes on the hi hat now.
Transcription
Roy Haynes Transcription
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1SaofDEVrk
20 mins a day.
Play with recordings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4m3yiOAe58
Playing with tihs lately, mostly playing just quarter notes and filling in occasionally with the skip beat. Trying to get my default playing style to focus on quarter notes. Atleast for now. 20 minutes or so a day.
i hate being fuckign sick, i want to go out and play
I have a gig in a few weeks, need to learn a bunch of tunes. Heres what Im learning this week.
[ ] Upper Manhattan Medical Group [ ] ESP [ ] Jump Monk [ ] Black Narcissus [ ] Blue in Green [ ] Impressions
Been slacking just a bit for the past few weeks. My dad's health has been up and down and my mom is recovering from surgery. So I've a lot more to do at home, which I guess has help with staying relatively in shape since some of it involves lifting heavy stuff. I also have weights at home so I worked out with them on a semi-regular basis.
I think the best thing that I can say has happened in the past week, and over the past month of May, is just getting closer to my crush again. We're both a bit flakey (sounds bad, but don't know how else to describe it lol) so we've kind of been all over the place in so far as how we act around each other, but we're back to hugging just about every day.
I'm hoping to get back on track with my workouts. I'm taking PTO and I'm using it to get back in the swing of things. So far so good. Yesterday went on a run. Kind of surprised that I haven't really lost much there with how I hadn't been running for the past month. I'd even say it was my best run to date. Today went on another run and then to the gym. Again, felt good. So I hope to keep it up with at least a daily run and maybe the gym every other day. Just feels like its tough with how my schedule is structured at the moment.
So goals/priorities for June. Mainly just getting in the habit of working out. Also trying to hang out with friends/family more since the weather is nice.
All things considered, I had a great May. I maintained my not drinking/smoking streak the entire month plus some extra before. I maintained DND weekly and have been having a great time. I've been more social and happier than I have been in a while. I got a health issue taken care of that had been bothering me for a few years now. And I put in a down payment on motorcycle that I'll be picking up soon.
As far as improvements go my main focus this month is on eating properly. I find it too easy to just skip breakfast and lunch most days. This has lead to me losing a little too much weight that I did not want to lose in the first place. I've been eating more fast food recently just to keep my caloric intake up (especially since my job is physical) and while that's better than starving myself, it's not something I should be relying on as much as I am. I wish I could meal prep but my brain seems fundamentally opposed to eating the same meal too often. Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
I also want to do some kind of workout at least 3 times a week. I get a ton of cardio walking my dog and biking to work but I need to start trying to get some strength back. Ideally I want to get back into rock climbing more often but cost and time are the bigger limiting factors there.
Congratulations on hitting the one month mark, that's a huge milestone! Keep us posted on your streak
In regards to nutrition, if I had to bulk I would just eat french toast every day. I would also eat a lot of peanut butter. My advice is to cook your breakfast the day before. I cook my oatmeal every evening for my breakfast tomorrow. You can also cook lunch the day before and heat it up.
You don't have to meal prep but it's a good idea to plan your meals in advance. I plan my meals almost a week in advance because I feel that going to the grocery store more than once per week is a waste of time lol. It also frees up my mental bandwidth because I don't have to think about what I'm gonna eat every day.
Btw you can find a bunch of workout plans on r/FitnessMaterialHeaven
My May was kind of a shitshow due to some health issues. I was unable to do any exercise because of it. But I kept up with my other healthy habits and that kept me afloat.
I have mostly recovered now so hopefully I will be back on the sigma grindset in June. This month I want to resume running 2x weekly. I also want to touch grass and hang out with friends because the weather should be nice outside
After a long nine months of juggling homeschooling and part-time work, the kids are starting summer day camp tomorrow, which means June-July-August is officially Work On Myself Summer™
- Closing all the movement/exercise/stand rings on my smartwatch every day (14 day streak so far)
- Logging all the food I eat so that I don't just mindlessly grab small snacks throughout the day (2 days so far)
- Biking the kids to and from summer camp when weather permits (final year for this as they're getting too big for the bike)
- Getting back into Synth Riders as a quick, fun workout
- A daily shoulder/back stretch exercise routine so that the aforementioned workout doesn't wreck my shoulder
- Picking a video game to focus on until I've beaten it, then moving on to the next one
Even with work ramping up, I'm gaining at least 20 hours of time per week of time from this summer camp thing. I am so excited for this. Honestly, the biggest risk is that I overdo it and mess up my knees or something during this first week.
Last time I started a routine like this, it lasted for 500 days because it just felt so good to just refuse to stop getting a little bit better every single day. I've let life claw back so much of the gains I made over the last four years, but at least for the next three months, I'm back in control of this thing
Hell yeah, that's a good routine
I'm also doing exercises for my back, I'm doing the McGill Big 3.
Btw I'm also trying to stick to one game for at least 15 hours before moving on to the next one, I don't want to be jumping to a different game every day. What is your current pick?
Thanks for sharing that video; I have a much better understanding of good bird dog form now!
I'm gonna finally complete Astro Bot Rescue Mission and then move on to wrapping up a nearly-finished Cyberpunk 2077. What are you focusing on?
I'm glad you found it useful :)
My main game is currently Mad Max, I picked it up recently to get hyped for Furiosa. It's fun as hell, I definitely recommend it. I would also like to go back and finish RDR2 and Midnight Suns. I haven't played Cyberpunk yet but I bought it recently on a sale and I'm looking forward to playing it!
Btw what are you using to log your food? I'm using Cronometer and it's super easy to log stuff in the browser on my computer, you can copy and paste entire days and edit entries easily.
I’m using Foodnoms which is a nice little iPhone app with one of the best “AI” functions I’ve seen: if a food isn’t in the database, it can take its best guess at the nutritional info.
Mad Max is a good one; it’s really satisfying to take the Magnum Opus from a frame on wheels to a machine of legend. I never did beat it; let us know how it holds up at the end
