Weekly Updates

Couple of updates this week on the goals.

1,000 Miles on Foot

There were a couple of days last week where I didn’t get the full miles I needed so my total for the month of February has lost some of its overall level of dominance. I’m still ahead of my goal for the month, but the trajectory does not have me hitting the goal of 100 miles this month alone to make up for some of the lost miles in January.

Renting The House

I’m not in Newport right now so I’m not ready to start working on this, but I have started looking at the steps for this project. The repairs and the pieces required to get to that step. I’m excited about getting there.

Acroyoga Field Guide

I’ve started working on this. You can visit it here: Acroyoga Field Guide. It is a big work in progress and I have bunch of things that I want to do for this, but I’m starting to get somewhere. I started with Pandoc, but really I think this is a full website. Currently leaning towards doing it with Eleventy.

After much thought, I’m going to start with a website and then try to convert to a book. My goal is to release the content on the website for free and try and print the book at the highest quality to make it worth it. That way it will be free for people if they want it and if they find value they can purchase the book.

Other Things

Before the pandemic started, I started a podcast called “Zack’s Quacks.” By start, I mean I recorded the first episode. I never published it. I did purchase a website, but that is about all. Anyway, I’m in the process of trying to get that together as well. You can find it on iTunes soon, more details to be forthcoming at Zack’s Quacks (website under massive construction).

This is my last week traveling before getting home. I’ve got a bunch of driving to do, but I’m pretty darn excited about heading back to the ocean. I’ve got stops on the way, though.

News Years Resolutions: Better Late Than Never

I’ve sort of already written my New Years resolution page and hinted that this years theme was less. Well, that is an over simplification. There are many more goals for me than that this year:

Rent house for the summer
Learn to cook more and eat healthier
Do 1,000 miles on foot
Dance lessons
Get better at cleanliness
Learn to share attention with others more
Write Acroyoga Field Guide
Consolidate (website, notebook collection, clean up office)

Let’s go through each of them.

Rent house for the summer

I live in a great town, Newport RI. It’s so great that the population of the town balloons from 40k in the year to 250k in the summer. Because of the disability of the area, rents are high for the summer. But it also super busy and crowded. Some people love all the energy this provides, for the most part, I do not.

The plan is to rent the house so others can enjoy the season they want to enjoy and I can be anywhere else. Preferably somewhere cooler, but we’ll see.

This is no small task. There is a lot of work that needs to be done on the house, from painting to various other tasks like organization and figuring out where some of my stuff is going. I still haven’t fully moved from my room to the upstairs. No small task, but good for my financial future.

Learn to Cook and Eat Healthier

My mom recently said that I’ve never really needed to diet because I’ve always been so active. It’s true. I do so many sports that it is actually impressive that I’m in the shape that I’m in. Now, I haven’t been able to do all of my activities over the Pandemic and some of my eating has taken a turn for the worse, but beyond that, I just enjoy food. I enjoy eating good food. I want to create the things I enjoy. I want to invest in creating better meals.

Last year I did Hello Fresh, which was a great, but their prep times were WAY off. I needed to spend much more time than each meal was supposed to take. I’d like to learn to go off script a bit and make some good things. I can do this with simple foods like steak or burgers or whatever, but I’d like to expand beyond the basics I can already do.

I’m excited for this challenge. I’ve done some while living in the Van, but honestly, kind of waiting until I have a full kitchen with an Oven to really kick this into gear.

Do 1000 Miles on Foot!

This one has been the one that I can’t put off. If I don’t start early, catching up to 1000 miles is a real challenge. Despite being pretty concerned from the beginning, I only got about 49 miles in January. My current pace in February has me passing that by the middle of the month.

I did 100 miles in a month, and I’ve done other challenges when it comes to movement, but this is by far the biggest I’ve attempted. It’s a much longer commitment than I’m used to. Still, I’m excited. I can do this and will do this.

Dance Lessons

One of the things that I’ve gotten away from during the pandemic was social dance. There are a couple of reasons, like moving to a new community, but they are all excuses. This is the year I dust off the dancing shoes and find some community among this arena. I’m excited to find some west coast swing not he east coast!

Get Better At Cleanliness

Before you talk about my BO, it is not that type of cleanliness. When possible I shower daily, sometimes multiple times in a day. This is not about my person, but more about my space. It is tied to some of the other resolutions that are mentioned (like renting the house, and consolidation).

It’s how I was raised. I often go into a conversation and feel like I need to be a major factor in the conversation. This inhibits some of my relationships from growing the way I want them to and often times makes it hard for me to fully understand other peoples perspectives. I want to make time for others, to hear and learn from them, to allow them to share and grow.

