The lifestyle, hobbies, and fun thread.

[REV5028]

I recently realized that yoga is a very cool activity

Ever had a Thai massage? It's like they do yoga TO you. 12/10 would recommend.

 

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[YanC]

So I'm just back from a trip in the USA... What a blast ! Everything feels so huge. So many beautiful places to explore. We are used to moutains here but the scale is so much bigger there, and we don't have these amazing desertic landscapes. As soon as you're out of the big cities it feels like the country is empty. Talking about cities, I'm not one to enjoy them but spending a couple nights in Vegas was definitely worth it. What the hell is this place guys ?! America at its finest . I found people to be friendly and chill. You guys have a funny way of randomly talking to each other anywhere, that really doesn't happen in France. Service is generally of higher quality than here, might have to do with the fact that waiters for example have to kind of earn their thing. On the down and sad side, obesity is SO damn bad...
The national parks are definitely very touristy, but as expected being there in late summer / early autumn plus being willing to wake up early and hike a bit made the crowds very much thinner. The only place I really felt trapped in mass tourism has been the Horseshoe bend and Antelope canyon (I hesitated a lot but finally went. I'm glad I dit, it really is something special to witness. I wouldn't do it again though).

Thanks @MJ DeMarco and @SteveO for the advice a couple months ago regarding phone service. The only place where it's been a little bit challenging was the Yellowstone and Yosemite, but even there it wasn't too hard to find a spot with service to make sure everything was running smoothly at home. Tagging @Runum who helped as well and asked for pictures, so here is a very short selection of them.



Can't wait for the next one, I'm looking at you Alaska !

Have a great day everyone.

 

[OMDA]

I finally got a good turn on video. A buddy had setup a camera and I turned around it.

It took quite some time to learn how to do this. It's a delicate act of keeping the foil high enough so that you don't slow down and stop flying, and low enough so that you don't get it out of the water and come crashing down. And you need to step on the other side of the board and flip the sail at the right time...not easy.

View attachment aFoilingJibe.mp4

 

[Ayush6543]

So I'm just back from a trip in the USA... What a blast ! Everything feels so huge. So many beautiful places to explore. We are used to moutains here but the scale is so much bigger there, and we don't have these amazing desertic landscapes. As soon as you're out of the big cities it feels like the country is empty. Talking about cities, I'm not one to enjoy them but spending a couple nights in Vegas was definitely worth it. What the hell is this place guys ?! America at its finest . I found people to be friendly and chill. You guys have a funny way of randomly talking to each other anywhere, that really doesn't happen in France. Service is generally of higher quality than here, might have to do with the fact that waiters for example have to kind of earn their thing. On the down and sad side, obesity is SO damn bad...
The national parks are definitely very touristy, but as expected being there in late summer / early autumn plus being willing to wake up early and hike a bit made the crowds very much thinner. The only place I really felt trapped in mass tourism has been the Horseshoe bend and Antelope canyon (I hesitated a lot but finally went. I'm glad I dit, it really is something special to witness. I wouldn't do it again though).

Thanks @MJ DeMarco and @SteveO for the advice a couple months ago regarding phone service. The only place where it's been a little bit challenging was the Yellowstone and Yosemite, but even there it wasn't too hard to find a spot with service to make sure everything was running smoothly at home. Tagging @Runum who helped as well and asked for pictures, so here is a very short selection of them.

View attachment 51831 View attachment 51832 View attachment 51833View attachment 51834 View attachment 51835 View attachment 51836

Can't wait for the next one, I'm looking at you Alaska !

Have a great day everyone.

Bruh, the pics look fake. Are you really this awesome of a photographer?

 

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[YanC]

Bruh, the pics look fake. Are you really this awesome of a photographer?

Well I'll take this as a compliment Photography is a hobby of mine indeed.

 

[socaldude]

Well I'll take this as a compliment Photography is a hobby of mine indeed.

What kind of camera and lens did you use? I have a Sony A7iii with a 2nd generation OSS 70-200 telephoto lens.

I would love to visit France one day. I taught myself some French to read the works of one of my favorite French philosophers; Gilles Deleuze.

 

[YanC]

What kind of camera and lens did you use? I have a Sony A7iii with a 2nd generation OSS 70-200 telephoto lens.

I would love to visit France one day. I taught myself some French to read the works of one of my favorite French philosophers; Gilles Deleuze.

