Seasonal Transitions

The last vestiges of winter is coming and going.  The snow has mostly melted in Warrensburg, and as I figured would happen, no more appeared.  I haven't posted in the last couple of days, and there's a reason for that.

For the past four nights, I walked to work.  Each morning, I walked home.  My legs keep begging for mercy, but I'm not giving up.  Tonight, I'll be driving to work seeing as how I need to fill my car up in the morning.

I also need to do some laundry as well, but perhaps that can wait until after I've taken a nap when I get home Monday morning.

I'm also getting close to finishing George Orwell's 1984.  The next book on my list could very well be Brave New World.  Either way, I'll be doing something very special this Tuesday after finishing the book in question.

Speaking of Tuesday, I plan on writing an article on that day so that there's content coming from me each week.  If other contributors were to pick a day to post, that would be excellent.  Imagine if the site eventually had content every day from one person.

It would be the right kind of balance of having regular updates without overwhelming any site visitor with information overload.

New Addition to the Family

I saw a Toshiba notebook in Central Pawn.  It has a dual core Intel Pentium T3400 processor, 2 GB of RAM, a 100+ GB hard drive, and Intel GMA 4500 graphics.  I wanted another computer that was primarily powered by Intel technology for the purposes of testing other operating systems.

Here are some pictures of the computer in question.

I saved a couple of bucks due to the missing faceplate from the optical drive.

Plentiful screen size, no webcam, and no frills.  :)

The machine is currently openSUSE 12.3.  So far things have been pretty stable.  I was even able to use WiFi for the network-based install.

The only problem is that I had to do a manual fix to make sure I could connect to my network at home.  Thank goodness for release notes.

Well, I better cut it short so I can get something to eat, shower, and go to work.  I'll have the next two nights off, so things should get interesting.  Toodles for now.  :)

Weekend's Over Wednesday: Short Work Week.

I only have to work two shifts this week before I go on vacation this Friday.  My dad plans on visiting, and I'm really excited about it.

After all, 30 is a milestone in one's life.

The funny thing is that I was going to treat it as just another day.  After all, it wasn't like I was a small child anymore.  When dad announced he may be visiting, I decided to go ahead and ask for some time off.

I'm eternally grateful it was approved.

The Exercise Front

On the good news front, I managed to work my way up to 50 reps with the dumb bell and two sets of 17 off the wall push ups.  Assuming the weather cooperates in the next couple of weeks, I'll be able to walk to work instead of burning gas.

Gas prices are shooting up, so saving money would be an added bonus.

The Website

Starting next week, more action is going to happen on the website as well.  Podcasting was the first step.  The next step is writing stuff on a regular basis.  The cool thing about the site system being used is that it allows for more activity to happen directly from the site itself.

Though third party services are nice, it doesn't necessarily contribute to overall site traffic.

Spiritual Front

I made it nearly halfway through the book of Genesis.  With each chapter, I write notes on my thoughts regarding the text and add any questions I may have to help me think a bit more.

Needless to say, I'll be spending my lunch breaks in a more productive manner over the coming months.

That's all for now.  I need to get something to eat and head to bed so I can be rested for tonight.  It seems I'm one of the few people who can shift from day to night mode in an almost seamless manner.

The important part is that one does it right, or they'll be tired when their nights off come to an end.  I'll elaborate more on that in a future post.

Until then, may the Ides of March pass you by in as painless a manner as humanly possible...... with green beer.... yeah.. green beer.

Only a Matter of Days

This will be short and sweet seeing as how I need to be at work in less than an hour.

I feel myself getting stronger with each passing day.  The exercise routine appears to be working.  This Wednesday, I'll be up to 50 reps with the dumb bell, and two sets of 17 off the wall push ups.

Since the snow should be going away for the most part, I may get my wish of walking to work soon.  Once I can walk on a more regular basis, I'll lose even more of that jiggly stuff that likes to hang off of me at the moment.

This puffed marshmallow is shrinking and shrinking so to speak.  ;)

For the last couple of nights, work has flown by really fast.  Part of it was due to it being busy.  The other part is due to my birthday coming up in a matter of days.  My time as a 20 something is coming to a close.

