My lifting split

Here’s my current work out split:

Monday – Legs(Quad focus)
Back squat – 4 x 6-8
Leg press – 4 x 15-20
Gobler squat – 4 x 10-12
Walking lunges – 4 x 8-10
Leg extensions – 4 x 12-15
Calf raises – 4 x ♾

Tuesday – Shoulders, Back, Biceps
DB shoulder press – 4 x 8-12
Y-raises – 4 x 8-10
Rear delt push downs – 4 x 10-12
T-bar rows – 4 x 6-8
Kneeling lat rows – 4 x 8-10
Single arm lat pull downs – 4 x 8-10
Spider curls – 4 x 10-12
Seated curls – 4 x 10-12
Curl machine – 4 x 5 (heavy)

Wednesday – Chest, Triceps
DB bench press – 4 x 8-12
Incline press machine – 4 x 6-8 (heavy)
Seated chest flys – 4 x 10-12
PecDec – 4 x 8-10 (banded)
Weighted push ups – 4 x 8-10
Single arm push downs – 4 x 10-12 (each arm)
Long rope push downs – 4 x 8-12
Weighted dips – 4 x 6-8 (heavy)

Thursday – Legs (Hamstring focus)
BB RDLs – 4 x 8-10
DB RDLs – 4 x 6-8 (heavy)
High leg press – 4 x 10-12
Laying leg curls – 4 x 10-12
Seated leg curls – 4 x 12-15
Calf raises – 4 x ♾

Friday – Chest & Back
DB bench press – 4 x 8-10
DB incline bench press – 4 x 8-10
Low to high flys – 4 x 10-12
Seated rows – 4 x 10-12
DB lat rows – 4 x 8-10
Face pulls – 4 x 10-12
Banded pull ups – 4 x ♾

Saturday – SARMs (Shoulders & Arms)
Shoulder DB press – 4 x 6-10
Y- raises – 4 x 10-12
Shoulder press machine – 4 x 6-8 (heavy)
Spider curls – 4 x 10-12
Seated curls – 4 x 10-12
Ez bar curls – 4 x 8-10
Single arm push downs – 4 x 10-12 (each arm)
Long rope push downs – 4 x 10-12
Sing arm machine extensions – 4 x 8-10

Sunday – Active rest day
Bike – 30 minutes

pc: time.com

Poetry, again, again.

I have a dog,

I walk in the fog,

Built like a pig, like a hog

This is a blog,

I have good dialogue,

In the morning I take a jog,

I love cereal, Kellogg

Barbecue, Hotdog

I jump high, names frog

Around the holidays I drink eggnog

pc: toledolibrary.org

AP Chemistry Exam

So the AP Chem exam is coming up. May second, which is in like a week and a half and I am beyond screwed. The exam is so impossibly hard that a 44% is passing, you get a 3 for a 44% on the exam which is just crazy. We’re gonna have our class final exam sometime next week which is right before the AP exam, and hopefully, that will prepare me for the AP. I guess in the past the final exam for the class was a pretty good indicator of how you would do on the AP exam so I guess we’ll see how I do next week. I’ve been studying so much, like every night I have FRQ’s or multiple choice questions to do. We had a 54 page slideshow to work on over spring break, which I did ok on but that’s not a very good indicator of the AP exam. Now we have like 8 FRQ’s due on Monday and some of these FRQ’s have like 9 parts (a,b,c,d,e, etc) which is just a crazy amount of questions.

AP Chem Exam Review - PTHS AP CHEMISTRY
Photo Credit- PTHS AP Chemistry https://pthsapchem.weebly.com/ap-chem-exam-review.html

Poetry, again

I lift weights

I have mates

My least favorite fruit is dates

I’m currently looking for good insurance rates

I love playing Crazy Eight’s

When my mom gets angry she throws plates

I work at the docs, carrying crates

Our future awaits;

This poem needs someone to narrates.

pc: vecteezy.com

Pilgrim Game

Yesterday, we had our second volleyball game against the Pilgrim School. The first time we played them it was at their court which was nice cause it was indoor and stuff, but this time it was a home game. Having it as a home game definitely makes a difference too. We have an outdoor grass court which is far different from an indoor court, you lose a lot of energy jumping on grass compared to jumping on a court, as the grass absorbs a ton of the power you put into the jump to go for a block or spike. Anyway, we did a lot better this time around than when we played them a month or two ago. We were playing our best then but our best was not very good, now we played our best and we held our own. The first time we played them we lost every set and only scored around 12 or 15 points in the three sets, but this time we were able to win two sets which were just awesome. We have never played like that before and we might not again, but honestly, I’m proud of what we did. This is the first year that our school has even had a boys volleyball team ever, and not a single one of us has ever played competitive volleyball in our entire lives. But man do we love it. I think it might be the favorite sports season we’ve had for most if not all of us even though we are probably not going to win the league like we have for the other two sports seasons. Despite our complete lack of experience, we have some incredible players that have held it down for the team in quite a few games. Anyway, next year we are going to beat Pilgrim for sure, we will all have more experience and since none of us are seniors, we will be playing with the same group of guys we have been playing with this year which means we won’t have to relearn the game and how we play with one another. Anyway, I love volleyball and I think our game against Pilgrim only reinforced that love for the sport.

