Archive for March, 2006
New Car!
Wow, it’s been a while since I last posted. I haven’t had much to discuss, but I’m going to try to update at least a few times this week.
The news is that I’m finally getting a better car. I’m picking up a 92 Eagle Talon TSi AWD this week. It’s setup for street and SCCA STX autocross racing. I’ll finally have something fun again. I’m setting up a new company, Perfect Apex Racing LLC. The car will be owned by the company and the goal is to get sponsorship. More details to follow soon, including a sponsorship proposal.
Book Review: “Fooled By Randomness”
I picked up “Fooled by Randomness” by Nassim Nicholas Taleb at the store about a month ago. While looking for a mathematical options trading book (big surprise, not found) this caught my eye. Randomness has always interested me so when I found a book in the trading section about it I couldn’t pass it up.
A Week’s Sleep In Review
This week’s sleeping went quite well. There were oversleeps here and there but overall I’m satisfied. Both school days went perfectly as did last night. Tonight should also go well. What I’ve found is that with the 2 core naps I can skip a 25 min nap when necessary and still function fine. However, the likelyhood of my oversleeping at my next nap in this situation is very high. When I do follow it and take all of my naps oversleeping either doesn’t happen or is much shorter.
Server Downtime
I apologize if anyone could not reach my site tonight. Come to find out a UPS went down at the datacenter and the server was down for 8 hours. My hosting company never contacted me about it. Just as I closed a chat with tech support the server came back up.
This was the only hardware failure downtime the server has had since I aquired it. I’ve had no complaints up to this point. I understand that hardware failures happen but when a server is down for this long a hosting company should email their clients to let them know. I will be sending them a nasty gram tomorrow.
New Goal: Ambidexterity
Finally, a new goal! While simple, this one is not easy to achieve.
In 6 months I can write at a normal speed with acceptable penmanship using my right hand.
Bean and Shrimp Tomato Soup
This recipe is easy to make, tastes great, and is good for you just like everything else I make 
It is a bit costly due to the shrimp and the number of other ingredients. If you don’t like shrimp you can substitute chicken. However, the shrimp complements the bean flavor very well. If you want to cut down on the cost you can do 50/50 chicken/shrimp.
Note: I only list brand names because that’s what I used. Other brands are fine, but the nutrition information may be off slightly.
Ingredients
- 28oz can Hunt’s Whole Tomatoes
Trading Update
I haven’t posted any trading updates in a while so here it goes. I’ve been trading a simple volatility strategy on a forex demo account with great success. The account is up close to 10% in about a week! The way the system works is that it takes small gains from low level randomized movement. Most losses are quite a bit larger (stoploss is 5-10x the take profit), but since wins are so frequent they offset losses and then some.
Workout Now!
I’ve now been working out for 3 weeks straight and I feel great. I’ve been pretty surprised at how well I can run, considering I haven’t done any aerobic exercise in years. I think I can probably make my goal of a 8.5 min mile now, but I haven’t tried yet. I tend to do 8.7-9 min miles and run for 10-15 minutes.
Lifting is also going well. After this week I’m upping the level on almost all machines and free weights. I took out my tape measure and found small but measureable results on a few different muscles.
Healthy Chicken Chili with cornbread
Here’s a recipe for chicken chili that I’ve developed. The resulting chili is very healthy (protein, carbs, and fat well balanced) and tastes great.
Ingredients
1.5 lb fresh chicken breast
28 oz can of crushed tomatos
15.25 oz can of Golden Sweet corn
16 oz can of Bush’s Chili Beans in hot sauce
1 bag Carroll Shelby’s Chili Kit (or season to your own liking, this just makes it faster and easier)
5 Jalapeno Peppers
3 Habanero Pepper (if you like your chili mild reduce to 1 or remove all)
1 Publano Pepper
1 Med to large white onion
2 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp olive oil
1/3 cup malt vinegar
Cheapest 40oz malt beverage you can find, typically Old English or Magnum 40.
Sleep Pattern This
It seems that I may have finally found a sleep pattern that works for me. It goes as follows:
Naps:
1AM – 2:30AM
5AM – 6:30AM
1PM – 1:25PM
5PM – 5:25PM
9PM – 9:25PM
Total sleep time of 4 hours 15 minutes. I have been doing this for a few days now and have found that it works very well. I’m not tired and my naps can be very flexible without worrying about them. The 9PM nap often becomes 10PM or 11PM without a problem.