Josh Writes a Blog

Author: zornog

  • Snowpocalypse 2023

    this one’s for real!

    Well, it snowed in ol’ Portland town, and not one of those “snow in the morning, melt by noon” type-a snows. No, this one stuck. Flurries and whatnot. Many friends of mine were sharing stories on Instagram of them being stuck in traffic. Icy roads, schools shut down. General mayhem on the streets. Fortunately, I was able to drive to the grocery store and back and didn’t have to resort to killing and eating my neighbors. A shame; some of them look pretty tasty.

    News & Updates

    Really not much going on over here. Same old, same old. Livin’ the dream! Etc. Etc. I run a lot now. I’m getting pretty good at making stir fry. Like, not “wok with intensely high heat” levels of good, but you know. Pretty good.

    Best Picture 2023 Showdown

    I’ve done it. I’ve seen all the Best Picture nominees this year. Every single one.1 I would like to at this point rate them in order of best to worst, in my humble opinion. As always, you can follow my film reviews on Letterboxd if you really want to catch my opinions hot off the press. The press of viewing the movie, I mean. … Right after I finished the movie, is what I’m saying.

    1. Banshees of Inisherin

      This and #2 are actually tied for 1st. If either one of these wins the Oscar, I will be happy. They are so diametrically opposed in terms of style and structure and theme, but so brilliant in their own ways. I love Martin McDonagh’s work to death, but EEAtT (EEEAAATT) is just so wild and weird and wonderful that I can’t pick one over the other. They are lovely and excellent in their own ways.

    2. Everything Everywhere All the Time

      See 1.

    3. Women Talking

      This movie was the most recent Best Picture film I saw, and I was very pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it. I don’t think enough people will watch this film, and they should, especially men. It’s one of those movies in the vein of 12 Angry Men—people having to argue through a problem, which reveals their characters and intentions, except this is definitely made with a more artistic flair. Great stuff.

    4. Tár

      I’m not even sure how to describe this movie. On Letterboxd I said it was like “Whiplash on quaaludes.” It was a slow burn for me to enjoy it but once I was in I was in to the end. I could see how this would not be everyone’s favorite though, it was one of those films where I had to put my smartphone down and actually sit and pay attention. (For the record, I pay attention to films, I just also … sometimes look at my phone too.)

    5. All Quiet on the Western Front

      This film deviates from the book a bit but really captures the uselessness of war. I was supposed to read the book in high school but I didn’t, but I know the gist of the differences and I’m okay with it. Adding the return to the village part would’ve made the film akin to The Hurt Locker (go to war, come back and civilian life is not the same, go back to war), which was a great movie which won Best Picture, so maybe this film felt the need to explore a different aspect of filmmaking—the gruesome trenches juxtaposed with the gruesome politics. The war scenes are as without mercy as Saving Private Ryan, even more so at parts (compare and contrast the knife scenes, for instance). One of those “only need to watch it once” type of movies though, unless you’re one of those dudes who fuckin’ looooves war movies, in which case this movie’s point has probably gone over your head.

    6. Top Gun: Maverick

      Speaking of dudes who fuckin’ loooove war movies … this is the film for you! I appreciate Tom Cruise’s adherence toward realism in his movies, with the cast flying their own jets and all. It’s also a film that knows exactly what it is and delivers on that. You know what you want to see, it knows what you want to see. Funny how shirtless dudes playing volleyball changed to shirtless dudes playing football though. What, is volleyball gay now? Sorry Tom, but I bet the gays love the shirtless dudes playing football too.

    7. Triangle of Sadness

      This movie has an absolutely batshit crazy Act 2, with some stuff that genuinely shocked me and also made me laugh out loud. I do think it goes slightly overboard with its message (we get it, rich people suck), but I appreciate the near-absurdity the movie brings. Could’ve been shorter, and I didn’t like the somewhat abrupt ending. But I hope to see Dolly de Leon in more stuff! (Also, RIP Charlbi Kriek, who didn’t even get to see her film’s premiere.)

    8. The Fabelmans

      Look, I know Spielberg is schmaltzy and all but this was like eating a Warhead made out of schmaltz. I really wasn’t into this film, even with the amazing final scenes. I may have to watch it again sometime though because I feel like the ending was a bit of an Adaptation moment. Regardless, I wasn’t a fan of the performances anyway and truly wonder what the deal was with Michelle Williams’s character. That coupled with Tony Kushner’s dated dialogue that made me feel like I was watching a play from 1994 was enough for me.

    9. Elvis

      Only Baz Luhrmann could take a fascinating character like Elvis Presley and make him the side character to his fucking manager. Who, to be fair, is an interesting guy too, but Baz doesn’t really even do a lot with him either. This movie is a maximalist nightmare. Austin Butler makes a great Elvis though, and there are some good scenes with him, sandwiched between just atrocious flamboyant nonsense. Baz perfecting the kitchen sink directing approach but failing to present Elvis fucking Presley as an interesting character. This film really feels like maybe Elvis was actually kind of boring most of his life and Baz had to spice it up so Gen Z wouldn’t review bomb him on Rotten Tomatoes or something.

    Well, that’s it! I hope Banshees or Everything wins.

    Providence Heart to Start

    Hey guess what I did a 5k again. Here’s my blog post about it:

    Another month, another 5k. This was the Providence Heart to Start, part of the Hood to Coast … family? of events? Collective of jaunts? I don’t know. It took place at Cook Park in Tigard, Oregon, about 20 miles southwest of Portland. It was a lovely day for running, overcast, temperature in the mid 40s, the tiniest sprinkle of rain at times.

    Getting here was easy, so I don’t have to belabor you with any commute issues. Cook Park is lovely and has lots of trails that I would like to walk on someday, but today is not that day! Today we race!

    Atmosphere was chill, not a lot of people for this race. Sometimes races feel like a Big Deal (Shamrock Run) and others feel like a group of folks getting together for a thing (Tar n Trail). This one was kind of in the middle. There was a kids run before the 5 and 10ks, so lots of little warblers running around.

