Why I Bleed

Last week I went and gave blood. This would not normally be blogworthy, but this marked a milestone in that it was my 25th donation so I felt some sort of reflection on the topic was in order.

There are two main reasons I give blood. The first is that it's one of the few pure, selfless things I do. Apart from some sausage rolls afterwards and the getting a badge every so often I don't gain anything out of it. A random stranger gets something that will help them live and all it costs me is some time. The ethical calculus is pretty clear this is a good thing to do. And in a life that isn't big in getting involved in things and doing stuff to contribute, a pure selfless act is a good thing to throw in every now and then.

The other, bigger reason why I give blood is that it is something that I grew up with. Many were the times as a kid when my sister and I would sit on the sides of the bed/chair bit while my mother was giving blood. Mum is O-, and while she was able to was a pretty regular donor. Giving blood was even a rite of passage. On my sixteenth birthday after school Mum came into town (I was at boarding school at the time) and we went and I gave my first donation.

Since then I've not been as consistent as I'd like, and living overseas for a bit didn't help either. That should no longer be a problem as the Red Cross are much more organized about this now, and will automatically book your next appointment for you and send you reminders a few weeks out, making it much easier to not forget about it. In fact, why not make an appointment now?

By The Numbers 30/52

Not quite back into the regular swing of things.

Wealth
Net Cash: $216.85
eBay sales cancelled out post-PAX splurge in Melbourne, and frugal living the rest of the week made for a nice result
Jobs applied for: 1
I did do this this evening just so I wouldn't have two zeros in a row, so could be better.

Health
Net Calories: ?
Monday was a bit hard to keep track of as I was out socialising most of the day between a coffee shop walkabout with some other enforcers and the after party in the evening. For Tuesday to Sunday I'm 94 Calories over my target
Weight: 94 kg
I guess Monday wasn't that bad, or there was more walking than I thought.
Fitocracy points: 0
Bad me
Blood donations: 1
Blood donation badges received: 1
I add a 25 donation badge to my 10 donation badge. I hope to get to 50 before 2020 (It's a long term goal)

Life
Bike Riding: 155 km
Back to work on the weekend after having most of the week off after PAX
Books read: 1, The God Argument by AC Grayling. Somewhat preaching to the choir for me, but good to be exposed to the arguments I try to put forward for my philosophy of life presented in a much better way than I can usually manage. He did seem to put a bit more emphasis on the right to euthanasia than I was expecting.
Games played: 2: bowling and an online game of Roll Through the Ages. Missed all my semi-regular gaming nights this week

What I kept

I used to play Warhammer 40,000. I quite enjoyed it and spent a fair bit of cash and time on the hobby. However, then I went overseas for a few years, and when I came back to Australia where my collection was there were new rule books and the relative power of certain units shifted, and I thought I'll get back into it in a bit when I have more cash, and for several years left it at that. Since then there's been even more new rule books at an even steeper price, and I recently made the call that I'm never going to play regularly again, and that the best use I could make of my collection would be to liquidate it. And now, thanks to the power of eBay, I'm now several hundred dollars richer (ignoring the 3-5 times that much I paid for the models and paint in the first place).

I didn't sell everything. There were a few pieces I wanted to keep as display pieces as I was particularly happy with how they turned out. So within the limits of iPhone photography here are the ones I kept.

By The Numbers 29/52

A bit late, and a few numbers that aren't as well defined as I'd normally have, but there's a reason for that: PAXAus. It was a bloody amazing weekend and even though it was a hard slog I'll be there again next year trying to cram even more fun in (I'm not sure if that's humanly possible, but let's see). Here we go

Wealth
Net Cash:-$236.41
Edit: I forgot to include my rent for this week. That makes this a bit more bleak purely on a numbers basis. However, since the purpose of getting money is to let you pay for the things you enjoy in life, this money has been used to great effect.
Jobs applied for: 0
Standard excuse for this week, PAX

Health
Net Calories: ?
Bad eating at PAX I hope was mostly cancelled out by various amounts of heavy lifting, walking all over the place, walking to and from trams, yelling with excitement, clapping, cheering, etc, etc, which brings us to a figure a bit easier to get
Weight: 94 kg (as of Tuesday night)
So a gain of 1kg. Could have been a lot worse. Bordercon was worse, but I was a lot more active at PAX.
Fitocracy points: 0
I could have put in all the walking but I've no idea of an exact figure and fitocracy doesn't really work on about 12 hours of walking

