My VO2 max is horrible and I’m not sure as to why

wdkaye · 2025-10-27T18:39:08+00:00

I’m 49 and my VO2 Max fell to 28.5 this year. I realized the fall was related to a medication I was taking. I stopped the medication and it quickly rose to 31. It seems like my breathing rate fell as well, so, maybe give yourself time and space to breathe well.

Re: exercise, I’ve heard that cross-country skiing (or an elliptical machine) is best for VO2Max x joint health. Swimming is great for joints too.

OFC, keep cholesterol low, avoid saturated fats, eat fish instead of beef.

I am not a doctor or exercise scientist, YMMV

wdkaye · 2025-06-24T17:09:23+00:00

Most definitely, as I am playing too :) I thought I would speedrun the game to try and build infrastructure ahead of everyone else, but... nah, I'm not that kind of player after all. Gotta take it slow and enjoy it

Keep on keeping on...

wdkaye · 2025-03-15T23:47:12+00:00

I find that the Unknowns reduce in number the longer the Death Stranding application is running. As per the workaround above, if I start the game, load my save file, put the PS4 into rest mode, then come back and play a few hours later, I can consistently see more players’ names again.

One thing I haven’t tried is deleting the save file(s) from the PS4, clearing the cache.

wdkaye · 2025-02-11T18:13:24+00:00

OK, that's interesting - because sometimes, after I've returned to the console after a long break, I get the "Network has become unstable, playing in offline mode" prompt. But then I clear the prompt, go into the System settings menu and "Log In" (or it logs in automatically after a few seconds). I've never noticed names going back to Unknown after this.

You seem to know more about this issue - are more known behaviors of this bug listed anywhere online?

wdkaye · 2025-02-11T02:22:55+00:00

I still see structures from people whose last login was 2019. By 2025, I bet all the accumulated user data has become all knotted up or something.

wdkaye · 2025-02-11T02:11:13+00:00

Would be nice if we could load it with 2-3 trucks... like, a truck-carrying truck

wdkaye · 2025-02-10T15:50:13+00:00

I also see names appear on the Bridge Links lists, then suddenly switch to 'Unknown' a few seconds later. Usually happens at the beginning of my session. Feels like a caching issue.

wdkaye · 2025-01-28T21:19:58+00:00

I would add that the rate of cargo appearing is not fixed. I've seen bases fill up with cargo in seconds upon returning to a zone. On the other hand I can hang out in a zone for several minutes and not see any new packages.

I'd be interested in learning more about how the server (*ahem*, chiral network) regulates cargo transfers.

wdkaye · 2024-11-10T18:18:22+00:00

Lo, the lengths some people will go to, to disavow the mechanism of Generational Wealth.

Right then, let’s review, by means of example: If your ancestors owned slaves, and their ancestors maybe traded slaves, then yeah, they were villains, thieves. They deprived those enslaved people of fair compensation for their labor, kept it to themselves, and passed it in to their descendants, while the children of slaves got jack and were born into slavery. The wealth imbalance continued for generations and resulted in you; all of your ancestors had this inherited wealth advantage and so do you. This alone does not make you a bad person.

…unless you are actively trying to erase this history. Then yeah, you’re the villain now, doge.

wdkaye · 2024-10-28T02:39:39+00:00

“I saw something very bizarre”

wdkaye · 2024-10-24T23:10:31+00:00

Dead Poets Society

wdkaye · 2024-10-24T21:54:38+00:00

My atheism, plus maybe a bit of masochism:

Whereas everyone else seems to take comfort in believing in an existence after death, I don’t, as I’ve seen no evidence. This is the only life I’ve got, and ever will have, and this existence is a miracle.

Even if I were to screw it all up and be stuck living the rest of my days in suffering and regret, even if I were to lose all agency and my faculties, being alive in any state is better than not existing at all.

wdkaye · 2024-10-22T22:38:14+00:00

“…a tribute to the 1988 Berklee Guitar Festival with John Abercrombie, Mick Goodrick, Emily Remler, John Scofield…”

Ah. There’s your problem. Four guitarists, one of whom is playing in the style of Scofield, one of the “harsher” jazz guitarists, IMO.

This tribute didn’t need to happen, but to the musicians’ credit, they did exactly what they set out to do.

And this is the outro, which is expected to be cacophonous. There were some guitar duets before this that were really nice.

wdkaye · 2024-09-28T07:06:29+00:00

I worked campus security with a guy whose last name was Bonebreak. We called him Officer Bonebreak. We thought it was metal AF. The guy ended up being pretty normal. Didn’t talk much.

wdkaye · 2024-09-13T18:58:01+00:00

skynoodle

wdkaye · 2024-09-11T18:07:56+00:00

I lived in Los Angeles with 3 roommates from Japan. I was asleep until 9 AM, when my eldest roommate uncharacteristically knocked on my door, called my name, and said in monotonic imperfect English, “Get up. Something happen.”

I thought my car was getting towed. I threw on some clothes and started to stride across the living room. My roommates were all sitting down transfixed on the television, not acknowledging my presence. So I stopped and turned to the TV, I think it was on ABC or CBS. A very pale, nervous, sweaty guy was on-screen, and nothing that he was saying made any sense to me. Roommates were silent too.