    When I got my bib a couple days before, there was no swag. I think there were free passes to one of the big athletic stores, but neither of the women at the station were like “Here these are free things,” so I just left with my bib. At the event though, they had a few bits of free stuff, which included:

    • Protein bars. Lots of different kinds of protein bars,

    • A stress ball in the shape of a heart (remember, this race is for heart health),

    • A pin that read, “Think With Your ❤️”, which, I’ll be honest, I personally think is a bad idea,

    • A beer or seltzer after the run (10 Barrel Brewing IPAs or Michelob Ultra Seltzer, to be precise). Probably could’ve had a lot of beers/seltzers if you wanted to, I dunno,

    • Bottle openers (there were no bottled beers or seltzers, only cans).

    I think that was it. Not too shabby, but not my favorite group of swag. Again, I really do think you should think with your 🧠, not your ❤️. Lots of bad decisions have been made thinking with your ❤️.

    Anyway, the Big Discrepancy! I started Strava right at the start line and I had this corroborated with two friends of mine who were at the race: the race was likely only 3 miles [but probably was actually a full 5k, read on]. I know, I know. Please sit down. We’ll get through this, together.

    When I passed the finish line, Strava showed 3 miles, so I stopped briefly to grab my medal and then started running again, to pick up the other .11 of a mile, but was flagged down by a guy who needed the chip tag thing on the bottom of my bib, so I gave that to him and then proceeded to run the additional .11 of a mile. Ultimately, what I’m trying to say is that I think my time would’ve been slightly faster if I didn’t have to stop. I’m not mad at the event for short changing us a 5k, but it is frustrating to get your results and see that they are 38:01, only to discover that that’s your 3 mile result.

    Although … if you reverse calculate a 12:15/mi pace (which is on my official results) into a pace calculator, for a 5k, the result is 38:04. So … maybe Strava fucked up on this one. WOULD NOT SURPRISE ME. I wonder if Strava gets nervous out in the woods or something? I mean, chip time is literally just the time between when you cross the start line and when you cross the finish line. I can’t imagine it being out of whack, especially since it’s a company that has set it all up and whose job is to set up chip timers. I think Strava’s GPS just screwed up somewhere.

    Either way, I’m taking the chip time. 38:01! A very good run!

    Running-wise, I think I did pretty good. Obviously we can’t completely rely on the damn Strava app for this, but we’ll use it anyway.

    I really hoofed it out the gate, mainly to get around all the slow people walkers. The “track” was a thin concrete trail, maybe 5ft wide at most, and was a nightmare to deal with for the first 8th of a mile. A lot of us ended up running around in the grass, and I think I ran on some parts where plants usually grow, which probably was a bad idea. The start of the race is always a clusterfuck like this, but this one seemed especially annoying. I appreciate the Shamrock Run, which organizes runners based on their pace, with slower runners towards the back.

    I only stopped three times, with the longest gap being a suddenly sharp hill that I absolutely did not want to run up or down. You can also see that dip at the end of mile 3, where the race ended [which was probably actually 3.11 miles, maybe]. Annoying. Meanwhile, when I run my pace is all over the place, which is something I’d like to work on, but I’m glad that the difference between the first mile and the third mile is only little more than a minute. That’s progress; my first mile pace at Race for Warmth was 11:53, while the 3rd mile was 14:13, a 2:20 difference. Slow and steady wins the race, as they say.

    The weirdest part was at the end: when I decided to run the extra .11 of a mile, I felt like I could keep going. That’s dangerous territory, folks. That’s long run territory. Maybe we’ll talk about that some other time.

    A very good idea I did before the race was massage my feet, specifically my left foot. Doing this virtually eliminated the numb foot I’ve been getting around mile 2. Plus it just felt good! I also moisturized my feet a couple days ago. This was nice, but I think it also made my feet slightly slippery this morning. Could be my imagination though. My feet were happier with me overall though, which was good!

    After the race and the little extra run I chatted with a friend and commiserated over Strava, and then I went to the taqueria truck that was making burritos and ordered a big and delicious chorizo burrito with the works and a champurrado. I always forget how weird champurrado is. It’s good, just different. Could’ve gotten a horchata, but a warm drink felt like a better option.

    And then I drove home! The end. See you at the Shamrock Run!

    Thing 4 U

    I binged through the Taskmaster episodes on YouTube and was disappointed when season (sorry, series) 12 ended at episode 6. They finally have started releasing new episodes, every week I believe, and FINALLY are releasing series 13. If you haven’t seen Taskmaster, you owe it to yourself. It’s brilliant. I’ve linked series 13 but obviously if you have never seen it, start with series 1!

    The End

    When next we meet, I will have ran my first Shamrock Run in 5 years! Also, it will be the Ides of March! Remember those? Caesar did! Ta for now.

    1

    I’d rather eat my own turds than watch Avatar 2.

  • Some Thoughts on The Whale & Being Fat

    Last night I saw The Whale. I’m going to assume you know the basics about the movie. I’ll probably spoil a bit of it too, because I don’t know how to talk about things without talking about the thing. So be warned.

    Also, obligatory CW for weight talk and fatphobia.

    I enjoyed the film quite a bit–Brendan Fraser was excellent and captivating, Hong Chau was even more so (and I didn’t recognize her from The Menu! Such different characters, I love it). Everyone else did fine jobs, if a little theatrical. The script was clearly a play turned into a movie by the guy who wrote the play.

    Side note: The movie/play was written by Samuel D. Hunter, who is an north Idaho native (hence the Moscow, ID references). He writes a lot of plays about Idaho and is kind of a theatrical celebrity there. I didn’t know he wrote this but to be fair he did write it around 2013, a few years after I left Idaho. Plus if Wikipedia is correct it never premiered anywhere in Idaho. (I’m fairly certain some of his later plays did premiere in Idaho though.) I have … thoughts about this, about a man who grew up in Idaho writing plays on the east coast about Idaho and having very few of those plays ever premiere in Idaho. I honestly don’t know if that’s a fault of Sam or of the dearth of spaces for world premiere plays by a Julliard graduate in Idaho.

    In any case, this is a play/film about a very obese man in the last few days of his life. He is taken care of by his widow’s sister, Liz, and is visited by his estranged daughter, Ellie, a New Life church dude, Thomas, and eventually his ex-wife, Mary. Again, many of these interactions feel more theatrical than film, with the exception of Charlie and Liz, who feel like two people who are in a situation together.

