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The Iron Church – Why Do People Quit Fitness Training?
And what the science — and AI — say about how to stop them. I would leave work after a long, hard day in the city and simply have no energy to attend my GoJu Ryu Karate training. I’d call my wife, as though for permission to quit, and she would always talk me into going. So, I did. I would always call her back after the lesson, almost high from how awesome it felt to use my body. She knew exactly what to say to get me to go, always motivating and tailoring her advice to me. So perhaps people quit fitness because the system they are using treats them like the average of their demographic — just a spreadsheet entry saying “Male, 28, Intermediate” — rather than a unique athlete whose capacity shifts from week to week. Life intervenes on us all, and real psychology is incompatible [...]
The Iron Church: Why Most ‘AI’ Fitness Apps Are Just Marketing (And How I Built One That Actually Works)
7 AI Pipelines ? 5 AI Prompts, 2 Deterministic Engines. Discover the technical strategy behind building The Iron Church—an AI fitness trainer defined by periodisation science, multi-prompt architecture, and serious consideration of your real equipment. This article is the technical deep dive for anyone who wants to understand what “AI-generated workouts” actually mean when you refuse to cut corners. Introduction This isn’t a story about prompts. It’s a story about why real AI products need state, constraints, and domain logic. There is a specific kind of professional irritation that arises when you spend your working life directing and building real AI systems, only to encounter something that treats AI as merely a marketing feature. AI on the box, we call it. Once you are trained to notice it, you spot it immediately, with telltale signs and vague claims. Such as “personalisation” claims, which amount to little more than a [...]
Announcing my new book: Trials & Tea Ceremonies: Misadventures in Far Away Places.
A hilarious and heartfelt journey for anyone who has ever wondered: "Is this it?" What happens when the life you've built no longer feels like your own? For Basho, turning thirty felt less like a milestone and more like "a splinter in the mind." A series of personal crises convinced him and his partner, Cesca, to make a radical choice. They walked away from their careers, put their lives in storage, and set off on a year-long, unscripted adventure across a dozen countries to answer one question: Is there a better way to live? Their path takes them from the rugged shores of Australia to the spiritual heart of India and the serene temples of Japan. But between the moments of transcendent beauty, a deeper, wilder journey unfolds. They must face down spitting alpacas, chaotic farm hosts, a terrifying encounter with the world’s largest spider in a Laotian toilet, [...]
Basho’s bonus modules: Rime of the Frostmaiden – an Adventure with Pirates
When I was a child, I had no one to play Dungeons & Dragons with. Now, I am 45 and play with my own children. Yes - I built my own players! Our players: the piplins! [...]
Chan Buddhism, Daoism and Zen – Journey through the East
Writing an article about Zen is almost a contradiction in terms. That is unless I simply leave the rest of it blank... Just a finger, pointing to the moon… But, I don't want to do that! At its basic [...]
The Hidden Context in some Great Movies
I love the cinema and movies. I also make films myself. What stared as a simple passion for the action and adventure in films has become a life long urge to understand what the filmmaker, [...]
Jawbreaker – Ultimate AI Upscaled 4k edition
I was at the gym and, as usual, I was watching downloaded films on the gym's TV while cycling or rowing. I decided to watch the documentary "Samsara" by Ron Fricke and was amazed to see that I had [...]
And so I went for a walk…
"And so I went for a walk..." by Basho Painted by hand onto a Microsoft Surface Studio 2 in the software "Rebelle" using a digital stylus. This is near the village of "Mount Bures, Suffolk, UK" [...]
Kyoto, Nara, Himeji, green tea and finding inner peace
I have written before about travellers wanting a point to it all, to travelling. In part this is perhaps seen as them wanting to justify the vast cost of travel; to have a point for spending all that money, [...]
Basho rewrites: Rime of the Frostmaiden – Defeating Auril, DM’s guide and ending
**Caution: this post contains spoilers for Rime of the Frostmaiden!** When I was a child, I had no one to play Dungeons & Dragons with. Now, I am 46 and play with my own children. Yes - I [...]
Children of the Red Rose
**Caution this post contains spoilers for Children of the Red Rose!** When I was a child, I had no one to play Dungeons and Dragons with, it being the 80’s and the game not being popular here in the [...]
You’re the Pretender – a Tier 1 tribute
A loving tribute to 5 years of Tier 1 Military Simulations events. They say that it is only when you lose something that you realise the value it had. That emotional wrench requires a loss of access. Not that [...]