This one is a character flaw of mine and will be a hard one to really work on for me, but that is my goal.

Write Acroyoga Field Guide

This is a big one too. I want to create a field guide for acroyoga. I want to write a book, and I want it to be the book that a bunch of people want to have in their hands when they go to a jam as somewhat of a players guide. There is going to be a lot to come here, and this is a big project.

I want to self publish this book too. I want to control all the aspects from the paper used to the binding. I don’t think it will be a giant first run, but it should be fun to have. Again, more to come soon, and I hope to put a bunch of the pieces of the writing online for other people to give feedback on as I write it.

Consolidate (website, notebook collection, clean up office)

As I grow up I accumulate a ton of different things. Some things I collect, some things I just have. A bunch of things I use, a bunch of things I don’t. I need to get rid of the stuff that I don’t use. Sometimes I need to just get rid of something I use so that I can force myself to use another thing.

The things we own end up owning us. THE THINGS WE OWN END UP OWNING US. There is cognitive load for the cost of ownership for things. I want to unburden my from this load. This will likely be a multi-year project, but the goal is to start this year.

Conclusion

Okay, so I may be biting off more than I can chew this year. My mom was giving me a hard time about setting such lofty goals. She gets upset if she doesn’t complete all her goals. She’d rather finish her goals and then go above and beyond. Personally, I’m the other way around. I’d rather have a pretty crazy goal and be happy with accomplishing 75% of it. Honestly, if I get 75% of these goals done, I’ll be super excited.

So this is me saying onward to these goals. Maybe I’ll try to post monthly updates.

Also note: this doesn’t even include any of my professional work goals! Those exist, they just exist somewhere other than where the public can read them!

Eilonwy in Memory

Over a year ago, I met a woman who is now my girlfriend. Along with that relationship came the relationship with her feline companion. This was not the first cat to enter my life, but there was a special feeling around this cat from the beginning. I am plenty fine taking my time for a pet or child to warm up to me, however this cat demanded attention in a way no previous cat encounter had occurred.

The cat’s name was Eilonwy, pronounced Eye-Lynn-Wee!, and she was a joy to be around. I put a lot of effort into getting her approval. I would put my hand in front of her face, and if she moved forward, I would pet her. If she stayed still, I would pull my hand away. Many times, I would wander behind her as she traversed the apartment. She would occasionally glance behind to confirm that I was following her. I was there ready to be of service if she performed the move I called the “burritto.” In this move, the cat would sit down and roll on her side exposing the side of her body for long pets. The rule was, if she burrito-ed, then I petted her, no matter what.

Over time we formed, what I deduced, was a pretty strong friendship. We were each others’ pals. My girlfriend was clearly her person, but I was second. Not a close second, but still second. While it took a significant amount of time for me to use the L-word with my girlfriend, that was not the case with the cat. The love bond for me was quick and there was a running joke about how quick I was to fall in love with a four-legged friend.

I started calling her “my queen” and that ran into some issues with the girlfriend. We settled on calling her my princess and I would end most phone calls with “Tell my princess I love her.”

She is also the primary reason I adopted Coco. The girlfriend looked at me one day and said, “You need a dog, she loves you, but not the way you want her to love you. You NEED a dog!” So she is responsible for my pet ownership as well.

In October of this year, my princess started getting a bit lethargic. She was peeing in weird places. While there were a lot of additional factors going on, we were concerned. We found out that she had a degenerative kidney condition which meant her time with us was limited. Despite being put on everything we could put her on, she eventually just stopped eating because it was too painful. She lost nearly half of her weight by the time the girlfriend made the decision to let her go. It was a very tough decision. We were both there as they put her down. She left this world knowing she was loved.

I will be forever grateful to the girlfriend and cat for entering my life and changing it in so many positive ways. I am now a partial cat person. While dogs will always be my first love, I can’t imagine my life without feline companionship.

Here are just a few of the things I will remember about the cat:

She loved warm blankets and would only really sit on us when we had warm blankets.
She was incredibly vocal and would meow when upset. I loved the sound of her meow.
She was a hunter, and despite the fact it would hurt the girlfriend, she would bring in her prey. I was proud.
She loved string, better than almost any present one could buy her.
She liked physical contact and especially belly rubs.
She loved being outdoors.
Even when she would get upset, she was very slow to bite or paw at people, she would usually just walk away.
She loved cheese and fish.
She hated traveling by car!
She enjoyed being held by her person and sometimes by me.
Boxes were her kingdom.

