Of Weather, Hockey, Non-Hockey

The weather today has been bipolar, I think is the best way to describe it. I ate lunch outside, and it was glorious (at least, the weather was; there was a woman near me talking on her phone in a mix of French and English, and my brain would not stop trying to hear what she was saying, even though I didn't care. Isn't the brain funny that way?). Sunny, warm--around 70--just overall lovely. I was very happy, and sad to have to go back inside.

As the afternoon went on, it became overcast, and when I left work, it had dropped at least ten degrees. It kept dropping as I drove home, to about 50 now, and it started to drizzle. So disappointing! Wasting the lovely weather when I'm inside ... not nice, mother nature.

Of course, making this time of year beautiful and deadly shows you the sort of person she is. My allergies weren't quite as bad today as yesterday, unless it was that having cramps as well distracted me, but my throat is all clogged and I had to keep sucking on cough drops and lifesavers and anything I could find all day, to not be That Person Who Makes Annoying Noises in the Office All Day. Tiresome, to say the least. I think tonight calls for some peaceful knitting. At home I can "ahem, AHEM!" as much as I need to. A few things before I go, though.

First, the Bruins. Game One was last night, and wow, what a game! Where has that Bruins team been hiding? I missed them; that was fun to watch! They went down early on a power-play goal by Toronto, but after that it was all Bruins, and very entertaining. The final score was 4-1, and it should have been 5-1 but for a goal disallowed (by my boy)(that intent-to-blow thing is bullshit). Can't wait to see what happens next time, which is Saturday night.

In other hockey stuff, if you are at all a hockey fan (and not just currently, but if you've ever been one), you really must see this excellent playoff montage of past and present, put together by the CBC/Hockey Night in Canada. They know their stuff up there, eh?

Man, I could watch that over and over. If it whets your appetite, do what I did and go watch some of the good NHL commercials of past years (so far, this year's aren't doing much for me); don't miss Cup Raise and No Words, which are my two favorites.

The non-hockey thing is an article in the New York Times that my mother sent me a link to, that my brother had sent to her, and that she had found interesting. It's about shopping habits, and it was in fact quite interesting, but the part that I found most interesting is more about habits, not about shopping. Specifically, it's about exercise, which as you know I've been trying to make a regular habit of mine for some months now.

"Luckily, simply understanding how habits work makes them easier to control. Take, for instance, a series of studies conducted a few years ago at Columbia University and the University of Alberta. Researchers wanted to understand how exercise habits emerge. In one project, 256 members of a health-insurance plan were invited to classes stressing the importance of exercise. Half the participants received an extra lesson on the theories of habit formation (the structure of the habit loop) and were asked to identify cues and rewards that might help them develop exercise routines.

The results were dramatic. Over the next four months, those participants who deliberately identified cues and rewards spent twice as much time exercising as their peers. Other studies have yielded similar results. According to another recent paper, if you want to start running in the morning, it’s essential that you choose a simple cue (like always putting on your sneakers before breakfast or leaving your running clothes next to your bed) and a clear reward (like a midday treat or even the sense of accomplishment that comes from ritually recording your miles in a log book). After a while, your brain will start anticipating that reward — craving the treat or the feeling of accomplishment — and there will be a measurable neurological impulse to lace up your jogging shoes each morning."

This is what I did by setting up my "bike knitting", the sock I only knit on the bike. It's right there, where I can see it, and I want to finish it. I want the sock, and the way to get it is to ride the bike. It's slow, but it's working. Interesting, eh? I thought so! Do you have any examples of your own? Exercise or otherwise.