u/clrncmcn

I worked out a lot in my early 20s, stopped for a long time, and picked it back up ~2.5 years ago.

For the past year, I haven't been able to improve my lifts at all. I lift to 'failure,' but the failure is just my muscles giving out. I don't get any of the burn or soreness I used to associate with failure, but I physically can't do another rep.

I go to the gym every day on a 4-day cycle: three days with 20 minutes of cardio and 50 minutes of strength training (back/biceps, legs/shoulders, chest/triceps), and the fourth day is an hour of HIIT.

I'm 5'7" and was around 147 lbs when I first plateau'd. I tried increasing my calorie intake and protein from 0.8g / lb to 1g / lb, but I just gained 12 lbs without any improvement in lifts after a couple of months. I also switched up my routine with different exercises twice, but also no improvement.

My goal for building muscle was to lower my BF%, so I eventually just said fuck it and went on GLP-1 to meet that goal. I'm now down to 125 lbs and have largely maintained the same weight with ~one less rep. Now I'm back to trying to increase my lifts, but I have no idea what I need to be doing differently.

Am I missing something obvious here?

I have white vinyl retrofit windows. The exterior trim looks really bad and doesn't match the rest of my house. I want to change it to black.

I've read that painting exterior vinyl trim black is a bad idea, because it will absorb heat and cause the vinyl to warp. I'm planning to replace the windows in 2-3 years, so I'm considering painting as a short-term solution. It doesn't need to last forever.

If I really want to go through with this, can I reasonably expect to get away without warping for 2 years? Is there any specific prep that should be done to make it last as long as possible? I'm located in Southern California, so it gets hot, but usually not extremely hot.

My home's front yard was done as cheaply as possible by a flipper for rebates and is starting to come apart. I'm looking to have it redone, but I don't have any good references for companies that can do both design + implementation.

Most of the companies I've come across while searching online don't have anything in their portfolio that matches exactly what I'm looking for (e.g. modern, minimalist, low maintenance/ drought tolerant), and I'm hesitant to roll the dice on this.

Does anyone have any recommendations for companies they've worked with?

More of a rant, I'm constantly getting guys in their mid-20s initiating plans after multiple conversations and then not showing up, not saying they're not showing up or acting like they're still coming, and then trying to continue the conversation later like nothing happened.

Most recently, I was talking to a guy for a couple of weeks, he asks if I'm free next week, we make plans for Monday. The day before, he confirms we're still on, yep, good to go. The day of, he asks what time, we agree on 9:00 PM. 11:00 PM comes around, I ask if he's still coming, yep he sure is! 12:30 AM hits, I go to bed. Two days later, he messages me asking how my day is going?

In the 15 years I've used Grindr, I've experienced some minimal amount of ghosting, but not this. And it's happening like 30-40% of the time with guys in this age range.

I understand ghosting: you were horny at the time, you get off, you no longer feel like meeting up. Sure, whatever. This new form of it makes absolutely no sense.