Month: March 2008

Back to the gym. Again.

Finally, my Christmas / New Year break is over.  The gym was closing for a couple of weeks, but, as always, I had some troubles getting back to my P.T.  The resulting two and a half month break devastated all my previous achievements…

Before I left the gym for Christmas, I weighted about 109 kilos and could run 3 kilometers for the first run, and another 1 kilometer after a short break.  Today, when I got back to the gym, I weighted an ugly 116.5 kilograms.  My running was even worse.  After half a kilometer down the way, I noticed a really old woman in black coat with a hood over her head running nearby me.  When I approached 1 kilometer, this woman picked up a really scary scythe, which was standing against the wall nearby.  At that precise moment, I decided to stop.

I went downstairs for some belly pain.  Here I managed to catch up with my previous results of 4 attempts of 30 exercises (whatever they are called), and then another 3 attempts of 10 other exercises.  I had to take longer breaks though, and it was more painful than I remember it used to be.

Going back upstairs for the second run, I felt really tired.  And noticed that the woman in black was still there, and still with the scythe in her hands.  She looked like she was waiting for someone, so I decided to skip it this time.

Overall summary: 116.5 kilograms of fat, bones, and flash.  1 kilometer jog is almost fatal.  That will need a lot of work to get back to the previous state.  And considering that the previous stage was far from perfect, it feels like there is really a lot of work ahead of me… Ouch.

No Country For Old Man

I went to see “No Country For Old Man“.  I’ve heard some buzz about this film – with it getting major ratings and collecting a few Oscars – but I never read too deep into it or even watched a trailer.

The movie turned out to be pretty good indeed.  An interesting story, nice story telling, good photography, pretty good acting on all parts, and so on.  But what really captured my attention was the quietness.  This is probably the most quiet movie I’ve seen in years.   Even though it has a few gun shots here and there, I was struck by an almost total absence of soundtrack, as well as how quiet actors are speaking. It almost sounded like real life, where people don’t argue, shout, or kill each other every 15 seconds…

This quietness wasn’t only in the sound.  It was also in visuals and acting.   Many modern films, especially those that involve guns, choose to go for stunning special effects with bits and pieces flying around, smoke covering up things, etc.   None of that happened in this film.  There were some special effects, but they were very moderate and appropriate, without destructing attention.  Same goes for acting.  Although there are some high profile actors, such as Tommy Lee Jones and Woody Harrelson, they aren’t shining.  They do their job and do it well, again, without stealing any attention from the film itself.

I rated the film as 8 out of 10.