Heavyhands, week 5, day 1

• Weight: 272
• Walked for 32 minutes, doing four sets of 45 reps of flyes, lifts, and overheads, with 1-lb weights.
• Heartrate stayed in 130s and 140s. I don’t think I broke 150 once.
• I got better results when I turned my CD player off; I think I was shortening and/or slowing my stride to cut down on the skips. I need to either:
  • get a strap-and-pocket unit of some kind to hold it around my waist or chest
  • get an iPod
  • walk without music

In peace there's nothing so becomes a man / As hefty tax cuts and humility; / But when the blast of

I just looked up the Public Theater’s website to see which Shakespeare play they’ll be putting on for free in Central park this year. It’s Henry V, and I just love their synopsis:

In HENRY V, Shakespeare’s epic history play, the clarion call of patriotism is set against the uncompromising harshness of war. A young King, upon the urging of his advisors, aims to redeem his misspent youth, divert attention from domestic affairs and silence doubts over his ascent to the throne by invading France. His transformation from inexperienced monarch to military hero poses the question, does a rise to power demand a fall from humanity?

I haven’t read the play since high school (if then); I should probably check an annotated copy out of the library.

In other news, I’ve tested the various brands of aquarelle graphite pencils I picked up on Tuesday. Looks like Koh-I-Noor is the clear winner; the graphite just dissolves more smoothly than the other brands. Cretacolor is the worst of the three, which is a shame, since their pencils are actually the best designed (painted different shades for the different darknesses, so I can tell them apart at a glance).

I know, I should shut up and just draw.

Update: Ack! LJ cut short my over-long title! Here’s the whole thing, arranged more formally:

In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As hefty tax cuts and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the hawk...

Maybe I should have gone with “I fell into a burning muse of fire”.