I accomplished just about everything I wanted to accomplish for the year, and then some. This is good, because I'm feeling the urgency and going all-in on working to reduce catastrophic AI risk from this point on. Having hit many highlights and capped off some long-term goals, I'm satisfied with Life and ready to defend it.
Last year's Mount Baker climb was a technical, tough trudge. This year we did a fun family frolic to Baker Lake, bringing Max and Clark for their first backpacking trip and getting my dad in on the action. Very chill, with a mountain lake meteoric stargazing session that blew Max's mind and will remain a core memory for me.
This year's hiking banter flowed freely and wasn't entirely centered on AI doom and what to do about it. The trip was a poignant break after a period of intense work, where almost every week this year has been noticeably crazier than the last, because after going deep into discussions on moral duty and the state of AI, I decided to increase the pace of work even further. Gotta try my best to avert some catastrophes, you know. Next year's hike feels eons away, but it's something worth fighting for.
This was my best training year ever, continuing with my online coach. I continued my cut through December, where I hit 7.5% body fat at 134.2 lbs (way past my <10% goal), then bulked through July, peaking at 160.4 lbs and 15.3%, training strength 5-6 hours a week consistently and cardio 1.5 hours a week for most of it. Bulking was less efficient than I'd hoped, and I'm cutting again, down to 149.1 lbs and 11.9%. A lot of effort to go through for just +5 lbs lean mass since last October at the same body fat, so I'm going to finish this cut and stay lean, reallocating more of my workout time to other pursuits. This is enough for me; I don't need to get any more jacked when other matters are this urgent. Since August, I've already reduced workouts to 4 hours of strength per week and no cardio apart from what I get on my incline treadmill during meetings.
Even though body composition only improved slowly since December, my lifts have gone way up. Tonal strength score went from 1506 to 1938, blowing past my goal of 1600, in part because Tonal 2 lets me lift heavier (max weight is 250 lbs, up from 200 lbs) and I got lifting straps to help with my grip. When I had written my book in 2013, I had wanted to try to get my bench from 150 to 210 and only gotten it to 190; later when I did my powerlifting competition with my dad in 2019, I got to 195. I found some free weights last month and realized I'm already at 215! I was probably a bit higher in July at my heaviest, when I hit a set 5% harder on Tonal than what I was doing in September. If I can maintain this as I cut 6 more pounds, it'll be 1.5x body weight. On deadlifts, I hesitate to try a really heavy free weight 1RM lift, but I can do 30 reps at 250 lbs on the Tonal cables with good form, so that's probably a lot more than my previous free weight deadlift of 5 reps at 305 lbs on a trap bar.
Strong enough, not much point to doing more.
On the cardio side, I had been training VO2 max separately with some HIIT and some zone 2 training on Peloton, but I ran out of time for it this summer. I was able to hit my VO2 max goal of 47.5 -> 50 mL/kg/min, hit 50.3 on last week's measurement. Cardio can also go in maintenance mode.
My fourth fitness goal was to strengthen my lower back through consistent stretching. I kept that up, had a couple minor flareups, but nothing like last year. This is dialed in now.
My fourth fitness goal was to strengthen my lower back through consistent stretching. I kept that up, had a couple minor flareups, but nothing like last year. This is dialed in now.
Overall stats:
Goals for next year:
Last year I had a big jump from 44 -> 60 push-ups and 21 -> 29 pull-ups as a result of the Tonal training. This year, I greased the groove with push-ups and pull-ups for the first five months and was able to make further progress, where I measured in June:
66 push-ups, +6: fast, strict, chin touching the ground.
33 pull-ups, +4: fast, no kipping, chin above bar (at 155 lbs).
I plan to re-test again soon when I'm fresh to see current amounts, but expect fewer, as I stopped greasing the groove in June. If these are my all-time records, I'll be happy with that.
Not so much reading this year. Not as low during the 2020-2021 crunch, but basically just did all the Dungeon Crawler Carl books over the winter, hit a couple other sci-fi books, and have only had time for AI safety news since the spring.
Today, I didn't have time to reread an old favorite. It's increasingly going to be like that, until maybe we all have lots of time on our hands.
Year Books Pages
2008 28 8,946
2009 18 7,244
2010 12 3,312
2011 16 6,469
2012 35 13,985
2013 33 11,760
2014 15 5,796
2015 30 18,694
2016 16 8,487
2017 17 6,824
2018 14 7,423
2019 21 13,901
2020 7 3,408
2021 3 1,538
2022 6 13,460
2023 22 17,459
2024 19 9,541
2025 20 12,070
2026 10 5,375 so far
Kids are continuing to be more fun the older they get. Ruby crossed her peak-fussiness four-year-old phase and has been much more delightful at five. Max at eleven and Clark at nine are both in a surprising stage where they seek my advice and listen carefully to what I say, which I'm enjoying while it lasts. Soccer in the park, practicing physics problems in the car, Minecraft on the weekend mornings, cooking crazy stuff together, getting pyromaniacal when the sun sets, reading my favorite books at bedtime... I'm steeping in all of it and wishing it would last.
Scheduled; will update when I get results.
Houses are expensive.
(If you're me, you get to see finance stats here. Since you're not me, you see nothing.)
Highest-ever choice reaction time (within noise); I fat-fingered the first few trials on Color-Word. Still no real sign of cognitive decline on these tests, perhaps as continued to be expected given last year's discussion of illusory age-related cognitive decline before your 60s-70s.
Chloe and the boys made me lobster ravioli with brown butter sauce, seared scallops, roasted brussel sprouts, and a Nick-friendly paleo version of French silk pie. WOW! It's basically the classic dinner from our favorite date night restaurant, but Chloe's lobster ravioli was somehow even better.
I set a lot of goals for the year across work, kids, marriage, writing, creative projects, fitness, finance, and AI safety impact. Most of them, I completely smashed, and I accomplished all of them except doing a long writing project.
I didn't list it last year, but I did the sensory deprivation float and a great session of Factorio 2 with the guys.
I didn't read the book this year, but I have hopes to get back to it next year...!