Tag: Routine

Categories
Aesthetics

Day 1263 and Hoe-flation

As I run out the clock on the last vestiges of my Covid infection (two fucking weeks give me a break), I’ve had the pleasure of being extremely online.

There has been a bit of a kerfuffle on the costs of being “a well kept cosmopolitan woman” with varying levels of push back that are functionally regurgitating the plot of The Devil Wears Prada.

Breakdown of the costs of a “well-maintained” attractive woman in a large U.S. city:
hair: $400/every 2-3 months at least
facials: $200-300/mnth
fitness: $200-400/mnth
cosmetics: $100-300/mnth
nails: $100+/mnth
brows: $15-40/mnth
waxing/laser: $100-$150/mnth
med spas: $1k/every 3 mnths at least
And doesn’t even include clothes or shoes!

Expressions of feminine presentation through grooming is what the academics like to call “contested space” but you can probably get the gist of how it through it by skimming Veblen, Baudrillard and old issues of Cosmopolitan.

Needless to say, most women are not $10,000 Instagram models, professional girlfriends, trophy wives or professionals in glamour industries. This spend is extreme and for people who life off their image.

I’ve been a peon in the image business and I’ve been a girlboss and it’s a bit exhausting if you are not young, naturally beautifully or able to afford the upkeep. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it. I’ve watched many rounds of influencer burnout. I am blessed with good skin, good hair, the knowledge of my professional background and cosmetology school, and I have money to spend on myself.

Hair: $80 2x a year
Facials: $0
Fitness: $0 on gym or classes but we do have a barn squat rack & a mortgage
Cosmetics: $100-200 a month it’s my hobby & former profession
Nails: $50 for pedicures 6x
Brows: $0
Waxing: $90 4x year
Med Spa: Botox $220 every 120 days

I am myself in the middle ground of expensive personal presentation. I like everything about cosmetics from makeup to haircare. I posted my own breakdown above and it’s about $250 a month.

I don’t dye or heat style my hair, I am not heathy enough to be a gym rat (I wish I was), I get pedicures because it’s hard to do my own with my spinal problems but don’t get my nails done, I wax downstairs for personal preferences, I love skincare and at 40 it seemed time to get a light dose of Botox seasonally.

Which is in my book quite a bit of money to spend on appearances. It’s the opulence I allow myself on the other side of some financial success and I justify it by saying it’s worthwhile to keep up on my old industry.

My husband says it’s mostly an excuse to buy makeup I’ll never wear and he is naturally quite right. It’s a hobby like any other. I’m glad I can justify it for work though.

Social media comparisons for lifestyles that are simply beyond most people’s reach shouldn’t be considered aspirational. My spending should level not considered aspirational on this either if I’m candid. I could easily get away with less and look good.

The good news is that for bargain hunters who want to combat hoe-flation costs in their life is that we’ve never had better access to quality grooming. We have cheap actives brands like the Inky List and the Ordinary, access to the best Korean biochemists, and excellent buyers clubs.

It’s never been easier or cheaper to learn to be well groomed. I very much advocate for looking your best as it reflects a commitment to caring for yourself and your body. Just don’t get carried away when a $16 product can do the job of the $200 one ok? Ask me if you need advice on what to buy.

Categories
Travel

Day 1240 and Speedrun

I have this habit when I’m abroad of packing in an impossible number of things during my last few days on a given trip.

I don’t go in much for shorter style week long travel, rather I tend to stay places for a month or more. I’ve done this in Germany, the Baltics and the Balkans with a lot of success.

I find a lot of the active ways people do things like corporate retreats and vacations to be too much. A week of intensity is just too much for me.

I’d rather keep a nice routine and work my way through a place at the pace of living. I love a rhythm. My health is always better when I give myself plenty of time to sleep.

But occasionally when the clock is ticking I’ll leap into a speedrun. Two or three days of intensity lets me go as hard as I can and then sleep it off for a few days. If I went that hard for longer I’d probably need way more downtime.

It’s nice to go hard. It is ironically the best way I’ve found to otherwise go very slowly and deliberately in my life. The marathon of life takes stamina but the occasional accelerated speedrun is fun too.

Categories
Biohacking Medical

Day 1229 and Hormones

I was pleased to wake up to a near perfect recovery score on my Whoop today. Because I manage a few chronic health issues I am a bit of a stereotypical biohacker type.

I happen to be rounding the corner into my best two weeks of the month and am seeing my biometrics improve.

While it’s fun to joke about moody women, I sometimes wonder if we’ve done ourselves a disservice by insisting that our hormonal rhythms be kept outside of polite conversation.

It’s not any fairer to men to keep discussions hormonal health quiet. Culture war nonsense aside, one of our major health systems surely deserves more public discussion and advancement.

As if the bounds of social propriety simply cannot accommodate anyone discussing say the follicular phase for women or what men can do to increase testosterone. Our fucked fertility deserves better than polite Victorian euphemisms.

If you aren’t sure about the state of your hormones and feel as if you could be in better health consider this permission to learn more about yourself. Your body deserves your self knowledge.

Categories
Emotional Work

Day 1226 and Integrating

I am meant to be wrapping up a personal development course today. It has been a more intense experience than I expected.

I am quite tired and am considering simply skipping the final sessions “integration” for a nap.

I am sure I could pass on it without consequence and maybe I’d even be better off if I did so. I am beyond exhausted from the week and the experience.

My hope is that I can hold myself together and simply disappear for a long sleep. What better way to integrate than through being unconscious?