Puppy Life

Last week I brought a new member into my home, Cortado Covfefe Cohen, or Coco for short. She’s a wonderful lab and duck tolling retriever mix. While the first day was amazing and she is great, I get significantly less sleep these days. People say it’s like having a newborn, and technically she is a young child, but I didn’t get any onramp. Went pretty much from the adoption stage right into getting up all time and having my hand chewed on at every turn. Luckily, I have the financial stability to procure chew toys and that is my first stop this morning!

Seriously, while I lament the lack of sleep she really is an amazing puppy. She is kind to and friendly to strangers (we take a daily trip to the coffee shop where she needs to stay on her towel (she is not fully vaccinated yet) and greets everyone with a lick. She will then move over to biting. Hopefully, if I give her more chew toys she will learn what to chew.

Getting a puppy was not something I took lightly. I have been thinking about getting a dog forever. One of my roommates in CA had g/f with a dog that would spend time over our house. That was an indication of how much I wanted a dog. Once I came back to the east coast, I wanted a dog to keep me company and help with the space. When I started dating my girlfriend, even she suggested I get a dog because her cat was never going to love me the way that I loved the cat. This has been a long time coming.

Lastly, just want to mention Save-A-Lab Rescue. Their application process is a little more involved than most and the process to get approved is slow, but they are a great organization and helped me land a pretty perfect puppy. They rescue labs and lab mixes from the southern kill shelters and transport them to the northeast where they can be adopted. As someone who has seen dogs elsewhere who I wish I could have adopted but these other agencies wouldn’t allow me to adopt out of state, it is really great to have found an organization that is taking labs from an area where they are in excess to an area where they are in demand. E$veryone I met was really kind and in the end, the process to adoption, once approved, was very fast!

So, I’m sure there will be more tales of Coco coming up, but for now, we are both just adjusting to each other’s personalities and finding a way to live together. I’m so excited to have this bundle of joy in my life.

Writing A Book

I’ve always wanted to write a book. I remember having a teal-covered five-star notebook where I wrote my first fiction story about a kid on a boat with a computer. It made no sense, I was very young when I started, and the book didn’t have a plan. Still, I pretended it was going to be such a good book.

The dream has grown over the years. I still write some crappy poetry from time to time (see some previous posts on this blog for pest poetry), but I haven’t really started anything super seriously. I want to change that. I want to write a book. The question is, what do I write about?

They say write about what you know, but I’m actually a little excited about learning as I write. I’m hoping the experience of crafting a piece helps me grow as well. This means my topic is still open for discussion. Some of my ideas include:

Acroyoga Field Guide – a guide to the practice of Acroyoga.
Moving to and from California – a software person who went to the west coast to learn his craft and survived to make it back.
Field Notes – a story from a fan of the wonderful product made in the USA by a designer and small firm that has blown up to a major product.
What I learned from 20 years in cheerleading – a memoir of my hears in the cheerleading world and what I learned. How the sport is different now and thoughts for the future.

What I do know is general size. I want to write books in a size and format that I enjoy. I don’t want to do big books unless they are picture books. I want my books to be smaller. I’m thinking of A Drive into the Gap Size or Wildsam Field Guides. Something pocket size. I’m unsure why this is so important, but it is.

My ask here is that if there is something you think I should write, please reach out and let me know as I begin to figure out what this project will look like.

St. Patty’s Day Party

It’s been a year since most of us started quarantining, and while there are many things we can’t do, we can still drink and celebrate the holiday. Teryn and I are hosting a St. Patty’s Day Zoom on Wednesday, March 17, at 7:30 PM Eastern until about 10 PM. Zoom link below. Depending on the number of people who show up, we will do some fun breakout rooms and a couple of other little games for the participants.

Happy St. Patty’s Day!

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84284311664?pwd=U1BRcWNxYTJLUGRXUC9lSHhOdUE3dz09

Crazy Nick

This is one of the last photos I have of Crazy Nick.

This photo was taken on August 28th while we were zooming around the east coast in his airplane. Several days later Nick died flying the plane in the background in Shenandoah National Park. (https://www.nps.gov/shen/learn/news/plane-crash.htm). I’ve been afraid to talk about it, because I’m afraid of my mom finding out. If she did, she would go crazy that I was in a plane several days before it crashed. I’m scared. I’m wondering if I did something super irresponsible, but I’m very grateful I took the day off to fly with him and spend one last day with him.

You see, we were working on this big project at work. It was consuming most of my hours and even though Nick arrived on Wednesday and we had planned on going out Thursday, he needed a new alternator in the plane, so we had to put our plans on hold for a day. When the project leader found out I would be out one day he was okay with it. When it got shifted from Thursday to Friday and a deadline was looming, there was some pressure to not take the day. I stood my ground and had a wonderful day with Nick. We made it Bar Harbor, ME. We stopped in New Hampshire, and an interesting time trying to find fuel on our way back in VT, and stopped by in Worcester, which is where this picture was taken. We made it home at like 11 pm. It was an awesome crazy amount of flying, and a great adventure.

