One Hundred Push Ups Or Bust

One hundred push ups. That's my new fitness goal. The other day my wife sent me a site with a training program to help you get to one hundred consecutive push ups in 6 weeks and I figured "why not?".

Like a lot of people, I've let myself get out of shape as I've gotten older. Even when playing sports in high school and college I don't remember ever doing one hundred push ups straight. 50 or 60 maybe, but not 100. So this will help me get working out again plus I'll be better at doing push ups than I was in my prime. Cool.

The program looks good, it's similar to a pyramid type work out and starts with an initial test of how many push ups you can do now. Then you follow one of 3 workout plans based on your initial number. The plan tells you how many push ups to do in each set and how much rest to take between sets. You do three work outs a week and each work out should only take 5-10 minutes total.

Last night was my initial test...25 push ups. Not too shabby. I'll do my first workout tomorrow. There's another push up test every two weeks to measure progress and adjust the plan as needed.

Will I be able to do one hundred push ups? We'll know in 6 weeks...hopefully less.

Finally Saw Pirates of the Caribbean III

We missed Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End when it was in the theater last year and finally got around to renting it Saturday. It was disappointing.

I've been a big fan of the original "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride at Disney World since I was a kid and loved The Curse of the Black Pearl. Dead Man's Chest was good but not as good as the first movie. This one had lots of action and was well produced like the first two but the story just got stupid.

It was a chore to watch in parts and I kept thinking "c'mon, c'mon get to some good stuff". Especially during the scenes in Davy Jones' locker and in the brig with the multiple Jack Sparrows. Those were boring and too artsy.

The first movie was a fun swashbuckler...At World's End wasn't. The plot was convoluted and it relied too much on the supernatural elements. Movies also get annoying when there's an unrealistic behavior like the pirate and East India Co. fleets doing nothing while the Black Pearl, Flying Dutchman and Endeavor fight it out at close range. The East India Co. fleet should have been protecting its flag ship at least.

On the plus side, I got to watch another film from my list of tall ship movies and did enjoy the ship battles. Those would've been even better on the big screen. And they left the door open for a fourth movie, hopefully that one will have a better story.

Drink up, me hearties. Yo ho!

Cramming For My Fantasy Football Drafts

Uh-oh, both of my fantasy football drafts are later this week and I've done zero prep work (unless you count 5 minutes watching the Redskins pre-season fiasco against Carolina). No cheat sheet, no draft strategy, no mock draft, nothing.

Time to start hitting the fantasy sites and cramming. Cramming is a bad thing for fantasy drafts...especially in a 14 team league where 210 players are drafted. There will always be last minute updates and adjustments to your rankings right up to draft day. But you have to be familiar with the players and their teams in order to make those tough middle round picks.

Can't do that all in a cram session. It needs to be started weeks in advance, even earlier for best results. That's something I didn't make time for this summer.

Fortunately both are online drafts this year. Might help if I'm able to do a quick search online before pulling the trigger on a pick. Yeah, I'll keep telling myself that.

The Mole Revealed

My pick for the Mole (Mark) ended up winning the $420,000 prize. I was convinced he was the Mole. Mark played a good game and I'm glad to see he won the cash. He was surprisingly close to being executed many weeks while Paul, the guy who pegged Craig as the Mole earlier than anyone, got whacked at the final four.

This season was a big improvement over season #2 and those disasters known as Celebrity Mole. The game was better balanced and Jon did a credible job as the show's new host. We're looking forward to the next season.

Craig played a great game as Mole. He played up his weaknesses, got on everyone's good side and had them all rooting for him as a fellow player. Brilliant.

Now back to the Olympics...

Fallen Sword Hits 2 Million Registered Players

The web based MMORPG Fallen Sword registered its 2 millionth player this week. I don't know how that compares to popular titles like World of Warcraft but considering that Fallen Sword is a free game, two million sounds like a cool milestone.

A friend introduced me to the game last year and it's one of the most impressive free games I've tried. Lots of features and no ads. Congrats to the FS team!

Survived The Great Urban Race

Didn't qualify for the national championships, but we had an awesome time running The Great Urban Race in DC last weekend! We finished in the top 100 out of 174 teams.

The race was fun and tougher than expected...there was only one mandatory clue on the list and none of the teams solved it. It was to take a picture at the address where XM Satellite Radio was established. We found out later that the correct answer was the NPR building.

We made a couple mistakes that cost us serious time. The biggest was not taking more time at the beginning to solve more clues and better map our route. Unlike The Amazing Race where teams get one task at a time, in the GUR you get a list of 12.

Several teams competed in costumes (there's a prize for best costume). Our favorite was the Yip-Yips. They were also the craziest for running around hot, humid DC in costumes made out of fleece blankets.

It was a great time and we got to see some cool parts of DC. We'll be back next year!

The Mole - Final 4

Clay was executed on last night's show and now we're down to the final 4 players. Correction...final 3 players and the Mole. Is Paul, Craig, Mark or Nicole the Mole?

It's Mark. Mark's the Mole. He was my top pick for the Mole after episode 1 and I'm sticking with him. In last night's episode, he was the only player who didn't obviously try to sabotage a mission...he even stopped Clay from using his wacky lawyer math to mess up the "Smart" team. Every other player was trying to make themselves look like the Mole.

Up until then Mark was usually the one stubbornly refusing to complete a mission or was playing the hyper-paranoid card. Now he's Mr. Mission Success...at a point in the game when every player is trying to get people thinking they're the Mole. Coincidence? I think not.

What about Nicole or Paul? Everyone's favorite obnoxious couple. Neither is the Mole. Although Nicole was making some odd faces when she survived the execution ceremony...she never intended to leave the game. That exchange between her and her mom about hiding dead bodies was funny...I laughed when her mom called Nicole "Omarosa". I like Nicole's mom.

What about Craig? He could be the Mole. He's played a good low key game so far and is my #2 pick as Mole.

I'm happy to say that this season has been good. Jon Kelley is getting better every week as host and isn't doing the cheesy announcer voice so much. The exemptions have been much better blended into the missions than they were in Season 2 and most of the tasks have been fun to watch.

Looking forward to the remaining episodes...