SafeHands

A blog containing some poorly-translated thoughts and general goings on in my life.

[funny-gif-1]

[mrfalling12345]

OMG WHAT DID I DO!?

For mobile just hold the reblog button

[iguessthisismyweedblog-blog]

I LEARNED A THING

[gaabrriela]

z

[safehandshenning]

Everytime I listen to @G_McEwan23's playlist I feel blessed #blessed

[wagw4n]

[safehandshenning]

Happy birthday to my little brother. Found this on my flatmates page and thought you'd appreciate it! :D

[safehandshenning]

Been listening to an album I have from Craig Armstrong - Stand out song for me!

[safehandshenning]

9th of January, 2013

God dammit! Buying things doesn't make you happy!!

In other news I have Flo from LoveHate Tattoo in Edinburgh doing a first drawing for me! Getting pretty excited about it!

Smaller post than normal, but it is 5.30am...

[tea-earlgrey-h0t-deactivated201]

Frodo: I can’t do this, Sam. 

Sam: I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something. 

Frodo: What are we holding onto, Sam? 

Sam: That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo… and it’s worth fighting for. 

[safehandshenning]

Why I want a cat...

[safehandshenning]

7th July 2012

Sitting in a Starbucks, opposite the Apple store in Glasgow waiting on my appointment at 16:10 - Why didn't I think to book an appointment for my iPhone? It is however quite nice. I am sitting with a coffee and watching a lot of people walk by the window. However I had scouted out a comfy looking armchair but some woman stole it before I could get to it. So I am sitting on the stools at the window. 

Anyway, I have had an incredible week. My internship properly started on Monday with me being "thrown in at the deep end", working for the first team of Hearts FC. My role as Conditioning Analyst involves the timing of each training session in which the Polar Heart Rate monitors are being used and subsequently reporting the data in an easy to understand fashion. I am doing this for both the first team and for the U20's. In this role it is imperative to communicate effectively with the coaching staff. I don't like using the term 'dumbing down'. However, essentially that is what is done. Instead of using the household terms used in Sport Science other ways of describing events are used. A certain amount of teaching can be used to emphasise how important the sport scientist's role is within professional sports clubs - Hopefully building a respect for the industry. Also, I am pretty much famous: http://www.heartsfc.co.uk/page/InPictures/0,,10289,00.html

This morning I had my hair cut, during which the barber sprayed my hair with water and combed it - When this is done it is apparent how little hair I have on the top of my head. Which makes me want to shave it to a 2 or 3 all over. In my view there is nothing worse than a balding person to try and hide it with longer hair - I might just have to accept it.

[safehandshenning]

21st of June, 2012

Not to long ago I was contacted from the head sport scientist at Heart of Midlothian Football Club with an internship proposition. The internship, for me, is perfect. Basically my role will be to help populate an already existing excel worksheet with data (taken from heart-rate monitors and via video analysis). So far I have been in two or three times and I am loving it: so far I have created a mock report presenting potential concerns (players under-performing) and a semi-automated excel sheet which produces both individual and summated data which will be collected from video analysis. The data collected from video analysis will be instances - so we'll have a list of variables (shots, passes, tackles) and these will be counted throughout a small sided game, which can be exported from the analysing software to excel. 

Also on the horizon is the large possibility that I will be buying myself a new laptop. It will cost a bit of money and I will have to sacrifice a smaller return key as I will be buying from across the ocean. The laptop I am looking at buying is an Alienware M14x R2 (12GB RAM, 3.3GHz i7 processor, 750GBHDD+32SSD) coming in at just over £1,000. Which, considering it's around £1,600 if I would have bought it from the UK website, is a hell of a deal. 

Besides all of that, at the moment I am at the back end of a nine day stint at work. This week I will have done a grand total of 44 hours (not including internship time). And I can tell you - I am feeling it! Finished at 21:00 every night since last Friday, as soon as I get in the flat all I want to do is sit on my chair and be alone. So far I have managed to do that but sometimes my flatmates can be so loud.

