EPT- Cooking
Something I've always really wanted to get better at is cooking. I don't mean just not burning shit in the oven but really cooking well. I have a friend that lives near me who I've already been getting some great tips from and is offering to help me out. Knowing how to cook well allows you so much more control over your overall nutrition and I feel will really help my health in general which is a major focus for me in 2013. Cooking really isn't that hard but unless you actually put the time in to learn and then put the time in every week to actually do it, it's something that is easy to skip or avoid doing. It's not something that you have to spend THAT much time on either, my friend said she cooks on Sunday for the week which saves so much time. I have a bunch of basic recipes that I'll start with and hopefully be at least a low masters league chef by years end. (I'm probably mid Gold now at best) - Staying in touch with people better
This is a pretty general goal but another thing I'm going to really work on this year is staying in touch with old friends better. I'm really terrible at staying in touch with people sometimes. I'm probably not alone with this as it feels so easy to do but I often fall out of touch with good friends often due to me getting so wrapped up in my own stuff. Too often I suddenly find myself going 3, 6 months or even longer without talking to some friend I used to speak with daily during college or from some activity in my past. I'm sure it's normal for people to just drift away over time as they go separate ways in life but some of these people I've lost touch with were really good friends or people I knew very well. when I've reached out to some of these "old friends" in the past they've always been so happy to hear from me...So for 2013 I'm really going to focus on making sure I try to rebuild a few old relationships, even going out of my way to make small things happen like meeting up for a lunch or sending a quick "Hey how's it going" email can help with this so much. - Running
Probably my biggest 2013 goals are related to getting back into top physical running shape. In 2007 I was actually really fast (by my standards) I ran a sub 6 minute mile which I was very happy with. I was 19 then and could eat whatever I wanted and not gain a pound. Times have changed since then, I'm 24 now and over the past year and a half actually gained about 30 pounds of fat. I'm not really aiming to lose much weight over the next year, more focused on turning the fat into muscle which is pretty difficult for my body type (tall+lean) but I don't think it's impossible, it just takes me so much more work than some of my friends who go to the gym for a month and suddenly are super ripped.
I'm planning on running in the Marine Corps Marathon in DC in late October. I'm already running about 16 miles a week over the past month, starting next week I'm going to up this milage to 20 and hopefully get this up to 25-30 by the Spring/Summer. It's a big time commitment though as it might not sound like much but running 30 miles a week is 4-5 hours of running (assuming I'm running 8 minute miles, hopefully my times improve much better than that). Factor in all the workout time I also plan on spending with weight training and this is going to easily turn into a 10+ hours a week thing very fast. I'm also planning on running in a semi-half marathon in late March which I'm focusing primarily on right now. Getting back to running sub 6 minute miles again shouldn't be that hard for me, I already pretty much know what it's going to take to get myself there and actually ran a 7 minute mile just last week and felt like I left plenty on the table. The marathon is going to be uncharted territory for me though and I've already started reaching out to some friends who have run them in the past, (and some guys on TL have been helping me out a bunch, shoutouts to L_Master and the running thread and YPang for the advice so far!)
This is going to be the biggest challenge of my 2013 by far and requires big changes in diet and alot of commitment but I think 2013 is a great year for me to go for this as I'm still very free in life to go after a goal like this. I'm not getting any younger so I figure it's best to go for it now.
So these are going to be three main things I've decided to focus on in 2013. Some people have asked me where gaming fits into this and honestly there probably won't be much room for gaming in 2013. All of these goals I've outlined I sort of dropped for most of 2011 and part of 2012 in favor of other lazy activities like playing starcraft, or screwing around with other games or god knows what other unproductive activities I was wasting time on. I still plan on organizing DC LAN events and staying active in the TL community but I find my interest in actually playing the game really diminished hardcore. I've sort of replaced my competitive outlet from sc2 into running for the time being which has been very rewarding. As of now I have no plans to start playing sc2 at all anymore. I've actually TOTALLY quit because even if I play just a few games here and there I'll lose them and then get mad and start playing 30+ hours a week again.
Mini depression rant on my 2012 year of starcraft + Show Spoiler +
2012 was a slow progression of events that pretty much led me to quitting sc2 completely after MLG Fall in early November. With how terribly boring hots was for me and the uncertainty of if it'll be WoL/HoTS early next year in major events I felt like practicing WoL was a waste of time and HoTS was such a work in progress it was only fun to just mess around with stuff which got boring pretty quick. my WoL career pretty much tanked in 2012 as well, I didn't really mean to "retire" or quit but it sort of became more and more logical as the year went on. losing to Flo in Columbus was nearly career ending in itself, I did get super motivated after that to prove I wasn't a total waste of life after all and got into really legit shape in April-May but narrowly missed qualifying for WCS USA even though there were like 60+ spots for that and I felt I was so much better than a bunch of people that ended up qualifying. When I missed qualifying for that I pretty much lost most of the drive I ever had. I had so many insanely disappointing and annoying things happen to me in so many qualifiers. I lost 3-4 in a best of 7 in the finals once, and then I lost another finals where I was winning but my pc crashed and the admin ruled I get an auto loss. I was putting so much time in and beating so many good players going so far in events but never getting anything to show for it. Even other smaller things I loved playing in 2011 like TSL qualifiers I couldn't in 2012 because they all happened during the day when I was at work or out of the house so I could only play in like 1 qualifier and had to play beastyqt round 1 (he ended up winning that qualifier to qualify for TSL) It just seemed like too much shit kept happening to me time after time that made me question why I was even wasting time trying to stay good at the game. My team (NrG) also disbanded as well over the summer of 2012 and there was no other team that could replace how epic NrG was.
Anyway wow that was a pretty hateful mini rant that I had to vent, didn't really mean to get negative in an otherwise uplifting and inspiring new years resolution blog, but telling that story I think really helps show where my motivation for sc2 went. I hope everyone has a successful and inspired 2013, thanks for reading.
Only 10~15 minutes from Annadale now.
