Did you hear the news? The earth is fucked. And if you’re not a ruthless billionaire, chances are you’ll never fly into space. Only a handful of people have dared and lived outside of the Earth’s atmosphere to tell about it, and none of these happy and extremely well-prepared souls (say 574 of them) has ever set foot on another planet. NASA wants to change this by giving willing and able volunteers the opportunity to live in a Martian simulator for a year.

You won’t cook your meals in 1/3 of Earth’s gravity or battle vicious sandstorms on Mars, but you will live in the most Martian-like environment the space agency can develop at their Johnson Space Center in Houston.

How do I apply to live in NASA’s Mars simulator?

The mission is called the Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog, and it’s not exactly public: applicants must have fairly specialized and advanced expertise in a STEM field, e.g. accredited institution. ”

NASA notes that their selection criteria are broadly the same as those of their astronaut program.which can be seen here if you think you need to consider scientific bonafides. Of course, the Mars simulator is not necessarily open to the public, but U.S. citizens between the ages of 30 and 55 with the required experience in a science or technology field are encouraged to apply.

The purpose of the program is to create a Martian environment on Earth that is as close as possible to the Martian environment in order to better study the living conditions on the Red Planet in case we manage to send a human there (before we can use the Earth’s ability to support life, completely destroy), that is). And if this mission isn’t quite as flashy as some billionaires’ big dreams of one day turning humans into space travel, NASA’s efforts will nonetheless play an important role in our broader exploration of the solar system.

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The mission itself will consist of three separate one-year deployments at the Johnson Space Center. That Space agency describes the living spaces write in more detail:

The 3D-printed living space will include private crew quarters, a kitchen and special areas for medicine, recreation, fitness, work and plant growth, as well as a technical work area and two bathrooms.

The work will include dealing with “environmental stressors such as resource constraints, isolation, equipment failure and significant workloads,” writes NASA. Other activities include simulated virtual reality space walks, “communication, plant growth, meal preparation and consumption, exercise, hygiene activities, maintenance, personal time, science work, and sleep”. Cataloging the data for future missions is also a central task. The three missions will take place in 2022, 2024 and 2025.

The requirements for consideration are pretty strict, so please read on through NASA criteria before submitting an application. For any potential applicant, the dream of fucking into space without actually taking off with a rocket is closer than ever.

Photo: Arsenii Palivoda (Shutterstock)

I used to use “ego-lifting” as an insult. Some guy loads all the plates on a bar and deadlifts with a rounded back? Curling and sticking his hips in? He’s obviously getting it wrong and making me superior even if I don’t even get half of his deadlift off the floor.

But now the tables have turned and I’m probably the ego lifter. I love lifting the gram heavy. I enjoy showing cool looking stuff that doesn’t reflect how I exercise most of the time. And the more I see the term “ego lifting” thrown around, the more I think: Okay, and what’s wrong with that?

What is ego lifting anyway?

Ego-lifting is colloquial when you try to show off at the gym. It’s a term people use to describe your lift when they think you’re trying to impress them, but they are not impressed.

The downside of ego-lifting, according to critics, is that you are using “too much” weight, that you could injure yourself, and that your form is not perfect. You might criticize that if you used a different exercise or better form, you would gain more muscle, making your ego a combination of useless, ineffective, and dangerous.

But my more cynical side sees it differently. Sure, there are people out there who do unwise things in the gym. But there are also people who look at a big lift and try to pull the lift down because they feel insecure or jealous. It helps them feel better about their own place in the universe when someone stronger than them gets it wrong, or when someone who shows off doesn’t deserve your attention.

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Any of these people can tell you the downsides, so let’s examine the good parts of ego lifting. Maybe you will get some ideas for your next workout.

It’s good to try hard things

It’s safe and comforting to stick to the same exercises that you’ve always done, with the same weights. But when you step out of your comfort zone, you learn about yourself.

If you only squat in sets of five, at some point put on a little more weight and see how much you can really squat if you don’t have to do four more reps afterwards. If you see someone doing a strange or cool exercise, give it a try. Maybe you can do what you thought was impossible.

