Woldan

I've heard of a study thats says that people who regularly look at the sky are happier. Makes sense, no matter how many bad things happen during the day, no matter the setbacks, the dread and pain gets dulled by a simple nightly walk looking at the stars, for me it feels like a warm blanket wrapping around me. I also always take a camera with me, these are my latest long shutter photos:

I'm using those huge inflatable mattresses wherever I hike with my tent, it weighs a lot but its totally worth it, sleeping on it feels like sleeping in my bed at home. If you aren't already using one of these I highly recommend them. They make a world of difference. Also with a good sleeping bag (400+ bucks) and a good tent (300+) its really comfortable no matter where you are. With good equipment you can camp really comfortably. That was my equipment in Iceland, slept in a tent for 10 days and always woke up fresh and energetic. What I did today: I broke another personal record in weight lifting, I have no idea why but lately I'm experiencing an unnatural power boost. I can increase most of my lifts weekly, lifts which are already heavier than what most people can naturally achieve, lifts I could not increase for several months. If I didn't know better I'd say I'm using some kind of performance enhancer or steroids. Also training feels so completely easy lately, I totally nail the technique every lift and my body control is like 110% all the time. Also my muscle mass increased by 3 Kg in a little over 1 month, making me weigh 105kg now. (235lbs) Like I said, I feel completely and unnaturally energetic.

Thats like a huge solid tent on wheels nice. What was your problem with big tents though?

Today I gazed at the night sky and I saw a meteorite explode. No idea about the altitude or the size, but for the tiniest fraction of a second I saw a shooting star trail and boom, a very VERY bright white flash, like turning the light on and off very fast in complete dark room. Almost as cool as the large meteorite I saw a couple of years ago, it looked like a rocket, it dark red, surprisingly slow and left a trail like a missile. People who go to bed early miss all the fun!

Today I called my favorite gun shop about the order I placed 8 weeks ago, I got the information that the shipment is already on the way and I can come and pick up my rifle in ten days. Thats awesome news, I was already thinking they lost my order or the rifle is not available for whatever reason. Whoop-de-doo!

''Home gym'' made me feel depressed.

Didn't read through all these pages, but isn't there a flag up there, among other trash and a freakin' moon rover that can be, you know, seen from a good telescope from earth? I watched the documentary, all the crap about the missing stars on the pictures, the shadows, the camera blah blah, there is only one strange thing they did not address that piqued my interest - there is a picture showing an astronauts boot footprint right under the landing craft, like right under it. That one is rather strange and makes no sense.

Set a new personal record in goblet squats. 1 rep 107kg 235 lbs. Though after having finished the repetition all my repaired teeth hurt and I had ringing in my ears. One of the few good things in summer, I miss grilling and fresh hot chili.

The funny thing is, I can see the virus spreading to Europe. Last years summer was so freaking hot we had a mosquito plague from early summer till mid autumn, and yes, there were tiger mosquitoes among them. I see no reason not to start having exotic plagues in those hot summers, last year several months the weather around here was hotter than in Egypt. And there are large bodies of still water that are perfect breeding grounds.

Bought a truckload of exotic chili seeds because February is the time to get the plants started. This year I want to ramp up my chili production by at least 400%. I ordered a lot of Habanero Red Savina seeds because they grew like crazy last year and they taste very fruity even though they're rather hot (577.000 Scoville), those are probably my favorite. I also got some seeds of milder chili races that grow in little bushes and produce seeds till late autumn, those can be used in large quantities to spice pizza, pasta etc. The remind me of little Rowan trees, very colorful. And last but not least a ton of seeds of the world record chili ''Trinidad Scorpion'', it's got over 2.500.000 Scoville and is know to be just brutal. Thats the real deal for hot chili meals, goulash etc.

Sanctum First I thought its gonna be your bad B-movie diving accident movie, on a similar quality level like all those countless volcano disaster movies, but boy, this one was actually worth watching. It was about group of cave divers getting trapped and having to work their way out, and they did a good job making everything feel horribly claustrophobic and the underwater scenes were rather realistic. It was entertaining to watch. One of the few films that definitely do not deserve all the negative reviews.

