Am I Bastard?

…yes I am. If there’s one thing I enjoy and hate at once, it’s tormenting users and let them face with their undisputed lack of knowledge when they try to enter my realm. My realm actually consists of five separated networks that has to be controlled, sniffed, fingered and spied. While being a kind of bored at work I did some research on one of all-time favourite tales – B.O.f.H.

B.O.f.H. stands for Bastard Operator from Hell and is a collection of tales of an operator, his pimply-faced youth and the struggle they have with their boss, the users and everything else a classical operator has to face with. For me these tales are more than just funny, they are something like a brutal mirror of truth of my own every day life at work. They also remind of a time where my “operator instructor” introduced me to these tales, that was a time where I was the pimply-faced youth, and he was truely one of the operator/administrator guys who really wanted to have the users suffer. Hell, those days were fun…

I’ve finally found the collection of books on a single server and they now make my day (mainly diverting). So if any one of you out, especially the younger generation, wants to know what a REAL operator/administrator is about and what kind of might he has, read these tales, learn and keep and honour our heritage.

The official website

The german website

Lazy edging

Seriously, I became pretty lazy within the last days after my vacation. Though I am glad that I can keep my new “low” weight and I am willed to do everything in a sports way to hold it that way I wasn’t able to trick my inner ratfink and make it off to gym for a nice training session or to the park to do a jog. I awoke everyday since Monday at 04:00am to the ring of my alarm clock and I really wanted to go to gym BUT I was actually too tired to do so. Well, I guess I just need one normal session at the gym in the evening, just to lick some sweat and blood and I’ll be able to kick off in the very early morning.

Well, finally I can say at least that everything else in project “Straight edge 2.0” works perfectly fine and there were no rule breaks until now. Okay, okay, okay, okay… there was  this small cupcake this one day but though it was extremely sweet and felt like it holds galleons of calories it wasn’t such a serious sin like the ones in the past. You might remember the two beers right after the start of the first straight edge project. So, this week will pass without sports BUT I promise to do better in the future, next week to be exact.

Straight edge 2.0

I am sorry that I didn’t wrote for such a long time and that I did not spread out any news considering my straight edge project and how it will continue. First things first, I was on vacation in France for the last two weaks, while being there I decided to continue living with my straight edge rules that exist till now. I don’t want to make any bigger changes because I think that the rules are good in the way they are now. Maybe I will change some things in the future and I’m still thinking about adding one or two new rules but it should not become too complex in the end.

I also have to admit that I was not following my rules as tightly as I have done it before I was on vacation. The reason for this is simple. When I am on vacation and when I have the rare opportunity to have some time on my own and with my beloved girl I don’t want to live like a monk. Well, of course I didn’t touch any alcohol or cigarettes and anything like that but when it comes to nutrition I had to try one or two desserts. But, hey dudes!!! I was in France and I had to experience the whole entired french cuisine.

But now straight edge continues for 12 month and and the weight I want to reach is now set to 90kg (198,41 lbs). Today I have something around 98kg so my weight did not increase drastically while being away. The deadline for 90kg is 1. October 2010, so there’s a lot of sports to do and to chose food wisely. There will be no exceptions in food like I mentioned them in a post a while ago. Everything will stay like it is now. Seven simple rules to follow and nothing else.

My name is Zim and my tank is full

It’s just one small step for a single, but one giant step for every dungeon group on Nathrezim and the whole entire realmpool. I reached level 79 at around 01:00am in the morning and I am now about 80 percent away from the level cap. According to the fact that I am soon will be level 80 I bought my paladin some new gear that he’ll be able to wear when he’s on maximum level. I had to buy this stuff because I don’t think that I’ll find much time for active raiding and most of my gear will be farmed in the three dungeons situated in Icecrown. The rest will be bought with ‘Emblems of triumph’. Sounds like a lot of farming though.

