In Praise of the Stash

Image by ishane via FlickrThe other day I had a date with my daughter. We were going to ride our bikes down to the cafe to have some tea together, and as we got ready to go, I realized that I had no cash. Not only no cash, but no money in the checking until the next day.

I searched through my pockets and wallet and bag, only coming up with change. I really don't like to use a card, so now I'm wondering what to do...

And then I remember - the stash!

In the header of my truck is a console with a compartment, containing pen and pencils, insurance and registration papers, and a wad of one dollar bills. We're covered. Let's go to tea!

I love the stash. 

• I have stashes for things like coffee, Emergen-C, cash, stamps and change. The stash has saved my butt many times; that one morning without the expected coffee just throws me off. 
• When I put away the groceries, and I have a new bag of java, I stash the old one. If I have the end of the last bag up high in the cupboard, I've got no worries.
• When we still needed to go to the laundromat, I would put quarters in one, and the rest of my change in the other. I don't like carrying change. After a while, the change jars add up. That's one stash.
• If I end up with a bunch of single dollar bills or fives at the end of the day, I stash about twenty bucks worth behind some stuff in the cupboard. That's another stash.
• The console of my truck, as above, is another.
• My daily work bag has a bunch of inside pockets. If I feel like I won't miss it, I stick a 20 or a 50 dollar bill in one zippered pocket.
• I have a credit card that has nothing charged to it yet that goes with us when traveling, just in case. It goes back into its stash when we get home again.
• If I'm feeling especially rich, I pull out a fifty from the bank and fold it very thin and put it in the back of my wallet. One more stash.
• Chocolate is a great stash item. Just remember to replace it if you eat it.
• A toilet paper roll stash under the seat of the truck and one stashed somewhere in the house will definitely come in handy.
• Bandaids get stashed in my bag and the truck.

I like to be prepared.

Got a stash?

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350: Why?

350 : Global Warming. Global Action. Global Future.

From the site 350.org:

About 350

350 is the red line for human beings, the most important number on the planet. The most recent science tells us that unless we can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, we will cause huge and irreversible damage to the earth.
But solutions exist. All around the world, a movement is building to take on the climate crisis, to get humanity out of the danger zone and below 350. This movement is massive, it is diverse, and it is visionary. We are activists, scholars, and scientists. We are leaders in our businesses, our churches, our governments, and our schools. We are clean energy advocates, forward-thinking politicians, and fearless revolutionaries. And we are united around the world, driven to make our planet livable for all who come after us.
We are everywhere, and together we are unstoppable.
Our Mission:
Our first job is to make sure everyone knows the target so that our political leaders feel real pressure to act. Reaching 350 ppm will require unprecedented international cooperation. The United Nations is negotiating a treaty that could put the world on a course to solve the climate crisis, but the current plans for the treaty are much too weak to get us back to safety. 350.org will bring millions of new voices to the table, united by our common call to action. Together, we will redefine the possible and rally the world behind the solutions that science and justice demand.
Join us today.
Our Vision:
Where do we go from here? Our first step is to wean ourselves from coal and oil and we have to do it while still allowing the poor parts of the world to develop. We can do this by creating a global clean energy economy that is strong enough to lift the world's poor out of poverty. It won't be easy, and there are many possible approaches.  We need to act swiftly, however—this is the greatest crisis human civilization faces.

Sign up at 350 and help spread the word!

Natural Father, Natural Fitness

About a year and a half ago, I took a "real" job again.

Before then, I was self-employed as a handyman/odd-jobber, doing everything from putting up fences to permaculture-based landscaping to installing woodstoves and insulation. That was great, except that being my own boss made it too easy to think, "It's a perfect day for bouldering. Work can wait.", or "If I don't go jump in the river right now, I'm gonna go nuts/get heat exhaustion/(insert excuse here)."

Now I've got a steady income again and my body isn't getting beat up everyday, but being inside and semi-sedentary has been hard. I've got some serious chair-time logged, on the computer and the phone, and by the end of the day my shoulders are up around my ears, my hip flexors are so tight that it's hard to stand up straight, and my butt hurts from sitting. I start to feel my age and I hate it. How do I still feel 20 inside but 40 outside?