I shoot a Nikon D850. For landscapes, I use a 16-35 F4 and a 70-200 F4, and also have a cheap and light 50mm in my bag in case the scene happens to fall somewhere in between. For wildlife, I have a Tamron 150-600 G2. I'm looking at grabbing one of these incredible 400 F2.8 plus a converter to turn it into a (quasi) 600 F4, but they are not easy to find ! I believe there is a significant learning curve before using them properly too, which is interesting but has to be taken in consideration.

Those mirror less cameras such as the one you have look excellent, in 3 to 5 years +/-, I'll probably sell my gear to upgrade to a Nikon Z8 and equivalent lenses. What kind of photography do you do ?

Really cool that you're interested in France ! Don't hesitate to hit me up if you ever make it happen, I'll be glad to meet up and show you around my little corner of the world. I'm not familiar with Deleuze but you'll tell me more about it haha.

 

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[Antifragile]

A little fog rolled in, our usual walk was amazing! The views, even the smell of the sea - all amplified.

 

[MTF]

Today I passed AIDA 3 Advanced Freediver certification. I've been training for it the last few weeks here in Greece and it was my goal for this year.

The requirements were:

• 24 meters constant weight dive (kicking with your fins and then freefall). I did nice relaxed 25 meters. This one stressed me a lot because I often have issues with my ears that make diving difficult. Thankfully they worked fine during the course.
• 2:45 static breath hold (without moving). I did 2:54 which was pretty good considering I hadn't trained it in a long time.
• 55 meters dynamic apnea which is swimming underwater on one breath with your fins. This one was extremely hard as I trained this discipline maybe 3 times in my life and it's the opposite of depth diving (as you need to work hard). The first three attempts I barely did 45 meters and couldn't go any longer. The fourth time I knew it was probably the last time I could do it relatively fresh so I pushed myself to the limit and did 57 meters, suffering A LOT during the last 10 meters.

In addition to that, there were other tasks like getting back to the surface from 15 meters using only your arms, rescue protocols, etc. plus a theory exam.

It's a significant achievement for me because when I started freediving 2 years ago, I was terrible at it. Extremely terrible. I suffered a lot and struggled to imagine myself ever getting past the initial hurdles.

Every beginner was easily diving to 10-15 meters and I couldn't even dive a few meters. I had no idea how to equalize my ears and nobody could help me. I was even told by one (terrible) instructor that he had never met such an untalented person.

I repeatedly injured my ears, had terrible vertigo, felt like suffocating underwater, had severe headaches after, etc. It wasn't pretty and I questioned my commitment to the sport multiple times.

But I never stopped trying and eventually found the right instructors who have helped me get past all these blocks.

My long-term goal is to pass instructor certification (AIDA 4 Master Freediver prepares for the role of an assistant, then the next step is a tough instructor course). It's not necessarily to teach others but to prove to myself that I can start from absolute zero, be absolutely shit in something, and persevere to become good at it.

As a side note, the first time I heard about freediving was through James Nestor's book Deep. I remember thinking "these guys are F*cking nuts. I'd never do it." And now I'm one of them and I love it.

As a secondary side note, the place where I freedive is one of the top places in the world to train. I got to see a female champion attempting a 100-meter dive and there's even a guy who's 69 whose record is 78 meters (and he started freediving when he was in his fifties).

 

[Robdavis]

Today I passed AIDA 3 Advanced Freediver certification. I've been training for it the last few weeks here in Greece and it was my goal for this year.

The requirements were:

• 24 meters constant weight dive (kicking with your fins and then freefall). I did nice relaxed 25 meters. This one stressed me a lot because I often have issues with my ears that make diving difficult. Thankfully they worked fine during the course.
• 2:45 static breath hold (without moving). I did 2:54 which was pretty good considering I hadn't trained it in a long time.
• 55 meters dynamic apnea which is swimming underwater on one breath with your fins. This one was extremely hard as I trained this discipline maybe 3 times in my life and it's the opposite of depth diving (as you need to work hard). The first three attempts I barely did 45 meters and couldn't go any longer. The fourth time I knew it was probably the last time I could do it relatively fresh so I pushed myself to the limit and did 57 meters, suffering A LOT during the last 10 meters.

In addition to that, there were other tasks like getting back to the surface from 15 meters using only your arms, rescue protocols, etc. plus a theory exam.