    That’s probably not very clear; what I mean is that sometimes when two characters appear in plays, they talk to each other in these sort of psychological status games because in a play, there aren’t many other pressures out there. In a film, you can have a scene where a man is trapped in a sinking submarine and the water is rising and about to drown him. That is a pressure outside of man. (Man vs Nature, I suppose.) You can’t really do that in a play, so plays (especially contemporary/”realism”/living room plays) tend to have characters talking to each other a lot and trying to win, or not win, in the case of Ellie, who is clearly a foil to Charlie and written so abruptly unlike him that it’s a little jarring. It’s one thing to be angsty and 14, and another thing entirely to be angsty and 17. Hunter does set up the reason why she’s like this (or a reason, at least), but it still feels like the raw angst of a younger teen.

    There is also a lot of symbolism in this film, some of it very overt, which again feels like it’s straight out of a play. Charlie needing to hear his daughter’s essay before he dies is a good example. That sounds like a necessity born out of a play. It’s not a bad idea, per se, it just feels strange from a film perspective. Though, it is also a film about a man who clearly cannot or does not want to leave his house, so him having something close to cling to in his final hours makes sense. (The reveal of him having $120k in the bank also feels theatrical, but I digress.)

    Alright let’s talk about the elephant, or whale, if you will, in the room: Charlie’s fatness. Charlie is 600lbs and has, at least, a disordered eating disorder, or, at worst, a food addiction. I think it’s the latter, since it is obviously affecting the people around him and he cannot and does not want to quit. A lot of people who hate this film criticize it for fatphobia. Specifically, some people seem to think that Darren Aronofsky and/or Samuel Hunter are fatphobic. I’ve seen critiques that Aronofsky’s lingering shots of Charlie’s obesity are an example of this.

    So, I’ve never been 600lbs, but I have been 308lbs, as late as August of 2022. I’ve always had issues with food, which I won’t go into great detail about, but which resulted in me being fairly overweight my entire life, with a few exceptions where I was a decent weight but thought I was overweight because, you know, mental health issues. There are a couple of scenes in The Whale where Charlie binge eats, and Aronofsky intentionally alters the shot during these moments, and I think people are getting the wrong idea about why he’s doing this.

    Lately I’ve been talking with my therapist about my own binge eating, and why I do it. It took some steps to get here–not out of fear, but out of my own brain literally having to make new connections to find the links. Ironically, before I watched The Whale I had binged on some ramen. I love eating ramen raw with the seasoning sprinkled on top. It’s my weird guilty pleasure. I’ve been mostly embarrassed by this until one day I was at H Mart (an Asian grocery store if you don’t know) and saw that you can buy packages of crushed up ramen noodles with seasoning as a snack. So fuck embarrassment, Asians have been doing this for a while! But since I eat it dry, I can down like three or four of them without breaking a sweat.

    Anyway, one of my “breakthroughs” if you will was after I learned about “parts” and parts integration. It’s a whole other blog post to talk about parts but the gist is that some psychologists believe that our brain has different “parts” or centers which are initially separate when we’re kids but eventually form a cohesive whole. This is an explanation for why Dissociative Identity Disorder exists: because if you are subjected to intense trauma at an age prior to when your parts integrate, they literally can remain separate, forming different personalities, some of whom exist solely to shield other parts of you from that trauma. That is a simplified way of explaining it, of course; I am not a psychologist.

    At some point in the past couple of years, I came to realize that when I binge eat, my desire to do so does not come from my frontal, higher reasoning lobe. It is an impulsive, lizard brain thing — a different part of my brain, if you will. And that part somehow shuts down my higher reasoning brain and before I know it, I’ve finished two bags of gummy bears and a bag of Doritos. It’s like a stupor.

    When I see Aronofsky shift the camera slightly when Charlie begins to binge eat, I interpret it as this shift, from higher, reasoning Charlie to impulsive, protective Charlie. The way he looks like he’s zoned out when he’s eating is the same kind of weird zen-esque mental state I get into when I binge eat. In other words, I don’t think those scenes are fatphobic. I think they are an equivalent to the scene of the alcoholic getting drunk. They are Charlie’s coping mechanism, and Liz knows this (even if she’s a bit of an enabler).

    There are other scenes where it feels like Aronofsky is playing with the grandeur of Charlie’s size, such as when he stands up for the first time and there’s this swell of music and we see just how big Charlie really is. This seems a little more fatphobic but also, in a strange way, feels like a sort of nod of respect to the human body. Like, science and biology aside, it is wild that we can become 600lbs. I’m not saying that with distaste at all. It’s a miracle that we can achieve that, just like it’s a miracle that some guy can run a 200mi ultramarathon. And both of those extremes can veer toward death. There is I think an obvious moderation between being extremely fat and extremely thin, or being extremely lazy and being extremely fit. But to watch people achieve the extremes is truly extraordinary. The human body is amazing.

    It’s absolutely terrible that people treat fat people with the level of vitriol and disrespect that they do. I was fortunate that my 308lbs seemed to hang on my body in such a way that nobody said anything about it, but I could see it, and feel it. And, in a way, I was unfortunate that nobody said anything. I wish people had, in hindsight. I probably would’ve hated it at the time, but it would’ve been nice if someone had said, “Hey, you look like you’ve put on a bit of weight, is everything alright?”

    One of the things I liked about The Whale is how everyone (besides Ellie) truly cared for Charlie. Charlie was the only one who didn’t care about himself, but Liz and Thomas and even Dan the delivery driver cared about him. I think Ellie did too, at the end. It was just one of those nice reminders that people are generally looking out for you, but it’s hard to see that if you’re not looking out for yourself.

    Other people commented about why an obese actor wasn’t cast as Charlie. I feel like seeing Charlie in the movie explains why. Imagine being 600lbs, waking up early every morning and going to a film shoot for 10-12 hours for a month. Charlie could barely stand on his own and you’re going to ask a real 600lbs person to attempt to stand on their own for several takes? I know that people want representation in film and media but I don’t think this is the fight, because in reality being in a film takes a lot of hard work and dedication that, honestly, go against the lifestyle of most 600lb people. I’ll probably catch some flak for saying that but it’s true. You don’t get to 600lbs by doing things, that’s the whole point.

    Also, think of all the 600lb people in the world and how many of them would’ve given the level of acting that Fraser did. Aronofsky already spent 10 years trying to find the perfect Charlie, don’t you think he spent at least some of that time looking at casting an actual fat person in the role?

