Short Film NO-A & Getting a Massage

I came across this pretty awesome short student film called NO-A. It's an Award winning graduation film completed at the Savannah College of Art and Design by a core team of 8 students. 

The world is a desolate, unforgiving place in this action sci-fi with a surprising amount of heart. We follow NO-A (Noah), as he attempts to rescue Aixa, the young woman that created him. In his desperate attempt to save her, he must face an unknown enemy force and fight to keep them both alive.

The animation is pretty cool and the fact that there isn't a single piece of dialogue but still they are able to convey so much emotion is pretty amazing. I'd love to see more of this story.

Later in the evening fellow NerdStronger and Massage Therapist Patty came over to my place to give me a much needed massage. I can't remember the last time I had gotten one.. it's been over 10 years. I've been hearing her praise from other NerdStrongers so I was really looking forward to this and I have to say I was not disappointed. I asked her to work the full hour on my back and that's what she did. I was feeling pretty good when the hour was up, she had really gotten into my back muscles. I hope to make this a more regular thing. If anyone is looking for a good massage therapist I can't recommend her enough.. Thanks Patty.

NerdStrong Gym - Free Standing Handstands

Today coach Christy surprised us with an additional Handstand day. Since we've all been making great progress over the past few weeks they wanted to give us the opportunity to actually do a full handstand.

Of course we had to start with a nice warm up with a jog at the beginning and lots of wrist and shoulder stretches.

We then moved onto the dreaded Hollow Hold Progression. We have done these before but they are a great way to work your core. We did :30 seconds of workout then :30 seconds rest. We started with Knees Bent, Arms Only, then Feet Off Ground at 90 degrees, then Feet Off Ground at 45 degrees, then Feet Off Ground, Arms at side before finally doing a full Hollow Hold. These are always a killer and I think always will be, but I did them.


Next we worked on doing Handstands, there were different levels set up. I worked with coach Andrew and since I could already do a handstand we worked on doing a free stand handstand. This meant I did a handstand against the wall but when pull myself away from the way with no support. This was tough and trying to find the right balance was difficult. Coach Andrew helped by slightly pushing me back and forth to find my balance. My first attempted I was up for about 5 seconds. My second attempted was a bit better and I lasted about 8 to 10 seconds. My third didn't last very long and I knew that I was done with handstands for the day.

For a finisher was had to do 3 rounds of 1 minute of Burpees, :30 seconds of rest and then 1 minute of Jumping Jacks. Again the times are deceiving as 1 minute of something doesn't sounds like a long time but when the coaches say.. "Okay we're halfway done" you can't believe it's only been 30 seconds and you still have 30 seconds to go.

Overall a great workout. I was very happy with my handstand progression. We won't be doing handstands again for a while but I'll continue trying to do free handstands on my own time.

Also more promotion for the gym.. this time on NPR.. it's pretty awesome. Take a listen HERE. 

Guinan Bobblehead And Previews of SHIELD S3 & Arrow S4

A few geeky things I want to share with you all today.. first off I want to share this awesome new Guinan bobblehead. I've always been a big fan of Whoopi Goldberg and Guinan is one of my all time favorite Star Trek characters. Though we've learned more about here over the years she is still relativity unknown. I've collected a few of the other Star Trek bobbleheads and still want to get the entire TNG line but this one will be a much buy as soon as it's released in November. You can pre-order yours from Entertainment Earth HERE. Cost is about $20 bucks.

The new TV season is about to begin so we are getting lots of sneak preview, the first one I want to share with you guys is for Agents of SHIELD season three. I've been a huge fan of Agents of SHIELD since the very beginning. The series has changed in the short two years but this next season is going to be pretty amazing. I can't wait to see what's next for Agent Coulson and his team.

The next one is for Arrow Season Four. I came to Arrow late but binge watched seasons 1 and 2. Season three was more of a miss then hit for me. I liked aspect of the season but over all I didn't like the main story but that hasn't dampened my anticipation of season four. From the preview it looks like it's going to be an action packed season four... I can't wait!!!

Strong Women & BB-8

Came across this very cool meme today and I just had to share it.. all of these women (characters) are strong, independent and amazing.

This goes to show you that Science Fiction really knows how to create women characters that can be loving and caring without losing their toughness.

I've seen and loved everyone of these characters and the series they have been in (with exception to Daenerys from Game of Thrones).

And this is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to strong female role models. I think of all the genres out there Sci fi and Fantasy have the most heroines.

