Healthy Bits: Part 2/2

Greetings:

Here's my workout schedule. I try to focus on a couple body parts per day. Personally, I wake up at 5:00 AM in order to do the workout without distractions.

I don't have weights, so I instead use water bottles or coffee mugs as a substitute when needed.

I also stretch 15-20 minutes before each workout.

Finally, I feel the need to give a shout out to Scooby, a body builder who has a really good website about getting healthy. He's one of the only people I could find who promoted health without pushing a bunch of expensive equipment.

And no, he has no relation to the dog.

Sincerely,

Me.

Monday: Thighs/Abs

Cardio: 20 Minutes

Thighs:

                Ski Sits

                Squats

                Lunges

Abs: Scooby’s 3-Minute Ab Workout

Tuesday

Cardio: 30-45 Minutes

Wednesday: Chest/Triceps
Cardio: None

Triceps/Chest:

                Easy Push-Ups

                Regular Push-Ups

Biceps:

                Bicep Curl

                Hammer Curl

                Overhand Grip Curl

Thursday

Cardio: 30-45 Minutes

Friday: Back/Abs

Cardio: None

Back:

                Bird-Dog

                Front Plank

                Standing Triangle Straddle Bends

Abs: Scooby’s 3-Minute Ab Workout

Saturday: Take a break

Sunday: Shoulders/Calves

Cardio: 0-20 Minutes

Shoulders:

                Presses

                Flies

                Front Raises

Calves:

                Calf Raises

                Inner Calf Raises

                Outer Calf Raises

Healthy Bits: Part 1/2

Greetings:

I’ve been trying to have a healthier lifestyle lately. When this is bought up, people sometimes ask what I’m doing to try to get healthy.

One of the biggest part of getting healthy is nutrition. Here’s some ground rules:

• Research!
• Learn how to read nutrition labels
• The less ingredients the better
• Carbonated drinks, refined breads, mayonnaise and lunch-meat are evil
• Flour, sugar, and high fructose corn syrup are evil

What I found to be especially disturbing is when a product tries to claim that it’s “all natural” and “vitamin enriched” when, in reality, it’s just as unhealthy as a McDonald’s happy meal.

Take vitaminwater, for example. Coca-Cola, the company that created the beverage, is being sued for deceiving customers into thinking that it’s actually healthy. Despite the heavy advertising campaign to the contrary, Coca-Cola's defense was that, to quote, "no consumer could reasonably bemisled into thinking vitaminwater was a healthy beverage." [Citation]

Sure, we lied to you, but it’s not our fault if you actually believed us.

The other big important part of health is exercising. More rules:

• Research!
• Don’t cancel out your workout by eating bad food right after
• Vary your workout to keep it more interesting
• You don’t need a lot of equipment
• Appreciate the little things. Take the stares over the elevator; park at the far end of the parking lot

I’m the type of person who needs a directive to keep up the pace on certain things. Because of this, I developed my own workout plan to help me stay focused on my workout.

I'll upload my workout in my next post.

Sincerely,

Me.


PS: This is useful.

M. Night Shyamalan

Greetings:

I was just thinking of the tragic downfall of a man named M. Night Shyamalan. Once the considered great mind behind "The Six Sense," now he's known for spitting on fans of the "Last Airbender" television series. Once the genius who created "Unbreakable," now he's the dunce who was globally facepalmed for "Lady in the Water."

What the heck happened? The world may never know. In the meantime, here's a few charts that I whipped together to compare the critical and financial success and failures of Shyamalan.

Note that, unlike the rest of the movies on this list, Shyamalan did not direct "Devil." Rather, he produced the film and thought up the story, most likely in an attempt to clear his name.

Metacritic averages critical reviews on a 1-10 scale. Rotten Tomatoes scales the reviews by percent. Box Office Mojo lists the financial income of movies.

Click on the pictures for full size.

Sincerely,

Me.

Teachers Good and Bad: Part 2/2

Greetings:

It's National Novel Writing Month so I've been writing a lot lately. I'll probably tell you something about my story--and, more importantly, my plans for it--in a few weeks.

Speaking of writing, as you may recall, I wrote last week about some of the negative things I've seen teachers do. Here's my promised follow-up; today, I'll shed some light on some of the things that I believe good teachers do best.

 

Memorizing student’s names.

I’d like to thank the teachers that take the extra time to learn our names. It’s the icing on the cake that shows that they truly care.

A singing teacher of mine once got creative with this. Our class had somewhere between 80 to 100 students. He had to assign our seats so that we would be arranged by height and part during our musical performances. I noticed that he used this to his advantage and started calling us by name shortly thereafter.

Awarding Students with something tangible.

One thing that I liked about preschool was those boards where a teacher would put a sticker by our names for good conduct. I also remember Vacation Bible School where I would get candy or a soda for bringing a Bible to class or inviting a new visitor.

Man, those were the days.

Anyway, why did that go away over the years? I guess getting an “A” is good enough nowadays. I still miss the grade school award system.

