Here you will find things about fitness and nutrition, mainly (but not exclusively) in relation to the Beachbody programs like P90x and Insanity. And, I will start adding reviews for Books, DVDs and Blu-Rays, and other products. All views and opinions on this blog are my own.
Welcome
Welcome to my ever-evolving blog. It started out as a blog on Beachbody workouts and products, mainly when I was a Beachbody coach. I no longer coach, not because I don't believe in Beachbody's programs (I subscribe to Beachbody on Demand and use their workouts every day), I am just not a salesperson and hated that aspect of it. I am more than willing to answer questions about my experiences with their products and the various workouts, and I feel freer to do so without the appearance of giving a biased review of something.
I have also started adding reviews for various things I have purchased like movies, books, CDs, and other products. This was brought about by a fight with Amazon in which all of my reviews were removed over a completely bullshit allegation that I posted a review that violated their terms of service. After going back and forth with the morons in the community-reviews department (even after they admitted that my posts did not violate their guidelines) they restored my account (which took them six months to do), but I have been posting my reviews on my blog to have them preserved in case something like that happens again. And here, I will post uncensored reviews so I will swear from time to time and post reviews that may be longer than Amazon's character limit. Everything I post here on any topic or product is my personal opinion, and I take no compensation for any product reviews I post. I am a member of Amazon's vine program and because I get those products for free, I keep those reviews on Amazon only, but everything I have purchased with my own money, whether from Amazon or some other store/website/outlet, I will post here.
I also plan to do some longer blog posts on various topics, such as how to learn physics, how to get through calculus, and longer reviews of workout programs as I do them. Basically, whatever strikes me as interesting at the time. As you can see if you navigate around the blog, I had many years in between postings. During that time I was going back to school to get an engineering degree, and learning material that I avoided my first time through college was a different experience and one that gave me a lot of insight into how to do well in those classes, which I will try to impart here for those who are looking to get a science or engineering degree.
Sunday, August 10, 2025
4k-UHD/Movie Review: Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
Friday, June 7, 2024
Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: The Master: Complete Series
The series starred Lee Van Cleef and Timothy Van Patten, with recurring appearances by the star of the Cannon Ninja trilogy (Enter the Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja, and Ninja III: The Domination), Sho Kasugi. Van Cleef played John Peter McCallister, an aging Ninja Master returning to the United States to find his daughter. Kasugi plays his former student, Okasa, from Japan, who was out to kill him, and Van Patten plays Max Keller, who becomes his new student after the two meet in the mists of a bar fight. It is basically a story-of-the-week show where Keller and McCalister drive around the country looking for McCallister's daughter and eventually get involved in some local dust-up between (usually) a damsel in distress against the local bad guy(s).
The Blu-Ray set is a three-disc set. The A/V transfer is okay but not wonderful. It is about as good a transfer as you would expect for an old 1980s TV show that was canceled halfway through its first season. The only extras included on the set are trailers for a handful of the Westerns that Van Cleef was known for throughout his career, as well as trailers for Enter the Ninja and Revenge of the Ninja, the two movies Kasugi had been in at that point.
I think most people who will get this are those who were kids in the 1980s and remember watching it back then. You will definitely not get it because of great writing or acting. Several very recognizable and good character actors and actresses were in the show. Also notable is that a very young Demi Moore had a guest-starring role in the pilot. Still, it was overall a pretty hokey and cheesy show. The pilot episode was even featured in an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000. The show's silliness is best exemplified by a scene in which one of the characters picks up a piece of uranium and sticks it in his pocket. Ultimately, if you watch it expecting it to be a fun blast from the past, it is enjoyable and even pretty funny. If you are expecting award-winning TV, you will be sorely disappointed.
Sunday, May 19, 2024
DVD/Movie Review: Rush Hour 2
The DVD extras again a director's commentary with Brett Ratner, deleted and extended scenes, a gag reel, making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes with the cast and crew, and the trailers. This movie is one of the few sequels that is better than the original movie. This is in part because the original was not exactly a masterpiece, so all it really had to do was improve on the formula that made the first one work. The two main additions to the case in this movie were Zhang Ziyi, who played one of the main villains of the film, and Roselyn Sanchez, who plays an undercover secret service agent. Both have a dance background which allows them to do really well in the fight scenes they are involved in, and of course, the rather gratuitous shot of Roselyn Sanchez in her underwear about halfway through the movie is not bad either.
Saturday, May 18, 2024
DVD/Movie Review: Rush Hour
The storyline is pretty basic. The daughter of the Japanese counsel in America is kidnapped. The FBI takes the case, but the counsel wants a cop he trusts from Hong Kong (Chan) to help work the case. The FBI gets the L.A.P.D. to assign a cop (Tucker) to babysit Jackie Chan's character, and hilarity ensues. The thing that makes the movie work is the Chemistry between Tucker and Chan, and the fact that they both got what they really wanted to do reigned in a bit. Tucker could not go over the top with improvising lines because of Chan's language barrier, and Chan could not have a movie that was essentially one long fight scene. So what resulted was a movie that really did appeal to a broader American audience than, say, Rumble in the Bronx did. It made good use of the character actors that were cast in supporting roles. It has the great action that any fan of Jackie Chan would expect, just not as much of it as in his Chinese films, and Tucker was at the height of his comedic gold status, being just a couple years removed from his roles in Friday and The Fifth Element.
To me, the highlight of the DVD is actually the extras, from the behind-the-scenes features and the director's commentary track on the movie. You really get a sense of what it takes to get Jackie Chan to agree to do a movie (he basically has to approve everything) and some of the obstacles that they faced during the filming. The extras also include deleted scenes, cast and crew biographies, the music video for How Deep is Your Love, and the theatrical trailer. For those who like going through bonus material, it is quite good. While it is probably not going to be something that everyone likes, if you are a fan of action movies (especially martial arts movies) and/or buddy-cop comedies, it is quite enjoyable and worth checking out.