Blood Elf Paladin

I was on a kind of ‘killing spree’ during the last levels but it ended yesterday in the instance ‘Halls of lightning’ because the paladin who was in the group pulled the first boss while he was loaded with energy and lightnings and after a short struggling fight I received a very unhealthy one hit and bit the grass. Anyhow, I am very satisfied with my tank abilities and the fact that I can finish nearly every Northrend instance in 20-30 minutes. Can’t wait to enter the last three Northrend instances and kick some mobs ass.

Heating edge

This week is by far the weakest week in my straight edge project. I made it only one time off to gym and it felt like a torture. You must know that the summer broke in to our country and the temperature increased drastically. It feels like you’re melting away the whole day. Another point why I didn’t made it off to gym is my nowadays tiredness. I feel a kind of burnt out and pretty exhausted at the moment because everything simply stresses me and I can barely catch a clear thought while concentrating on anything.

Straight Edge - wallpaper by ~x-vegan-x

I am proud to announce that there were no backlashs. I resisted alcohol and cigarettes and I kept to my latest rule change. My weight also did not increase and is a kind of stable for now. By the beginning of next week and after catching a looooot of sleep over the weekend I will definately go to gym every workday. There’s still the goal to reach 96kg (211.64lbs) by the beginning of my vacation in two weeks and by reaching the last milestone in this very first straight edge project of mine. Straight edge 2.0 is on its way…

Got that feeling

I don’t know why but today I feel an urgent need to get drunk. I haven’t had the need for alcohol since the beginning of living straight edge but today is one of these days where I just feel that need to get totally fucked up. Maybe it’s the fact that I am bored at work or that I haven’t been to gym this morning because today is my girlfriend’s 30th birthdays and I wanted to wake up with her. Interestingly do I feel much more exhausted than I feel on days where I go off to gym very early in the morning. Guess I got comfortable with gym in the morning.

Frauenkirche. by distancexkills

It’s so damn nice that I finally found a gift for my girl’s birthday and most importantly a gift that she like. I arranged a hotel room for a weekend in August in the beautiful city Dresden. Hopefully the weather will be nice and warm that we can discover a lot of sights and places in Dresden. Last time I’ve been there was around 1988 or so and I am really excited to see the rebuilt Frauenkirche Church. I remember last time where I was standing in front of this building it was nothing more than a bunch of stones, not even a ruin.

Two sins and a friendly scale

Week two of my straight edge project lies in the past and there were a few hurdles to take and some of them fell down. First things first, a friend of mine moved to another apartment last weekend and me and a few friends were helping him out to get the job done as fast as possible. We finally moved the whole furnitue in about three and a half hour and you might expect it, when a handful of men comes to hard work, the beer is not far away. Though I said in the beginning that I am not going to drink alcohol I finally could not resist and had to drink my favourite brew of beer that was bought especially for me. Actually I do not feel very guilty about it according to the fact that I was simply thirsty and of course I did some real hard and tough work. I have to admit that I felt a little dizzy and I actually did not really liked it after the first bottle but this feeling was soon to be gone. That was the first sin.

Secondly me and my girl decided to eat this god damn ice cream we still had in the fridge. We ate a small portion on Saturday evening and another one on late afternoon on Sunday. Though it was a kind of sin and against the rules in this project I was a kind of proud that I could devide the ice into quarters that we could eat from it more than one time. This was nearly impossible in the past, because I mainly destroyed a pack of ice cream in about half an hour completely without leaving anything for another day or another person. I would say I am an ice cream addicted.

After these two sins and rule breaks in this very project I can also announce something truely nice that made me reeeaaally lucky today. My weight dropped down to 99,5kg (219.36lbs) and hopefully it will stay down there and will continue to fall to lower values. My goal until 15th June is 96kg (211.64lbs) and I finally want to reach 92kg (202.83lbs) by 15th July. A lot of people told me that this is nearly impossible but I do not want to give up without giving it a try. I know I can make it. On the other hand, the weights that I mortise in gym are getting more massive. My muscles feel more “comfortable” with the training and I was able to increase a few weights on some training machines. I am pretty much fixed on training back and abdominals because my opinion is that you can train much better when the center of your body is trained and stabilized. And, by the way, I do not want to end with a ruined, hurting back.