And maybe you can’t. That’s okay. But when you try, you learn about yourself. The first time I deadlifted was because my husband asked me to try it. “No, I can’t,” I said, and he said, “Prove it,” and I grabbed the bar and was just as shocked as anyone when I pulled and she came up. I no longer shy away from challenges; Since then, I’ve pleasantly surprised myself dozens, maybe hundreds, of times.

A lot of us can lift a lot more than we think so Put a damn weight on the bar and see what happens.

It’s good to do things to be proud of

There is nothing inherently wrong with showing off. Every competition is an invitation for people to show off, and I don’t mean just weightlifting or powerlifting. Professional basketball players show off by playing in front of crowds rather than in their local park. We just got through a whole bloody Olympics where people showed what they can and we got behind them and celebrated them for it.

You can also do things that you are proud of. If you’re running a race, please post a photo of yourself smiling at the finish line. When you’ve built strength in the gym, show us what that strength is good for. When you’ve practiced a skill show us all how your hard work has paid off. I love this stuff. (I’m serious, mark me on insta, I want to see it!)

People have told me that my posts about weightlifting on social media inspired them to try weightlifting, or study some aspect of fitness that they think they would enjoy, or they told me mine Antics brightened their day. And I think similarly about the performances I’ve seen from my friends and acquaintances and from athletes I’ve never met.

It’s good to do things to be proud of. It’s good to work towards doing things that you want to be proud of. After all, that’s the nature of training. You are pursuing a goal. And it’s up to you whether your goal is a formal competition or a 1RM attempt in front of your gym pals, or something difficult but stupid, like a gymnastics club make a turkish outfit with a kayak.

How to use ego lifting for good

So how do we balance these benefits with the criticisms of ego-lifting? Quite simply: We make sure that we are meeting our own needs before we consider how we will communicate our services to others.

Do not confuse training days with test days

A satisfying ego lift is something you do to demonstrate the strength that you have built, but it is not a substitute for building that strength in the first place. If you max your bench press every week, your bench gains will plateau pretty soon.

Prioritize the long term over the short term. Most days, all you should be putting in is work, the boring stuff that makes you stronger. And occasionally you can enjoy a little ego lift as a reward.

Do what you trained for

People like to criticize anyone who tries to get the maximum of one rep and is not in perfect shape. But as you will know, if you’ve ever tried one, max reps won’t be perfect, and that’s fine. Injury in the gym is much more difficult as an armchair trainer like to pretend it is.

But all bets are wrong if you do something drastically different from what you have been training for. If you’ve never done a squat in your life, don’t put a barbell on your leg press and expect to be able to walk and bend them. Be sure to try new things, but be smart about how you do them.

Be honest to yourself

If you’re aiming for a big squat but are so afraid of failure that you don’t even try to break the parallel, that isn’t exactly an impressive squat, is it? Before you decide that it is worth celebrating with others, consider taking pride in your accomplishments.

However, it is up to you to choose what to be proud of. If you’re struggling with your squat depth, a heavy squat that is a little high may still be something you want to show the world off. Just make sure you prioritize your goals for yourself over what you want others to think of you.

Recognize jealousy in you and use it productively

Funny how ego-lifting is viewed as attention-grabbing behavior and we still use it for careful introspection. But I think that makes perfect sense. Ego-lifting is ultimately about you, and it is valuable to think about what services you value and why.

When you’re in competition with someone else – maybe deadlifting just a little more than you – it can be great when the other person is pushing you to train harder and dream bigger. It’s not great when you just see someone do something you wish you could do and then stew in jealousy.

It’s up to you where you put your ego. When you find yourself obsessed with the accomplishments of others and interfering with your own training, it is time to find a new way to focus your work and goals. But if you film yourself doing big lifts to challenge yourself and connect with a community of friends and teammates, and have healthy relationships with rivals, then I say do it.