Saturday, November 19, 2022
Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Enter the Ninja
The basic plot of Enter the Ninja is that a mercenary named Cole, played by Franco Nero, is trained as a ninja in Japan. The movie opens at the completion of his ninja training in a great action sequence. One of his fellow students, Hasegawa, played by Sho Kosugi, resented having an American trained as a ninja, which sets up the end of the movie. The main part of the story starts when Cole goes to visit his war buddy Frank Landers (played by Alex Courtney) and his newlywed wife Mary Ann Landers (played by Susan George), who are the owners of a large piece of farming land in the Philippines. Cole soon finds that the Landers are being repeatedly harassed by a local land baron, Charles Venarius, the wealthy CEO of Venarius Industries, in order to get them to sell their property because, unbeknownst to them, a large oil deposit is located beneath their land. Most of the middle portion of the movie involves Cole beating up the local henchmen Venarius has hired to bully and coerce the Landers. At the end of the movie, we get the classic ninja-versus-ninja battle between Cole and Hasegawa.
For those who get the Blu-Ray, the A/V quality is good, but not great. It is much better quality than the picture and sound on the VHS, which is how many of us in our mid-forties or older saw the movie when we were kids. But, it did not get a high-quality restoration and transfer given that it was an independent 1980s martial arts film. There are no extras on the blu-ray aside from the trailer for the movie.
Overall, this movie is a blast from the past for those of us who saw it as kids. Chances are, if you were into martial arts at all in the late 70s through the early to mid-80s, you probably loved this movie when the horrible acting and cheesy fight sequences (and Nero's 70s porn stache) were easily ignored. It is kind of hilarious to watch Nero in the fight scenes in which he is not in the ninja costume because it is clear he had zero martial arts training or skill. But, when the stunt guy is in the costume and fighting with Kosugi, those are good fight sequences. Kosugi was still pretty green as an actor (not that he was ever a great actor), but he could pull off the menacing bad guy very well. It does have one sex scene (which is pretty tame) and a lot of violence (but even that is tame by today's standards), as well as its fair share of stupid comedy (including a guy with a hook for a hand). You definitely have to take this movie for what it is, and as long as you do not expect more from it than being a cheesy action movie with ninjas, it is enjoyable. If you are looking for an academy award winner, this is definitely not something you will be interested in.
Friday, July 16, 2021
Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Wednesday, July 14, 2021
Workout Update: Power 90 Day 2; Sweat 1-2 and ab-ripper 100
Yesterday I did the first cardio workout in Power 90, sweat 1-2, followed by the ab-ripper 100 workout. Sweat 1-2 starts out with a few minutes of stretching, a lot of which will be familiar to anyone who has done p90x. Then there is about 4 minutes worth of yoga. Basically working through a couple of modified asanas (plank, push up, upward dog, down dog, crescent, and warrior 1/2). Then you get into the cardio portion. It starts out with a knee lift series (three moves each for 30 seconds, then repeat). Then, there is a jumping jack, run in place, and run lunges (the same run lunges from the p90x warm-up sequences) combo, again each for 30 seconds, and then repeating without any rest. Then there is what Tony calls "x work" which uses a taped "X" on the floor (but it is really a cross-shape that creates 4 boxes to step/hop in). There is a series of hop steps in all four boxes, then you run in place for about 3 seconds in each box moving counter-clockwise, then you do hops diagonally from one of the front boxes into the rear box located diagonally from it, and repeat).
Once you get through that portion you get a short water break, then go on to do a martial arts sequence. First, you do kicks, front kicks, knee kicks (which are just a modified knee thrust), and then what Tony calls side kicks but which are really front kicks in a back stance. Basically, they do not do any pivoting so no "real" roundhouse kicks or side kicks as you would do in Taekwondo or Karate. Then there is a punching sequence in which you do jab-cross and then hook-uppercut then do kind of a body blow (short punches that would be to a midsection).
That ends the cardio portion of the workout. Then there is a short cool-down and stretch. Then you go into ab-ripper 100, which is a series of 10 ab moves (again some of which appear in a slightly different form in ab-ripper x in p90x).
I found myself able to keep up in the cardio portion of the workout pretty well. I never had to take any unscheduled breaks, but I did have to slow down a couple of times and modify some of the jumping moves for a few reps. The harder part was the ab-ripper workout. Toward the end of the ab workout I could not finish all 10 reps on some of the exercises. But, I think I can make enough progress that I can move on to the 3-4 workouts after 30 or 45 days (at the latest).
Overall, this is a very good, but scaled-down workout. The cardio portion combines the warm-up from p90x with a little bit of the Kenpo-x program mixed in. It is mostly low-impact, but does have a bit of jumping. The good thing is that Tony shows modifications that you can do if you need to. It is perfect for anyone who is starting out or, like myself, who has gotten out of shape and wants to get back in shape before tackling one of the more intense programs like p90x, Insanity, Body Beast, or the like. And, if you are wanting to go on and do p90x it introduces you to a lot of the moves you will see there. The one drawback I will point out is that, the two "helpers" that Tony has with him in this video sometimes have horrendous form, especially during the kicks and punching portions. They were very likely models who were cast because they were in good shape and looked good, but unlike later programs that used a test group and had many of those people in the workout videos so there were people who knew what they were doing, that is definitely not always the case in Power 90. But, if you watch what Tony is doing, you should be good.
Saturday, July 10, 2021
Movie/Blu-Ray Review: Revenge of the Ninja
Friday, July 9, 2021
Movie/Blu-Ray Review: Ninja III: The Domination