Geek gets fit (kinda sorta almost)

One of the downsides of my otherwise amazing career is the lack of physical activity. And while I am aware that I should be fit and I love yoga, I am not fit. Yet. However, somes serious steps have recently been taken towards this noble goal.

First, Hubby and I got Multisport cards from my work (and I would like to thank my boss and everyone...)


The cards are way shinier IRL and they let us access many gyms ans swimming pools for [almost] free. We've been using them intensively and visiting a gym twice a week (and the swimming pool later to relax) for a month now.

Second, Husband got a balance for his nameday. A kinda smart balance, that measures your fat and water percentage. The smart balance taught me that I'm made in 50% of water and 30% of fat- sigh.

Finally, Hubby bought me my nameday present: the Wii Fit!



The Wii Fit always tempted me, but I judged it by its cover, and the cover mainly features yoga poses (they look best on pictures), so I instantly thought of the mountain of money I could save by doing these exact same poses on my bedroom floor. But, since I got the console as a wedding gift (I love you Auntie!), its cost dropped significantly and the temptation won.

I like it. It is important to note, however, that it's a weird cross between a game and a workout. It's not a decent game. It's not a decent workout either. But, on a Thursday night, after 8 hours at the office, and knowing that we'll hit the gym the next day and a real workout is not a great idea, the Wii Fit is a pretty cool pasttime.

I may write a better (longer) review, but in the meantime, Gizmodo has an extensive and geek one - enjoy!

Blogging my thesis: 2nd of October

On Saturdays, I usually get to stay home all day, except for a belly dance class and maybe a walk with my husband. What a great time to check mail, apply for Google Wave invites, chech mail, check Facebook, expand my musical horizons, check mail, check Facebook work on my thesis.

What have I done today? My answer is a typical one for a student asked by his advisor what he's done so far:

Er, I have found, I have read, I have understood...

I think I've finally understood the previously mentionned Bernstein method. Understanding is the toughest part (unless you were a sissie wise person and chose an easy subject) - then comes description and implementation. Actually, doing these while trying to understand works really good, I always do that. I now have half a dozen of lines of LaTeX erroneously deleted and product trees implemented in 8 impressive lines of code (n = len(primes), if n == 1: return primes and stuff like that). But all of these were proudly accomplished yesterday, and today, I just read and understood.

Well, the night is still young.

Ten little zen things that I do

This post is totally inspired by 10 Odd Little Minimalist Things I Do from Zen Habits, it's my take on the same subject.

1. No watch.
It started with a watch with a broken bracelet - I learned to check time on my mobile phone.

2. No alarm-clock.
Cell phone again. That's not really creative, as Lifehacker recently asked: "What's Replaced Your Alarm Clock?" and over 7000 people said "cell phone".

3. No "real" phone.
Primarly because of all the marketing calls you can get - haven't had one since I moved in! Also, only one number to give, one bill... But I really need a better cell phone plan.

4. No TV.
It's just a screen for the PC, the Wii and the X-Box. I might start watching it while doing housework, however, I don't promise I'll keep away, but it doesn't suck my time (the web, however, hmm...)

5. No iPod.
I used to prefer my cheap normal Zen Creative mp3 player, but It's getting more and more...

6. No mp3 player.
Cell phone taking over again.

7. No hairdresser.
Though maybe I should visit one once and again. But I wear long blone hair, which is a simple, but great look, cut my bangs myself and wear them slightly to the side so no one can see if they're cut unevenly.

8. No hairstyling products.
I never decided to sacrifice any time to first, learn some advanced hairstyling, and then just do it. I believe you can't go wrong with long hair.

9. No make-up.
Actually, I don't do this that often. You rather won't see me without make-up at work. But sometimes, I don't wear any and feel good about it. My mind is free (if I don't have time for make-up it's absolutely okay) and that's what counts.

10. No gym membership.
That's mainly for financial reasons. This may not work for everyone for various reasons, primarly motivation. Health is priceless and if you can't get motivated without attending a class, do it. You might also take bigger pleasure in that class, meet friends there, use equipement you don't want to store home, etc etc. But I like yoga, pilates and kick boxing and manage pretty well to make good use of my floor, big ball and Wii.

Geek does chick stuff

I'm getting married soon, my exams are over and I should be writing my funk project. There couldn't be a better day for chick stuff.

I started with a bit of cardio. I had Carmen Electra's Striptease Aerobic vol. 2 lying around for months, so I decided to try it.


Well, it wasn't what I expected. It had no vulgarity (no, no disappointment here), but not much fitness either. The girls were walking around and caressing their tights, but I wished for some more dance, more jumping, more challenge. (Though the clothes were great - if only the crew put as much effort to the choreography as to the styling...) Well, judge for yourself:



So I ended up doing what I usually do for cardio: put Bomfunk MC's CD loud and improvised. And that was great.

Another thing lying around (but only for weeks) was Philips' Satinelle Premium:

In one word: ouch. This was my first try to epilation with that kind of hardware and the pain was a bit hard to bear at first, but I got used to it pretty quickly. (I guess I should have RTFMed and kept the cooling thingy for 4 hours in the freezer and not 20 minutes in the fidge. I'll try that next time.) Plus, the powerfulness of that thing made the whole process a bit fun. Still, my skin doesn't look as smooth and shiny as Carmen's. And I'm not as fit. Go figure.

[Picture credit, credit]

TV is dead because the web is way too cool

I almost don't watch TV. Sincerely, with all the great stuff the web has to offer nowadays, it's really hard to make time for something as primitive as TV.