Controlling the mood of a classroom.

Mr. Glenn, one of the best school teachers that I've met to this day, took a day off of our regular studies just to tell us about his life story. He wanted us to know exactly where he was coming from. From what he told us, it was apparent that he truly cared for us and honestly deserved our respect.

On the other hand, I’ve always liked the teachers that could make me laugh. It’s easy to pay attention to an educator who doesn’t take him or herself too seriously.

Any teacher who can control the mood of a classroom to his or her advantage gets the highest grade in my book.

Sincerely,

Me.

Movie Music

Greetings:

I was thinking of making a video for this. I don’t have time. Vlogs will have to come later.

Anyway, music is a movie’s best friend. It helps to control the emotion of a scene without being as annoying and forced as a live studio audience.

Because of this, many great movie franchises, such as Star Wars and Indiana Jones, are known just as much for their musical score as they are for their most famous scenes.

I’m in college. One of my classes is “Concert Choir.”

This November, we’re doing an even called “A Night of Music from Film.” We’re going to be celebrating a bunch of movies as well as the music that went along with them.

Unfortunately, I recently found out that my grade partially depends on how many tickets I sell.

Yeah. I don’t like it. It’s like having to pay for my grade.

Even so, it sounds like fun. I’m selling the tickets on eBay, although I won’t be making a personal profit from it.  

CLICK HERE for the eBay.

Sincerely,

Me

Birthday Love on Facebook

Greetings:

Many people wished me a Happy Birthday today. Here's the list of them. Quynh and Melissa also wished me birthday joy via Facebook Messenger. Sierra, Marcus and Grandma also gave me written notes.

Marcus
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Manny
Happy Birthday J.-....

Kenneth
"Rah-Rah!" Bravo!
We sure had a nice party!
Sorry all of you could not attend!
Lot's of left over food! And Cake! And Ice Cream!
It was nice!

Charlene
I wasn't online all day to say happy birthday.. so here I am.. Happy birthday! I hope it was good. =]

Krystine

happy birthday!!!!

Sierra
happy day before your birthday!!!!!!!! :D see you soon!!!! ♥ I'm coming over tonight :) to look for wrinkles!!!!!!!

Yoshie
Happy birthday!

Shianne
happy birthday

Phuong
happy birthday 21. Big party huh?

Dena
Have a FANTASTIC birthday J.! Doing anything fun? How is your mom?

Troy
Happy BIRTHDAY!!! YAY im the first to wish u happy birthday hahah!!! ....id leave u a wall post but U DISABLED IT ..so i have to tell happy bday in a comment

David
Happy Birthday J.!

Jennifer S. 
Happy Birthday!!!

Jennifer N.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY J.!!!!!! Hope you have a fantastic day!!!!!

Jim
Happy Birthday!!

Karla
Happy birth day!!!!!!! I hope u have a great day :D

Andrea
Have a great day, J., with love from the B. Crew.

Nancy
Happy Bday J.!!!! :)

Allison
Happy Burfday Jor-Jor!!! I love you! Hope its a great day!

Jeffrey
Happy birthday J...have a good one

Sierra
happy birthday, KIRBY!!!!! :-D i will be on the lookout for overalls :D i love you!!! ♥

Kusikoya Saune
HAPPY 21st BIRTHDAY J.!!!!!!!:D
Hope your days filled with lots of happiness!!!!

Jessica
happy birthday

Dennis
HAPPY BIRTHDAY J.!!!

Amanda
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! :D ♥

Shaquay
happy birthday J.

Ariel
happy birthday!!

Bridgette
Happy Birthday J.

Joshua
Happy Birthday J....hope it was a good one.

Day
happy bert day

Lamotta
Happy bday foo. I know we lost connect, but im always around to hang.if we are not busy. congrats

Joy
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! YAY!!!! :)

Diana
Hope you have had a really great birthday today.

Diana
Happy Birthday, J., You rock.

Diana
Birthday fun. Have a great one.

Carlos
Happy Birthday J. I hope you like your cake XD

Sincerely,

Me

21st Birthday

Greetings:

It's my birthday today. I'm now 21 years old. We celebrated a day early. Along with the typical cake and ice cream dinner, I was given the following gifts.

• Two t-shirts
• Markers
• Socks
• Two large sketch pads
• One small sketch pad
• A watter bottle
• Glow sticks
• A regular calendar
• A page-a-day calendar
• C.S. Lewis' Prelanda (Book)
• Colone
• A hat
• A fake mustache
• $20 bucks
• A mini-pinata
• A rubber band ball
• I Am Legend (Book)

Thank you to everyone to help make my day and year happy. I'm glad I survived for this long. Life may be stupid at times, but it rarely fails to be interesting.

Salutations,

Me

PS: I'm going to start including easter eggs in my posts. For example, you might find a link hidden within the text if you click randomly. There will be at least one in every post.

Also, the color of my blog's title will change according to the mood of my post recent post. It's currently green because this post relates to my increasing age and thereby growth.