    Anyway. The last bit of criticism I read is that Fraser did okay but people are lauding his performance because it’s his big comeback. I think this is a shitty thing to think and I hope I never have to hang out with those critics because they suck.

    I just wanted to write this as someone who has dealt with my weight my entire life, and dealt with binge eating and how I felt that was portrayed in this movie. Which I thought was well made and well thought out. I think the movie suffers in other ways (part of me wishes it was just a Charlie & Liz film) but by the end of the film I was awestruck and had to sit with my thoughts for a while. I think it’s worth a watch. Charlie is a difficult man to watch at times but I think it’s important to humanize fat people. We don’t need to put fat people up on a pedestal, we need to show them being human. I think Darren Aronofsky does a decent job of that in this film.

  • Technology Woes

    Folks, I think I made a mistake. See, a few months back I decided to trade my Samsung A71 in for a Pixel 7 Pro. I was enticed by Google Fi’s “Pixel Pass,” a $50/month option in which you get a free phone upgrade after two years. I liked the Pixel 4 so I decided to give it a shot.

    That, so far, had been fine. The Pixel 7 Pro is pretty cool and fast and good. I’m starting to have a more existential objection to the size of the phone itself, but that’s a topic for later. The phone works and is good.

    Then, a couple months after that, I took the plunge and got a Pixel Watch. At this point, I had decided: I am a Google Boy. I will get all the Google things. Why not. The Pixel Watch seemed neat and I’d never had a smartwatch before (aside from a very cheap, very defunct watch I bought from China a few years ago). So I bought it. It is the crux of this conversation so I’ll come back to it.

    Month or two later, I bought the Pixel Buds Pro. These I like, and I hate earbuds. I really had to hype myself up for these, but they sound great and they don’t make me feel like I’m compacting my ear canal with wax, which is what other, cheaper earbuds feel like. I like this.

    Now, as you may know, I am in my 2023 Marie Kondo mode, getting rid of stuff and trying to make my space simpler and sleeker. I’ve also been running, which you definitely know about because I won’t shut up about it. One of my problems with runs is that I have this Pixel phone which is pretty big and heavy, heavy enough to notice when I’ve got it in my pocket for runs. Long story short, the damn thing pulls my joggers down when I’m running and it’s kind of obnoxious. I even bought one of those armbands that holds your phone but that is also a pain in the ass. So, know that that was in the back of my mind when I thought, “Why did I get such a big phone?” which turned into “Why did I get such an expensive phone?” which turned into “Why did I get a Google phone?” etc etc etc.

    And so I went to Google Fi, my carrier (which is a good carrier, btw, never had a problem with it). This is when I realized that I was locked into all this stuff: Pixel Pass means I can’t trade in my phone. In fact, Pixel 7 phones aren’t even listed among the items I could trade in. If I cancel Pixel Pass, I have to pay the remainder of my phone’s cost. Which is absurd–why not just switch it over to month-to-month, like you do with every other phone?

    That’s alright; the phone is good, if big. I can deal with that. Pixel Pass is nice, and the added features (device protection, YouTube Premium, Google One, and $5 off my plan) are worth it. I just wish I had a smaller phone! Never thought I would think that, but now that I’m running I need something a little smaller and lighter.

    The Buds I don’t want to trade in. They are great, no issues.

    The watch. The damn watch. I can’t trade it in because there’s nothing to trade it in with. It’s a fine smartwatch but here’s the thing, the wrinkle that helped spur my desire: my health insurance include Rally, which is a whole service dedicated toward fitness and health and wellness. Part of this includes “coins” you can earn which go toward rewards. One of the recent rewards is 25% off a Garmin smartwatch (and $60 off an Oura ring, which is also kind of tempting). This made me think of recent YouTube videos I watched from the Running Channel, in which they tested Garmin’s “suggested” feature for runs based on your activity, which I thought was pretty neat.

    Fitbit does this too, but not to the degree Garmin does. And then this morning I was thinking: What do I want out of a smartwatch? Like, what do I use my Pixel Watch for? Heart rate, Strava, Fitbit, and sometimes I use the voice recorder if I had a particularly weird dream. But … I realized I don’t even look at the watch for the time of day. Thus, it dawned on me: I don’t need a smartwatch, I need a fitness watch. I need a Garmin. I barely ever wore a watch in my entire life and I certainly don’t need a watch to tell time. It’s the long battery life and the nuances of exercise that the Garmin offers that I want. Curses!

    Honestly, the problem is less that I have this watch and not that watch. The problem is that I locked myself into something I ultimately don’t want, which is frustrating for anyone. And the truth is that I probably will end up getting a Garmin watch and wearing both when I run like one of those dorks. A first gen Pixel Watch will depreciate in value pretty quickly, especially when V2.0 inevitable releases in the future. I think I made a costly error. Thankfully, at least the Pixel Watch still does a good portion of fitness monitoring and does it well. I just wish I had the added features of a Garmin.

    My point is this: Don’t be a Google Boy/Girl/Person. Or an Apple X/Y/Z! Just get the stuff that works with what you want. All these brands talk about “seamless integration” but it’s all seamless. It all works together, more or less. Get the iPhone and the Garmin watch and the Pixel earbuds. It won’t be as difficult to pair them as the brands would make you believe! Meanwhile, I’ll just keep using this Pixel watch until I inevitably get the budget Garmin Forerunner and then end up wearing that all the time instead. LOVE TECHNOLOGY!

  • Depression Data

    This evening I thought it would be interesting to track down as much data from previous runs that I could find and compile them onto my “Running Journal” spreadsheet. It would be neat to see how well I was running ten years ago, I thought. I remembered that I used to use Runkeeper for my runs, and managed to log in and, much to my surprise, discovered that Runkeeper does, in fact, keep you runs!

    But what I thought would be fun turned into me watching the run data align with my depression. Which is not fun. The data begins in 2012, which is about when I started to get into fitness stuff in general. Weight lifting and all that. Back then, I lifted weights way more than I ran, so I didn’t have a lot of data — only 22 runs in 2012 and 30 in 2013, minus the two or three runs I did that were completely garbled by Runkeeper’s GPS.

    These were the years I was in grad school. I didn’t have a job, didn’t need a job due to Obama’s “training unemployment,” and thus could spend my days in class or bettering myself. Which I did. The small amount of runs in 2012/13 paled in comparison to my lifting schedule.