Life
Bike riding: 0 km
Books read: 1, Book 2 of the Dark Force Rising trilogy, I'm now working through The God Argument by A.C. Grayling
Games played: 13:  Zombie Fluxx x2, Lords of Waterdeep, The Resistance x3, Hanabi x2, Magic: The Gathering x5

By the Numbers 28/52

No fancy intro this week

Wealth
Net Cash: $249.78
Jobs applied for: 5
better

Health
Net Calories: 117 Calories
I pigged out on a block of chocolate today which was over a days worth of calories in one go.
Fitocracy points: 965
Weight: 93kg

Life
Bike riding: 107km
Books read: 1
Games Played: 16. Lost Legacy x2, Expedition, Ticket to Ride - Team Asia, The Walking Dead x3, Glory to Rome, Kingdom Builder, Pass-ack Words, Hanabi x3, Attika, Innovation x2

By the Numbers 27/52

Into the 2nd half of the year

Wealth
Net Cash: -$126.46

Ouch.
Jobs applied for: 2
Bad me.

Health
Net Calories: -1103
A while ago the app I use to track my calories suggested I need to revise my target intake to suit my current weight, but I didn't do it at the time as I didn't want to change the baseline I was reporting to, but since we are now half way through this seems like an ok point for a disconnect in the data. The new baseline intake is 1850 Calories a day, down from 1970 Calories a day (this is about one muesli bar or half a chocolate bar less a day).
Fitocracy points: 2542
This includes a few hundred bonus points for completing a quest (a recommended set of exercises), and I've leveled up to level 15.
Weight: 95 kg

Life
Bike Riding: 134 km
Books read: 0
Games Played 9: completed games of Through the Ages and The Hanging Gardens online during the week, 6 plays of Dominion (Dark Ages with a mix of other sets) and Battlestar Galactica with both Pegasus and Exodus expansions. Not bad for having missed the regular Wednesday and Friday gaming nights.

By the Pictures 1/?

Halfway through the year, lets convert all these numbers into some pictures

Wealth

One of the more varied graphs. Overall more positive than negative, but a bit more discipline is needed (at least until I get a better paying job).

 A graph of Jobs Applied For is just a few delta spikes and mainly a testament to my slackness.

Health
Net Calories

In only 6 of 26 weeks did I go over my weekly target. It would appear I'm getting used to being hungry, although the realization that exercising let's me eat more food has helped as well.

Weight

Steady progress for most of the year, but that seems to have plateaued over the last month or so.

Fitocracy points

A slow start that's picked up as the year progresses. Getting the dumbbells a while ago has added some variety and made it easier to get more points (I can do a treadmill session and a dumbbell session in a day and not feel too put out, but to get the same number of points with just the treadmill would be tough).

Life
Bike Riding

Yeah, pretty consistent most of the time.

By the Numbers 26/52

Half way through the year. Probably time to try some of those graphs I talked about way back in week 1. Look for something tomorrow

Wealth
Net Cash: -$288.12
I splashed out and bought some stuff for my place, the main one of which was a robot vacuum cleaner.
Jobs applied for: 4

Health
Net Calories: -4058
A good result, combination of exercise and lack of eating, although I suspect I got too much credit for rock climbing today
Fitocracy points: 2030
Weight: 95 kg

Life
Bike riding: 204 km
Books read: 1
Neil Gaiman's new book Ocean at the End of the Lane. A bit disappointed, mainly in that their was not more of it, and also that it seemed more "I'm Neil Gaiman, I write stories of people who get caught up in a world that's bigger and weirder than they knew and it changes their life" than "I have an interesting idea for a story." I would also agree with the person on twitter who said it was really a young adult novel, not a novel as American Gods or Neverwhere were. Today I picked up 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson (of Red, Green, and Blue Mars fame) mainly on the basis of one of the blurbs on the back being from Iain M Banks.
Games Played: 8 x Dominion (Guilds + Intrigue x 2, Guilds + Prosperity, Dark Ages x 3, Dark Ages + Hinterland, Dark Ages + Alchemy)

By the Numbers 25/26

Another week. We're at 5 squared, and according to wikipedia there's not much more interesting about 25.