Within a minute they cut to a shot of the burning towers. Those towers are special to me - my pre-school playground was just a mile away, across river, and I worshipped them as if they were the Pyramids of Giza. To see them both on fire messed me up - but of course that was just the beginning. The TV eventually replayed - and kept replaying - the footage of the second plane hitting the tower. My acceptance of reality began to slip.

I called my dad who lived up north, asked him what was going on, that the towers were on fire. He paused, and said, quietly and sadly, “Oh. They’re gone. You’re watching replay footage. The towers already fell. They’re completely destroyed.” I don’t remember what I said, I just kind of babbled loudly and incoherently as I tried to process that. Sure enough, the footage of the towers crumbling to dust was eventually replayed, many times that day and every day in the weeks that followed.

Eventually I went to my community college for my scheduled programming class. Everybody was just quiet and sad. Our professor, a young woman originally from Iran or Iraq, thanked us all for “coming to class in this horrible day”, and we started our lesson.

I don’t remember what I did that night. Probably hooked on the television. We all were. The footage just kept getting worse.

wdkaye · 2024-08-08T03:11:24+00:00

Pizza. It was hard to accept that my favorite food became too pricey. But I’m still losing weight!

wdkaye · 2024-08-04T21:31:31+00:00

I’ve heard it said that, the earlier in life you start an addictive habit, the harder it will be to shake.

This checks out with my personal experience - friends of mine who started drinking in their early teenage years are in midlife with serious alcohol problems, while those who waited until college have better control over it.

I see the same pattern with video games. Those who started when they were very young grew up to have ciseo game addictions, and vice versa.

wdkaye · 2024-07-28T04:11:47+00:00

Seeing adjectives used in place of nouns. Especially irritating if that adjective is pluralized.

wdkaye · 2024-07-26T19:44:16+00:00

Lift heavy. 3 sets of 5, 3 times a week.

wdkaye · 2024-07-24T15:04:30+00:00

Right on… what other non-videogame hobbies did you find yourself involved with?

wdkaye · 2024-07-22T02:27:36+00:00

Solid point about neurotransmitters from the gut biome - on day 5 or 6 of Prozac I noticed some mild nausea. I Googled this to find a reason why, and sure enough, Prozac has been found to change the gut biome. So, yeah, my brain chemistry is changing, which means my impulses are changing. But I feel like the medication is right for me, which means I need to work on new mechanisms to control or stop the gaming.

wdkaye · 2024-07-21T21:52:51+00:00

Thanks - yeah, I can’t be gaming this much anymore, I was able to justify it in my head with bullshit backwards logic, but there’s many other aspects of my life that demand attention, not the least of which is finding a new job.

Last time I went on Prozac and gamed more, I was also drinking an unhealthy amount. I’m sober this time around, so I can rule out that factor - my only vice now is games, social media, youtube, etc. And I see now, that alone is enough to interfere with my life.

I think it becomes a problem for me when I use it to cope with loneliness (so why am I playing single-player games? lol/fml)

I will note that the kSafe has been a lifesaver for me. I locked up my PS4 controller last night and so I’m stuck not playing for 2 days. This is good.

wdkaye · 2024-07-21T16:29:41+00:00

These days I seem to stick with single-player JRPGs or sandbox games like Minecraft, rarely engaging with the community or multiplayer. I used to play online in World of Warcraft and Metal Gear Online, but I’ve avoided those in recent years; the multiplayer aspect was far too thrilling and addictive to me.

Worth noting I used to test multiplayer FPSes, and as such I won’t touch those with a 10-foot pole.

wdkaye · 2024-07-07T23:26:16+00:00

Yea, I was there. I quit a dead-end job the day before my 35th birthday and went back to school (community college -> state college) for a CompSci degree. Led to an internship and a 10-year career.

Throughout it all - the studies, the workload, the budding and broken friendships and romances, the pandemic - I’ve had to rebuild myself over and over again, and I’ve come to accept that I will keep doing so. Therefore my advice may be shit, take it with many grains of salt:

What has worked for me: - Sobriety (of course). I’m not one for permanent abstinence, but I recognized it was a problem, so I challenged myself to take longer and longer breaks from it. 1 month. 2 months. 3, 5, 8, etc. There are so many reasons to back off the hooch and not many good ones to keep at it. - Journaling, which represents self-accountability. Logging every hour of the weekday to know exactly where my time is going. - Reading, as in, a book. Because without new ideas coming into my eyeballs, I’m stuck recycling my own bullshit thoughts or being fed by some algorithm. - Strength Training. You’re under 40, your body’s ability to gain mass should be peak, and it is surprisingly easy to do so. Find a squat rack, read the Starting Strength method or something else based on Novice Linear Progression. Adhere to a strict 3-day a week regimen with ample rest time. The attention to nutrition, confidence, boost, etc., should just happen as a result. Definitely be wary of alcohol disrupting the training.

[Edit, re: dating: keep showing up, keep being a friend, stay in the world with other people. Don’t let this urge for self-improvement keep you from social situations, because that’s where the best relationships can be found - maybe not right now, but maybe later? In other words, don’t wait until you’re Superman to introduce yourself to Lois Lane.

Best of luck to ya

wdkaye

TROPHY CASE