December 2020: 5 random things from the year
How is it December already!? So, eh, one or two things happened this year in case anyone was living under a rock. Some thing called ‘Covid-19’, that lane-duck president got voted out of office in the USA, work from home became the new normal (finally) for a subset of people that have been capable of doing it for at least a decade, and - possibly? - it started to look like the word may be thinking of getting its act together around climate change (I’m not overly optimistic on this unfortunately…).
Personally, a few things also happened….
1) Back to the office - for a while
After returning to Dublin at the beginning of January, I noticed quite quickly from my trawls of the Internet that the world was about to be blown up. Reports of “WHO says new China coronavirus could spread, warns hospitals worldwide” started to pop up in my Twitter feed sometime in mid-January while I was settling back in, and trawling the Interwebs for opportunities. There’s nothing like reading about an imminent global pandemic to focus the mind on getting a job quickly!
As it happened, it was all to work out well as a great opportunity for a role that combined a bunch of my skillsets (technical understanding, coaching/mentor role which was ideal for a managerial position, and a telco/technology background) came in front of me through the network (never underestimate the power of the colleague/friends network….) starting with the amazing team at eCom Solutions. Starting in mid/late-February, I was in the position to spend 6-7 weeks face to face with the team before we were all sent home in our new work-from-home world that we’re all living in.
Lessons learned?
never underestimate keeping an eye on future news and the power of Twitter. If I hadn’t seen the Covid-19 pandemic on route, I may not have rushed as much for a role and ended up looking at the time that companies were starting to lockdown.
Working from home doesn’t work for all, but it sure does for me. Gets rid of all the expense of working in town, I’m lucky to have a great home working setup, and focusing is much easier without office noise. I like it 👍
2. Continued as part of sea swimmers, joined by the rest of Dublin
Also mentioned in the previous post, regular swims confined throughout 2020, an ideal activity during COVID-19 times. And as anyone else who’s been doing this regularly, you’ll have noticed that it’s the year of sea-swimming, with mobs at the main Dublin venues continuing, much to even my surprise, into December!
You’ll spot a reference to item number 5 in one of the photos below…
3. continued work with a coach until…
as mentioned in the previous post, I’d start working with Rob of MyTherapyPhysio from January and had been steadily working through the program, including a couple of adjustments based off of input and discussions. All went well and is a great demo of the power of a consistent routine. Here’s some basic numbers showing what I was at in late January and what I was at by June:
Weighted pull-ups (5 reps):
+10kg (Jan), +25kg (July)
Dips:
+2kg (Jan), +11kg (July)
1-leg pistols:
+3kg (Jan), +16kg (July)
One-arm hangs 20mm edge (note that I transferred from the lattice edge to the Beastmaker 2000 at one point as was finding the lattice rung friction a little off):
-13kg (Jan), -6kg (July)
Density hangs (30-second hangs with removed or added weight):
+1 (Jan), +10kg (July)
Straight off, big gains in basic muscle exercises. Dips was a major milestone coming off the shoulder surgery - zero pain now in these. With fingers, it’s a slow steady burn in gains on basic one-arm test, however, a very decent gain for density hangs.. note: these aren’t for anyone to benchmark off as everyone is different, and also, there’s a lot stronger people out there than me. However, what should be take away is that they were gains made with 5 hours of training per week… e.g. one arm finger strength went from 79% of body weight to 90%. Imagine what YOU could climb if you gained an extra 10% in strength!
4. slammed with an autoimmune issue
You’ll notice all the numbers above all are up to June…. the plan had been to keep at this steadily indefinitely, however, my body had other ideas… after returning from a lovely long week away in the west of Ireland, I woke up to agony in my ankles and various other issues. Three days later, I’d given in and was at the doctors. 8 hours after the doctor, I was sitting in the emergency ward of St James Hospital, where I’d be transferred to a bed for the next three days. Various tests later and I was sent home with the mostly all clear, with a follow-up call two weeks later reporting I’d had some autoimmune response to…something… and to continue on with life! Of course, while I was given the all-clear, energy levels weren’t the same for quite a while after and with some imminent changes in life coming later in the year, I was pulled away to focus on them. Training sadly never got re-started (which also shows the challenge of when a routine gets broken…) and would only start again (at a lower rate) in November. However, this leads me to the some rather amazing, excellent news so there’s no negativity here….
5. Ayla arrived
See that photo from the sea swims above? You’ll notice has a little bump… and in December 3rd, that bump transformed as little Ayla entered the world! Mom, Naomi, showed just how amazing women are, and continues to do so in the early days of being up our little daughter.
as both Naomi and myself have offered, if anyone wants to hear our birthing story, please reach out to one of us. We’re more than happy to share it over an email, message or a call (of which we’re all well used to calls online these days!).
Reflecting on my life up to now, I can only hope to continue with the same adventures in life, introducing her to many incredible experiences with a lot of fun along the way! You start to recognise your values pretty quickly when this amazing little bundle of joy is curled up on one of our chests - long may it last.
Speakikg of Ayla, I suspect rime will be in even more short supply going forward however let’s hope it’s not December 2021 before the next update!