    I graduated in 2013 and then did some temp jobs for a bit, until getting hired at the law firm where I currently work. Gone were the carefree days of plays and rehearsal and weight lifting classes. Now I had a Big Boy job, a 9-to-5 if you will, even though no job is 9-5 anymore.

    Maybe this is related, or maybe it’s not, but for some reason in 2014 my mental health took a nose dive. To this day I am picking up the pieces of whatever shattered my brain in May of that year, and then ground the pieces into gravel in August, when Robin Williams killed himself. And you can see it in the running data, where I went from 30 runs in 2013 to eight. And one of those is probably a walk. Eight/seven runs that abruptly ended in August.

    2015 is worse: seven runs, all of them part of a couch-to-5k program I attempted in October. My motivation was in the toilet. It looks like 2016 was going to be different; I began in January, dropped off a month, but then got my ass in gear in February as I was running the Shamrock Run that year (my 3rd go). I then did a Zombies, Run virtual 5k a couple of weeks later. But after that, it dropped off, and after May there were no other runs that year. It didn’t help that we were kicked out of the home we rented because the owner was going to sell it. In a daze I rented a cheap apartment out next to Gresham, way on the east side of Portland, which … was not a good idea.

    For some insane reason I decided to run the Shamrock Run in 2017 and 2018. But that apartment on 174th destroyed my spirit. It’s one of those things that I knew but didn’t know at the same time; the feeling of living alone for the first time in my life was nice, but the fact that I was so far away from my friends and nature was soul-sucking. I missed walking among trees. My house before wasn’t in the forest or anything, but the neighborhood was nice enough. This new apartment was surrounded by concrete and bland buildings and gang activity and it was just not great.

    The good news is that I was still getting steps in. Frequently at work on my lunch breaks I would go for a walk, and then the walks to the train and to home were helpful too. At this point, my exercise data is limited to Google Fit, which kept track of my steps. Runkeeper was out in 2015, and Zombies Run was largely abandoned with the 5th Shamrock Run.

    Then came the pandemic, and I guess that was all I need to slide into some kind of bottom. Not rock bottom (I’m thankful that I don’t think I’ve ever hit that point), but a new low which included barely moving and having copious amounts of food delivered to me via DoorDash. My weight had already been increasing steadily since 2019 but it ballooned to its highest point at that point in my life — 307lbs. This weight didn’t last long, however, as this is also when my neighbor started being psychotic (literally, meth induced psychosis) and targeted me as someone who was doing something bad to him, which caused me to stop eating and lose around 20lbs in two weeks. Not a diet program I recommend!

    Fortunately, I was able to break my lease early and leave ASAP, moving to my current and infinitely better apartment in June of 2021. Immediately my step count jumped from 22,000 in May to 60,000. I even started running again, restarting once again the couch-to-5k program, which I did for a few weeks until getting plantar fasciitis from being too sedentary and heavy. I relegated myself to walking for the rest of the year.

    I don’t know if these are interesting to look at, I just think it’s nice to break up text with images.

    My weight ballooned up again at the end of 2021 and into 2022, reaching a new PR or 308 in late August. August was also the month that I decided to really invest in walking; I walked everywhere, all the time. I was ramping up all through the year, but went from 70k steps in July to 123k steps in August. And then, two months later, I was starting to run again. Last month, I had 210k steps; this month I am at 204k and still have six days to go.

    What did I learn from this? I guess I learned that it’s hard to see depression when you’re in it. For many years I was in a heavy brain fog (I honestly think I was missing some key vitamins then) and it was only after the depression that I could look back on it, but I couldn’t, also, because I didn’t remember it. But the data never lies, and will tell you the truth, whether you like it or not.

    I learned that I am still here. I still went for runs. I still tried, until I didn’t, but even then, I did. I kept myself afloat, despite the sadness and the dark days. I’m doing it now. I am making up for those four years in east Portland. I am moving and progressing.

    I also learned that I have NEVER gotten below a 10 min/mi pace and barely got below an 11min pace and that is driving me nuts.

  • Artists & Bohemian Lifestyles

    This morning I read this article from OPB on Milepost 5, an low income artists community that I lived a block away from when I first moved to Portland, which happened to be a year after Milepost 5 opened. The article addresses the decline of the space over the past 15 years, particularly after the space was sold to an investment company in California. Ain’t that always the case.

    I have a bit of history with Milepost 5, particularly in that I have visited their communal art space, the Art Haus, and even auditioned for a performance of Romeo & Juliet by a Milepost 5 theatre company, that was to take place in the interior courtyard. This was back in 2011. I was cast as a “musician,” which meant not as an actual character in the play. That, coupled with the general sort of vibe I got from the audition process, was enough for me to pass. It wasn’t bad, it was just … bohemian. The whole space felt bohemian. It felt like I was audition for R&J within the context of being in a production of RENT. Again, that’s not a bad thing, it’s just not my thing. I often find that these pseudo-DIY, bohemian plays come with erratic and often poorly organized rehearsal schedules and, sometimes, very self-important directors. (To be fair, most directors are self-important.)

    Milepost 5 was meant to be a place where low income artists could have a home, but for some reason, that also means that the space itself has to be kind of a shithole. I’m not sure why this is. I don’t understand why so many artists feel the need to be dirty bohemians. I get it, in part–the rejection of capitalism, the communal lifestyle, but why do these things require artists to live in hovels?

    I know, I know, I’m turning into Don Draper here. It just always seems like there are two artistic camps: bohemians and yuppies. It’s all class war stuff, of course; we’re all under the thumb of capitalism. But when the government says, “Hey, we’re going to provide you with low income housing so you can do fun art stuff,” why does that housing have to be shitty? What if you want to do art but don’t want to share a kitchen, or a bathroom? Why are artists either packed into apartments like sardines, or living in the Upper East Side?

    The answer is: it’s not a dichotomy. It never is. There are obviously middle class artists all over the place. There are people who live in suburbs and act in community theater, and there are people who attend those “drink wine and paint sunsets” classes. But it seems, to me at least, that the cultural concept of artists is one of bohemian hovels. Brick walls, a giant canvas with paint splattered all over it, either hung up or lying on the ground. A woman doing performance art where she drips her menstrual blood on a canvas. None of that is bad! Art is art. I’m just curious why art is often culturally considered poor.