Well, that will be enough from me for one night. Tara.

[safehandshenning]

2nd of May, 2012

In two days time I will be one exam down and two to go. Today has been a write off for myself in terms of studying. I am getting really good at watching the snooker so I don't see why I shouldn't keep going! Been learning recently about a micro-nutrient that us humans depend on to keep the nasty hydro-peroxides and the horrible oxidative damage away called Selenium (element 34). The topic is dry and reasonably complex, but I am feeling confident for the exam on Friday.

In other news I got free pies for dinner tonight.

Going to chill until 19.00 or so then I'll whip out the notes again and learn something new about Selenium.

I am looking forward till next Thursday as I will have all my exams out the way, the pressure won't be completely off though as I plan on having my honours year project methodology finalized with a sound rationale behind it. #keenbean

Had, what has been said, our last Sport and Exercise Science football game yesterday which I am pretty gutted about! As I had to repeat a year my friends have now finished their undergrad degree and will be moving on to other things in different parts of the country. I guess it always had to come to an end at some point but I will miss those guys. Thankfully the game of football was great, everyone put in effort and I can tell you I am paying for it now, I feel like an old man! Lets get the Firsts in boys!

[safehandshenning]

Calcium in the body

An interesting fact about calcium is that no matter what the dietary/supplementary intake a person meets, blood calcium levels remain fairly constant. This is done through sacrificing things like bones calcium demand, which potentially can lead to the onset of Osteoporosis (brittle bones). From what I gather from my learning, homeostatic blood concentration of calcium is required as it is essential for the contraction of your ticker, among other things like force of skeletal muscle* contraction. Although, be warned this is no message telling you to take calcium in excess, as excess Calcium leads to the formation of kidney stones. *There are three types of muscle in the body: Skeletal, e.g. biceps; Smooth, e.g. arteries/veins; Cardiac, e.g. only found in the heart. Each have differing properties.

[safehandshenning]

19th of April, 2012

Exams are looming, my notes are written on the three courses I am taking this semester - four overall although one was purely coursework on my upcoming honours project. I'm currently sitting in a computing lab with some people from the degree. Reading over and trying to memorise what I wrote on the notes. I have to admit, I do know a bit more than I thought I would at this stage so I'm staying positive, although once I step into the exam hall and open the paper I know I'll panic somewhat. I've been really tired the past few days. I think it is because my sleeps keep on getting disrupted with me having to visit the little boys room during the night. Every night and at 6 o'clock for the past 2 mornings I have woken needing to pee. However, I've been drinking plenty of water because I genuinely feel hypohydrated (dehydration = the process, hypohydration = the state). Maybe I shouldn't drink water close to bed time. Got the intro to Hotel California down, just got the rest of the ~6 minute song to learn. On Saturday I plan on taking the dart board we have screwed to the wall down, and repair the wall of the holes with some polyfilla my dad has given me. Also found a 10 litre tub of paint which is the same colour as the hallway in the spare room so that will do nicely to cover up the smaller holes. In other exciting news: as it is the NHL playoffs I am now growing my beard until a team lifts Lord Stanely's cup for the 2011/12 season. So far my beloved Devils are doing alright. They are losing 2-1 against Florida in the first round of the season (best of 7 games).

[safehandshenning]

24th of March, 2012

I realise I don't post on this much, that is why from this point on I will stop mentioning that I don't post much. Just to keep you in the loop, I know you were dying to hear that.

Just finished another shift at work, easy night, cleaned the deli bit in the shop which takes about two and a half hours to do. Better than stocking up, or pretending to work.

Been learning the actual Eagles version of "Hotel California". Sounding good so far - I just hope I don't do what I usually do and stop at the intro to the song.

