#and then a reverse love pyramid that is later resolved

[kcowgill]

A couple of days!

First things first - yesterday would’ve been my mom’s 92nd birthday. I had a martini to celebrate the occasion. Maybe two. Ok, definitely two.

But before that, I opted to stay home from a “free science party” at the Science and Surplus store - I thought it would be a bit of a madhouse and I was all peopled out for the day. Instead I decided to sear some beef short ribs and prepare a wine reduction sauce to sous vide them in for a few days. Got them in the water bath a bit later than I wanted (it took SO LONG to reduce the wine) so I’m hoping 44 hours is just as good as 48.

This morning I had my therapy session while my wife took our son out for breakfast and my daughter slept in. Then she took him to his group therapy session up north while I got ready for the day. After they got home, everyone lunched up and my plan was to take the kids climbing and to the YMCA for some swimming. My son was worried his super-loose tooth would come out at an inopportune time (i.e. in the pool, so he wouldn’t be able to collect from the tooth fairy which I SWEAR he knows isn’t real) so he actually let me yank it out - which was a huge deal for him*.

Climbing was fairly uneventful - I got my son to actually use the auto-belay after the mishap** his first time. And he loved it! Still didn’t get super high on the wall, but we all had a good time, finishing off with a little bouldering.

On the way to swimming. I told my kids I was going to go straight to the lifeguard to ask if since they’ve both passed the deep water test, would it be OK if they came in to swim while I ran a quick mile on the treadmill in the cardio room? I figured if it was one of the lifeguards I knew it’d probably be no problem. But I walked in and I didn’t know her. I asked here anyhow. She said even though it technically was against the rules, she was OK with it***. So I ran a slow mile and then joined them.

While getting dressed after swimming, I got a text from my wife (who had a 14 mile run on her schedule for the day, thus my day with the kids) that my son’s friend wanted to hang out - so I just dropped him off on the way home. Ordered sushi with the girls and watched the 2016 Pete’s Dragon. Picked up my son, hustled the kids to bed, and then got in another lifting session. Decided to dust off my RPT**** spreadsheet and follow the numbers for my feeble squats.

Warm at sets at 50% and 60% of the target weight for the “work set” (i.e. “X”) and then back off sets (for more reps) at -10% and another -10%. (This spreadsheet is setup to calculate the numbers automatically - rounded, with increments of 2.5lbs since I have 1.25lb plates. Today I ended up rounding up anyhow and skipped the “fractional” plates. No clue what the numbers in parenthesis mean. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

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* Among his challenges are sensory issues (e.g. get out of my mouth!) and extreme avoidance of anything that might be potentially painful. I didn’t have to argue, threaten, or plead - I nonchalantly offered to do it for him, and after steeling his resolve for a few minutes he acquiesced. Popped right out without any fuss and I told him how proud I was of him for letting me do that.

** His very first time he didn’t really trust the auto-belay, so only let go with one hand which wasn’t enough to support his weight so he kind of “fell” and dragged parts of him (his elbow I think?) down the rough surfaces of the climbing wall, which not only hurt but also bled and was enough for him to swear off the auto-belay forever. Or maybe not forever? :)

*** I seem to have inherited something from my dad which I’ve only fairly recently learned was a “skill” of his (from my stepmother). It’s a knack for what I’d call “social engineering”. In his case, he’s able to get i.e. retail workers to accept returns or exchanges even if it’s usually against the store policy. My dad usually does it without any real effort - I think the way he talks to folks makes him seem genuine and charming (and it’s totally not fake). My stepmother likes to contrast his experiences with hers where if she were to attempt the same thing she’d get raised eyebrows and eventual refusals.

**** RPT stands for Reverse Pyramid Training. I’ve mentioned it before, but it’s basically what I described after the spreadsheet. Increase the weight during warm up sets, hit the peak of thee ‘pyramid’ for your working set, then back off the weight aiming to get more reps at the lower weights. It’s someone’s take on “minimum effective dose” and I’ve had success with it in the past.

#runblr #climbblr #RIP mom

[oykusubaskinnua]

Frozen Structure Analysis- 5-Act Structure

So I laid out my notes on Frozen (2013) on my previous post. Over the week, I got to sit down and think about the structure bit more. I picked up the book Into The Woods by John Yorke to get a better idea of the story structures. I did mentioned that Frozen fits more into the 3-Act Structure but today, I want to analyse it once again with the 5-Act Structure.

