Ukulele Practice Everyday

Pretty sure I played ukulele every day in the last quarter.  On the days I didn't feel well, I played for 30 minutes or so and then shut it down.  On the really crazy days, I put in about 4 hours.

I can spend 20 minutes a day practicing a song that is only 2 minutes long and still not have mastery over it after a month.  And so, I have a lot of respect for people who make it look easy.

I've been recording video of my practices.  I was doing this selectively at first but found that I was too nervous about "getting it right" for video and it didn't feel natural.  So I decided to purchase an external 4TB USB drive and now I am recording nearly every minute of my practice.  I burned ~3.2GB of storage just yesterday.  It's an extravagant use of storage, but totally worth it and storage is cheap.

I posted 3 videos to my Youtube channel and 9 videos to my Instagram profile.  I've been embracing a mode of "Document, Don't Create" and it's a lot easier for me to just post something that has rough edges with that mindset.

The 50 songs project is going strong, albeit slowly.  I now have a combined 43 songs on my "accepted" and "active" lists.  The instrumental solo songs take a good bit longer to be able to play but are very rewarding.  I have found that most of my energy goes toward this and I am fine with slowing down the project for this purpose.  James Hill's site, The Ukulele Way has been the most important resource in my development during the last 90 days.

Also, I finished working my way through Harmony and Theory and I am now pursuing Ear Training during breakfast.

Physical Challenges

Q1 2017 presented a number of physical challenges for me.  A shoulder injury sustained while practicing Jiu Jitsu has made me reluctant to do pull-ups since January and those were a staple of my workouts.  So I've switched to resistance bands and I am doing my own rehab.  I can now do half height (to 90 degrees) pull-ups without too much distress.

And, just a month ago, I found out just how bad it is to add miles really quickly.  I ran so much I limped for a week.  So I put myself on the injured list and I will not be running either of the races I listed on Franco Now: 2017 1Q.  That being said, I did run with The Raven in Miami when I was there in January, so I had my fun.  I am still proud of most of my training but I am looking forward to taking a break from running to heal up.

Time Enough for Heinlein

I read a LOT of Heinlein.  Added many quotes to my Aphorisms page.  I think I've just about had enough of him.  So going to move on to other readings.  Dune perhaps.  And more Sanderson.

Strong Tech

My tech development went pretty well during Q1 2017.  I made a conscious effort to spend more time working on frontend Javascript/ReactJS/BootstrapCSS work and it has paid off nicely.

I have agreed to take on Scrum Master role for the team so I will have study up to understand how I can help the team to better organize and turn our hard lessons into new cultural practices.

And Other Things As Well

I hosted two WDS Local DC meetups.  I do a roll-call in the days before each to ensure a quorum before proceeding.  It works well enough.

I didn't do so well at contacting a friend each day but I feel like I did pretty well at keeping in touch with remote buddies.  I averaged a phone call with a long-distance friend about once every 2 weeks and even managed to get some people on/before their birthdays.

I started the process for becoming a volunteer with the County.  Going to try to focus on assisting Seniors with living during 2017.  And I am hoping that I can incorporate ukulele into this.