    It sucks that Milepost 5 was lauded as an artistic community and then sold to capitalists who have since run it into the ground. It’s obvious that capitalism hates art, unless it makes money, and low income artist hovels will never make money. So they abandon it like a carnivorous amoeba searching for a new meal to suck the life out of. So, bohemia is a response to that. I get it. I just wish the government got it, and invested more into it, I suppose.

  • Heart to Start

    Another month, another 5k. This was the Providence Heart to Start, part of the Hood to Coast … family? of events? Collective of jaunts? I don’t know. It took place at Cook Park in Tigard, Oregon, about 20 miles southwest of Portland. It was a lovely day for running, overcast, temperature in the mid 40s, the tiniest sprinkle of rain at times.

    Getting here was easy, so I don’t have to belabor you with any commute issues. Cook Park is lovely and has lots of trails that I would like to walk on someday, but today is not that day! Today we race!

    Atmosphere was chill, not a lot of people for this race. Sometimes races feel like a Big Deal (Shamrock Run) and others feel like a group of folks getting together for a thing (Tar n Trail). This one was kind of in the middle. There was a kids run before the 5 and 10ks, so lots of little warblers running around.

    When I got my bib a couple days before, there was no swag. I think there were free passes to one of the big athletic stores, but neither of the women at the station were like “Here these are free things,” so I just left with my bib. At the event though, they had a few bits of free stuff, which included:

    • Protein bars. Lots of different kinds of protein bars,
    • A stress ball in the shape of a heart (remember, this race is for heart health),
    • A pin that read, “Think With Your ❤️”, which, I’ll be honest, I personally think is a bad idea,
    • A beer or seltzer after the run (10 Barrel Brewing IPAs or Michelob Ultra Seltzer, to be precise). Probably could’ve had a lot of beers/seltzers if you wanted to, I dunno,
    • Bottle openers (there were no bottled beers or seltzers, only cans).

    I think that was it. Not too shabby, but not my favorite group of swag. Again, I really do think you should think with your 🧠, not your ❤️. Lots of bad decisions have been made thinking with your ❤️.

    Anyway, the Big Discrepancy! I started Strava right at the start line and I had this corroborated with two friends of mine who were at the race: the race was likely only 3 miles [but probably was actually a full 5k]. I know, I know. Please sit down. We’ll get through this, together.

    When I passed the finish line, Strava showed 3 miles, so I stopped briefly to grab my medal and then started running again, to pick up the other .11 of a mile, but was flagged down by a guy who needed the chip tag thing on the bottom of my bib, so I gave that to him and then proceeded to run the additional .11 of a mile. Ultimately, what I’m trying to say is that I think my time would’ve been slightly faster if I didn’t have to stop. I’m not mad at the event for short changing us a 5k, but it is frustrating to get your results and see that they are 38:01, only to discover that that’s your 3 mile result.

    Although … if you reverse calculate a 12:15/mi pace (which is on my official results) into a pace calculator, for a 5k, the result is 38:04. So … maybe Strava fucked up on this one. WOULD NOT SURPRISE ME. I wonder if Strava gets nervous out in the woods or something? I mean, chip time is literally just the time between when you cross the start line and when you cross the finish line. I can’t imagine it being out of whack, especially since it’s a company that has set it all up and whose job is to set up chip timers. I think Strava’s GPS just screwed up somewhere.

    Either way, I’m taking the chip time. 38:01! A very good run!

    Running-wise, I think I did pretty good. Obviously we can’t completely rely on the damn Strava app for this, but we’ll use it anyway.

    I really hoofed it out the gate, mainly to get around all the slow people walkers. The “track” was a thin concrete trail, maybe 5ft wide at most, and was a nightmare to deal with for the first 8th of a mile. A lot of us ended up running around in the grass, and I think I ran on some parts where plants usually grow, which probably was a bad idea. The start of the race is always a clusterfuck like this, but this one seemed especially annoying. I appreciate the Shamrock Run, which organizes runners based on their pace, with slower runners towards the back.

    I only stopped three times, with the longest gap being a suddenly sharp hill that I absolutely did not want to run up or down. You can also see that dip at the end of mile 3, where the race ended [which was probably actually 3.11 miles, maybe]. Annoying. Meanwhile, when I run my pace is all over the place, which is something I’d like to work on, but I’m glad that the difference between the first mile and the third mile is only little more than a minute. That’s progress; my first mile pace at Race for Warmth was 11:53, while the 3rd mile was 14:13, a 2:20 difference. Slow and steady wins the race, as they say.

    The weirdest part was at the end: when I decided to run the extra .11 of a mile, I felt like I could keep going. That’s dangerous territory, folks. That’s long run territory. Maybe we’ll talk about that some other time.

    A very good idea I did before the race was massage my feet, specifically my left foot. Doing this virtually eliminated the numb foot I’ve been getting around mile 2. Plus it just felt good! I also moisturized my feet a couple days ago. This was nice, but I think it also made my feet slightly slippery this morning. Could be my imagination though. My feet were happier with me overall though, which was good!

    After the race and the little extra run I chatted with a friend and commiserated over Strava, and then I went to the taqueria truck that was making burritos and ordered a big and delicious chorizo burrito with the works and a champurrado. I always forget how weird champurrado is. It’s good, just different. Could’ve gotten a horchata, but a warm drink felt like a better option.

    And then I drove home! The end. See you at the Shamrock Run!

  • New, Improved, but Still Boring

    Well, only three people voted on my newsletter poll, but two voted for shorter, more frequent newsletters, so I guess I’ll do that. I don’t think I have it in me for once-a-week posts, but I think twice a month will suffice. I’m not interesting enough for once-a-week posts. I’m barely interesting enough for once a month! Anyway, check your local email inboxes and the sides of industrial-area porta-potties on the 15th and the end of each month. I promise to be just as boring as always!

    Big Congratulations

    To the Kansas City Chiefs for winning the Super Bowl. Not a lot of people know this, but now that they’ve won, the Chiefs get one free name change from anything that’s not appropriating Native American culture. Normally this costs millions for rebranding, but for the Chiefs—this one’s on us! Big win!

    Meanwhile, in Philadelphia, win or lose, they’ve destroyed the city.

    It’s Tuesday (I’m in Love [with These Bagels!])

    Tuesday was Valentine’s Day. I am so absolutely emotionally and mentally disconnected from that holiday at this point that I don’t know what to think about it, other than chocolate. Chocolate and hearts, and little chalky heart candies.