Well, unsurprisingly its Iceland for me, and I've visited many countries to compare it to. Its by far the most beautiful and pristine country in the world, the people are nice and very relaxed, the food excellent, and pollution....well, what pollution? There is practically none. Health care is good, the landscapes are extremely varied and stunningly beautiful, undisturbed nature everywhere, volcanoes, easy access to the ocean round the entire island, white nights, a great Strongman culture and history (Hafthor Björnsson aka the mountain of GoT, Benny Magnuson etc.), the legendary Jakabol strongman gym, the People speak all very good English and they are VERY concerned about keeping nature undisturbed - they love their country, every little town has their own public bath, I've seen no obese people there, the crime rate is laughably low ( I think their only prison only holds a handful of people there), as far as I know unemployment is non-existent, you can own and possess guns and their gun laws make actual sense. There are also mountains, they might not be nearly as tall as those in my country, but they're definitely worth climbing, the wildlife consists of many cute animals, the entire island has a very calm and mystical atmosphere... I could go on forever listening all the little details that make this place so great. Downsides: Geothermal activity, actually volcanic activity its great in many ways since its the #1 green energy source in the country, but if a volcano breaks out you're in trouble. Throughout the history there has been a fair amount of catastrophic volcano eruptions, in some cases half the population died in the aftermath because the fields were covered with poisonous sulfur and ash, the sheep and cows could not eat which lead to dramatic famines. Another downside, unsurprisingly, is street conditions in winter, you need a very good 4x4 offroad vehicle, ideally equipped with a winch, reserve battery and balloon tires if you want to leave the main road. Things get ugly fast off the main road. Believe me, off the road you definitely want a freaking monster truck, one that would never fly with your countries laws. I rented a standard Daihatsu Galloper 4x4 and that brought me more adventure than I wanted. If you are stuck somewhere off the main road you are in big trouble. Several hours from the next town help won't arrive anytime soon, which is fun in winter. The Jökulhlaup. Jökul is the glacier and Hlaup means flood. If a glacier is heated by geothermal activity up in the ''highlands'' it will melt and burst like a gigantic dam. The flood will kill anything in its path including bridges, which cuts off towns from access for weeks. Though the Icelanders are probably the best in repairing bridges, they have a clever System, their bridges are built like Lego. Also the language is extremely hard to learn, and I think it would be even worse for a native English speaker, also there are 4 months with only 2-3 hours of direct sunlight in winter, you have to be able to deal with the dark. Next downside off the top of my head is gardening, if you love gardening forget Iceland, very few plants worth planting in your garden survive the conditions. The vegetation is comparable to a mountain top at 2500 m altitude - creeping plants, arctic birch and small conifer. So in a nutshell, the country feels like a pristine prehistoric Nordic paradise with a small tribe of nice people on it. Yes, I think that describes it perfectly.

Hows that for a shotgun round. Opens up upon impact and pokes a 5 centimeter wide hole into your body. And yes, its hull is not plastic but brass! For the record, a normal shotgun slug has a 1 shot stop percentage of 98%, and those do not expand half as much. That thing is so overkill, if you get killed by one of those it will kill you a second time in your next life.

Today was the first time I did deadlifts after my 2.5 week long pause due to an injury I suffered from an accident. I didn't want to risk tearing my healing wound so I stayed well below my maxes, at about 75% - 80% or so, but its still very satisfying to lift 200kg/450lbs for a couple of reps after such a long break. Its like drinking cool water after a trip through the desert.

Somebody needs to keep those guys in the Vatican up to date! Don't they know that we will run out of oil in the next few decades and the total collapse will lead to the death of half if not two thirds of the worlds population?

Thank god its back - bent over barbell row and reverse flyes day today, all that sitting in front of a computer curls me in like a dried leaf. Weight lifting is like going to a blacksmith and you're the hot, warped metal. You get beaten into shape, from a lump of ugly metal into a shiny, strong and powerful blade.

I wonder, if a woman gets infected by that virus through a mosquito, but the virus goes dormant like they often do, could her baby suffer from birth defects if she becomes pregnant many years after the infection?

Its so small that I could probably lift it.

Got a belated birthday present, the Witcher - Wild Hunt. To be honest, I've never payed much attention to the Witcher series, I've heard many good and many bad things about it. I have the computer to run it on max though so at least my eyes gonna be happy.

Did some slow careful dead lifts with belt to check if my exercise injury has healed properly, started with 140kg 8 repetitions and worked my way up to 160kg 8 repetitions and 180kg 5 repetitions. Didn't want to push it. Its looking good, I've got no stability issues and I can use a good stance though it still hurts a tiny little bit above 180kgs. I don't want to push it. I guess in a month I'm 100% again.

So our Secretary of defense made the decision to not let in more than 37500 immigrants per year, the quote is expected to be reached in early summer. People cheered, most are quite happy about the decision. However, there has been absolutely no word about how the borders are going to be closed for immigrants and how the decision is going to be enforced, right now we do not even have the manpower to monitor the invaders refugees crossing the borders, we're basically getting overrun. There is no way we can secure our borders, and police sure as hell is not allowed to use force so early summer is going to be absolutely hilarious.

Yeah, its seems so, I carefully inspected the cases of all my reloads in that caliber and found no alarming signs of metal fatigue- no rings, no bulges, no varying colors in the brass. Of course to be 100% sure I'd have to x-ray the cases to measure the wall thickness of each individual case, lol. Maybe it was a factory load with overpressure or maybe for some reason the case was produced with walls way too thin to handle the pressure. Maybe I'll send the manufacturer an e-mail, but I doubt I'd get a response.

In game music I like the classical orchestral fantasy music with lots of brass best, Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate immediately come to mind. Second best is the ambient OST of the Thief game series. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KnCFwdOw-o

Today I prevented a future accident. I reloaded rifle ammo and was about to put it in the case to shoot it next time on the range. Then I saw this: Its REALLY hard to see unless you turn it so that the crack casts a shadow like in the pic. That would have caused a catastrophic failure with the potential to do serious harm to the rifle and the shooters face. We're talking about pressures in the 3400 BAR / 50000 PSI range and temperatures above 1500 Celsius. Not sure what went wrong, none of the reloading steps could have cause this, and the case has been fired only once and that was the factory load. Seems to be excessive metal fatigue. Anyway now I'm checking all my reloaded ammo. The funny thing is, I checked the ammo a third time which I never do, thats when I saw the damage.