In Yorke’s book, we look at two classic structures, 3-Act and 5-Act Structures. 3-Act is the easy one, one they teach us since... 6th grade, insert the UK/other country equilavent. It’s made up of a Setup, Confrontation and/or Journey, and finally, Resolution. But before its’ resurfacing around 19th centuries, there were another structure model used especially by Elizabethian playwriters: 5-Act Structure. German novelist Freytag visualised this idea with a pyramid:

Exposition (getting to know our setting, characters and inital conflict);

Complications (basically the Road of Trials);

Climax (the most intense part of everything; the crossroads. It’s now called the Midpoint in the updated version of this pyramid);

Falling Action (Reversals and consequences of the Climax; momentum is slowed down but the tension is rising, mostly due to false hopes and feelings);

Catastrophe/Denoument (Conflict is resolved, loose ends are tied; for the good or for the bad).

When you think about, this looks pretty similar to 3-Act Structure but bit more detailed- And it would be right, as you do can put the middle 3-acts into one. But, I think the 5-Act Structure also helps to put the placement of songs into some perspective.

Our intro with characters, sisters’ isolation and introduction of the problem (Elsa bringing the winter) is our Exposition bit. We get an idea on why there’s such problem, our settings and characters, with Problematic Sami Songs [will be referred as PSS] (I remembered there were two- the latter one being more Irish or Scandinavian than anything Sami, if you know anything about joiks and Sami culture), Do You Want to Build a Snowman, First Time in Forever and Let it Go. You do can argue that first 2 (or 3, if you separate PSS) can split the Exposition into two parts; Intro to Characters and Setting, and Intro to the Problem, which can be used to get the viewer engage with the characters more.

Our Complications bit is more simple. Anna, along with her numerous sidekicks, goes on an adventure to find Elsa, while getting past some complications.

Our Climax/Midpoint is more pronounced; Anna goes into Elsa’s castle, they sing First Time in Forever and suddenly, things change- Elsa hits Anna from the heart and now, Anna might actually die (And that’s where the audience is expected to gasp.) It’s also when the lighting changed for no other reason than drama and Hans’ army arrives. The tone momentarily changes, there are some tension risen. Some, because later the Trolls’ Wedding Song takes away all that tension, thus the rise is unnatural. Yet, that’s also when we are reminded of the Anna’s problem so, no problems there ? (There are so much problems there.)

Falling Action are the consequences and reversals, with some points intermingle with the Climax. Now everything is at crossroads; Elsa is guilty of what she has one. Anna is is the brink of dying. Arendel seems to get more and more desperate. Thus the false hopes arise; Arendel have no other way than getting rid of Elsa once and for all. Anna’s cure seems to be Hans’ kiss, as an Act of True Love. And Elsa... just wants to turn into  her sheepish self since she doesn’t really change as a character (well... almost none of the characters does... but that’s another topic.) Thus, everyone goes into their ways but, hence the word false, not everything is as it seems! Elsa gets imprisoned, Hans is evil, Anna now has a chance of actually dying, and Kristoff realises that he might be the one who can be Anna’s True Love. Thus, tension rises as the big showdown gets in but unlike the classic 5-Act plays, there are more things happening now, thanks (or facepalm) to our changing culture who has shorter attention span.

Catastrophe is of course, Anna’s sacrifice and later the Denounment, the happy ending where everything gets a closure. Conflict is resolved, summer is back and baddies are kicked out. Time to buy some merchendise, right?

Maybe because of the intermingle of of Falling Act and Climax, as well as the tension/momentum parts of the Falling Act, Frozen does still feel like a 3-Act film. It can also be said that it’s because of the medium (5-Act was used mostly for the plays, Shakespearean for example) but because of the new global culture, where the attention spans are shorter and we expect action every time, especially near the end. For the good or for the bad? Who knows. Joseph Campbell wrote his book to just point out things but became an ugly technique to cash-grab by many Hollywood writers. Perhaps 3-Act Structure is also getting the same treatment? Only our interpretations can tell.

#narrative