    That sounds harsh—is Josh Disconnected from Love™?!1—but it’s more like, Love is over there and I’m over here, putting a new GPU in my computer. I still love things. I love my cat! I love my family and my friends. I’ve got a least half of those Greek love types down. But the one you find over a candlelit dinner, the one that makes you eager to put genitals up against genitals and cook breakfast for them the next morning … that’s over there, sitting and staring at me like a creepy doll in the attic.

    As I near the end of my fourth decade of life2 I have become a male spinster—a spinstro, if you will—and I’m laaargely fine with that. Like, 85% fine. The last couple of years I’ve been trying to take care of myself, after falling off the Wagon of Life, which was crossing a narrow, rickety bridge at the time, and at the bottom was, like, a pit of spikes, Prince of Persia style.

    Dating hasn’t really been on my mind. I mean, it has, clearly, but not with any sense of urgency. I’ve been thinking about it, and might even get back into it soon, but like I said above—I’m workin’ on me now. I feel like once I came to the conclusion that I wasn’t going to be having kids (sorry mom, sorry dad), the idea of being with someone felt less necessary. I still like having a significant other, don’t get me wrong. But I don’t feel like I need to get married and have kids and protect my lineage or anything like that. Matt had the kids, I’m going to have a cat and too many video games and D&D dice.

    Thankfully, I used To Good to Go again last week to buy some day-old bagels from Henry Higgins for $5, which I am still eating. The really load you up on bagels there, it’s nuts. Best of all, they’re mostly everything bagels. Hot diggity. Great app, highly recommend it. This part really has nothing to do with Valentine’s Day or love or anything. I just really love bagels.

    I’m Taking Over for Marie Kondo

    2023 has been my year of getting rid of stuff, which I guess Marie Kondo isn’t doing anymore. I’ve sold some things, I’ve donated some thing, and I’ve left some stuff in the little “free pile” nook in the trash room of my apartment building. I finally donated a ton of electronics to FreeGeek, which I’ve been meaning to do for ages. My old behemoth computer case for instance, the Antec-DF85, an absolutely stupid computer case—as tall as a toddler and probably weighed as much, had eleven fans, all with RGB but only glowed a demonic red. Ah, 2011, how I missed you.

    I’m trying to downsize and let go of things that I no longer need. This has actually meant buying stuff, such as a smaller computer desk, so I can get rid of the giant gaming desk that I don’t really need. (I ended up throwing the desk in recycling because the screws had stripped the particle board so much that they were useless.) Gaming accessories are so fucking dumb. It’s all giant, dumb, RGB-lit nonsense. Gaming chairs are made to resemble race car seats, which, when you think about it, makes no sense whatsoever. I saw a post on Reddit years ago where a guy made a gaming chair out of an old Honda Civic car seat and that’s a gaming chair, folks. Something you can sit in for hours on end! Not a chair that usually has a protective cage of metal around it.

    Anyway, it feels nice to get rid of stuff. I like donating things. I hope some low income person gets to use my old Chromebook, or a kid in a poor family gets my old GPU installed in a refurbished computer or something. Pay it forward and such. It feels weird to get rid of some stuff though. I gave away my Optimus Prime Transformer, the one I bought on one of my last days working at Hastings. Which means it’s been around for around fifteen years. I’m not going to toy-shame here, but I will say that I think my era of having toys is coming to a close. Don’t worry, I just replaced them with D&D dice and fantasy coins. I’m not saying I’ve de-nerdified myself, I’ve just changed directions.

    Running Update

    Some neat updates. Parkrun #4 (42:14, 13:36/mi) went well, but for parkrun #5 (39:47, 12:48/mi) I finally ran a 5k under 40 minutes! That’s a big goal for me. It’s very strange because I rode for 11 miles the day before and then ate an entire frozen pizza and two bags of chips. I thought I would be garbage at that parkrun, but instead I did better, which of course means I should be eating frozen pizzas and chips more often.

    I’ve been running a mile non-stop on my workout runs, and running longer/faster at the track. Also been doing strength training again to strengthen my legs, which need it badly. My legs giving out is the biggest factor currently; my breath is fine, my core is mostly solid. It’s just that my legs feel like they’re dying and I have to stop so I don’t fall over. But, if parkrun and my track runs are any indication, I’m doing way better than I think I am.

    Here, Watch/Listen to This

    Let’s get down to brass tacks: a lot of “DJs” show up on my YouTube feed. I like music, and I like house/EDM music, so I get these videos of DJs, almost all of whom are very attractive women playing those Pioneer MP3 DJ turntable things, the ones that don’t have vinyl but you can still manipulate the track like it’s vinyl.

    And look, I know, and you know, that attractive people can be talented. We see it all the time on TV and in movies. But there’s something about the glut of hot women DJs on my YT feed that makes me think that maybe, maybe, some of them are just hot women pretending to DJ and just being hot for views. Maybe! It’s fine, because the playlists are pretty good and the women are hot. Dopamine, folks. It just works.

    With that in mind: Gia Fu is a hot woman who plays salsa music on actual turntables and she is very good at it. I think I caught her on My Analog Journal? Or maybe one of its offshoots. This type of YT video—people playing eclectic music on turntables and it’s just a cool groove—is great. I highly recommend getting these videos to pop up in your algorithm.

    The End

    That’s all. Life is coasting along. Hope you ate some conversation hearts.

    1

    Disconnected from Love, coming to ABC Family in 2024. Written, directed, and produced by ChatGPT, the sitcom follows a sentient AI as it attempts to find love … in all the wrong places! Starring Dall-E representations of: George Clooney eating a corndog, Albert Einstein hang gliding, and Alf wearing the Chiquita Banana fruit hat and riding a bison. Roger Ebert gives it 0 stars, because he’s been dead for 10 years.

    2

    But Josh you’re going to be 40! Yes, but: 0-10 = decade 1, 11-20 = decade 2, 21-30 = decade 3, 31-40 = decade 4. It’s “2001 is the first year of the new millennium” all over again!

  • parkrun #5

    Despite what the image says, I did very well on this run. In fact, finally ran a 5k under 40 minutes. My time on Strava was 39:41, my parkrun time was 39:47. I haven’t ran a 5k under 40 minutes since April of 2016. Obviously, it’s a milestone for me in my exercise resurgence.

