Telegraph Static

This is quickly becoming one of those blogs that always begins with "Well I haven't updated in awhile..." but I've come to discover that's for a reason. The reason being, well, I wouldn't say life is boring now, but it is far more routine than I've been used to in the past 18 months or so. And as a result, I haven't felt like saying "everything is just rolling along as expected" every day or two. However that said, I do have a few things to update my loyal following (ha) with.

First, the job change has gone over smoothly. Compact Sod is long gone, and I've now been at Aberfoyle Concrete for about 3 weeks. Overall I can't say I enjoy the job as much as the sod gig, mostly due to a lot of sitting around and waiting. There are a number of large projects we're waiting to start, but the difference between Mr. Wilson sodding his backyard and McMansion Homes starting foundations for a 1000-house subdivision is sodding does not require permits or inspections. I am told once things get rolling I'll be working 50 hours weeks easy, and I'll also get a raise soon but in the meantime I'm lucky to be working 30 hour weeks and barely paying the bills. However we are essentially guaranteed to be working all winter (a fact of life that will test me dearly, I'm afraid- I do NOT do well in cold weather).

I've also now been at my new house for the better part of a month, and that's going alright. The house itself is a little anonymous in vibe, so to speak, everyone keeps to themselves for the most part. But as I've said a million times, I don't plan to be there all that often, so I don't really care that much. I'll be there to sleep/eat/cook/shower so I'm not too put off by the lack of homeishness thus far.

Kingdoms is done in the studio, the recording of our 5 song debut EP went off mostly without a hitch, other than Hutton our vocalist being decently sick the whole way through. Given that, however, his vocal parts came across pretty well. We have our first show booked for Oct 24 in Kitchener and it sounds like it's going to be completely sold out. We're all really excited to finally see this thing get off the ground... (Our site is here, by the way, if you haven't seen it yet.)

Speaking of getting off the ground, I'm restarting (again) at the gym at the very start of October. I've learned a lot about nutrition and workout exercises this year, and I'm making sure every single piece of the puzzle is in place. As a matter of fact, due to the relative lack of anything else worth writing about here, I'm going to turn this (partially) into a workout-progress blog, to keep all the info on how I'm coming along in one place, and also a place where people can see (and hopefully keep me on track towards my goals). I have a number of friends also either starting to work out lately, or planning on signing up (Hutton/Aaron, I'm lookin at you guys) so hopefully we can keep each other motivated!

The only other bit of news is related to the gym, sort of... I've had fairly chronic back pain for years now, which I always chalked up to simply being the inevitable tall-guy-curse, but it's gotten a little worse lately and I finally decided to get it checked out and hopefully fixed. I also wanted to make sure I wouldn't be doing any additional damage by going to the gym, but by the sounds of it I can actually use the gym to work on exercises that will help fix what's going on back there (namely, under-arching lower back, curved-to-one-side upper back, uneven shoulders and extreme muscle tightness between the shoulder blades). And as an added bonus, in another 2 months of work, I can get any physio or massage therapy covered by benefits! I guess there's a bonus to staying at one job for a decent period of time after all.