Categories
Chronicle

Day 1218 and Start Stop

When you have to “make the most of something” you’ve already done some calculus of personal expectations. I know I will have try to pack as much into a trip to balance out the various costs of travel. It’s not always financial as time, emotions, and focus all have value in your life.

If you have too much variability across these costs or can be hard to justify against your personal expectations. I’ve been known to run as fast as I can once I’m in motion because I believe acceleration is more expensive than stasis. That’s not always true obviously as staying in the same place can be very expensive.

So when I stop-start through life I hope I’m not making the ride more uncomfortable simply because I can’t manage the fuel calculations. Being fueled to make the best of a situation means being prepared.

In other news, I didn’t eat lunch before I ran some errands and I regret it because everything always takes longer than you expect.

Categories
Internet Culture Reading

Day 1208 and 16 Years

I don’t recall exactly when I first began using WordPress. If memory serves, it was a friend James in the philosophy department at my university who set up and hosted my first blog sometime around 2003. Eventually I went out on my own.

While I’ve only been writing on JFredrickson.com for 1208 days (ha only) the current account I’ve been using since 2008 has an anniversary today.

Happy Anniversary with WordPress.com! You registered on WordPress.com 16 years ago. Thanks for flying with us. Keep up the good blogging.

I’m delighted to be a long time user of the service. I believe in the value of open source software and the stewardship of Matt Mullenweg. While there are plenty of other social media platforms where I can reach an audience no one has earned my trust like WordPress. II use many other content management systems, social media accounts and the like but for my own identity under my own control nothing else compares.

Categories
Emotional Work Travel

Day 1203 and Flow

I don’t quite know how I managed to settle into a flow state but I’ve been listening to American classic rock from sixties & seventies and just being in my body today.

The excuse for focusing on chores and what is in front of me preparing for a spring print. I’m packing for some travel and doing spring cleaning.

What I’m really doing is as a form of physical somatic integration as I’ve been throwing back more information than I thought I could handle. Or to put it simply, I’m noodling on shit. My mind is compiling.

I do prioritize nervous system regulation but even with a full toolkit of techniques I could feel the strain before I hit this flow state. It was time to breakthrough or breakdown.

I feel as if I’ve broken through to flow. There was no breakdown. I leaned into the turn. And it feels great.

I am intaking as much information as I ever have in my professional adult life. Maybe university study is a close second but I have a foundation of knowledge now that obviously I didn’t have twenty years ago. That foundation has given me more mental agility that I expected to have in middle age candidly.

I expect whatever the end process of this synthesis will show itself when it’s ready and I shall cultivate this playful ease. I trust myself to find the way through.

Categories
Chronicle

Day 1200 and Nice Round Numbers

Even after twelve hundred days of writing every single day I still get great pleasure from seeing a nice round number when it comes around. I don’t have anything grand to say this far into the experiment except that it’s good to have consistent habits.

There is a category of the extremely online that subscribes to “nothing ever happens” but you find if you journal long enough that quite a bit happens all the time. It’s not so much that “it’s happening” but rather that life continues to find a way.

Things fall apart but so do they come together. The round numbers of consistency are m simply reminder to myself that taking action is what makes your life come together.

Categories
Biohacking Emotional Work

Day 1181 and Up All Night To Get Lucky

I’m in a new and odd pattern of activity recently. I maintain a flow like hyper awareness on my rotation of professional obligations with little sleep for two or three days. Then I break to sleep with as little movement or energy expenditure as I can manage for full day. It seems to be working for me.

I would prefer to call this approach “fits and spurts” or “the lion hunts when it’s hungry” but that sounds more like a behavioral problem than a protocol. Which, given the endemic narrative civil wars against empiricism in the N of 1 gym bros, seems about right aesthetically. Experimenting with your body is your right.

I have made many shitpoasts about this culture after yesterday New York Magazine “are we having unrealistic expectations about the same traumatized dude” essay. I don’t know anyone involved in that particular situation but I take lots of biohacking tips from broken people because I am also broken. Physician heal thyself. Biohacker hack thine own protocol and or behavioral problem.

So any distinction between a protocol and a behavioral problem is perhaps unnecessary except for optics. We can do a wash coating of public relations speak but it’s a virtue to seek to serve your gifts while carrying your sins. I personally advocate for a minimum viable approach to this but omnia vanitas

We do what we can to fix and accept parts of ourselves that we cannot live with and pray we find wisdom as we accept our own hypocrisy and failures. I hope that I do less harm to others and most especially less harm myself. I do not accept any type of coercion I didn’t choose myself. Neither should you. Don’t ride any dicks unless that’s what you like.

Categories
Aesthetics Homesteading

Day 1179 and All Good Seasons

While the Spring equinox has come to pass, we have had a couple late snowstorms this week in Montana. I am always wishing we’d get just a few more weeks of winter. It’s my favorite season here.

Of course, there are no bad seasons to be had in the Gallatin Valley if your preference is dry, crisp and bright. It’s never too wet or too dreary here. Our mountains feel close to the sun at our altitude. Maybe some of April qualify as the muddy season but the sun is our friend here.

Our summers are long and bright with intermittent thunderstorms. Our winters are cold, snowy but most crucially sunny. We get 300 days of sun on average a year in Bozeman.

Something about the Southwest Rocky Mountains in Montana keeps them from the unfortunate damp wetness of the rainy Pacific Northwest forests that begin closer to Missoula on towards Washington.

Alex standing in front of our solar array

The sunniness has made our solar grid in the front pasture particularly efficient for us.

Already melting into nothing

Just a few hours ago it was snowing fluffy powder. The sun is already melting it away within hours as the clouds pass over the foothills and the sun begins to shine again.