As a conclusion, the last week showed me that I am still not a 100 percent able to resist the seductions of life but on the other I can see that my everyday training shows the first effects. I think that this project is going to be tougher in the nearby future, but I am not sure what is going to be tougher, the resistance or the training. I always have to remind me that just two weeks have past and lots will follow and that there is no need to get devil-may-care.

One week after

Over one week has passed in the straight edge project and though it was tough on the very first weekend I can say that it is getting easier every day. But on the other hand I have to admit that it is still hard to resist the seductions in every day life. Everytime whenI feel the need to eat something sweet and delicious or when I just get an appetite for food I suck a licorice drop. I also have to say that it is easy to resist seductions when you are on own and everything is in a kind of “under control” but as soon as you leave the house and visit some friends for example you see that control is getting loose and you find more and more obstacles on your way to be straight edge. It is natural to serve coffee when you visit someone at 3:00pm and it is also natural when visit someone with a new born baby with a small group visitors that this person is not going to cook something special for you when it comes to dinner. I am not sure if I should feel like a sinner because I can’t say that my nutrition was always “perfect” but I was mainly eating a kind of unhealthy in groups when there was no other choice. I know that this is no excuse but I haven’t found a potential solution by know.

Fitness 3 by ~Swisst

Another announcement I have to make is that I started to go to gym before work at about 5:00am in the morning. I was a little bit of skeptic if I can have the workout with the same intense like it is in the evening. Finally I found out that there is no difference for me in my overall ability and last but not least that a workout in the morning is much more efficient for someone like me who wants to lose weight and fat. I do not eat breakfast before gym in the morning so the fat burning progress is starting much earlier as it is going to happen on a workout in the evening.

One serious problem I found in combination with my workout is that I cannot measure my progress by watching my weight because it going up and down on a high level around 204 – 208lbs. I guess it would be a finer way to control progress if I start measuring belly, arms and legs weekly. One goal of training is to gain muscles and my sustentation includes a lot of proteine so I personally think that I gained a lot muscles over the last days so that controlling weight will not indicate how much fat I lost.

Next positive thing I have to mention is that I found fun in cooking. I am not a very talented cook but it is fun at all to do more than opening the pizza box and placing the pizza in cooker. My cooked meals are mainly made with chicken and rice. Chicken to gain proteine and rice to fill the stomach and receive as little calories as possible. And, of course there are always some fresh vegetables included in my meal like tomatoes and pepper.

My final conclusion after more than one week of living straight edge is that I feel much better and healther though the project is only over one week old and definately will continue with this. By now I don’t see something that will make so frustrated that I feel the need to quit.

Lags, horrible LAGS

I would like to make a proposal. Days with 36 hours would be very nice. Why am I not having the time for anything? I have this bad foreshadowing that it got something to do with my work. Since I’ve been working my amount of free time decreased over the years. While hanging out in school or my apprenticeship and even my civilian service I had much more free time.

Delorean 2 by ~UtterBen

Even though I can’t say that I waste my time on useless things like watching pr0ns on the internet or raiding 12 hours per day in World of Warcraft. My maximum of sleep is around 5-6 hours per night so this can’t be the root of all evil that sucks my free time away. I don’t know what it is but I always have time for nothing. Maybe I should go and start some black hole investigations or bye me a DeLorean and build up a flux capacitator.

Vision thing

Here I am, Berlin. The official stuff is done and over and now it’s time for a little vacation. I friend of mine who moved to this beautiful city a few years ago introduced me to a club called “Club der Visionäre” which is like a dance club, a pub and an ‘alternative beer garden’ in one piece. If you that kind of person who enjoys to be outside and hang around and chill with some friends, this is definitely the spot where you can satisfy your needs. Give it a try…

clubdervisionaere

Hopefully I am going to have the chance to take some pictures here.  I am not sure if I should go out tomorrow and wander around in some of the more alternative boroughs or if I should do the standard 08/15 tourist trip. We’ll see how big the riots are going to be here in town…