OMEGA Speedmaster Professional “Moonwatch” review
THE SPEEDMASTER PROFESSIONAL MOONWATCH. For well over half a century, the OMEGA Speedmaster has witnessed events that have tested the limits of physical endurance and human courage, including the first manned lunar landing in July of 1969 and every one of NASA’s piloted missions since March of 1965.
The Alam Clock Lesson
Early in my leadership career, I had a junior member of staff who was late to work. Nothing unusual about that, you may think, for are we not all occasionally late into the office? Most of us commute and moreover [...]
A Wild Sheep Chase
**Caution this post contains spoilers for The Wild Sheep Chase!** When I was a child, I had no one to play Dungeons and Dragons with, it being the 80’s and the game not being popular here in the United [...]
Varanasi City of Gods – Special Edition
How does it make one feel to be in one of the most “holy” cities in the world?
Varanasi – City of the Hindus
Many Indian cities are a jumble, a mix of the ancient and modern, but nowhere I have ever been compares in this regard to Varanasi. I come from a country, and from a city, which [...]
Mount Wudang and the Meaning of Life
In China, Daoist temples atop mountains are so numerous that there must be something about these high places that answers a longing for cliff edges and being above the clouds. A simplistic analysis of this, one using that most ignoble [...]
Remembering Catherine
"Remembering Catherine" by Basho Today, on the anniversary of her passing, I present a new painting; a present for my mother in law. This digital portrait was painted in Rebelle 5 Pro.
“Morgan” – Digital Watercolour
"Morgan" by Basho Painted in Rebelle 3.
Yaks for tea and Tibetan Temples. Living the high life in Shangri-la
"You have to imagine," said the man in broken English, "that this..." he gestured his hands at the view in front of us, "big lake... flood wide and deep... great water!" He broke into a wide toothy smile.
Critical Praise for “Trials & Tea Ceremonies”
A hilarious and heartfelt journey for anyone who has ever wondered: "Is this it?" What happens when the life you've built no longer feels like your own? That's exactly what Basho and his wife Cesca felt. So, they walked [...]
The day I met the Buddha, and killed him
Delhi. Many people say they have “done” Delhi, but in all honesty they haven’t. They have perhaps done the tourist parts of New Delhi, or maybe spent some time in an Ashram there – which amounts [...]
The Purpose of Travel – Now Published!
We often take arriving at the destination to be the purpose of travel. Taken in this way the journey itself is not the point, rather it is the serious business of transporting our bodies from one place to another. Getting [...]
What is Daoism/Taoism?
Before we start I should add a caveat to this article: I am a philosopher and a Daoist. As such, I suppose, I am open to accusations of bias and a lack of objectivity. This is unavoidable. However, if one [...]
Waterdeep: Dragon Heist | Dungeons & Dragons
**Caution this post contains spoilers for WDH!** My players (9-year-old children, my wife and her 70+-year-old mother) just completed Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, and there follows my write up of the adventure. The piplins! [...]
“The Backroad to Bures”
"The Backroad to Bures" by Basho AI image upscaled from 2019. It would make a lovely computer background.
The Storm King’s Thunder and the Dragon’s Bane
There follows the campaign we have played all through the 2020 lockdown. It has helped us all resist the mental anguish of the COVID virus, recover from the infection itself and be a beacon of bright enjoyment for all. Truly the great value of this magical game cannot be overstated when played with attentive and imaginative children. So, I present the chronicle of my son, my daughter and my wife playing their first campaign after the starter set, Storm King's Thunder!
Slumdog Millionaire Movie Review
Cesca and I sat in the heat of the Mumbai movie theatre around the corner from the Victoria Station – that defining landmark at the centre of the city – and waited for the film to start. All around us were packed in hundreds of the Mumbai crowd. I scanned their faces. The film was in English with no subtitles, other than those found in the international edition, so most of the audience were those more educated types who understand English very well. None-the-less, I was sure that all over the city a large variety of people packed in to cinemas and movie houses to see this film and its greatest star.
Every Waking Moment by Goran Powell – Book Review
I first came across Goju Ryu and the DKK style while sat in, the now defunct, Borders in [...]
Basho Reviews : Michael Clayton
What is it with George these days? The last 4 or 5 movies he has been involved with have all been seriously excellent. Whatever is leading to the rhythm he has found, I thank the god's for it...
