Some people seem to really like dancing. I have not counted myself among this group, but since I've often had people invite me out to do it, I have wondered if I have somehow been flawed in this preference. The last few times I've randomly found myself in dancing situations, it's seemed very awkward and unpleasant. While the obvious explanations were that I didn't like the music, the people, or (at the time) the smoke, I also noticed that I seemed to be unable to let myself get fully into it. This suggested that I had a bit of anxiety about it, which meant that I may have liked it if I could get past a potential minor block. I decided that I would give it a serious try sometime soon.

We did it tonight. We picked a club that had acceptable music playing, and that was neither too skeezy or fancy. We had one drink and scoped out the place a bit, and by then I was ready to give it a shot. I did fine. I managed to dance pretty well for about 20 minutes straight and to let myself get into it without feeling self-conscious or ridiculous. However, I still didn't enjoy it. People weren't really interacting much (at least, not with me), and the dancing sensation alone was kind of enjoyable but really not worth the effort. Further, overhearing some of the patrons' conversation in the poutine place afterwards suggested that I wouldn't have really wanted to interact with them anyway (they sounded rather boring and superficial). So I learned that I was actually correct in my verdict all along (I just don't enjoy it), but also learned that it's something I can get into provided the music is decent and there's some social incentive. The main problem is that I would much rather spend my time getting to know people in some depth, or at least seriously working out (while sober).

I finally ordered my new bike! This bike will be so awesome. I am so excited.

Technically, all the specifications are quite good (lightweight steel frame with carbon fork, Campagnolo components, Veloce gearing, handbuilt wheels, blah blah blah), and the frame has been reviewed as one that is excellent for riding for very long distances. This bike will give me a fair shot at pulling off this crazy French ride (1200km, Paris to Brest and back, to be completed in 90 hours). It should be decently fast and comfortable, moreso than any bike I've had before.

However, the best part is the following: I seem to be excessively long in the legs, so I needed a custom frame built. This means that I got to pick the colour of the frame, so I chose a bright sparkly green. I have also been pining over this jersey for quite a while, and I finally ordered it. I think the bike will have to be named "Lucky". I don't even have the bike, and I have already managed to turn myself into a caricature. As long as it's mildly amusing for the other riders, I'm fine with that.

I love bodyweight exercises (such as push-ups, chin-ups, dips, and handstand push-ups if I am kidding myself about my abilities). I think they are the best way of developing strength for most people, because they are quite safe, low-fuss (the equipment is readily availabe), and can be done whenever you feel like doing them, so they are likely to be done often.

I ended up with the New Year's Resolution of having to do a one-armed chin-up before the end of the year, so I have to get much better at chin-ups than I currently am. The obvious thing to do is to add more weight as I do them, but I haven't finished my weight belt yet. I am willing to try other approaches as well, though. Yesterday, for fun, I tried to see how many I could crank out in a day if I never exhausted myself at any point. This involved doing sets of only 2 chin-ups, and taking as long to rest as I wanted. I ended up doing 100, and I probably could have done more. I was doing the same thing with push-ups, in sets of 5, and ended up with 200. I'm actually not very sore today, which is surprising. I have yet to see how this will contribute to the number that I can do continuously. Currently, that is about 6 chin-ups and 16 push-ups. I will test this again tomorrow to find out.

I have too much leftover heavy cream. Both of us are trying to work off a bit of the holiday cheese, so I don't really want to use it. I sort of want to make a batch of cream puffs and hand them off to someone, but almost everyone I know who I would want to give them to is in a similar situation. While they would probably enjoy eating them, they would not appreciate how I have contributed to their fatness.