Summer Shred!

20+ years into my career at IBM, I find myself working remotely a majority of the days and will only go into the office maybe once a week at most.  The demands of my job just don't require me to be on site as much as I used to be.  While I am still active by going to the gym a couple times a week (for strength training and cardio) and pickleball league on Wednesdays, I often find myself getting very little physical movement on several of the weekdays that I am working from home.  As I've gotten older too (I'm now 42 at the time of this blog post), I've definitely noticed that my metabolism just isn't as fast as it used to be.  I still like to eat and drink a fair amount throughout the week and changing the diet is not always easy.

My friend Alec from Twitch is a personal trainer and he even owns his own gym in San Fransisco.  He's always been good about trying to push people to be in a better physical and healthy state, so I've decided to jump on his Summer Shred motivational bandwagon.  I currently way about ~193 pounds, which is pretty heavy for me.  Let's see how much I can lose by the end of summer...but how are we going to do this?

Like I've said earlier, it's difficult to change diet.  It's also difficult to move around a lot when you're working from home all the time.  And finally, at age 42, the joints just don't hold up as well as they used to.  Extreme workouts are effective, but they also take a toll on the body.  So what can we try that doesn't require a major change in lifestyle, will get us more active, but also lower the risk of injury at an older age? The answer might be: a walking pad!

Alec has pitched how effective a walking pad can be and he recommended me the same one he uses every day.  It's the Vitalwalk Apollo 11 Elite and I just got mine delivered today!  The goal is to use it on days that I don't have pickleball or go to the gym for cardio, which will be approximately 4-5 times a week.  And on those days, the goal is to do two 30-min walking sessions at a brisk speed like 3-4 mph and the incline % of this pad goes up to 6%.  We're starting on May 15, so we'll come back in 3 months on August 15 and see how effective a walking pad can be.  Already I can tell that the walking pad will be something I can use easily while watching a baseball game, or even while I'm working on my laptop (since I got one of those stands that can raise up high if you want to stand while working).

You also know I loooove spreadsheets, so I'll document my daily walking amount over the course of the next 3 months.  There will be periodic weight checks that we'll use the scale at the gym to track.  The scale is a little inaccurate at times, but as long as we use the same scale to measure our weight, it should be somewhat accurate, right?

Wish me luck and stay healthy out there! 

Another New Bowling Ball!?

You might recall last year I posted about buying a new bowling ball.  While I did get the Storm Typhoon, it was really only for dry lane conditions.  At PINZ Fiesta this year in the Thursday bowling league, there just haven't been lane conditions where this ball has been needed.  In fact, I can't say that I've thrown more than 10 games with it since getting it.

The oil this year at Fiesta Lanes has been really challenging, often to the point where I just wasn't getting any reaction with my Infinite Physix.  It's gotten to the point where I just feel like there's no life on the ball anymore, and my average was suffering, dropping all the way down to the low 180s!  After talking with several bowlers at the alley, they all agree that the oil has been difficult and many have turned to more aggressive balls, which my Storm Typhoon is the opposite of.

And thus, I decided to purchase another new bowling ball, this one to replace the Infinite Physix.  I ended up deciding on the Storm Ion Max Pearl, which is arguably the most aggressive ball I've owned to date.

I've also been taking my bowling balls to get drilled by my friend Butch (former IBMer and friend who I've bowled many seasons with over on the east side at Bowlero), as he now works at the Bowlero pro shop.  He did a great job with the Ion Max Pearl and after owning it for a few weeks, I've already shot a 723 series with it!  I probably won't be able to salvage this season's average (190 is possible but definitely not 200+), but moving forward it feels like this ball was a great choice.

Bowling balls seem to last about 4 years for me, which was about right for the Infinite Physix.  Here's to the new bowling balls!  Let's see if they can overcome the challenging bowling alley that is PINZ Fiesta! 

New Furniture!

I recently went to American Furniture Warehouse to take a look at some new furniture. I have had the same dining table and couches since I moved into this house, which was back in 2005.   

