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In my continuing quest to simplify my life, I've started standardizing some things in my life. Part of that has been about developing routines to simplify my day-to-day life, although that's not really different than how I normally operate. Everyone will develop daily routines to efficiently get through mundane tasks and move on to dealing with the rest of the day. Mostly though, I've been moving towards standardizing my possessions and things I need to use.

I am now nearly 60 episodes into Fist of the North Star. That comes out to about 40 episodes watched in the past 3 weeks, only two of which I've actively watched the series. Hey, what can I say? When your wife is off traveling to foreign lands, you have a lot more free time living a bachelor life. Anyhow, I've picked up some new lessons hidden in the plot of FOTNS. I'm still really enjoying watching Kenshiro kick ass, but these little points stuck out for me:

Replacing my Buddy Lee rope cord

I finally managed to snap the cord on my Buddy Lee rope. It took me about three years, but I finally wore through the cord. All things considered, that's not too bad. I chew through the cheap ropes when I get in a jump rope conditioning phase, though I guess I mostly break those ropes at the handles.

In the capitalistic model, it's money. But we all know (hopefully we all know) that money isn't everything. So, then what does motivate us? I thought this video had an interesting answer:

I've recently started watching Fist of the North Star since I've discovered the Hulu has the complete series. I had watched the animated movie in college, but I never saw the t.v. series. I'm around 17 episodes into the 152 episode series, and I must say I am enjoying it (1980's graphics and all). But I am glad that I didn't watch the series as a kid. While it is technically a cartoon, I'm not entirely sure my 7-year old self would have been quite ready for all the animated gore. I also think that the cartoon quirks may have taught me some erroneous lessons.

Conventional wisdom tells us that weight training increases bone density (ex. here and here). The force of your muscles moving a load stresses the bones slightly and causes them to grow back stronger. That's a decidedly good thing, at least assuming that you don't do anything really (excuse the pun) bone-headed like lift weights you're not ready for or do exercises with terrible technique.

Conventional wisdom tells us that weight training increases bone density (ex. here and here). The force of your muscles moving a load stresses the bones slightly and causes them to grow back stronger. That's a decidedly good thing, at least assuming that you don't do anything really (excuse the pun) bone-headed like lift weights you're not ready for or do exercises with terrible technique.

Reading through a fitness mag (ok, I admit it, I flipped through my wife's issue of Shape), I came across an article about equipping a home gym. As expected, I found half the suggestions to be ludicrous. I was quite amused that the bigger budget home gyms had a treadmill and elliptical trainer--two pieces of equipment I think are completely unnecessary for a home gym. I was likewise amused at the suggestion of the perfect pushup device; rotating handles for pushups are overrated and not worth $30.

My dad was never a big fan of my avid interest in physical fitness and physical activities. His attempts to turn me into a nerdy bookworm were only half successful. I did turn out to become a nerd, but he fortunately never succeeded in making me forgo all physical activity to study more. In fact, his constant badgering about me not studying enough probably caused me to rebel and become even more interested in physical fitness. But last night, he didn't poo-poo my fitness expertise like he usually does.