I’ve been avoiding things I devalue lately. After writing about the day after Thanksgiving, also known as Buy Nothing Day, I decided to strive to buy nothing but food that month and succeeded, if you don’t disallow that I bought two things that I later returned. I’ll write more about it when I eventually do buy something, as I’m still going. Next, I decided to avoid social media and news[…] Keep reading →

I just finished my second set today of twice-daily burpee-based calisthenics. Normally, I do my second set in the evening, but since I started the habit on December 22, 2011 and today is December 21, 2021, today completes my first decade. I already finished my first decade of publishing blog posts, nearing 5,000. Here are all of them. 20 percent of the time has been on a single load of[…] Keep reading →

Someone suggested I learn about a writer named Pico Iyer. In an interview I listened to he talked about the musician Leonard Cohen, who apparently spent time living as a monk. Cohen’s practice, according to Iyer, included scrubbing the floor. The practice doesn’t sound glamorous. You can hire someone to do it. Why bother if you can afford not to? The movie Amazing Grace, about William Wilberforce, showed John Newton[…] Keep reading →

There’s litter everywhere. I pass maybe thousands of pieces daily. You may live in a place with a lower population density, but probably as much litter per person. I pick up a dozen or so pieces each day, leaving most of it. That means I pass most without picking it up. I’m not doing it for my health or to solve the problem. I do it because it feels right.[…] Keep reading →

I finished six marathons and my exercise habit began by joining the cross country team in high school in 1986. Ultimate had a lot of running in it. Practice led me to love running. I didn’t at first, when I struggled. I’ve had my share of running injuries. Last year I started running barefoot, inspired by podcast guest Nir Eyal. Over the winter I tend to row inside on the[…] Keep reading →

Meeting myself as I did yesterday and today happens once every couple of years. It turns out the wild blueberries I thought I was picking were black nightshade. Black nightshade apparently comes in edible and toxic varieties and I seem to have eaten the toxic kind. First things first. If you see these adorable looking berries, I recommend thinking twice. It was hard for me to type the word adorable[…] Keep reading →

My spreadsheet said I hit 175,000 burpees yesterday. I don’t record each one. I programmed in how many I do each day. I update the date and it tells me how many I’ve done. So I’ve done more, since occasionally I do extra without telling the spreadsheet. A decade ago, I’d record what felt like big milestones like my first six months of doing them daily or the first ten[…] Keep reading →