Tomorrow a ton of new Star Wars Episode VII merchandise is going to hit he shelves. I collect Star Wars things here and there but because of lack of fund and mainly lack of room I've cut down buying action figures and such so I don't have any plans to purchase any of the new Force Awakens action figures but then I saw this and almost lost it. It's BB-8 and it's a remote control figure. It's going to be the hot item to get tomorrow and that's saying something since it's retail price is $150. When I first saw this video I had to have it.. I mean how could you not but luckily common sense took over and I realized that I can't afford to spend that much money on one item. But still I know my brother will be getting it so I'll get to play with his :)

NerdStrong Gym - Shoulders, Push Press & Jump Rope... Oh My!!

It's all about the shoulders and push press for today Strength class.

We started with a pretty good warm up with a run and shoulder stretches at the same time. I'm sure we looked like a group of crazy people jogging while doing circle with our arms to stretch the shoulders. We then came in and did a bunch of calf stretches.

We spent a good amount of time working on our external shoulder rotation, found out that my right shoulder is less mobile then my left.  We did lots of mobility movements. When we were done we did a retest and those stretches actually helped with my lack of mobility in my right shoulder.

We then moved on to our workout which was an 8 minutes EMOM (Every Minute on the Minute) 3x Push Press. I chose a weight that was a bit heavier then my usual and I was feeling it and I may have struggled a bit I did finish it.

The final workout for the day was a Jump Rope Ladder. We had to jump rope for :30 seconds and then rest :30 seconds, then jump rope :45 seconds and then rest :45 seconds and then jump for a full minute and then rest a full minute before going back down the ladder with another :45 second and :30 seconds before finishing the ladder. I'm an okay jump roper but I was spent after going up the ladder that doing down was extremely tough.

Another fantastic workout.. thanks coach Christy

River Returns & Anyone Can Be A Superhero

I was excited to read that River Song will be appearing in the next Doctor Who Christmas Special.

The BBC has officially announced this morning that Alex Kingston is returning to Doctor Who for this year’s Christmas special. Show runner Steven Moffat hinted today: “Another Christmas, another special for Doctor Who – and what could be more special than the return of Alex Kingston as Professor River Song? The last time the Doctor saw her she was a ghost. The first time he met her, she died. So how can he be seeing her again? As ever, with the most complicated relationship in the universe, it’s a matter of time…”

The BBC’s synopsis for the episode reads: “It’s Christmas Day in the future and the TARDIS is parked on a snowy village street, covered in icicles, awaiting its next adventure. Time traveller River Song meets her husband’s new incarnation, in the form of Peter Capaldi, for the first time this Christmas.”

I have always loved River Song so I am thrilled to hear that she will be returning and I'm really looking forward to seeing how they accomplish this... can't wait for Christmas.

I came across this amazing story about Autism and Guardians of the Galaxy and wanted to share with you all. Just goes to show you that anyone can be a super hero!!!

NerdStrong Gym - Crossing the Alps

CON Day at NerdStrong and that means Coach Blair and his crazy hard workouts and today he didn't disappoint. Today's workout was titled Crossing the Alps.

But before we got to the workout we had to do a "warm up" which felt and looked more like a workout. For this "warm up" we had to do 10x Air Squats, 10x Jumping Jacks and 5x Tempo Push Up. We then went out side and did a surprise skip.. yeah we skipped around the entire parking lot which is 230 meters. We then did a 10 yard side shuffle, up and back and both sides, a 10 yard Toy Soldiers up and back, a 10 yard High Knees and then a 10 yard Back Pedal. Once we were done with that we went back inside and the "warm up" continued with 10x Mountain Climbers and finally 10x Striders. Needless to say I was exhausted and that as just the "warm up".

Now the actual workout was a 25 minute AMRAP (As Many Rounds as Possible) of Squats, Slamballs and Sit Ups. We had three mountain to choose from. The green mountain which was for beginners, the black mountain for your average Joe and the red mountain for advanced members. Since I was already dying from the warm up I chose to climb the black mountain. So I started doing 10x Squats, 10x Slamballs and 10x Sit Ups, then 15x Squats, 15x Slamballs and 15x Sit Ups and so on. I went up the mountain and down the mountain and then back up and almost made it back down before time ran out. In the end I did 120 Squats, 120 Slamballs and 120 Sit Ups in 25 minutes.

Needless to say if I wasn't already tired I was dying now and coach Blair had one more surprise for us... a Finisher. It was a TABATA Wall Sit with a Mace. A TABATA is 8 rounds of :20 seconds of work and :10 seconds of rest. So I grabbed a 10 pound Mace and somehow managed to complete the wall sit while holding the mace the entire time.