It's a significant achievement for me because when I started freediving 2 years ago, I was terrible at it. Extremely terrible. I suffered a lot and struggled to imagine myself ever getting past the initial hurdles.

Every beginner was easily diving to 10-15 meters and I couldn't even dive a few meters. I had no idea how to equalize my ears and nobody could help me. I was even told by one (terrible) instructor that he had never met such an untalented person.

I repeatedly injured my ears, had terrible vertigo, felt like suffocating underwater, had severe headaches after, etc. It wasn't pretty and I questioned my commitment to the sport multiple times.

But I never stopped trying and eventually found the right instructors who have helped me get past all these blocks.

My long-term goal is to pass instructor certification (AIDA 4 Master Freediver prepares for the role of an assistant, then the next step is a tough instructor course). It's not necessarily to teach others but to prove to myself that I can start from absolute zero, be absolutely shit in something, and persevere to become good at it.

As a side note, the first time I heard about freediving was through James Nestor's book Deep. I remember thinking "these guys are F*cking nuts. I'd never do it." And now I'm one of them and I love it.

As a secondary side note, the place where I freedive is one of the top places in the world to train. I got to see a female champion attempting a 100-meter dive and there's even a guy who's 69 whose record is 78 meters (and he started freediving when he was in his fifties).

^^^^^^^^^^
This just sounds like the most incredible achievement.

AFAIK freediving takes massive physiological conditioning to be able to do.

Well done, you are such an inspiration to everyone on the forum.

Thank you for being here and posting this.

 

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[MTF]

This just sounds like the most incredible achievement.

Thank you. It was a difficult challenge for me but I'd say that for an average person who didn't start with such issues as I have, it's not that huge of an achievement. With proper training, most people can easily get to 25 meters probably within a few months of training (I needed more time as I can't dive where I live half of the year).

AFAIK freediving takes massive physiological conditioning to be able to do.

It takes way more conditioning when you go past 30 meters of depth because then you're diving below your lungs' residual volume (the amount of air that remains in your lungs and trachea after a maximum exhale).

At 30 meters, the volume of your lungs is four times lower than on surface. This means your chest is super compressed and you need to progress very slowly and carefully. For example, a fast turn at 30 meters can already result in so-called lung squeeze, which is a pressure-related injury of your lungs that takes from weeks to months to recover from.

But overall, freediving is fascinating because it's - to my knowledge - the only activity where it only works if you're relaxed (this primarily applies to depth freediving, for dynamic it's more of a workout).

You can't push hard. Quite the contrary, you have to completely relax, let go, have zero expectations and the less you care, the better you dive.

You can't ignore the pain because it's a guaranteed injury then. There's no acting like a tough guy in freediving. Water doesn't like cockiness.

You should never be uncomfortable because at best it'll result in an unpleasant dive (which can then ruin the session because the mental aspect is 99% of success) and at worst will lead to an injury.

I've tried various types of meditation but nothing comes close to the meditation on steroids you get underwater. During the best, most relaxed and nicest dives you feel like you could go asleep underwater. You feel so gloriously relaxed that all worries completely evaporate.

I highly recommend watching William Trubridge's talk on freediving (at 4:45 he also does a great visual demonstration on what happens in your torso at depth):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MZetpFw7qY

 

[Jrjohnny]

I recently went on a camping trip for the first time.

We left Wednesday morning, and came back just after lunch today.

They made us go outside for most of the day, I loved it.

I’ve never breathed in so much nature air.

We would be gone for 8 hours on end, with only 10 minutes of a break in between every 2 hours.

We weren’t allowed our phones unless it was downtime.

Our supervisor came in at 10 pm to collect our phones and lights out.

He would wake us up at 6:30 am

I was dreaming, all I remember was:

*lights on*

EBOLA EBOLA EBOLA WHAT DOES THE FOX SAY ITS TIME TO WAKEY WAKEY EGGS AND BAKEY

*door closes*

Anyways, all jokes aside, the food was great.

We did a huge bon fire for about 120 minutes, just sung songs together.


I’ve never been so calmed down before. Being in Nature and socializing for hours without technology on end does something to you.

Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures.

Best experience ever.

 

[BizyDad]

I enjoy going to new cities and checking out their museums.

Here are a few from Boston's Fine Art Museum.

 

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[BizyDad]

Built a new fire pit with the kids and put it/them to work cleaning up some backyard debris.