BYU men's volleyball one win away from national title
Photo Credit- Salt Lake Tribune https://www.sltrib.com/sports/byu-cougars/2021/05/06/byu-mens-volleyball-one/

A Pattern

The reason that we as a class in journalism write these blogs weekly is that some of us enjoy writing about stuff and sharing our opinions but it is also a required project for the class. The blogs are all graded by a rather strongly opinioned small person who very much so has a specific type of blog that they enjoy reading and that they grade highly. For example, if you the reader were to guess what kind of blog that I have written has done the best I’d be willing to bet that you’d probably be wrong in your assumption. Out of all my blogs, there are six about video games, ten about me and my life, and three about music or tv shows. Out of all these blogs on average I tend to receive lower grades on ones about video games and sports, I don’t know if this is because of the fact that I can be a mediocre writer at times or just a consistent thought process from the grader. Also, I don’t know if it’s just because it’s me or something but all my blogs about my various injuries such as breaking my arm or the stitches that I have gotten in the past. But I tend to score higher on injury stories and blogs about music. And it might make sense to lean into that but I ran out of injuries to write about at this point in time. And yes I could write about music but I don’t really have any new music I’m listening to right now it’s just some old stuff. Personally, I feel like it would be interesting to see how the journalism members’ grades would change if the grading of blogs was put in the hands of someone else. Would it be a positive impact or a negative one, there are a couple of students that I think would make my grade go up because of their common interest in video games and anime. But on the other hand, I feel like certain students might grade me poorly just as a general dislike towards my writing topics and or me as a person. I don’t think that I would be a good grader because of the fact that I am not the greatest person at noticing errors in writing.

Image Credit: Readers Digest

Plans For The Future

So far in my life, I have had many experiences that have shaped me into the person I am now. I have traveled all over places including Canada, Germany, and Mexico and all of these places have shown me different cultures and people. I have had the privilege to learn to snowboard and I have been riding dirt bikes for over ten years now. Even with all this under my belt, all I can wonder about is what is to come for my future. Such as where am I going to go to college and what will I learn to love, for example, I really want to major in some sort of computer-related degree such as computer science or computer engineering. But I also want to do outdoor activities such as snowboarding and dirt-biking. So I will have to find places in which I can do both, the convenient thing about the career path that I would like to have is that it allows me to work in almost any place and almost any category of work. For example, if I wanted to live in the mountains in a place where I could snowboard in the summer and dirt bike in the summer I could and I would be able to do that while also being able to do my work from home or work on the mountain in some way. All I know now is what I can do to help myself go towards that goal, I can learn to code better and I can apply to colleges that may lead to what I want to have in life but all I know now is that the future is a really interesting and scary thing that I have very little control over and I cant wait to see.

Image Credit: Vivente Australia

Using Spanish

I have taken Spanish casually for 9 years now and at no point have I thought I have been good at it. I never really paid attention until high school, but completing workbook pages in Spanish was my least favorite homework. The work I was assigned was habitually tedious and boring. On the other hand, I thoroughly enjoy listening to music in Spanish and speaking Spanish with people who speak the language.

Last year, I hated Spanish 3 Honors. I hated learning tenses and rules, what even is the reflexive? This year I am in AP Spanish, which is more conversation and application-based, which is the first Spanish class I have really enjoyed. My speaking ability has improved immensely, and I have a good grades without feeling like I am slaving over the work. This has given me confidence in speaking that I never really had before.

I have also started speaking mostly Spanish to the new girl in my grade from Spain. I have talked to her friends who only speak Spanish for hours on the phone and have gotten only good reviews.

I am very proud of how far I have come in speaking Spanish and feel like I can have a decently fluent conversation with just anyone.

PC: Pintrest

4 Square Diaries

Some say soccer is a beautiful game, but I beg to differ. For me, it’s four square.

This quarter, four square has taken our high school by storm. Yeah, you read that right, four square and high school in the same sentence. It is mainly played by the freshman, who isn’t the most mature bunch (ask anyone), but a small contingency of senior boys, myself included, also are driven to play. It’s probably because, like the freshman, we are not the most mature bunch.

We have created all types of rule sets: feet only, west coast no feet, and many more. Most of which came from one of the most magnificent minds of all time, (can’t say the name but it’s pretty great).

Each player uses their own rule set when they are king. The power of tailoring the rules to your strengths is intoxicating and keeps the players coming back. This forms them for square identity, with the only other factor being how much they argue and whine.

There is so much whining and arguing that goes on, it is plain to see how much these people care, even though most act like they don’t. When two players disagree on a call, it becomes a screaming match, with the mob of players itching to get back to the king square serving as a jury. If the jury grants it, a 1 v 1 starts, in which two players face off. The winner is usually the person who throws it at the other person’s shins first.

On April 1st, Mr. Floyd pranked the players, sending freshmen into what I can only explain as identity crises.

“This isn’t FAIR!” whined nearly all of them.

That dark day demonstrated how reliant these students are on four square. They truly care about a children’s game, as if it is the NBA. I have been punched, insulted, and jeered over it, and I am fine with it, it’s in the game.

PC: Playworks

I Really Like Sunflowers

Sunflowers are great. They’re pretty, when you plant one you suddenly have 20 popping up in your yard, the seeds are edible, they’re easy to maintain, they’re not toxic to most animals, they symbolize loyalty, and every song with “sunflower” in the title is a bop. I really like them. Sunflowers are my special thing with my best friend, too. If I could just have one plant in my yard, I would choose sunflowers. I don’t really like yellow things, but I love sunflowers. I really want one of those teddy bears that have sunflower print on them. I’d name her Susan after Susan Storm. If anybody wants to get Susan for me, I’d be very grateful.

https://www.milwaukeemag.com/7-sunflower-fields-to-check-out-this-season/
https://www.buildabear.com/online-exclusive-build-a-bear-x-van-gogh-museum-sunflowers-bear-bow-bundle/329739_29738.html