I was extremely happy with what I had accomplished with this workout. That's one thing I love about this gym is even though you are exhausted and tired and feel like you can't continue, then know you still have more in you and slightly push you forward and just when you think you have nothing more to give.. they ask for just a bit more and sure enough it's there.

After the workout it took me about 10 minutes to recover and I was ready to start my day.. I felt great. I know tomorrow I'll be sore but right now I'm feeling fine... Thanks coach Blair

And just a side note IGN did a piece on the Gym.. watch it below.

New MASH Podcast & 5th Wave Trailer

Today Geekyfanboy Productions released a new episode of the MASH 4077 Podcast. This is episode 111, covering S5 Ep 14 "Hawkeye's Nightmare".

After Hawkeye bemoans the young age of the wounded, he appears to develop problems. Sleepwalking and bad dreams, according to Sidney Freedman, are taking Hawkeye back to a simple time, but the horrors of war continue to intrude. After Sidney's assurances that he is as sane as can be, Hawkeye's life once again seems to settle down.

 You can Download from itunes tinyurl.com/MASH4077itunes , listen on Stitcher Radio ow.ly/iZJIz or listen and get direct download from our main website MASH4077Podcast.com

Don't forget new episodes are released on the 1st and 15th of every month.

One last thing I wanted to share was a trailer for a new movie that I had never heard about called the 5th Wave. I guess it's based on a young adult book trilogy Here's a synopsis of the first movie "Four waves of increasingly deadly attacks have left most of Earth decimated. Against a backdrop of fear and distrust, Cassie is on the run, desperately trying to save her younger brother. As she prepares for the inevitable and lethal 5th wave, Cassie teams up with a young man who may become her final hope - if she can only trust him.

NerdStrong Gym - Negative Pull Up Ladder

Surprise Coach Blair was teaching today's DEX class and he always brings a tough but good workout and this one is no exception.

We started with one of our standard warm ups with the exception of a surprise run at the beginning which coach Blair enjoying springing on us every now and then.

For the workout itself it was broken down into four mini workouts. The first was a Pull Up Negative, since the majority of us at the gym can only do a few actual pull ups we work on negatives. This is when you jump up to the bar with your chin and then slowly lower yourself down. It's extremely tough on the shoulders and arms. We were doing a Negative Ladder which meant we did 1 Negative Pull Up, then 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 before going back down the ladder 5, 4, 3, 2 and finally 1. Needless to say after I got to six my arms were like noddles and I struggled to finish. Luckily we ran out of time around 3 so I was spared a few remaining negatives.

Next was 3 Rounds of 12x Lunges and 16x Kettlebell Deadlifts. Lunges weren't that tough but the kettlebell deadlifts were painful as your arms were already jello after the last workout.

We then did a 6 Minute AMRAP (As Many Rounds As Possible) of 5 Hand Release Push Ups and 10 Knees to Elbows. Now push ups are pretty easy for me now and I've been doing hand release push ups every once in a while because regular push ups aren't much of a challenge for me anymore. So doing 5 at a time wasn't bad. The Knees to Elbows were a bit tougher, especially since you are hanging from the bar and again your arms are dead. But I manged to do about five or six rounds before time ran out.

Our final workout was another 6 Minute AMRAP (As Many Rounds As Possible) in which we had to do 5x V-Ups and :20 Second Superman Holds. V-Ups are a major core workout and after all the work we had done today my core was hurting. Superman Holds weren't as bad though twenty seconds feels like forever. I couldn't even tell you how many rounds I did in those six minutes.. it felt like a million (but more like six or seven).

Of course we had a few minutes left in class so coach Blair had us do a TABATA Plank Hold as a finisher.

As I said it was a tough but good workout.. thanks coach Blair.

Volunteering

I'm about to turn 45 years old and my life has become pretty stagnant. I mean I have a job (until November), I have a nice apartment, I'm working out and getting healthy, my family is doing well and I have some amazing friends.. with the exception of not having a partner to share my life with things are going pretty good at the moment. But there is a part of me that's going unfulfilled and I finally figured out what it was... volunteering.

All through my 20's and early 30's I volunteered, APLA (AIDS Project Los Angeles), Babies with AIDS, Big Brothers of America and various soup kitchens. Giving back to the community and helping those in need has always been a huge part of my life but somewhere along the way life got busy and I let that part of me fall to the waist side.