The last time that I actively worked out was at a local gym, and I would lift for an hour or so every other day, using both free weights and machines. But my "routine" was based on what I learned over 20 years ago with a basic bench and weight set (plastic-covered cement "plates", remember those?) and bodybuilding books from the library. 4 sets of 10-12 reps for each exercise, split your workouts between pushing and pulling, lots of isolated work like curls, and so on. A complete Arnold Schwarzenegger/Lou Ferrigno fascination.
So I'd go to the gym with a routine in mind and never get through it because it was too complex. I stayed at it for 6 months, and I always got a workout, but I didn't really feel any progress. Part of that was also because I would always work on my strong points, like upper body strength, and wuss out on my weak points - legs and core. If I then figured in the time and money involved in going somewhere outside my house to work out, and the amount of time invested in the gym every week, it didn't make sense to continue that way. So I quit the gym (another story about contracts and direct payments and bounced checks). I would still mess around with jungle gym stuff at the park and work on my handstands, but I wasn't regular or disciplined about it at all.

So I'm looking for some fun way to stay fit and young (still bouldering, but not so much in the winter), and I hear that a friend is putting together an indoor soccer team to play in a league at the sports center, so I join up. The first sort of practice was at a park, and I don't really warm up, I just run out there. I've got tennis shoes, not cleats, and I just put out a cigarette 5 minutes before. I imagine that I'm still 16, king of the hill on the soccer field, and within 20 minutes, pull a muscle in my groin.

Of course, being a man, I continue to play and limp around for the next half hour. Stupid. Needless to say, I was hurting after every game that first session, but ready to play the next week and feeling some improvement each time. I finally wised up and ran wind sprints every other day between games, but I had to force myself. I would feel like puking afterwards, it was so intense.

Another friend recommended some books and resources about max-effort workouts and functional fitness and loaned me several. Never Gymless by Ross Enamait, and The Naked Warrior by Pavel Tsatsouline are two of the best that I've read.

I began by getting a speed rope (6 bucks) at the local sporting goods store and gathering some big rocks. We already had a rope-climb as part of a swing, 20 feet of 1 inch manila rope. I figured that I would start simple and yet try to get full body workout in under 20 minutes. I skipped rope at about 80% of full speed until I had to stop, then go climb the rope, then do one handed clean and press with a big rock, then plyo squats, then repeat the circuit until 20 minutes is up. 20 minutes seems like forever when you are at maximum effort.

I attempted to work out every day except Sunday, alternating wind sprints with bodyweight exercises, but grew to dread it. Now I try for at least three days a week, plus any spontaneous tree climbing or jungle gym fun, and I put up my slackline for balance and core strength.

It's really been working for me, and I can feel the difference in my mental state and my attitude, because if I miss a couple of days, I get cranky and low energy. If I go out back and crank off a bunch of pullups or do handstands, all of a sudden I've got energy to spare. There's a lesson in there...

To me, natural fitness means a functional, full-body fitness, one that is maintained through low-tech or no-tech backyard workouts. It doesn't require investing a lot of money, but it does require the willingness to go all out every time. If I get in a rut with a routine, I can easily improvise or learn new skills (handstands, muscle-ups, slackline, unicycle) and add them in. I recently read of the connection between max-effort high intensity exercise and increased HGH production, so I've been focusing on the growing-younger aspect of being active.

I'm convinced that movement and rhythm play a huge part in our health, and that when you skip rope, take an African dance or swing dance class, play a drum or take a long bike ride, you re-configure and re-connect your mind with your body. It's your built-in health insurance!

As a father, I want to be able to keep up with my kids, and I want to be able to climb mountains with my grandkids. I don't want to miss out because my body won't do it or my mind won't do it. When my kids see me out there spinning the rope, they think it's pretty funny. But isn't that part of fatherhood, getting laughed at by the munchkins?

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