First, I'm learing Java. So, both my Firefoxes (one under Windows and one under Ubuntu) have a dozen of tabs with Java documentation opened.

Second, I'm learing Spanish. I only spend about 10 minutes a day on Babbel, but I know that any other language course is close at hand (and I miss my dear Arabic).

I think you can see a pattern emerging here: I love learning. I think one ofn the greatest things to have is a cool skill. I wish I was able to do a cartwheel for example. Well, for skills like that, there's WikiHow.

I'm interested in security, but never had a class about it. My school now has a new program in computer science and there is a security course. Reason for jealousy? Absolutely not! There also is a new site with all the content of all the classes, so I just downloaded and printed some pdfs and here we are - the security knowledge is mine!

Still hungry for knowledge? Check this Metafilter thread for tons and tons of cool educative videos.

Now I'm set for at least a dozen of lifetimes of browsing the web. TV is dead.

What the geek is up to

Here's what I'm up to right now:

• Jobhunting. I didn't get the internship I was applying for and I'm really disappointed. So, the search goes on.
  
• Working out. I've finally updated my gym routine and my other blog (the details are over there).
  
• Learning how to make a GUI in Java. Like this. Because, as you all know, I'm learning Java.
  
• Studying, studying, studying. Finals are coming. Actually, one has already come, psychology, and I passed.
  

Geek ends the week (happily)

I haven't posted much since Monday, day 1 of a tough week. Here's what I've been up to meanwhile.

Day 2. OS study-party. Few were allowed to participate in this exclusive, invite-only event. (I couldn't just say I had a study buddy over, could I? Nor could as just say "friend" now, there is no rhyme in "friend".)

Day 3. OS study after-party. I love after-parties. Never been to one actually, except for this one. Still, I love them.

Day 4. Morning: studying for the OS exam. Afternoon: Taking the exam. I didn't do bad, but I'm not sure I'm gonna pass either.

Day 5. Playing the Sims 2. My boyfriend bought me the newest expansion pack, "Free time". Now, you know you're a geek when your Sims can play "the Sims 3" and you wonder how deep this recursion goes. Or you make a list of the bugs and the usability issues. Or you pick a different language while installing the add-on just to see what happens. (That's a great idea, by the way, as soon as I have revised my French a bit, I'm switching to German.)

Day 6. Staying at my boyfriend's. We went for a walk as the weather was great and later to the swimming pool. Yep, I've really been lacking sport recently.

Day 7. Staying at home and doing lots of stuff that had been pushed away for quite a long time, like making back-ups. By the way, do you know how great ImgBurn is? I used to have Nero and it kept screwing my blank CDs. ImgBurn is the man! (I mean the app.)

Okay, life is getting almost normal. How awesome is normal?

On my wishlist: " Ballet Conditioning by Element" DVD

I just saw this today on fitsugar and instatly started wishing for it. The reviews on Amazon are extremely encouraging. Besides, I've always loved ballet but never had the chance to practice it (expect learning some stuff from a book as a kid, but how much dancing can you learn from a book?). And man, 9$, that's so affordable (well, not for me at the moment, my budget really says "student budget" right now). I think that would be a wonderful change from yoga in spring or summer.

Your blog alone is not enough

I grew very fond of blogging and just started a second blog: "Lila loves yoga". It's more personal, intented to keep track of my yoga progress and not really share something new with the world, but if you find interesting, it's cool. Can't wait to find a bit of free time and style it nicely.
I also started a Picassa Web album and loaded loads of pictures of my private life. It's here.
Enjoy!

New year's resolutions

I never believed in new year's resolutions. Why wait for the 1st of January when you've got a good idea about changing your life for better? Or what good ever came from the cliche resolutions like "loos weight" (but how much and how?), "exercise more" (again, how?) or "improve my English"?
Whenever I get an improvement idea, I'll make a resolution or I'll forget it forever. I wrote about reading more just a few days ago. On the other hand, I also have a "it would be great to..." list which contains for example volunteering and getting a job, which, well, would be good, but school keeps me too busy at the moment.
This year however, I've been surfing on more motivational sites and right now, there are plenty of resolution ideas running around. So most probably, I'm gonna have some 2nd or 3rd January resolutions.
I set up an account on Joe's Goals to keep track of my goals. I don't really have problems with my willpower, still writing your achievements down always helps. I used to do it on a Gnumeric spreadsheet, but Joe's Goals is nicer, simpler and goal-oriented.
So what's on my list? Eating right, ab workout and yoga. Reading a bit of a book. Socializing (cause I'm a freaky geek glued to the computer). Amazing how "socializing" and "updating the damn blog" are popular, by the way. And last but not least, my only new year's resolution so far:

Read some lyrics.

I know, sounds weird. I'm a lyric-oriented songwriter and still, I don't read much lyrics. Most of the time, unless you gimme the plastic disc with the paper booklet, I will listen to a song 1000 times, get bored and never search for the lyrics. This happens to music I get from people, like the entire White Stripes discography I got from my boyfriend.
Here's another funny idea from persistenceunlimited.com:

One push-up a day.

Sounds weird? "Now let me ask you question. How many push-ups did you do last year? Was it less or more than 365?" Well, in my case, it was something around 4. No that I care about push-ups when I got my dear yoga, but that's not the point. The point is that the "one a day" method can be better than many others.
I'm looking for some more resolution ideas.