Wealth
Net Cash: $255.77
Yay for living cheap.
Jobs applied for: 3
Still not hitting the 1 a day I'm aiming for

Health
Net Calories: -4952 Calories
Living cheap is also living on low calories (Calories = $?)
Fitocracy points: 1989
Fitocracy level: 14
Weight: 95 kg

Life:
Bike Riding: 178 km
Books Read: 3
Finished rereading the Amtrak Wars. Now starting on the new Neil Gaiman book
Games played: 10: Dominion Guilds x3, Notre Dame, Troyes, Through the Ages, DnD, Settlers of Catan, Monty Python Fluxx x2

Thoughts on Winning Friends and Influencing People

I finally finished reading "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carneggie a while ago. I can't say I was really enthused by the book, as evidenced by the fact that it took me over a month to read it. My main interest in reading it was due to it having percolated into popular culture as The Book for learning how to deal with people successfully. Whether this is just due to it's age or the name recognition of the author vs it's actual merit is something I am not sure of, although I'm less inclined to give it the benefit of the doubt now that I've read it.

So why do I feel like I've not learnt much from this book that so many people swear by? Part of it is presentation. Each point is only illustrated with a series of anecdotes, and as we all should know, the plural of anecdote is not data. This is a collection of feel good stories, and if presented as such I wouldn't be so unsatisfied, but the claims it made starting out were of scholarship and research and on that basis the book oversold itself (I'll admit my background might make me view research in a more mathematical orientated way, but even loosening those standards I still feel it didn't meet the standards it claimed). Overall, it's made a claim that this is a good way to deal with people, but hasn't backed up the claim.

Another reason I didn't like the message conveyed in the book from a number of stories such as the salesman who found out a potential buyer's son liked stamps, so went out and bought a rare stamp as a gift and so got the sale, which to me feels like a bad message. The person didn't get the sale because he was selling a good product at a good price that met the needs of the buyer, but because they did something nice that was irrelevant to the transaction. I don't think it's cynical to say that if you're making a large purchase on behalf of your company, giving the sale to the guy who was nice to you just because he was nice to you is a dereliction of duty. Some of the tactics suggested in the book do seem cynical, or at least some of the applications described are. A salesman finding out the needs of the business he's trying to sell to and altering his pitch to suit is sensible and a good thing. A salesman finding out the manager is a baseball fan and spending the meeting talking baseball with the potential client is being manipulative rather than standing on his merits.

The last problem I have with the book is a message that I partly find contradictory and partly makes me feel as though I fail at being a human being. Several times the book stresses that when showing an interest in people it must be sincere, and not just flattery, but then gives examples where the interest is insincere. The part where this makes me feel like an incomplete person is that in general I don't find people interesting. Specific individuals yes, but it generally takes me quite a while to get there, and it usually requires some sort of context where I have the time to get to know them (university, work, board gaming, etc). So being told that the essential key to good interactions with people is something I don't have (and that faking it is bad) is discouraging at the least (at the most it makes me feel like a failure as a person that something fundamental to the human experience is missing in me).

So what can I gain from all this? Be nice to people? I already try to do that. Start with a positive and then move to the negative? The "You're doing this thing great but need to work on this other thing" routine just makes the first part sound phoney. Do something that doesn't come naturally to me but don't fake it. The final section on tips for married life quote clearly dates the book quite markedly. I get the point the book is trying to make but the implementation it suggests seems flawed and impractical.

By The Numbers 24/52

A less than stellar week

Wealth
Net cash: -$241.59
This is a two week figure as I didn't keep track of things as well as I should have last week. Based on a rough idea of where I should have been last this works out to about +$100 or so for the week.
Jobs Applied for: 1
Yeah, I got slack after getting back from Bordercon.

Health
Net Calories: 1640 Calories
More slackness I'm blaming on Bordercon. I got back after a delayed flight to no food and ordered pizza, which then meant I had enough pizza for three days. Bad Kevin.
Fitocracy points: 734
Weight: 95 kg

Life
Bike Riding: 227 km
Books read: 1
Book 3 in the Amtrak Wars
Games: 11: Glory to Rome x 3, Ad Astra, Hanabi, Ricochet Robots, Race for the Galaxy, Mamma Mia, Sole Mio, Dominion x2

By The Numbers 23/52

Later than I expected due to Bordercon and after a delayed flight back to Brisbane I felt watching the season finale of Game of Thrones was a higher priority than doing this.

