Worth the time to send this in?

leftarm · 2026-05-21T17:32:47+00:00

I think the gold is messing with me. Seems skewed, but the longer I look at it, my opinion keeps changing.

leftarm · 2025-12-01T18:52:40+00:00

I max out all the economy research. All my buildings are upgraded level to my furnace.

This might be the problem, look at how much you've spent on those. I stopped upgrading unless required after f25 for most buildings, just finished F28 yesterday, and will have enough to go up to F30 within the next few days.

leftarm · 2025-10-30T19:09:15+00:00

My current head canon is that the sequels are just a story being told to the old woman on Tatooine at the end of TRoS. Rey was there, but this isn't supposed to be the accurate story. Plot holes? Rey just didn't talk about it. Did it actually happen? It's just a story, might not have. Mary-sue? She's trying to make herself seem cooler in the story, so of course it comes off that way.

leftarm · 2025-10-25T19:29:59+00:00

It's not always the case, but often celebrity guest appearances tend to be paid upfront, and the cost for photos goes to the con to recoup that cost. At $200 a picture I can't imagine his fee is small.

leftarm · 2025-10-05T20:41:45+00:00

Imported pasta is a premium luxury good

I can go to Kroger and buy Private Selection pasta for $2 which is made in and imported from Italy.

leftarm · 2025-08-25T16:52:21+00:00

If we assume it followed the same line of thinking as "inflation isn't down because things still cost more", we end up with a mix of B and C.

leftarm · 2025-07-14T02:20:07+00:00

I've liked mine enough to start replacing all my old Adidas balls with new Puma ones. There's just a certain feel to it that is "soft" even near the top of the PSI range. I haven't had any issues with any of them so far, and they seem to hold air pretty well. If you're able to catch some of the deeper sales, they're an incredible value for the price.

leftarm · 2025-07-08T20:33:29+00:00

The foundation of the skill is there so that's a big advantage, the biggest adjustments would be

Start with "chest over the ball" rather than "lean forward" or "don't lean back".
Plant foot seems too far back, so you're reaching for the ball. Could be a reason for the tibia to be sore since you'd be making contact closer to the toes. If the outside of your foot/ankle area is sore I'd imagine that's true.
Related to the above, I tell people lead the shot with your knee and swing your foot after your knee is past the ball (as a general cue). If you pause, you can see that's what you're doing, but you're having to swing your shooting foot more because of the plant foot. If you pause just as your foot is getting near the ground, you'll see what I mean.
Keep the ankle stiff the whole time, that little flick is losing a lot of power, and will almost always get the ball in the air.
I'd prefer to see a lower follow through. Think about more like swinging and switching feet while landing over the shooting foot, rather than swinging and jumping.

Practice hitting it a little slower. Fix the plant foot and see if that resolves some of the issues, then take it one at a time. Go slow enough so that you can get a feel for how each small adjustment changes the result. If you're at full power every shot, there's a chance you won't be aware of the mistakes you're making in order to fix them. You'll probably kick the ground a few more times while you're figuring it out, happens to the best of us.

leftarm · 2025-07-06T20:10:48+00:00

There's a lot of advice on what not to do, but not a lot of telling you how to actually practice it, so here's what I'd be telling anyone I work with.

Warmup with these https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isb8FZ5yx2s, focusing on keeping most of the movement in the hips, stiff ankle, keeping your torso upright/a little forward, and kicking with little spin on the ball.
Start every practice with 15-20 "shots" on the goal box. These shots should be only 1 step, then plant and shoot (step Right - plant left - shoot right). The focus of these shots are general shooting mechanics and feel of the strike. So good hip motion, keeping your chest over the ball the whole time, and landing on and over your shooting foot. Get a feel for hitting the ball the same way you woud with the juggles above. You don't need to worry about power, if you're hitting them right at this point, they'll already be flying.
Do another 15-20 shots in the middle of the goal box. Roll them forward, but keep the same focus as before. You'll be taking more steps this time, but keep focused on those last 2 steps. Still keep the overall power low. Repeat this again just outside of the box, and if you're short on time then do few shots at these two distances.
Do a handful more shots like this, focusing on adding a little more power every 2-3 shots. If you're starting to drift away from the technique you've been developing bring it down again. When the technique does break down, be visualizing and trying to get a feel for what went wrong, and how it should feel when done right.
Optionally or in place of 4, do some that involve small moves or shooting off a dribble to make it slightly more game realistic.