I have a busy week of uni work, starting tomorrow and ending on Friday. I have one solitary presentation which will last approximately 10 minutes about my up coming honors year project. The other one is a 10 minute presentation but it is a group one, so that takes it down to 2 minutes of talking which isn't so bad.

That's enough about Uni though. I've really hurt my foot and I don't know why. Started hurting in the shower after a 7 mile run in the gym on Thursday. I hope it feels better tomorrow as I plan on doing a 5 miler before I do some uni work. I've started using a website to track my running progress, three runs in the bag and I've racked up a healthy 15 miles in the past week. Personally, the site gives me a lot of motivation to run, just to get the "miles ran" as high as I can. The link to my profile is (even though one half [2] of my followers already have me added on it):

http://www.dailymile.com/people/GreigH

In other news, I have one little grievance - This is now the only online social platform which I can freely bitch about uni/coursemates etc as they have all now migrated over to Twitter. Not that I did it often or anything. They also keep hinting to me that I should follow them just because they follow me. Which pisses me off a little. I will read their tweets every so often, if they post good stuff I will follow them if not, I won't. I don't see the point in following someone and clogging up my own feed, just because I know them in the real world.

Well that's enough from me for now! Till next month!

[safehandshenning]

Minecraft - Again

Yup - I'm back into Minecraft. Decided I am going to build a little bigger than I normally would, just so I have a long term project. I've decided to build upon an existing forgotten building on our server and make it my own.

This is the starting of it. The walls with the windows are three quarters of their finishing height, with a roof to go on top too. I've got another smaller tower to go up in the back corner and a few out buildings to create and add some windows to the existing one. Then comes the task of the outer walls, but I might create a full town with this great hall thing as the centre piece. Not really decided yet.

[safehandshenning]

25th of January, 2012

Today it feels as if I have been floating around in purgatory. Had what I would class as a late night last night - 01:00 (I usually go to bed around 22.30) - as I went to play some ice hockey for the first time with a new team. They're called the Edinburgh Stingers, a recreational (reccie) team who play out of Murrayfield. Even though the skill level was very low I still enjoyed being on the ice. 

As I am tired, I seem to just eat all day! Hungry all the time! Couldn't resist a little cheeseburger from McDonald's when I was in Asda earlier. Now, on that note I am going to go put some dinner on - Pasta with garlic bread tonight!

[safehandshenning]

15th of January, 2012

Had my first proper free-weights session today, went well did no real lifting of weights but instead worked on form and technique and to spit ball ideas what I want to get out of the sessions. Before you know it I'll be squating 110kg. Just you wait!

Decided I am going to run the Glasgow Half Marathon this year, just for something to work towards. Lets just hope it will be a nice day like it was last year, hopefully my brothers might consider doing it with me.

It's getting nice and cold outside, the canal down the road from me is starting to freeze over nicely. Just need another week or two and it will be enough so I could potentially skate on it. In a 'hockey' related note, I've just finished the fourth and final episode in the NHL 24-7 Road to the Winter Classic series for 2011/12, man it was good, maybe someday I will work for a team like that.

My new song for the guitar that I've been learning is the famous opening riff from Money for Nothing by Dire Straits.

Other than the first week of Uni has been alright and mostly introductory lectures I've got nothing else to write apart from that I need to reign in the purse strings, letting them get all loose. It's not what I need!

[safehandshenning]

5th of January, 2012

Just finished a good game of Gears of Ward's "Horde" on the Insane level (the top level) and as the name suggests, it was insane. What's know as a "Ticker" (which normally takes 1 shot to take down) took 5-6 shots from the lancer rifle. We only managed 20 levels but considering we bassically only had 3 'real' players (one hadn't played the game before and one was idle most of the time) it wasn't a bad result. Ended it after 2 hours of play.

Had yet another boring day for the most part. As Colin said would happen, I regret not going for that walk. Anyway, I going to go up to my room, get my pajamas's on and read my book! I've got a good night ahead!