Fugato

Thermal bewilderment

n.

The inability, after bathing in icy water, to distinguish hot and cold.

Try it, it’s cool!

(The terms ‘thermal confusion‘ and ‘thermal conflation‘ were both taken.)

You know that feeling when you really have to sneeze and you’re just about to, but then you can’t, so all you do is put an enormously silly expression on your face, like the one pictured here, and then say “uhhh” and give up, woefully unsatisfied?

I’ve been doing that all day.

I hate that.

My department has had a thing for sea-swimming recently. Snæbjörn made a bet with Viggó on the latter’s diet success. Viggó achieved the stated goal, so Snæbjörn had to swim from Nauthólsvík to Kópavogur, about 600 metres (2000 ft).

(Note that this is Iceland; even in August the sea is not exactly balmy.)

It bears noting that Snæbjörn is the least cold-tolerant man on Earth. He complaints about the cold gust of air when someone sighs in the office.

He has been in the sea several times recently to toughen up for the long swim, and workmates have hopped in with him. Last week I went along, and that day he unexpectedly completed the whole swim … and doubled it: he swam back as well. Took him about 45-50 minutes.

This video shows him stumbling out of the sea afterwards, with slurred speech and wobbly legs. He was visibly incapacitated at first — had us worried — but a couple of hours later he was at the nightclub Sirkús supporting Pablo in the Tom Selleck moustache competition. Now, several days later, he does not seem significantly impaired in any way.

And this video shows me hopping in for a (much shorter) swim

I’ve noticed that I responded “say what?” three times in 45 seconds. Maybe I should worry about that a little.

Anyway, everybody dive in! It’s good for ya. Just look at Snæbjörn!

I was raised to be a good boy. This is a fine thing in itself, although for getting ahead in life it is grossly overrated; being a good boy tends to get you trampled on.

This week I received a trampling of a new and different kind, thanks to my old friend Smári.

Smári gave me a gift certificate for a Chinese massage for my birthday last month. I went this week, and got a full-body foot massage. I.e., was massaged, largely by feet, at Kínverska nuddstofan on Skólavörðustígur. It was … interesting. And damned good. I have little to compare to, though; this was my first professional massage. The masseur was a kindly Chinese man upwards of forty. He did not say much, though a “jæja” and a slight chuckle helped to ease my embarrassment when a push on my lower back let out some air.

There is a square hole in the bench to plant my face into. This makes sense, but the edge of that hole digs into my Adam’s apple when the nape of my neck is, well, stepped on. In lifting my throat to protect it, I was unable to relax the muscles being massaged. I wonder if there are people working in AutoCAD designing massage bench holes to work around this problem based on craniometric data for various world markets. Or if I just have a silly big larynx.

I liked the massage, during and afterwards, and will go again.

Oh, and the illustration is for silly laughs only. At no point in the process was my face stepped on, and certainly not by the foot of Cupid.

After several weeks of completely-failed attempts to move my bedtime from 4am to midnight, I’ve decided to go radical on the whole issue. I’m trying the Pavlov approach.

I made a pact with myself: for each minute past midnight that the clock reports when I go to bed, I pledge to do two push-ups in the morning.

Right now, I’m headed for just over a hundred tomorrow morning.

Yesterday morning it was 114. That took a bit of time. I’m no ironman, I need breaks inbetween.

The first time was the morning before that, but I decided to postpone the initiation of this pact by one day, rather than do … 430 … push-ups that morning. Some glorious start that was.

The way I see it, I’m headed for either a disciplined sleep schedule, or formidable pecs and triceps. Or perpetrating pact breakage against myself, but that would be too lame. We shall see.

Of course, after that solemn promise in my previous entry, I am obligated to blog about what I had for breakfast today.

It was oatmeal porridge. It is always oatmeal porridge, at least when I am at home. Sometimes other stuff too, but always oatmeal porridge. Oatmeal porridge is from heaven, in the same way that Coke, french fries and beer are from the devil. It is dead simple to make (chuck oats in a bowl, Just Add Water™, and salt, and stick it in a microwave for two minutes), tastes fine, and is really, really healthy. It packs protein and soluble fiber. It lowers cholesterol. It delivers blood sugar slowly. It is filling, keeps your appetite moderate. Oatmeal is a sworn enemy of blubbery waists; it has certainly worked well on mine. I love oatmeal. Whoever thought of domesticating oats instead of considering them a weed like everyone else did, should get a medal. We owe you, buddy.

Why did porridge get such a bad rep?

When I was a kid, porridge was the epitome of UFTYMMYE, Unpleasant Food That Your Mother Makes You Eat, except that my mother didn’t ever make me eat it. Maybe in the first few months of my life. I tasted it once at my aunt Helga’s when I was a tiny tot. Helga reportedly liked nothing better as a kid. Helga demanded porridge on Christmas Eve. Helga, like most of my family, does not walk the beaten path. Anyway, I don’t remember liking it then, but I also don’t remember disliking it.

What I do remember is that the conventional wisdom, the prevailing view held by everyone but Helga, was clear and unanimous: porridge was Bad. And so I ate less healthy stuff for breakfast for most of my life so far. How did that happen? What does everybody have against oatmeal porridge? Seriously. Ditch the Cocoa Puffs. And the Coke and beer and french fries, while you’re at it. Especially for breakfast. You’ll thank yourself soon enough.

Thank you, Snæbjörn, for suggesting oatmeal porridge to me. Sometimes we find wisdom where we least expect it. ;-)