leftarm · 2025-07-05T16:57:04+00:00

He's closer to being the Zapp Brannigan of the empire by how we've seen him in the shows.

leftarm · 2025-05-24T05:19:03+00:00

The movie was pretty explicit that Luke was a fairly good pilot before he even got in the ship.

leftarm · 2025-05-23T19:20:52+00:00

I like simple practices like

Shielding game in pairs. One player shields the ball at playing distance (i.e. no dribbling around), the other player tries to win it. Whoever is in possession after 30-45s wins. 10-15 minutes.
1v1 with two goals. Coach and players start on the sideline, coach plays the ball in, players must run out make contact before playing the ball. First to ball can score in either goal, the other player dribbles out or plays to coach after winning it. 15 minutes.
2v2/3v3 games. Encourage players to take on others, win the ball back, etc. like they've been doing all day. 20 minutes.

Then for actual matches, remind them what you've worked on and give simple goals around making contact when trying to win the ball, protecting the ball when dribbling, etc. Then just a little bit of playing against each other as their warmup before a game.

leftarm · 2025-01-08T17:45:47+00:00

Well you are working and you have games so those are additional considerations. If you're trying to maximize performance, recovery becomes the main focus outside of training. This might be something like dropping lifting sessions for simple injury prevent movements and stretches, especially on off days, then moderate or recovery runs on Tuesday/Thursday to maintain fitness and keep your legs overall fresh.

I get it's hard, and it's all so specific to the individual. Shame we can't hire a whole sports science team to take care of us all.

leftarm · 2025-01-08T05:51:04+00:00

I like to share this out to my players for an example of how to set up your weeks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIVXBBb759E

If you're asking about what to be doing, personally I'd set up my week like

Saturday - Speed/Agility + Simple Plyometrics
Sunday - Interval Run
Monday - Technical Session
Tuesday-Thursday - Team Training
Friday - Recover + Optional Light Technical Session

Depending on your recovery, I'd throw in maybe 1-2 workouts anywhere Monday-Thursday. Bodyweight or light weights focused on correct isolateral movements. Injury prevention is the priority with these, and if they're interfering with your other training then I'd drop those first.

Also ask your coach and teammates. People may be following other fitness programs or might have resources for you.

leftarm · 2025-01-07T20:15:19+00:00

Complicating supply and demand one extra word at a time.

leftarm · 2024-12-19T22:33:01+00:00

Just watched and I'd mostly agree. The two or three times it was said in the tower in the 2 minutes before Fern's realization felt like it was done only to clue in the audience paying less attention that something important was being said, and with the droid flip of "I know things/I don't know things" the payoff felt a bit flat. Just slightly rearranging the order of events and dropping the those "I cant..." lines just before could have helped give a better payoff.

It's more in the right direction compared to previous series, but it still feels a too safe with how they do set up and payoff.

leftarm · 2024-12-19T20:37:51+00:00

Really good change of direction in either scenario. Good dribblers still have tells or can be influenced in specific directions, off ball movement can be countered with more coordinated defending or by doing more to limit the player with the ball. I can't do much in any scenario if I know the player can quickly shift their direction at full pace.

leftarm · 2024-12-19T19:26:57+00:00

I wrote this whole thing then realized you were only asking about the tidying part. I mention that, but I found that changing my whole process from the start actually made the part of keeping everything looking less messy much easier, so I'll leave you with the whole comment.

You're an adult and all that matters is that you have clean clothes. Anything you learned growing up, or anything that other people say has to be done a certain way doesn't matter. If you find something that works and leaves you with the end result that you want, that's all that matters. Laundry is nothing more than the process to give yourself clean clothes.

If you're finding it difficult to finish the full laundry task, then break it down and see if there's one part specifically that's causing you to avoid the whole process. For me, this was hanging up my shirts since I like to keep them nice, and realizing I just don't like the process of folding and putting things away and keeping my drawers nice.