Hey, Fastlane isn't always about how you spend your money, right?

 

[msufan]

Hey, Fastlane isn't always about how you spend your money, right?

Fastlane is primarily about having the time to do stuff like be with your kids if you ask me.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

We have a new puppy and he loves watching television. He recognizes dogs, cats, and intently watches like humans watch a Super Bowl.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Wynn only has em at +3000, nearly half the return.

I took the Bills which is not considered a flier. The Jazz or Pelicans for the NBA championship, the DBacks for the World Series.

Now I remember why I don't gamble regularly and make sports bets, as soon as I posted a bet on the DiamondBacks to win the World Series, they lost 5 straight games.

Please allow me to jinx myself...

 

[Johnny boy]

View attachment copy_20385FA7-9DAD-4EBA-902C-ED0694CE7B20.mov

 

[MTF]

I'm getting too old for long flights.

I had two flights yesterday. One 2 hours and then a long haul one for 10 hours. In a seat like this:



Apart from the already booked return flight from this trip I don't think I'll do such long flights again as the health impact is too much.

I'll limit myself to at most 6-7 hours of flying a day and break down any longer trip into a few days with stopovers for recovery.

I can't understand how people can manage 12-hour plus flights.

 

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[Ing]

I'm getting too old for long flights.

I had two flights yesterday. One 2 hours and then a long haul one for 10 hours. In a seat like this:

View attachment 52320

Apart from the already booked return flight from this trip I don't think I'll do such long flights again as the health impact is too much.

I'll limit myself to at most 6-7 hours of flying a day and break down any longer trip into a few days with stopovers for recovery.

I can't understand how people can manage 12-hour plus flights.

When booking, I book the seats, where the emergancy exit is. Ther is a hand broad more place.

 

[MTF]

When booking, I book the seats, where the emergancy exit is. Ther is a hand broad more place.

Yes I sometimes do that. This time I was booking through a Dutch airline and the website was in Dutch which I don't speak. I didn't notice the seat selection thinking I could do it when checking in. And then I was randomly assigned this one.

But I still spend at least 10-20 minutes each hour standing up. Despite that, I still suffer a lot, also due to super dry air. My body also doesn't tolerate prolonged sitting, no matter if an emergency exit or a regular one.

Better airlines like Qatar are way more comfortable. TUI is a shitty vacation airline I'll avoid from now on.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I'm getting too old for long flights.

I had two flights yesterday. One 2 hours and then a long haul one for 10 hours. In a seat like this:

View attachment 52320

Apart from the already booked return flight from this trip I don't think I'll do such long flights again as the health impact is too much.

I'll limit myself to at most 6-7 hours of flying a day and break down any longer trip into a few days with stopovers for recovery.

I can't understand how people can manage 12-hour plus flights.

The answer to this is to make more money so you can afford business class, first class, or private.

I refuse to fly anywhere packed in a box like a sardine. I pay the price, or I don't fly.

 

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[Kak]

The answer to this is to make more money so you can afford business class, first class, or private.

I refuse to fly anywhere packed in a box like a sardine. I pay the price, or I don't fly.

I have always considered commercial air travel almost completely intolerable.

First class helps, but it's still a bad experience.

It will ultimately have to be private.

 

[Fox]

Today I passed AIDA 3 Advanced Freediver certification. I've been training for it the last few weeks here in Greece and it was my goal for this year.

The requirements were:

• 24 meters constant weight dive (kicking with your fins and then freefall). I did nice relaxed 25 meters. This one stressed me a lot because I often have issues with my ears that make diving difficult. Thankfully they worked fine during the course.
• 2:45 static breath hold (without moving). I did 2:54 which was pretty good considering I hadn't trained it in a long time.
• 55 meters dynamic apnea which is swimming underwater on one breath with your fins. This one was extremely hard as I trained this discipline maybe 3 times in my life and it's the opposite of depth diving (as you need to work hard). The first three attempts I barely did 45 meters and couldn't go any longer. The fourth time I knew it was probably the last time I could do it relatively fresh so I pushed myself to the limit and did 57 meters, suffering A LOT during the last 10 meters.

In addition to that, there were other tasks like getting back to the surface from 15 meters using only your arms, rescue protocols, etc. plus a theory exam.