Wealth
Net Cash flow: ?
a significant negative number, but I don't have a precise figure (on the order of -$300). I wasn't careful enough keeping track over the weekend and while I now have everything up to date, back tracking to get a figure for where things were on Sunday evening would be a lot of hassle. I will post a two week figure next week that will once again be exact.
Jobs Applied for: 3
A new record, tripling previous best results. I am again planning to improve on this.

Health
Net Calories: 298 Calories
This figure is probably low as I ate out a lot and so couldn't just scan barcodes of what I ate to get the actual numbers.
Weight: 95 kg
This has crept back up again. Need to hit the treadmill some more, as dumbbell exercises score points by don't burn much calories
Fitocracy points: 1430
Not bad considering I was away for half the week
Fitcracy level: 13

Life
Bike riding: 9 km
Books read: 2
I'm going through the Amtrak Wars series in one go, as while I've read the complete series, there were significant gaps in time between books due to availability at different libraries, so this time I'm going to go straight through.
Darts: skipped this week
Games Played:  25 (woo Bordercon) Zombie Flux, For Sale (x2), Shadow Hunters, Cartagena, Fantastiqa (x2), Glory to Rome, Hanabi (x3), Innovation with both expansions, King of Tokyo, Merchant of Venus, Vanuatu, A Study in Emerald, Clubs, Klunker, Mamma Mia, Potion Making Practice with both expansions, Win Lose Banana (x3), Love Letter, Tichu,

By The Numbers 22/52

Next week may be a day or two late, as I will be going away to Bordercon next weekend.

Wealth
Net Cash: $129.22
Not great, but after the last two weeks it's good to be positive again
Jobs applied for: 0
Look for this to be higher next week

Health
Net Calories: 321
I slacked off with the diet and exercise this week, but it could have been worse.
Fitocracy points: 1386

Life
Bike Riding: 353km
Books read: 0
Darts: 501 in 9 rounds
I got lucky
Games played: 6 Roll Through the Ages, The Hanging Gardens, Maori, Masons, St Petersberg, Factory Manager (all but the last were played online)
This will be higher next week (see earlier note about Bordercon)

By the Numbers 21/52

Once more onto the breach

Wealth
Net cash: -$147.47
Given that I bought $200 bucks worth of bike gear (boots, new gloves, and a balaclava) and paid for some more expenses for bordercon/PAX, I was kind of surprised it wasn't more negative.
Jobs applied for: 0

Health
Net Calories: -2023 Calories
A bad week. A full pizza for dinner last night didn't help. But exercise kept me in the negatives.
Fitocracy points: 1749
Fitocracy level: 12

Life
Bike riding: 381km
Books read: 0
Darts: 501 in 24 rounds
Games played: Hacienda, Resident Evil: Mercenaries, Ticket to Ride (team variant), a session of DnD, and I finished an online game of Stone Age (it took about 3 weeks to play)

By the Numbers 20/52

Wealth
Net Cash: -$145.10
I bought my plane tickets for Bordercon and PAX this week, so I don't feel too bad about this. It also helped that the monthly bonus was paid this week. I'll also have to pay for some accomodation and some other related expenses so I shall endeavour to be a bit more frugal in day to day life in the coming weeks to make up for that.
Jobs applied for: 0
I continue to suck

Health
Net Calories: -1926 Calories
A few instances where will power gave out was mostly but not completely countered with exercise
Fitocracy points: 2769
While taking the benefits for it, I still believe strength exercises get more points than cardio for the amount of effort put in.
Fitocracy Level: 11
Yeah, I leveled up again.

Life
Bike riding: 397km
Books read: 0
Darts: 501 in 20 rounds
Games played: 0

By The Numbers 19/52

Wealth
Net Cash: $63.41
Jobs Applied for: 0

Health
Net Calories: -2448 Calories
Weight: 94kg
Fitocracy Points: 1632

Life
Bike riding: 366km
Books read: 1
The Geek Manifesto, a call for greater prominence of science and the scientific method in the public sphere.
Darts: 501 in 25 rounds
Games Played: 2 Age of Industry (the Japan map) and Steam Barons

By the Numbers 18/52

No comments about the progress of time this week.