Over the past 15 years I've tried get back into it but I've always had an excuse, and that's the problem.. they are just excuses and they have to stop. There is no better feeling then giving back and helping those who need it. We all can spare a few hours a week of our lives to help others. So that is what I'm going to do.

Now I just have to figure out where I want to volunteer, do I want to volunteer with the elderly, maybe a hospice, the idea of being there to comfort someone during their final days is kind of nice. Or do I want to volunteer with children, I have done that in the past and I loved it. I love kids and kids always seem to love me. Maybe I can volunteer with young adults, especially gay teen or do I volunteer with the disabled. I've always wanted to volunteer with the Special Olympics.  Lot's of options to choose from as so much help is needed. Time to do some research and see which path my heart takes.

Clothes Swap, Jaws & Poetry

Headed back to NerdStrong Gym around 2:30 for the clothes swap. When I got there I noticed that there was a lot more women clothing then men but I went over to the men's section and actually started finding stuff that I though would fit me. I grabbed several swim trunks, some jeans and about ten or so t-shrits. Since I had gone down two pant sizes and a shirt size I was looking for smaller sizes. In the end I did manged to find one pair of swimming trunks, two pairs of jeans and about ten shirts. I also grabbed a few t-shirts (which were to small for me) for my buddy Erik.

I hung out with Derek and Seely and played a few round of Cockroach poker. As 4:00 approached we had a ton of clothes still. The turn out wasn't that great. We had alot more people drop off clothes then come in to get clothes. Towards the end we had a women come in and take about six trash bag of clothes. She planned to try them on at home and then whatever she didn't want she would drop off at the same Out of the Closet that we were dropping off the leftovers to.

Once the event was over I helped bag up the extras and there were alot of them. I think we had 16 or so large trash bags full of unwanted clothes. I don't think they'll be doing this again any time soon. But thanks NerdStrong for all the awesome shirts and pants I manged to grab.

Got two videos I want to share with you guys. First one is the reason I am still scared to go into the ocean. This video is terrifying yet also extremely funny at the reaction of the news casters...

The next is a guy reciting his poem.. his name is Steven J. Boyle and for what I can tell he's a Vlogger and enjoys writing poetry. I really don't know much about him but when I saw this video I really enjoyed his poem as well as the presentation.

NerdStrong Gym - Knight and Squire

Team workout today.. I love team workouts. This one was titled Knight and Squire.

We first did a nice warm up and then moved onto a Skill work. We practice Back Squats and Push Press' before moving onto the main workout.

We first teamed up in to teams of two, I teamed up with my buddy Michael. He's pretty strong so I knew I'd be in for a good workout. One of us would be a Knight while the other his Squire and we'd switch back and forth with these positions. We chose a 45 pound Halberd (barbell).

The workout starts with a 230 meter run with your Halberd, both Knight and Squire did the run and either or both could carry the Halberd. We then had to do 100x Wallballs, while the Knight did Wallballs the Squire had to do an Overhead Hold with the Halberd. After x10 Wallballs we'd switch places until we finished all 100 of them. We then did another 230 meter run with your Halberd, then came back in and did 100x Back Squats. While the Knight did the Back Squats with the Halberd the Squire had to do a Plank Hold and again after x10 we'd switch places until all 100 of the Back Squats were done. We then did our third 230 meter run with your Halberd, before coming back inside the gym and doing 100x Push Press' and while the Knight was doing the push press' his Squire was doing a Chair Pose and again we switch back and forth until all 100 of them were done. And finally we did one final 230 meter run with the Halberd.

This was a killer workout, for the runs I carried the Halberd for the first one, then Michael carried it for the second run and for the third one we teamed up and carried it together and the final one Michael carried.

For the workouts the Wallballs were fine and then the Back Squats started to get a bit tough for me and when we got to the Push Press I wasn't doing so great. After the third run I wasn't feeling to hot, I was a bit dizzy and could feel my hypoglycemia coming on so I grabbed a butterscotch candy for some quick sugar. It took a while to kick in so when we started the Push Press I only managed to do twenty of my fifty before I just couldn't do it anymore. While Michael finished his 50 I tried to do the Chair Pose which was very difficult and wound up just sitting on the ground and breathing. After he was done I was feeling better so we did the final run and as I mentioned Michael carried the Halberd.

Overall it was a good workout, I think I chose a heavier bar then I should have. I also think the heat played a part of it as well. In the end I did 50x Wallballs, 50x Back Squats and 20x Push Press' while running 920 meters.. not bad.