It's a significant achievement for me because when I started freediving 2 years ago, I was terrible at it. Extremely terrible. I suffered a lot and struggled to imagine myself ever getting past the initial hurdles.

Every beginner was easily diving to 10-15 meters and I couldn't even dive a few meters. I had no idea how to equalize my ears and nobody could help me. I was even told by one (terrible) instructor that he had never met such an untalented person.

I repeatedly injured my ears, had terrible vertigo, felt like suffocating underwater, had severe headaches after, etc. It wasn't pretty and I questioned my commitment to the sport multiple times.

But I never stopped trying and eventually found the right instructors who have helped me get past all these blocks.

My long-term goal is to pass instructor certification (AIDA 4 Master Freediver prepares for the role of an assistant, then the next step is a tough instructor course). It's not necessarily to teach others but to prove to myself that I can start from absolute zero, be absolutely shit in something, and persevere to become good at it.

As a side note, the first time I heard about freediving was through James Nestor's book Deep. I remember thinking "these guys are F*cking nuts. I'd never do it." And now I'm one of them and I love it.

As a secondary side note, the place where I freedive is one of the top places in the world to train. I got to see a female champion attempting a 100-meter dive and there's even a guy who's 69 whose record is 78 meters (and he started freediving when he was in his fifties).

So cool - amazing!

Has this improved your lung capacity in other ways also - like running or training.

I guess water confidence for surfing is way up too.

 

[MitchC]

The answer to this is to make more money so you can afford business class, first class, or private.

I refuse to fly anywhere packed in a box like a sardine. I pay the price, or I don't fly.

Credit card points from turning over heaps in your business is even better because you don’t even have to pay for it

Your only problem is what do I use all these points for

I guess having so much money your only problem is what do I do with it all is better but hey I’m no where near that yet and can fly business with points

 

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[MTF]

The answer to this is to make more money so you can afford business class, first class, or private.

I refuse to fly anywhere packed in a box like a sardine. I pay the price, or I don't fly.

I could afford business class but I would feel like I'm greatly overpaying for it because usually it costs something ridiculous, like at least 5x more. If it was double then that would be more sensible.

But that might just be another mental block to overcome as I love traveling and it would be nice to not feel like shit after a long flight (though I doubt there's any difference in humidity levels in business class or the general impact of sitting so much).

Private sounds beautiful but it scares me. Most accidents happen on private planes while commercial is over 200x safer.

 

[MTF]

So cool - amazing!

Has this improved your lung capacity in other ways also - like running or training.

I guess water confidence for surfing is way up too.

I haven't yet surfed since this. I'm currently in the Caribbean about to start training again tomorrow but there's no surfing here so I won't be able to tell until next year when I might go somewhere where I can surf.

As for running, I haven't run since then, either.

Training wise, I do a kettlebell workout now but I'm not sure if it affects this. The mechanics are different.

When you lift weights, you have all the oxygen you want and you take relatively shallow breaths, not proper full diving breaths. For freediving you only take one big breath and that's it.

One huge improvement I did notice is general mindfulness throughout the day as well as the ability to reduce my stress levels through proper breathing.

 

[AppleTree]

I have just started participating in NaNoWriMo and began writing my 50K novel. Currently 4,500 words in and I am committed to finishing this as I already have an outline and ending thought out.

 

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[MTF]

There are some days when I wake up and can't believe how lucky I am to live such a lifestyle. All thanks to @MJ DeMarco, the Fastlane and this forum.

Today I had a freediving session at a huge wreck in Bonaire. I saw a ridiculously huge tarpon that looked like a shark from above (but also formidable when I was close to it even though it's not dangerous).

I also got some awesome pictures.

 

[Kak]

I could afford business class but I would feel like I'm greatly overpaying for it because usually it costs something ridiculous, like at least 5x more. If it was double then that would be more sensible.

But that might just be another mental block to overcome as I love traveling and it would be nice to not feel like shit after a long flight (though I doubt there's any difference in humidity levels in business class or the general impact of sitting so much).

Private sounds beautiful but it scares me. Most accidents happen on private planes while commercial is over 200x safer.

View attachment 52325

This is misleading because the private category includes a full spectrum planes and operators.

This means the statistic includes new pilots in single engine piston planes. Many of which don't even have an instrument rating. They are the vast majority of crashes.

A you can rest assured a NetJets Gulfstream or Challenger are going to just as safe as commercial with a much reduced chance of infectious meningitis.