    I’m not sure what to attribute this boost in speed lately. Sure, I could blame the sprints I ran on Monday, trying to push myself harder. But I could also blame the entire frozen pizza and two bags of chips I ate on Friday night. (Side note: Kettle Chips makes air-fried chips now and they are soooo much better than regular chips. Less greasy, taste the same!)

    I also rode my bike 11 miles on Friday, which makes my result at parkrun so ridiculous to me. I honestly thought I would run slower because my legs were aching from the ride. But I didn’t!

    Even despite all those walking bits (and a couple points where I had to stop to regain feeling in my foot) I still managed to get below 40 minutes. This is a good sign. I even felt more rejuvenated during the downhill bit (basically running back to the start). I’m not sure where that spike of energy came from, but it bodes well for future runs.

    Even the last bit to the finish line is fascinating me. I’m running under 11 min there, around 10:45. At the end of the run. I did that because I was coming up on 39 minutes and I had to get below 40. So I actually pushed myself more than I’m usually capable of. This is a good sign. These are all good signs.

    I should also mention, tangentially related, that I purchased Pixel Buds and this run was my first with them in my earholes. Resounding success; I got the pro version which has that cool Transparency Mode so you can hear stuff around you. These things don’t have hooks for your ears or those little bits that press up against your ear fold thingy, I don’t know ear terminology. You just put them in your ear, and they stay there. I don’t know how that works. Magic? Sound quality was great, the best I’ve ever had with earbuds. I normally hate earbuds, but these are good. I guess I needed quality ones. I even wore them while doing all sorts of apartment chores today. The little charging case looks like an egg. Oh and I can charge the case on my magnetic charging thing for my Pixel Watch! TECHNOLOGY!

    So, I said last week that I was going to rest this week, and then I didn’t, but I think this week I totally am going to rest, at least for an extra day. This is because I have a race on Saturday and I want to be fresh for it. Time for some walking and strength training instead.

    Until next week!

  • Bean Juice Review: Keia & Martyn’s

    Keia & Martyn’s, Portland, OR
    Light(?) Roast, Colombia Nilson Yunda
    Tasting Notes: Sugar, chocolate cookie, dried fruit

    Oh boy. Oh boy. I’m excited for this one. First off, look at this packaging:

    Absolutely cute as fuck. And compact, too!

    But moreover, this coffee has a bit of lore to it, which has particular interest to me. Martyn is Martyn Leaper, of the band the Minders. I don’t know the Minders, but I am familiar with who they are connected to: the Elephant 6 Collective. These were a group of musicians who created some of my favorite bands–Neutral Milk Hotel, Of Montreal, and Apples in Stereo to name a few. (Elf Power, Olivia Tremor Control, and Beulah to name more.)

    To grab this coffee on a whim because it had cute packaging, only to find out that one of the roasters was a part of a highly influential recording collective, is pretty cool! Sadly, it appears that Martyn recently had a heart attack and is recovering from heart surgery. I hope he makes a full recovery!

    I can’t find much information on Keia, unfortunately, though having a Black woman as a roaster bodes well for the equity of the beans, I think. I’m always leery about fair trade when it’s just a bunch of squirrely looking white guys running the roastery, you know? She has even set up an awesome Equity Pricing model for purchases. Super great.

    Yeah yeah Josh, but how’s the coffee taste?

    Pretty good! First sip was a blast of bright, floral notes, followed by a rounded out roasty flavor aftertaste. I’m fairly sure the beans are a light roast, which explains the floralness of it, but they may be more of a light-medium. I don’t really get any of the tasting notes, but that’s unsurprising for me. (I’m bad at tasting notes.) Perhaps the floral aspect I’m tasting is more along the “dried fruit” route, but I swear it has a bit more of an almost lavendery-esque taste to it. I thought the floral punch would stick around but subsequent sips are much more mellow.

    Overall, great pro-social justice coffee roaster with a nice, pleasant flavored cup of coffee. And the Minders are a good band too! 7/10

  • SFA (Stop Fucking Around)

    For today’s run, I decided to Stop Fucking Around.

    I ran hard today. Sprintervals, I call them, though I can’t have been the first person to do so. Walking to the track is when I decided that this week would not be a deload week, as I had previously intended. Instead, I ran a full mile with a 11:46 pace, and then the 2nd mile was split into the Sprintervals — half a lap walking, half a lap running as fast as I could.

    This Strava pace chart is interesting to me. (And maybe only to me.) A relatively even pace for that first mile, dipping towards a 12:00/mi pace at the end there, but once I start doing sprints, my pace jumps to around 9:30/mi for the first sprint and then 8:00 and 8:30/mi for the second two. What’s fascinating to me is that people can run faster than that for much, much farther. But what else is fascinating is that the first sprint was hard, but on the second sprint I purposely ran even faster, trying to really bump my heart rate into the anaerobic zone. I’m very good at keeping my heart rate to a max of around 160, which is good, but I do feel like sometimes you gotta push yourself beyond that. So I did, and I felt like I was going to die. But the third sprint, where I purposely tried to get back to the speed I ran on my first sprint, was faster than the first sprint, even though it didn’t feel like it. That is interesting to me.

    So, on the way to my run I decided to Stop Fucking Around. Originally I was going to run a mile at an easy pace because I was worried I overdid it at the last parkrun. But I didn’t overdo it. I was just slow, and being slow means that I’m spending more time running, which means I’m more prone to injury or soreness. I think, instead of pushing myself to get better, I’ve been settling back, out of fear of injury or collapsing or puking or looking like an idiot at parkrun or on the track, I don’t know what.

    But an average 13:30/mi pace is abysmal. It’s slow for me, which is saying something. I think the Race for Warmth made me realize that I’m faster than I give myself credit for. Yes, I’m also out of shape and heavy. But I’ve still got the muscle from years of squatting, just sitting there, deflated, ready to work again. My pace seven years ago was a full minute and change faster than today, but at the Race for Warmth, my pace was 13:07. That means I am well on track to get back to my old pace, and even faster, as long as I keep pushing myself.

    Is every days a SFA day? No, of course not. Next time I run it will be slow and easy, for endurance and to recover a bit before Saturday. Parkruns will always just be whatever I’m capable of. Races I will push myself. But Mondays … Mondays are to Stop Fucking Around and kick my ass into high gear.