Day 7 (75 Hard)

 This morning I had to be at work extra early, so I got up early, and hit the trail for my walk an hour earlier than usual.

You can tell it's early, because the picture is super dark and therefore blurry.

Here's my log of my walk:

It didn't really take me an hour to do it. I forgot to turn the app off when I got home, so it kept counting me walking around the house as part of my workout.

I also got right to the yoga as quickly as I could after that.

I also got right to the not eating right after that. In fact, I had already been doing that all day, and I just continued with it. I'd started into my fast the night before, and fasted the whole day through. 

I'm getting used to it. It really wasn't that hard, but if I'm ever tempted, the fact that I'm doing 75 Hard and would have to start over is a good motivator to me to say no.

Fasting always makes me cold, and it really kicked in today. My last quart of water I got out of the coffee maker instead of the water dispenser. I just filled my cup up with hot water, and drank it like coffee or hot chocolate to try to warm myself up. It took a little more than a quart, but I eventually did feel warm again, and was able to take my jacket off.

Tropical Storm Beta hit in full this evening, and it started flooding in some spots in Houston. Because of the chaos, I got the pleasure of staying an hour and a half late at work so we could cover it for the lovely folks at home.

I was a little worried about driving home, but most of my time is spent on an elevated freeway, so it wasn't a problem at all. I was afraid I would have to sleep at work, and I hadn't even brought a sleeping bag or a change of clothes. It was fine, though. I spent the night in my own bed.

I started a new book today, because I finished my outlining book. Now I'm reading a set of books that are about how to self-publish your books in a way that will guarantee the most sales. We'll see how that goes.

On top of that, I need to get to work outlining my next book, which I believe I will be calling Others, unless a better title comes to me later. I know what I need to do, now I need to systematically and methodically do it.

Day 6 (75 Hard)

This morning, I didn't get up and hit the trails like I usually do. Instead, my wife had decided that for fun, we would all go to Brazos Bend State Park to see the beauty of the nature there, specifically the dozens upon dozens of alligators that populated the park.

They've limited the capacity of the park...who knows why, it's gigantic, and you'd have to purposefully try to get within 20 feet of someone you didn't come with much less six feet...so you have to purchase your tickets online. We learned that the hard way a few months ago when we tried to go and were turned away after driving an hour to get there.

Only this time, the online ticket buying backfired in a different way. Since we paid for our tickets, we had to go, even though Tropical Storm Beta is just out at sea and the whole sky was rapidly clouding over. We did have sun in the early morning, at least, so we hit the road, and went to the park.

I hiked my usual 45 minutes and then some while we were there.

The clouds moved in quickly and blotted out the sun, and it began to sprinkle a little as well. It wasn't too bad for the most part, but it did get bad enough that we decided it was time to turn around and head back to the car.

Back in 2018, I went here with my oldest son before he graduated. It was just the two of us, and none of the others in the family had seen it yet. While we were there, we saw dozens of alligators. Here's some of the pictures we took:

With the sun hiding behind the clouds today, however, the gators weren't so keen to be out and about. We walked all of the same trails that me and my son had walked in 2018, but the outpouring of alligators was nowhere to be seen.

We saw only one very small gator wallowing in the water beside the trail while we walked around the park.

It was better than nothing, which was what I was expecting we were going to see by that point of our hike, but I felt bad for the family who hadn't been there before and didn't get to see what me and my son had seen last time around.

We did see a lot of spiders though. Huuuuuuuge spiders. The were hanging out in their gigantic webs that they'd spun between the trees along the pathway, and they were the size of my hand.

This particular spider looks like he's seen better days. I'm pretty sure spiders are arachnids, and that they're supposed to have eight legs not six.

Anybody know what kind of spider this is?

One last picture to share with you. I got this really great picture of a bird, I think it's an egret, eating a dragon fly that it caught.

By the end of our time hiking around Brazos Bend, it was raining hard. We had to give up on our planned picnic lunch, and eat it in the car while we drove home.

The drive home was a white knuckle affair the entire way. The rain was making conditions absolutely miserable and dangerous. I could barely see where I was going the whole time. I was ready to drop to my knees and kiss the ground when we finally pulled into the driveway at home, and I was officially safe and sound.

It took me way longer than usual to get the rest of my stuff taken care of. I did my second workout, the yoga routine at about 10 PM.

Sorry the picture sucks so bad. Not only was it really dark at that time of night, but I can never manage to get the camera situated to a point where I can see my whole body during yoga. I'm always stretching up high and stuff, and my body tends to reach out of frame. I'll get it sorted eventually though.

I drank the last of my water, a whole quart, right after this, which meant I was going to have to wake up in the middle of the night and pee like a striped racehorse, and that I did.

I took my progress picture just before hopping in bed. I read my book in bed as I went to sleep, and I managed to conquer another day of 75 Hard.

Day 5 (75 Hard)

Hit the trails again first thing this morning. It was the nicest weather I've dealt with so far in either the first five days before I failed the first time and then this past five days again. Is fall coming or something? That seems unlikely.