First, I wanted a new dining table.  My old dining table was a small round glass table I bought from Ikea.

Old Glass Dining Table

While this table was fine for 1-2 people to eat a meal on, I wanted something bigger and better for playing board games on with 3-4 people.

While I was at the furniture store looking at tables, I figured it was also time to replace the sofa and loveseat that I had gotten from Macy's back in the day.  They had become pretty worn out from 20 years of sitting in them.  In fact, a lot of the cushioning had broken away and you could even feel the block pieces inside when you sat on them.  I also had a hand-me-down blue couch that my sister gave to me when I first moved into my house.  I never sat on the couch and to be honest, it was more for my pets than for me.

Old Sofas and Couch

I ended up getting a rectangle marble-top table and a new 3-piece sofa, loveseat, and chair set!  All the seats have power reclining too.  In total it was $2,700 including taxes and delivery. 

New Table and Seating

The dining set has some chairs that match it, but they were out of stock until February, so I'll have to go back once they're available.  That will run me an additional $240 for four chairs.  For now, the old chairs with the glass dining set are still shown in the above picture.

Crazy that the previous furniture lasted me 20 years before I changed it.  That's pretty good value if you ask me!  Happy Holidays!

 

Expanding my Bowling Game

In 2022, I bought a new bowling ball, the Infinite Physix by Storm.  It was definitely a more aggressive ball that I don't usually throw, but over the first few months of using it, I eventually figured out where to stand on the lanes in order to throw decent games, and by the end of the first season I found myself just missing out on a 200-average season.

Then came the 2023-24 season, which was a big change for me.  I decided to try a league at Fiesta Lanes with my friends, breaking the streak of bowling with the IBMers and at Bowlero for 16 years.  Part of the reason was my work and streaming schedule had me staying up at some pretty late hours, and bowling on the east side of town just wasn't convenient at that time in my life.  Regardless, even though my average wasn't 200+, it was a still a season where we ended up in 3rd place overall.

The 2024-25 season, I found myself back at Bowlero because Fiesta Lanes had major damage during the monsoon season that summer.  I joined a team halfway through the season and ended up with a 207 average, my highest ever albeit in less games than a full season.

Since I didn't bowl a full season, I decided to join a summer league with my friends once Fiesta Lanes reopened (now renamed to PINZ Fiesta).  However, I found it difficult to keep up with the dry lanes and had a below average season, nowhere near the level of my expectations.  In fact, I had always felt that Fiesta was just a more difficult house to throw at than Bowlero.

Here are my past years with the Infinite Physix so far:

As an experienced bowler, I feel like my ability to read the lanes is really good.  I know when I need to adjust my boards when the lanes are more oily or more dry.  However, I would often struggle when the lanes became too dry as the night wore on, or if the lanes were dry to begin with.  When the lanes are dry and I throw the Infinite Physix, my path to the pocket becomes a bit tight and it's easy to miss the pocket and leave splits.  I would talk to and see other bowlers with 210+ averages and I came to the conclusion that there was still a big hole in my game: I was only throwing one ball for all lane conditions.  Thus, I pursued throwing another ball for when conditions are too dry.

I began to do a lot of research on the bowling balls I've used in the past, starting with the Code Red and now the Infinite Physix.  The Code Red was a less reactive ball with less hook, and my starting board with that ball was on board 9 (board 9 being the 9th board from the left, or board 31 if you want to get technical for right-handed bowlers).  That starting board was a good 2 boards to the right of where my starting board is with the Infinite Physix, which is a more reactive ball with bigger hook.

Based on the specifications of each ball, I compiled a Google spreadsheet that shows the behavior of each ball and how they will roll for me.  Using the data, I decided the new ball I should buy would be the Storm Typhoon, which had similar stats as the Code Red.

And so begins my quest to become a better bowler!  I am now taking 3 balls with me to bowling league instead of 2.  One ball for oily conditions (Infinite Physix), one ball for dry conditions (Typhoon), and then one ball for the 6, 9, and 10 pins.  Here's hoping that this is the missing piece to expanding my game!