Goodbye Xcover, welcome Xcover

I sold my old phone the Samsung Galaxy Xcover and I bought the second version the Samsung Galaxy Xcover 2 :)

It's a rugged phone also, designed for active people. It is a big upgrade, the screen is much nicer and the hardware is better so it moves way faster than my old phone. The software improvement is huge also, the jump from the old 2.3.6(Gingerbread) android to 4.1(Jelly Bean) is like switching from Vista to Windows 7.

I like the new phone, it has a lot of nice new features and it's fast. The only thing I don't like is the camera button on the side, it doesn't feel as solid as the rest of the buttons and it makes a strange sound, all this because it has two positions (the first is for the focus) like on a usual photo camera.

Hopefully I will start writing an app soon for my home automation project.

It's Spring again!

Hooray, it's spring again!

Sunday I went for the first road ride with my road bike this year. It's so weird to go out on the road again after a long winter... These were my thought:

• this bike in so unstable (the same feeling every spring)
• help, I can't feel the bike
• this is too fast
• it't too cold
• it's too hot
• this bike is too big
• the bike is not comfortable
• the seat is bad
• my back is killing me
• my legs are on fire
• I need more training
• this is too hard
• need to pay more attention, I almost felt down
• I'm too tired, I want to go home

There were a lot of similar thought going threw my mind but overall it was a nice ride. Every Spring is hard to go out on the road again but I am looking forward to the next ride :)

Riding the bike to play some football

As I said some time ago I like to play football and I play football every week with my coworkers.

This was the first winter when we played indoors. The "problem" is that we don't play in the city and for me there is a 20 minutes bike ride before and after the one hour game. I use my city bike to go to play football and it is a heavy bike which needs a new transmission so that makes the ride even harder. I like to run a lot when I play football, that combined with the bike rides make a very good workout :)

Winter ride

Last Sunday I went for a ride in the forest. The weather was nice and there was a lot of snow. I was very excited because this was my first real snowy ride this winter.

My excitement turned into a struggle to move forward in the big and wet snow. I was moving as fast as a snail :).

As i got I out of the forest the view was great. On one side of the hill there was a big cover of fog in the valley, on the other side there were some nice hills covered with trees and snow.

awesome white rim :)

I didn't want to go back in the forest because I was very tired so I decided to go home on the tarmac. Just before arriving home I had the idea to climb the hill above the city.

The view of the city was worth climbing the hill. after that I arrived home with my ice pedals and wet clothes from a lot of sweat.

Winter rides

After waiting for a few moths for the snow it is finally here. Last Sunday I could enjoy the first real snow this season :)

At the end of last year I went for a nice road ride and for a short ride in the forest were there was a little snow and a lot of mud and were I took these pictures:

Hopefully this winter has some more snow and we can have some more snowy rides.

Movies to watch

Lately I've been watching movies online. It is easier then downloading them. There are a lot of sites were you can watch movie online and some of the older moves are on YouTube also.

Merry Xmas

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

First ride in the snow

Sunday I went for a short ride in the forest, it was the first ride in the snow this winter. It was so much fun that I can't wait for the next chance for another ride. Sadly my battery was dying so I couldn't take pictures but at least I could record the ride :)

PS: I was so busy lately that I forgot that 4 years have passed since I started this blog...

Body weight building

I like very much bodybuilding but it requires a lot of time. Recently I discovered body weight building which requires less time and I saw results faster. I'm lucky that we have at the office a power tower and it takes me less than 5 minutes a day to have a complete workout.

I started slowly, with only a few repetitions but as I get more powerful I can do harder and longer exercises. The winter is long and the human body doesn't have limits so who knows what can happen until spring. My main goal is to be able to do muscle ups and maybe walk on my hands.

Here are some videos for motivation:

New kitchen toy

I bough a new kitchen toy, a Moulinex meat mincer. But it is also a vegetable/fruit shredder and slicer, a mini food processor.

It is a great tool, I already used it to mince meat, to shred carrots, horseradish and onions. I will post a moussaka recipe soon  ;)

PS: If you are looking for some cheap electronics check out this link today because it is black friday again.