vital functions

[kaberett]

Reading. I managed a bit more of Neil Shubin's Your Inner Fish before it got autoreturned to the library; I do not regret the outdoor activities I was doing instead of finishing it up but I am also mildly disgruntled that it's likely to be around another month before I get it back from the library. (Yes, it has won me over from my initial grumbles about Intro To Phylogeny.)

I have managed to reread approximately, generously, a chapter and a half of Wicked Problems (Max Gladstone), which I still want to complete before I have another go at Dead Hand Rule, because I absolutely do not have adequate recollection of how WP finished. And yet: my brain it goes eeeeeeeeeenh.

Watching. Apparently it has been a week in which I was willing to do audiovisual processing, and not just on my special interest?

In NOT my special interest news (see also Exploring), I appreciated this very short documentary on the piece of artwork at the centre of the Kerdroya labyrinth.

On Friday I hit the point of going "okay, this is ridiculous, what the hell is going on that I am managing to move that much weight in what is nominally a barbell row", tried to get the internet to tell me how I should expect row vs bench weights to look, and found a Renaissance Periodization video on 11 Barbell Row Mistakes (content note: masturbation jokes in questionable taste). RP are a source that Casey Johnston trusts, and I trust Casey Johnston sufficient to take that rec (though, to be clear, not on all things), so I watched it! And I now think I know some things I'm doing suboptimally and for that matter some things Johnston recommends doing suboptimally or unclearly! So obviously I am impatient to wave a stick around and see how it feels, and I am next scheduled to do this with barbell rows on... Wednesday.

I have three other videos from that sequence open in tabs.

Listening. Tragically we did NOT listen to a bunch of Hidden Almanac on the way down to Cornwall and then back up again, because it would not have been to my mum's taste and we did not wish to ensadden her on the journey.

Playing. Have replayed Tukoni: Prologue on my own machine for the purposes of getting the Steam achievements (incidental to wishlisting the full game as and when it gets released). Also a couple of rounds of Scrabble.

Cooking. Uh. Let's see. There was... quiche? There was a quiche, and also cheese straws. A questionable stirfry that did broadly achieve the goal of delivering protein.

Eating. ASPARAGUS incl purple. Birthday cake. A sampler of commercially available Greek and Greek-style yoghurts. The LENTIL MOUSSAKA of my mother (second portion). Bean burgers also of my mother. ALPINE STRAWBERRIES from the garden!

Exploring. Helston Sports Centre and associated environs (involving BUSES).

Kerdroya!!! We wanted somewhere to stop and eat our Gear Farm pasties on our way back upcountry, due to divers alarums and excursions we wound up on Bodmin Moor at lunchtime (i.e. well behind schedule), so we sat on some grass and watched cows wade in and out of the lake and then while A was eating their Cornetto we went to see how long a walk it was to this labyrinth. WE ARE IN LOVE WITH THIS LABYRINTH. In addition to showcasing the various kinds of rock found around Cornwall and their accompanying styles of hedging we also got to see an excellent variety of foxgloves (white to very deep pink), a thing my mother called "whispering grass" that is not Stipa tenuissima that I am not going to finish looking up properly right now (short, seed heads bow over, fascinating sort of inverted-teardrop-shaped white-to-pink scaled situation?), scarlet pimpernels cascading down the vertical faces, ...

Growing. The at-home plants have not all died while I was away, despite the nightmares about the lemongrass! Indeed the poblano has NEW FRUIT on it!!!

Meanwhile, in Cornwall I Actually Did Some Weeding.

Observing. Goldfinches! Stonechats! Cormorants! Choughs!!! Barn swallows! Cows In Water; many calves and lambs; so so many Excellent Flowers.

The waves.

Goodness it's been an excellent week for spending time quietly outdoors.