Diary of a Young Grandpa - 1

Diary of a Young Grandpa

The day turned out to be surprisingly active. The meds and my body decided to treat me well, so I managed to get a lot done around the house—I cleaned up, did all the laundry (is that even a word?), gathered firewood in the forest for the sauna, built a bench for bench pressing, took a trip to Rokytne with Zheka for groceries, and ended the day with a nice barbecue.

Rural Lawbreakers

I started the day by cleaning inside and in the yard. There’s an oak tree growing on the property with a fascinating history. When visiting the village, my father trained by running in the forest. Back in 1991, he found an acorn he liked and put it in his pocket during one of his runs. Naturally, he forgot about it. Later, while running again, he rediscovered it in his jacket; by then, it had already started sprouting. That was the same year I was born. So, my father planted it in the yard, and to this day, he forbids anyone from touching it.

This oak tree, my peer, provides excellent shade in the summer. But in winter, when there isn’t much outdoor work, it makes sure we stay busy by constantly shedding its leaves, which need to be raked up. You know, just in case we were getting too comfortable in the cold season.

That Old Oak

After that, I decided to gather some firewood in the forest. To clarify, I wasn’t cutting down living trees or even dry-standing ones—just picking up branches that had already been knocked down by the wind and were never coming back to life. However, it turns out that this is illegal. According to Ukraine’s Forest Code, all dry and fallen trees are considered forest resources owned by the state. So technically, collecting them without a special permit from the forestry department is theft.

That said, the risk was negligible due to the minor nature of the offense. The Ukrainian Code of Administrative Offenses only mentions penalties for cutting live trees, so I wasn’t worried about administrative fines. I’d also read that sometimes authorities try to charge people under the “Arbitrariness” article, but given the small scale of my “crime,” I decided to take the bold risk.

My stance on such laws perfectly illustrates one of the metaphysical principles—the unity and struggle of opposites (shoutout to my KNU professor, Oleksandr Moskaliuk). I both agree and disagree with the ban on collecting fallen wood. On one hand, why shouldn’t villagers be allowed to gather windfallen logs to heat their homes? But on the other, if you give our people that right, the entire forest will suddenly be “windfallen” overnight. So, I suppose the legislators have a point. Besides, what forester would make a fuss if they saw someone carrying a bundle of fallen wood?

A Bit About Fitness

A few words about dieting. I’m not a fan of fasting, low-carb or high-protein diets, intermittent fasting, or other trendy schemes. I believe in physics, chemistry, and math.

The first law of thermodynamics states that energy cannot be created or destroyed—only transferred. That means the rule is simple:

• Want to lose weight? Consume fewer calories than you burn.

• Want to gain weight? Consume more calories than you burn.

Period.

If someone tells you, “I hardly eat, but I don’t lose weight,” they’re lying—maybe even to themselves. Or we’ve just discovered a perpetual motion machine, where we should capture that person and turn them into a power plant.

That’s why I opted to collect firewood instead of going for a jog in the forest. I figured it would be an equal calorie burn, but it turns out that sawing wood is no joke. I probably burned more calories than if I had just gone running.

Handyman Club

Since last year, I’ve joined the “handyman club.” No, not that kind of handy work—I mean DIY projects. There’s even a movement called Do It Yourself (DIY), which you can check out on YouTube.

For convenience, I built myself a bench for bench pressing. It’s wooden, but still a bench.

By the way, that wooden structure in the background? Built that myself, too, but that’s a story for another time.

For the bench, I cut up some old boards, sanded them, treated them with an antiseptic, painted them, and gave them a final coat of varnish since they’ll be sitting outside. I made a stand a bit too low, which makes lying down on it awkward, but hey—adapt and overcome!

Knowledge is Light, and Books are Windows

Finished reading a book I borrowed from my father.

It was exciting and insightful, especially given my love for beer. Learned a lot, and now I even want to try brewing my own. Fun fact: until the mid-20th century, beer wasn’t served cold. It was a warm, unfiltered, very hoppy ale brewed in barrels with a short shelf life. Modern keg lagers are a mainstream industrial product, but I still enjoy them.

My favorite beer is Grimbergen Blonde, a Belgian abbey ale, but it’s perfect from This is Pivbar because they import it directly from Belgium. The church, as always, followed the “if you can’t beat it, join it” principle—when their fight against alcohol failed, they (surprise!) decided to take over beer production themselves.

Another fun fact: the human body is naturally equipped to metabolize alcohol. The moment ethanol hits your tongue, alcohol dehydrogenases jump into action, breaking it down into harmless molecules. So, moderate drinking is excellent. In fact, studies on fruit flies show that alcoholic flies actually live longer than their sober counterparts.

I’ve often seen beers labeled with “IPA” but never considered what it meant. It turns out that, in the past, beer had an extremely short shelf life, which made it impossible to export to India. Then, someone discovered that hops act as a preservative, allowing hoppy beers to survive the journey. These were marked Indian Pale Ale (IPA). Now that I understand what to expect from its taste, I randomly picked up a bottle of IPA—and accidentally discovered a fantastic beer that has now made it into my top favorites.

Yesterday’s wonderful day ended with a barbecue and a glass of this delicious beer. A well-earned toast to finishing a great book—why not?

Wishing you all a great day!

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