Much like yesterday, and once again despite the moving average numbers, I feel really good about today. Over a year ago I was doing a hundred push-ups per day, and had to stop that when I managed to pinch a nerve in my back. I have started inching back up, and this morning I did fifty five, in five sets on cadence without breaking. I will continue alternating between sit-up and push-up days to try to keep from putting my back out again, but it is progress in the right direction. I also inched up the pace on the treadmill from the past few days. Once again, a year ago I was pushing 5mph on the treadmill, and I am a long way from that right now, but I am moving back in the right direction. My moving average for weight went up again today, but tomorrow the largest number (by far) will drop off the average, and the day after another big one will drop off. I fully expect the change in trend to finally start showing in the latter half of this week. I am still well on target to my goal of getting firmly back below 270 by the 15th, and to be in the low- to mid-260's by the 31st. All in all, a good day, workout-wise.

As for Blake's 7, well...

Gambit

(Blake's 7 Wiki Recap)

I don't know what Robert Holmes was smoking when he wrote this one, but hoo boy it must have been good stuff. The setup is straightforward enough: the last story gave Blake the name of someone who knows where Star One is located (home of the Federation's Command & Control Center), so this story has the team chasing down that lead by going to a gambling outpost just outside of Federation control.

That's where the weird starts. The setting is just all over the map. Freedom City is presented as a spaceport, with a saloon straight out of a period American Western show complete with a Gunsmoke Miss Kitty knock-off. The second floor is a casino straight out of a James Bond novel, run by a mobster who is inexplicably dressed in eighteenth century French aristocracy garb, along with his personal assistant (played by, of all people, John Leeson - the voice of K9). Servalan is running around in a slinky red dress (not entirely out of character, but also clashing with literally everything else on the set) while Travis is leaning into the whole eye-patch thing dressed as a gunslinger. Oh, and up in the casino we have Deep Roy (possibly the only working Little Person in the U.K. in the mid- to late-70's?) as a lethal chess master.

On top of all that, the plot has Avon and Vila going off on a side adventure together, doing their own little Ocean's 11 riff by taking the casino for ten million credits by having super-computer Orac shrink itself down to pocket size so they can carry it around and have it predict the outcome of the roulette wheel. Whaaa??? First of all, the notion of Avon and Vila palling around on a caper is just.... weird. Second of all, when did Orac get the magical ability to shrink itself? Thirdly, how is a casino even briefly fooled by a player who constantly holds his wrist up to his own ear (to listen to Orac's guidance) before every game play? It's just, as I previously mentioned, weird.

That's not even to mention the part where Cally and Jenna stage a catfight with each other to cause a distraction, because that's something they would do.

Oh, and the last episode had Travis and Servalan working together, whereas this episode has Servalan actively trying to kill Travis for no apparent reason.

I just...  there has to be an amazing behind-the-scenes story about how this episode happened, and I am dying to hear it.

All of that being said, and for all of its ridiculousness, I have to say that at least the episode was enjoyable. Weird, yes. Random, definitely. Nonsensical, absolutely. But at least it was never boring or predictable.

Oh, in the end the guy turns out to not know where Star One is located because of Reasons, but he passes along the name of another guy who knows. So the Star One plot gets stretched out tomorrow with another snipe hunt before it finally pays off in the season finale. So there's that. Tomorrow's episode is set on a planet named Goth, and I will be very disappointed when the inhabitants are not just a bunch of moody teenagers dressed in black and listening to The Cure.

STATS:

Episode(s): Blake's 7: Gambit
Steps Walked: 7,114 today, 4,812,246 total
Distance Walked: 3.20 miles today, 2,498.17 miles total
Push-ups Completed: 55 today, 11,805 total
Sit-ups Completed: 0 today, 6,865 total
Weight: 272.54 lbs (five day moving average), net change -34.76 lbs