That was Nick. Mr. Adventure. I met him at Philly Phlight several years before. It’s an intermediate Acro festival and he and his partner were in my house. We connected and had a grand old time together. I even went down and visited his place in San Luis Obispo (SLO) and was part of putting together an Acro festival with him before covid made us cancel our plans. Nick had a go grab the life by the horns and try the crazy thing mentality, and I ate it up.

He passed flying his plane, and it is sad that I won’t get to play with him again (term we use for doing Acro with others), or fly with him, or just talk about the challenges of life. He will be in my memory and he will inspire me to try to see the joy in the adventure and look for new ones.

I will miss my friend Nick.

Nick, with a busted knee still doing Acro, basing me in a shoulder stand. This Is the type of crazy stuff Nick would do. I will miss him.

Current Projects

I’ve always got a bunch of projects going on. Some of them are big and overarching and some of them are small and simple. Some of them are related to work and some of them personal. What if at the beginning of the month I talked about the projects I was currently working on and which ones I finished last month, would I get more done? Would I have a more concrete record of my goals, achievements and failures? I have a LOT of failures.

To that end here is a list of my current projects and some notes about them.

Unpack + Settle In: I’ve relocated due to covid to the east coast. I have a bunch of stuff to unpack. Currently all the stuff is just thrown around the house. I need to find the permanent home for the stuff. I also need to update billing addresses and various other pieces of work here.
Van Cleaning: Clean out Claire and get her ready for the winter season and future adventures.
Taxes 2019: I’m very behind on getting my taxes for 2019 done. I have an extension, but I need to put together a full working document on them and figure out where I can deduct.
Dog Rescue: I have come to the conclusion that I’m ready for a dog. Now the challenge is to find one to rescue and bring them into my home. This may be done through fostering first.
The Newport Book: Working on putting together a photo book for Newport, RI. Still figuring out what this means, but is something I really want to get done. I love this town, want others to appreciate how special it is.
Covid Card: I’ve been very distant from my friends during the covid times. I’m looking to make a little gift card to send out to friends to let them know I’m thinking of them.
Journal Most Days: This is something I enjoy. I don’t know if I’ll ever go back and read the stuff I write, but I love having the notes and thoughts from younger me to refer to if I find stuff I need to think about.
Super Secret Work Project: Can’t really talk about what this is right now, but I have grand plans and hopefully will be able to share with you before the end of the month.

The goal here is to recap these at the beginning of month and update you as to progress throughout the month. Feel free to ask questions about these projects (if you know me and know how to connect).

Planet Granite Comment Cards

I’ve been meaning to find a way to share these for quite a while. There was a point in the not too distant past when I thoroughly enjoyed leaving comment cards at the Planet Granite. I would attempt to leave a couple a week. here is a collection of some of the comment cards I’ve left. Please beware, some of them have foul language.

Also, please note that throughout the entire time I was leaving these cards I had a relationship with the management at Planet Granite and it was very clear that I was leaving most of these comments with nothing but humor in mind. The people who read them are working really hard and have to deal with very tough customers day in and day out and this was an attempt to leave some humor for them throughout the week.

Linda Motorkid

I lost a friend last week. She was amazing and I want everyone to know about Linda.

I met Linda six years ago in the Planet Granite Masters Class. She always climbed levels above me, but was never too busy to encourage me as I worked on my projects. She was a magnificent climber.

Linda shaped my life with our friendship. One such example was the following exchange (to the best of my memory):

Zack: “I really want to get better at climbing so I can climb with you”
Linda: “You are a coach, how would you coach yourself to get better”
Zack: “I would hire a coach, it’s really hard to coach oneself.”
Zack goes out and gets a climbing coach and gets better at climbing and life.

There were adventure trips with her to Yosemite (multiple) and Bowman Lake up in Tahoe. I remember a boulder adventure to Castle Rock. There were an appearances at my birthday parties and just general tons of fun and laughs.

The collection of stories that runs between our lives is complex and this is just a taste. What I’m failing to convey is the caring emotion she brought with her. The kindness and compassion that moved me and inspired me. The connections between me and others that are stronger because of her compassion and involvement in my life.

I’m going to miss her terribly. To all of those who had the pleasure of knowing Linda like I did, I’m sorry for your loss. To those of you who didn’t know Linda, I’m sorry that you didn’t get to meet her.