Sennybridge, a Basho film about “The Chernarus Conflict”
To those of you who play computer games, the country of Chernarus may ring a few bells. As anyone who loves the Arma series of games from Bohemia Interactive will tell you Chernarus, or Black Russia, is a fictional post-USSR country somewhere in the East that is used as the main game location. TA Events have licensed the entire storyline from Bohemia meaning that players at the event could sign up to the various factions found in the series. When someone says that you should get out from behind the keyboard and get some exercise, these events enable you to re live the brilliant, in-depth storyline for (almost) real. A detailed account of the factions and background to the event can be found here and it has a very professional depth to it not usually available to airsofters.
Nick Griffin on Question Time, a liberal view
Last night, Question Time: the BBC’s ‘political debate’ show, invited the leader of the BNP onto the panel. This caused [...]
Basho’s art 1992 to 2011
I have finally finished a long time project (no more procrastination for me!) to scan in all my paintings, drawings and sketches from the last 15 years and post them up here. After all they were not doing any good in my case on my cupboard!
Varkala & Holi : Kerala part two
Varkala is a very popular tourist destination with western travellers. Similar to Goa in many respects, it is a large [...]
Goa: The Beach Life
I lay on my back and tried to relax. The sound of rolling waves crashed back and forth in the [...]
A Basho Film : Australia
A short fun film highlighting our trip to Australia, showing some of the fantastic things we saw in this wonderful [...]
Sunset in Mumbai
The November terrorist attacks on Mumbai was something we had worried about before landing in the city, but to look [...]
OMEGA Speedmaster Professional “Moonwatch” review
THE SPEEDMASTER PROFESSIONAL MOONWATCH. For well over half a century, the OMEGA Speedmaster has witnessed events that have tested the limits of physical endurance and human courage, including the first manned lunar landing in July of 1969 and every one of NASA’s piloted missions since March of 1965.
Charity Airsoft Event – Write Up
On Sunday, my airsofting brothers and I held an airsoft event on behalf of the little kids at Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital. Many people gave up their time and gave across their money for the event, including the Electrowerkz site owner's, marshals, medics and players. The net result was a combined donation of £1816.68 to the charity.
Vietnam: Cu Chi, the Mekong and Nha Trang
We meet with the crazy Cao Dai!
The best MOVIE actor of all time
Sir Michael Cane
Airsoft Adventures Podcast
I have been playing airsoft now for 7 years, which is an easy date for me to remember as I started my first proper skirmish on my stag night. I went on from there to play regularly at the old London site of Electrowerkz and was soon drafted into the Dark Angels (as they were then known); a 30 strong team of serious CQB players. Soon after that I was asked to join the marshalling team at Electrowerkz and rose to become a senior marshal and even ran the venue on my own a few times. Unfortunately, Electrowerkz closed on the day I left to go travelling and the Dark Angels became team Delta-Alpha. They have gone from strength to strength since then and have successfully branched out into playing military simulation games as well as appearing on TV, a music video and as “resistance security” for the Sarah Connor Chronicles London launch party
Singapore: Gateway to SE Asia
The hottest cold One of the first things that hits you on arrival to Singapore airport is the intense cold. Litres of Icy cold air is blasted at you from almost all directions from a myriad of air-conditioning machines the size of skyscrapers and it is quite nice to get outside and experience a little heat for a while. Air-conditioning has been taken to new heights by the Singaporeans, indeed the entire Tube system is frosty cold conditioned, as is every single mall and many of the pavement steps surrounding them. To walk around Singapore is to be blasted by heat and cold at such extremes you wonder if you have wandered into a new form of torture.
Losing Control, Releasing Nature – The Directors Cut!
In the last of my series of films re-examining my output over the last 10 years, I present the definitive [...]
Tier 1 Military Simulation – Operation PAYBACK – Download Now
This incredibly well played event showcased some of the highest quality effects ever used in milsim. Including RPG attacks, EOD detonations, explosive entry and more. All captured in the 20 minute film from Outside Context. If you have any interest in milsim then this is a must watch!
Cambodia – Journey to Angkor
Spiderville stands between us and the wats, can we escape the 8 legged freaks?
Headshots In Airsoft: Argument For Full Face Protection
The quotes are from various people in the arnies airsoft discussion on this issue I have recently become embroiled [...]