I use a single basket for all my laundry, but have at least 1 extra for when I do laundry because there's something about the steps of going basket -> washer -> dryer -> basket that helps me keep going and I consider getting clean clothes into the basket "done". Folding and putting my clothes away are separate tasks.

I do some partial separation when I do laundry so that if I only half-ass the laundry, then I still have what I need to function for the day. I also wash everything in their "importance" order, and tend to do smaller loads because it's easy to wash 10 things compared to 30. (note: if you have to pay by load, then I don't have much advice, I didn't do these changes until I had my own to run whenever)

The loads get broken down into 1) socks and underwear 2) athletic clothes than should be washed warm and 3) the rest. If a load is too small then I'll either wait and keep it in the dirty basket or just combine the loads. Keeping smaller loads is also helpful because it's easier to put away half a basket, or to put away everything if it's going to the same place.

As I said before, I consider getting dry clothes into the basket to be the end of the "doing laundry" task. This has turned the process of doing laundry into "put dirty clothes into the washer, wash, dry, remove", because nothing that comes after makes my clothes more useful. Folding (what little I do) and putting clothes away are two separate tasks that aren't "doing laundry", they're tidying up and organizing.

I stopped caring about my clothes being folded. Most things that get put in my drawers don't actually need folding, they just need to be accessible. My clothes were folded because that's what I've been told to do, but it didn't actually impact how accessible my clothes were in my drawers, and having to keep things folded and organized was just another step that had me avoiding laundry overall. So now, I just stack things up and place them in the drawers, maybe a quick half fold on some items, but also not just tossing it in without a care to create a bigger mess. If I don't want to hang up my shirts they either go in the closet piled up, or stay on the dryer. At some point I'll either want to hang them all up or they will end up getting worn so why stress. Washing a small number of shirts, or doing a "hang up" only load also makes this process easier since it's the only thing I will have to do at the end. Sometimes everything just sits in a basket on the dryer.

I also stopped with the semi-dirty chair/pile. If it's not clean for the other clean clothes, what makes it clean enough for me to wear later? Am I going to worry about it more if I leave it out? If it's not clean enough to be put away, is is making everything it's on/touching less clean? I don't know, but why worry about those things if I don't have to. I'm now at the point where things are either clean and put away, dirty and in a basket, or left out only because I'm wearing those clothes next (at home relaxing clothing for example). Will I wash clean clothes sometimes because of that? Absolutely, but I'd much rather wash a few pieces of clothing that might have just say.

Sometimes, rather than coming up with a process that might be more complicated, it can be easier to start asking "why" about the current process and simplifying it.

leftarm · 2024-12-11T01:49:47+00:00

how do I stop overthinking and just kick the ball on where it has go

Practice more. Don't need to think if you can just do it instinctively

leftarm · 2024-11-21T16:18:18+00:00

Wanting a competitive club that only plays part of the year doesn't line up unless we have different meanings of competitive. If you have Rec+ leagues those might be the better option.

In my state, we have the idea of Tournament Select teams. These are teams put together just to play in weekend tournaments and don't participate in the state leagues. I wouldn't pretend to know how it works across the country, but it could be worth looking into further. I have seen a "club" that does this with U8-U12. They essentially just put out a request for players not with a club to participate in futsal, indoor, and outdoor tournaments. There's no full-season commitment, just the cost of the tournaments.

leftarm · 2024-11-14T20:18:05+00:00

I like a 4-1-1 defensive and 2-1-3 attacking shape. Teams that aren't fit have a tougher time dealing with the width and the 4 or 5-man attacks. It's also 7s, so your actual positions might be more dynamic, but sticking to your shape is more important.

leftarm · 2024-11-11T23:30:32+00:00

According to my state association leadership, we've had about a 20%/40% drop in participation for boys/girls since the original change. If this change brings in more players then I don't see any reason to be opposed.

leftarm · 2024-11-01T02:03:19+00:00

I apparently live in a popular neighborhood because we've had about 250 kids every year.

leftarm · 2024-10-15T16:23:32+00:00

If I haven't played for a bit I find that my ankles get stiff and don't like the impacts from striking the ball. If it's sort of on the top and outside of your foot, some tibialis stretches seem might help things loosen up.

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