{"id":11783,"date":"2016-12-01T20:49:10","date_gmt":"2016-12-01T20:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/?p=11783"},"modified":"2016-12-01T20:57:51","modified_gmt":"2016-12-01T20:57:51","slug":"busy-doing-well-everything-really","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/?p=11783","title":{"rendered":"Busy doing… well, everything really"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is a truth universally acknowledged that…<\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

I \u00a0have been stupidly busy.<\/p>\n

My aspiration to do less remains just that.<\/p>\n

An aspiration.<\/p>\n

I have many demands on my time, yet the amount of time I have available to service these demands seems to be on a diminishing curve.<\/p>\n

Work continues to be busy, which is great.<\/p>\n

But being busy at work isn’t helping with the ‘do less’ thing.<\/p>\n

Not having horses in my life should be – and is – helping, but I actually found myself looking at a rather tasty 5yo mare last week.<\/p>\n

That would be totes bonkers.<\/p>\n

*steps away from the horse-buying thought*<\/p>\n

Motorbike time has been limited, due to the awful weather.<\/p>\n

But I did trundle out and about for three hours on Saturday, in the freezing cold, and as a result I was given this:<\/p>\n

\"Enhanced
Enhanced Rider Certificate<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I think this means that I am now officially licensed to scare professionals, or something.<\/p>\n

Actually it means that I am now a Blood Biker.<\/p>\n

I have already passed the Controllers training; now I’m able to go out on the bikes too.<\/p>\n

Umm.<\/p>\n

I have a new guitar.<\/p>\n

Well, actually I have almost two new guitars.<\/p>\n

After encouragement from top muso and ace bloke Ash, I sent my SG away to be professionally set-up.<\/p>\n

It came back, a week later, feeling like a new man<\/del> guitar.<\/p>\n

Seriously, it’s a different guitar, in terms of playability.<\/p>\n

But Ash started me looking for another guitar, something with a different neck design, to the SG.<\/p>\n

I’ve been looking at Fender Strats, having played one of his.<\/p>\n

But after an unplanned visit to\u00a0a guitar emporium in Leicester, I accidentally bought this:<\/p>\n

\"G&L
G&L Legacy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Legacy is a different animal to the SG, and it feels very Fender Strat-y.<\/p>\n

But in terms of playability, it’s a significant step up from the SG (even from the newly-feeling, professionally set-up SG).<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, the new-and-a-half guitars haven’t lifted my playing ability from the crap zone, but I have got a lot of practice in this week.<\/p>\n

I have got a lot of practice in this week because Sam has been in Dubai, UAE; Dhaka, Bangladesh; Yangdon, Myanmar; Bangkok, Thailand; and Saigon, Vietnam.<\/p>\n

She’s on her way back from Saigon to Yangdon, then to Dubai, then EMA, then home.<\/p>\n

So while she’s been away I have played guitar.<\/p>\n

I have also babysat the two rescue kitties and the two rescue kittens.<\/p>\n

I have done a bit (not much) of laundry.<\/p>\n

And cooked and eaten like a singleton.<\/p>\n

And worked.<\/p>\n

When not working I have fallen asleep during TV watching.<\/p>\n

Actually there’s a topic.<\/p>\n

I don’t seem to watch ‘live’ TV any longer.<\/p>\n

I have watched the first two episodes of The Grand Tour (or, to give the show its real name: How To Look And Act Like Top Gear Without Actually Calling Yourself Top Gear).<\/p>\n

My three word review: Trying too hard.<\/p>\n

I fell asleep during both episodes.<\/p>\n

I have also successfully fallen asleep during three episodes of The Man In The High Castle.<\/p>\n

And an episode of Lucifer.<\/p>\n

I quite liked Preacher, and didn’t fall asleep through any of that.<\/p>\n

There are other TV programmes that I have fallen asleep through, but their titles have been as memorable as the watching experience(s).<\/p>\n

I recently got a Fitbit (there will be a more detailed post about this, soonish).<\/p>\n

It is interesting, wearing a piece of medical tech.<\/p>\n

I have become slightly addicted to checking my heart rate, but this shows me that I have an odd pattern of fluctuation.<\/p>\n

I checked my heart rate before taking the ZX10R out for the three-hour test on Saturday.<\/p>\n

90bpm.<\/p>\n

I checked my heart rate after the journey up to the Blythe meeting point.<\/p>\n

78bpm.<\/p>\n

So, when slobbing about at home, my heart rate is higher than yours (probably), but is in the average zone for me.<\/p>\n

But, contrastingly, a fairly swift\u00a0trip in, frankly, some pretty hairy weather, and on one of the world’s most rapid Superbikes, actually lowered my heart rate to what is (probably) average for you, and is below average for me.<\/p>\n

All of this is a bit bonkers.<\/p>\n

Indeed, sitting here typing this (and watching the Blessed Sandra Bullock in ‘Gravity’ at the same time), my heart rate is currently 99bpm.<\/p>\n

Which is also a bit bonkers, obv.<\/p>\n

Anyway.<\/p>\n

I shall try to be less busy, and make more of an effort to hang around here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is a truth universally acknowledged that…   I \u00a0have been stupidly busy. My aspiration to do less remains just that. An aspiration. I have<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stuff","two-columns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11783\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}