I love this part of the trail. It looks like one of those tunnels into the scary dark part of the forest that you would see in a movie. 

Like that part in Beauty and the Beast where Philippe and Maurice get lost, and they have the choice between the serene pretty peaceful road where the birds are chirping:

 And the scary dark one that has the sound effect like a ghost breathing down your neck:

 It's not quite that bad, but I do love how dark it is, and how the vines connect the tree branches at the top and make that spot into a complete arch-like tunnel entrance.

Here's my walking log for the day:

I get basically twenty to twenty-one minutes a mile whenever I walk. I wonder what the colors on the map are. Is that where my pace faltered a little? I never pause the workout while I'm taking my picture, which slows my time down. I bet that red spot is where the picture was taken. That seems about right in my memory of where the spot would be.

When I got home, I ended my fast with a nice meal of eggs and sausage. Here's the details on my fast:

Weird, the app doesn't want to load. I wonder if it's going to come back or if it's totally dead. No big deal, I suppose. All it is for me is a timer. 

Okay, this is an update from days later. The app finally stopped circling around the loading picture. Here is the info on my fast.

Well, I'm pretty sure it was about 43 hours or so. The exact time isn't really important. I just fasted from the end of my lunch on Thursday to the start of my breakfast on Saturday.

After breakfast, I loafed around a while (mostly making this blog post), then finally went out to get my weight lifting in:

I know 2020 is a freaky year for the rest of y'all, but you wouldn't believe the Bizarro world that I'm living in. I have to do all these workouts to be able to compete with Rish Outfield. Rish Outfield? Rish Outfield! He's been obsessed with exercise for more than six months now, and I still can't believe it. I only hope I can keep up.

Of course, it's not a competition or anything. Ahem.

Now I've got to go get a dang haircut. I've been meaning to get one all week, but this 75 Hard crap eats up all my free time. Hopefully, as I get into better shape, I won't need so much rest period in between each thing. At least my progress picture will look good from the neck up today.

Yeah, I'm still not sharing those. Not until I'm as ripped as Rish Outfield.

I eventually did the rest of the things required of me by my harsh mistress. I drank my gallon of water, took my progress picture (complete with new haircut), and, at last, read my book. By so doing, I completed day five, and topped my last attempt, where I flamed out at day five because I forgot to read my book. So, huzzah! Now, on to day six.

Wherever There's Trouble

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Gung Ho just arrived from Amazon. I still have yet to see him in a store. I usually prefer to buy from a store, but these GI Joes are nigh on impossible to find in any stores. I’m afraid I’ll never see Beachhead or a Cobra Trooper. #gijoe #hasbro #toys #toycollector #toycollection #toycollectors #actionfigures #actionfigure #actionfigurecollection #actionfigurephotography #actionfigurecollection #arealamericanhero #gijoeroadblock #gijoescarlett #gijoeduke #snakeeyes #gijoesnakeeyes #gijoegungho #gungho

A post shared by Bigg Anklevich (@biganklevich) on Sep 19, 2020 at 8:15am PDT

Day 4 (75 Hard)

 Okay, as soon as I sent the kids off to school this morning, I hit the trail again.

I wonder if I need to do the progress picture in the bathroom with no shirt on every day. This picture of me walking ought to count as a progress picture, shouldn't it?

Anyway, here's my log for my walk:

I've been seeing a rabbit jumping around the trail each day when I go walking, but today I saw two. I'm thinking that maybe the Watership Down warren is somewhere on our trail. Will I encounter El-ahrairah while out walking? I certainly hope so.

Next is yoga. See if I can stretch myself out a little more, maybe work out the kinks caused by my walk.

Yoga isn't getting any easier, but I know that I need to keep it up. I really need to develop some flexibility, and what better time is there than when I need to do some kind of exercise every day for 75 days in a row?

I also managed to read my book, take my picture, and drink my water (but just barely on the water. I just don't sweat as much with yoga than I do when I'm lifting weights in the garage, so I'm not as thirsty).

Four days in the books. Tomorrow is day five, which is the day I screwed up last week. This time, I vow not to repeat that mistake.

Trapjaw

 I've got this mask that my wife made for me. It was a little tight, so I put some new straps onto it to make it looser. But I think I overdid it, because every time I move my mouth, it slips down onto my jaw, uncovering my nose.

I was looking at myself in the mirror the other day, right before readjusting the mask back up, and I thought the mask made me look like Trapjaw from He-Man. What do you think?

I just need a laser cannon that I can attach in place of my arm, and I'm there.

More Pandering

 Since you all love Juno more than me, I’ll give you another picture of her. 

Here she is in her favorite spot of late, hiding under the couch. 

She used to only go under there when thunderstorms hit (which, granted, in Houston is pretty often), but now it’s pretty much a daily thing.

She probably just goes under there to avoid me. My wife thinks the cat hates me because I'm the loudest person in the house, so therefore the scariest. I'm apparently as bad as a thunderstorm.