Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Also, photos from Laura and my trip to New York!


Laura and her brother.


Me looking weird.


A fountain in a park.


Times Square.


Again.


Post No Bills (I love these stencils).
My running has been going a lot better lately. Whatever stomach problems were ailing me over the previous few weeks seem to have largely left. Most of my runs go off without any problems and hopefully I am back on track. Currently I have run 825 miles this year (and 875 since I started training for the Boston Marathon in December).

I found out recently that Kenny Florian, one of my favorite UFC fighters, is opening a training center in Brookline. I've toyed with the idea of taking Jiu-Jitsu classes and this was a really cool opportunity to do that. I signed up for their mailing list and got an e-mail today letting me know that there would be early registration this Friday and that classes would be starting on September 2nd. While these dates suck for me, I'm still really interested and will keep checking their website to see what's going on.

Last night Laura and I went to look at a bike for her in Cambridge. She took a ride on this bike (a Redline 925) and really liked it. She's been having some issues finding a bike that would fit her, but this one seemed to work really well. We're going to do a little bit more research before she commits to anything but this guy seemed pretty awesome.

After the bike shop we went to Newbury Comics and I bought a few CDs. I got the new Gaslight Anthem album which I've been listening to online for a while, a CD by the Flobots (which was the first hip-hop record I've ever purchased) and Boston's self titled album. Since Keely is taking his records back in September I was going to be without his Boston LP, which was pretty unacceptable. They've all been really good albums thus far and I think they'll be a lot of fun on the road trip.

Monday, August 11, 2008

After a good evening drinking with Jason (his last night in Boston - sad!) Laura and I woke up early on Saturday morning to build bookshelves.


Lumber arrives by night.


Framed.


Assembling the shelves.


Done!


Action shot!

This was a ton of fun and a great way to spend most of a Saturday. I learned a lot about making things like this (measure everything, don't assume anything) and when I get the lumber for for the smaller shelf I'm pretty sure I won't have any of the problems we had with the first two.

The top shelf there are miscellaneous unpainted models, including some Vostroyans, Chaos Marines, and a fair amount of Khador minis from Warmachine. Below that is 1000 - 1500 points of Space Marines that will be my project after the Wood Elves get done. Under them, barely visible, is about 1700 points of Wood Elves.

My running took a pretty big down-turn this weekend. Lisa and I embarked on what was supposed to be a 17 mile run down and back up Heartbreak Hill, but we both ended up walking the final three miles to our respective houses. My legs felt terrible the whole 8.5 miles out and while they felt a little better on the trek up Heartbreak (weird) by the time we got to the top I was totally spent.

I don't really know what's been going on with my running. I'm going to try to start paying more attention to my diet and being more rigorous sticking to my schedule but I'm not really convinced that either of those things are the culprit.

Spoony and I are going out to Framingham tonight to get some fish for my tank. If all goes well I'll come home tonight with a small school of Neons and possibly some Corys.

Friday, August 08, 2008

I've been doing some research into Space Marine painting as I get closer to being done with my elves. After looking at a bunch of forums and blogs, I think I've identified the style of marine I'm looking for - bold and clean highlights on top of a clean basecoat. I have a few examples below, none of which were painted by me. You can get a better sense of the paint job if you click on the images to see larger versions.


painted by static grass


painted by rev


painted by lemfresh


painted by Cyric the Mad


painted by From the Warp



painted by kkoene


painted by spikyjames


painted by lone pilgrim

The last guy is the final step in a really great highlighting tutorial from From the Warp. The colors aren't the same, but the principles apply and I'm going to use this to paint up my third Crimson Fist test model. I've done a few tests already (here), and while they are in the spirit of my vision, they are also messy and unrefined. I think this tutorial will help me get them more in line with what I'm looking for. I've also found this article from Tau Online that gives a very detailed description of how to highlight marines.

Laura and I went climbing last night and it was a pretty big disaster for me. My technique is still around by all of my forearm and hand strength is out the window. Laura got to the top of an 11b, which is a pretty big deal considering she'd never gone up anything harder than a 10c before. She looked really good doing it to, probably a lot better than I did.

My running has been a huge roller coaster lately. Some days (like Wendesday) I can't finish a run because I have horrible stomach problems. Other days (like yesterday) I can crush a four mile run with 6:30 miles. I'm planning to skip another 4 miler I had planned for today and to start being more conscious of what I eat and when on days with runs scheduled. I hope this will get me back on track to healthy, stomach problem free runs. I am also planning on shifting my training away from the schedule I've been on since December (rest, short, medium, short, rest, medium, long) to a new plan that Culla reccomends. The new plan calls for three key workouts a week (tempo, long, and track) plus two other days of easier miles. This is really new stuff for me, and really intimidating, but he thinks it will help push me to the 3:10 time I need to qualify for Boston.

I am pretty sure that my fish tank is fully cycled, so hopefully I can get it stocked with some Neon Tetras soon. I found out recently that I had bought a 10 gallon tank (and not a 5 gallon like I had assumed), which means that I can put a few other fish in there. Currently I'm thinking about a school of Pygmy Corydoras, but I'm not sure how available they around here. Hopefuly when I get to the store I can take a look at what they have and make some decisions based on that.

Wow, lots of links!