Photo: By YuliaDerid (Shutterstock)

There are enough of Plant care techniques the growers help make bigger profits, like cables and screen of green nets that help plants grow taller and get more sun. And of course there is pruning, which is the pruning of a plant to the right size to encourage new, fuller growth. However, a similar process is known as “deadheading,” and uses pruning to encourage increased (and longer) blooming of flowers. Here’s how to dispose of your flowers for better bloom.

What is deadheading?

When a plant blooms, it spends a tremendous amount of energy producing its seeds and less in new leaves for new flowers. Deadheading removes dying (or dead) flowers and seed pods to redirect the plants’ energy and focus on their fresh buds. Removing the expired pod signals the plant to produce more leaves and flowers for the season.

What is blooming for the deadhead and when to do it?

Deadheading works best on annual flowers because they bloom once a year and then have to be replanted for the following season. Cutting off the dead ends will help them bloom fuller and longer so you can enjoy the beautiful flowers during their full bloom period. At the same time dead perennial flowers redirects energy to the parent system for higher yields once they return in the following season.

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When to start pruning your flowers will depend on the type of plant, but in general pruning can start as soon as you see a flower fade. This dying flower means the plant is working overtime to sow that flower before it dies, and all of that energy could be used for new growth. This process can take place for the duration of the growing season, as long as you want to see the flowers bloom.

Household product supplier Fiskars recommends leaving some flowers a little longer to provide nutrients for the wildlife (and some still look pretty even after they’re on their way outside). For flowers with multiple bulbs on one stem, you should wait until 70% of the flowers are dead before you hack it.

How to make flowers dead

Most flowers can be dead with two fingers to break off the dead head just before the green leaves below. However, you should be careful not to break off new buds because these are the flowers that you will soon enjoy when the dead buds are gone. Of course, some plant stems are stiffer and too hard for just two fingers, so you need to Secateurs to cut the withered flowers at the nearest leaf base for harder plants. Continue this process for the entire garden, making sure to break off or cut off all of the dead seed pod, and not just the dead petals, to ensure that the plant’s energy is focused on the new buds.

Photo: Subbotina Anna (Shutterstock)

As a lover of the salted and heavily salted, I appreciate the many gifts that the caper bush gives us. From this we get not only capers, but also caper berries – two things that sound like they might be the same, but in reality are very different.

Capers and caper berries are both picked from the caper bush, but at different stages of ripeness. Capers – the small, intensely salty, savory little balls that are often found on a bagel with salmon – are the unopened, unripe flower buds, while the caper berries are the ripe fruit.

Both are usually pickled in some way, but caperberries are larger and more tender with a lemony, floral flavor. Salt-filled caperberries tend to be slightly crunchier than their liquid-pickled counterparts, which, like most pickles, are sour and salty, with crispy seeds that have a texture similar to that of a kiwi.

Use caper berries like olives – especially in ice cold martinis. You can toast them whole, with their stems still on, with a protein, or all on their own, or toss them into a large bowl of pasta. They also make an excellent pizza topping: cut them into small slices and sprinkle them around like hot peppers.

Capers, on the other hand, are smaller and have a sharper flavor, but are still quite light and are best served as a side dish (or fried as a smol bar snack). Capers are harvested before flowering and rated for size, with the smallest – labeled “not comparable,” which means “incomparable” – the most sought-after. Hand-picked and fermented and stored wrapped in sea salt on an island between Sicily and Tunisia, Pantelleria capers are the most refined and best served as a side dish to enjoy their complex flavor.

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But all capers are pretty good. They’re good with chicken, they’re good with fish, they’re good with salads, they’re good with pasta, and they’re good in compound butter. (You’re good at a lot of hearty things, I say.)

Both capers and caper berries are usually packaged either dry in salt or in jars with a liquid salt solution. The salt-filled versions of both are predictably very salty, so it’s usually a good idea to rinse them off (or even soak them overnight) to trap the salt content before adding them to your food. Some people recommend similar moves to the guys with brine too, but I never do that because I really like salt. (If it’s wrong to eat capers straight out of the jar, I’ll never be “right”.)