Wealth
Net Cash gain: $388.37
In this I'm counting $150 worth of Coles gift vouchers I received via work this week, as they're almost equivalent to cash. Not sure if I'll just use them for groceries and bank the cash I'd otherwise have spent, or use them for a slightly bigger purchase such as a new chair or a filing cabinet.
Jobs applied for: 0
Man I suck at this

Health
Net Calories: -1793 Calories
Back in the negatives, but could be better
Weight: 96kg
Fitocracy points: 614
In addition to the gift vouchers, I also got a set of dumbbells to get a bit more variety in the exercise I do. I've noticed that for the amount of effort I put in, I get a lot more points for doing strength exercises vs cardio exercises.

Life
Bike riding: 156km
A lot of public transport this week as my shifts were during peak hour ($5 petrol + $9 parking = $14 bus fare + less stress)
Books read: 2
So I finally got round to finishing How to Win Friends and Influence People. Unsure on my feelings about it, and will probably write something about it to get my thinking straight. I then went and tore through Inversions by Iain M Banks, and can only lament the fact that there will be no more Culture novels (damn you cancer)
Darts: 501 in 18 rounds
Games Played: 2 Roll Through the Ages and Twilight Struggle

By the Numbers 17/52

And April's almost done

Wealth
Net Cash: -$97.25
I reverted to form on eating takeaway in the later part of the week due to some bad planning on the groceries front (if you're going to run out of food on the day before ANZAC day, don't think you can get your groceries home delivered on ANZAC day), plus I went out and saw a movie on Saturday
Jobs Applied for: 0

Health
Net Calories: 1166 Calories
A positive no. A consequence of eating too much takeaway during the week (it doesn't help that they make it cheaper to get a meal than just one item by itself, but I should have known better).
Weight: 96 kg
Fitocracy points: 590
At least I walked to and from the cinemas on Saturday.

Life
Bike riding: 289km
Books read: 0
I've all most finished How to Win Friends and Influence People
Games played: Glory to Rome and Tichu

By the Numbers 16/52

Another week down.

Wealth
Net Cash: $197.45
Jobs Applied for: 0
Successful Interviews: 0
So after a few delays at work, they final told me that they'd decided to appoint no one to the position I applied for, and also that I might be better suited in a slightly different role, which I suppose is at least more constructive feedback than any of the other job application this year.

Health
Net Calories: -2431 Calories
I noticed a trend this week. If I don't get enough sleep I eat more. I should try to get by on more than 5 hours sleep.
Weight: 95kg
Fitocracy Points: 1361
Fitocracy level: 9
The arbitrary no increases again, hooray!

Life
Bike riding: 360km
Books read: 0
Games Played: 4, two plays of Dominion base and intrigue, and two new games, Discworld and Twilight Struggle (note to self: If you're going to replay the entire cold war, expect it to take a while)

By The Numbers 15/52

Here we go again

Wealth
Net Cash: $163.03
Not bad, but about half of the surplus comes from gifts, so it's not too sustainable, but I spent more than usual as well, so it probably balances out. If I'd given in too temptation, this would have been a very big negative number, but I've decided my current computer will have to do for now.
Jobs Applied for: 1
Interviews Attended: 1
A new field! Now, I don't think I gave them the answers they were wanting to hear so I'm not too optomistic, but I should find out how I went today (it was for a different position at my current work).

Health
Net Calories: -2583
Yeah, eating a packet of mint slices on Sunday probably wasn't the best lunch
Weight: 96kg
It's going down again. Yay!
Fitocracy points: 243
I'd forgotten about some exercise I did early in the week and was thinking this was going to be a terrible week for exercise, but instead it's just ok.
Fitocracy level: 8

Life
Years lived: 32
I'm older! Yay! If I use hexadecimal I'm only 20
Bike riding: 214km
I caught the bus in to work a few times this week to avoid traffic and weather.
Books read: 0
Still plodding through How to Win Friends and Influence People. After that I have two very interesting books to read, The Physics of Wall Street and Scepticism and the Possibility of Knowledge.
Darts: nope
Games Played: 6
Glory to Rome x3, Eminent Domain x2, and Dominion

Things done
Worked on the jigsaw puzzle, read a bit, went to Critical Mass, got a haircut, did some cleaning around the house, exercised on Monday, walked to and from the bus stop on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday (although I forgot my go card on Friday, so the return trip was in the morning and then followed by riding the bike into work).

Again I haven't really lived up to what I'm trying with this section.