On March 9, 2013, I will be 30 years old.

My dad plans on coming up to visit, and he plans on bringing something big with him (big enough that it requires a truck).  That day is going to be a landmark for me.

It's a sign of things to come, for everything is going to start falling into place.

I took another break from Vimeo, but that's ok.  I needed the sleep, and I got plenty of it.  While sleeping, I had some of this playing in the background.  That particular site has changed in the last few years, and it's looking pretty good.

I've also been doing some more spiritual research on my part.

In other words, I'm working on body, mind, and spirit.  :)

For now, I shall go shower and get ready for work.  After tonight, I'll have to do a small load of laundry (and more spiritual research while clothes are washing and drying).

Holy Strain, Biceps!

I did it.  It hurt, but I succeeded.  The repetitions with the 10 lbs dumb bell has been increased to 45.  I have also modified how I do push ups off the wall.  I do a set of 16, wait about 20 seconds to cool down, and do another set of 16 for a total of 32 push ups off the wall.

A week from this Wednesday, I'll be at 50 reps with the dumb bell and two sets of 18 push ups off the wall.

We're apparently suffering winter's last gasp.  Last week, there was a good amount of snow.  This week, there appears to be more of the same.  The same goes for the week after that.

Of course this shit happens as I'm about to turn 30.

I'll just have to play my cards carefully and hope that the weather people are wrong in their forecast.  At the very least, temperatures should be in the 30's (degrees that is), so that may prevent the new snow from sticking as effectively.

In the mean time, I'll continue my focus on weight training throughout the weeks until the weather becomes consistent enough for me to walk outside on a regular basis.  The plan is to eventually save gas by walking to and from work.

Some More Good News

A friend commented last week that it looked like I was losing weight.  Another friend of mine told me that I was looking good as of late.  One of my coworkers told me that whatever I was doing, it was working.

That means I must continue the path I've been traveling.

Remaining true to myself and living life as I see fit along with molding myself into what I want to be has been the goal that I've been seeking all along.  Progress has been made, but there's still much that has to be done.

One step at a time.  One step at a time.

Mission Complete!

Yesterday, I said I was excited about the opportunity to get ahead on a few things.  I suppose I have done just that.  The only thing left to do for the time being is to get my oil changed (might do that in the morning) and the gas tank filled up.

The good news is that I'll still have money left over, a good feeling to have.  Things seem to be going right so far in 2013.

There's been a slight change in technological terms at the living quarters.  I recently went to my ISP's new pricing.  Granted, I have to use their modem from here on out, but there's no rental fee anymore.  An added bonus is that it's a DOCSIS 3, which should improve performance.

The utilities are taken care of, and I managed to stock up on a few more food items (low carb of course).  Speaking of food, I've somewhat changed my strategy a bit.  I'll eat the veggies that are low carb as part of the last meal of the day.  That way, I don't have to worry about refrigeration as soon as I get to work.

Thank goodness for canned meat is all I have to say.

Speaking of healthy living, I got a bit of extra exercise today as I moved some carts out of the parking lot towards the end of my shift.  I still took to the dumb bell and off the wall pushups when I arrived home.  Next Wednesday, I'll add two repetitions to what I'm already doing.

According to my calculations, by keeping up with the pattern for increasing reps, I'll be doing 50 of them with the dumb bell by March.

Once I hit 100 reps with the dumb bell, I plan on increasing the weight to 20 lbs.  At the higher weight, I'll start with 15 reps and work my way up to 50 using the same pattern described in previous posts.  The fun part will be when I increase the weight to 30 lbs.

At the highest weight I'd be willing to work with, the starting point would be five reps.  Working my way up to 25 would be what I refer to as quite a challenge.  If I can meet it, then another crucial step would be taken.

It would involve using all three weights in a sort of pyramid fashion.  I would start with 10 lbs at 100 reps, go to 20 lbs at 50 reps, then to 30 at 25, back to 20 at 50, and finish off with 10 at 100.

I'm guessing that won't happen until at least the end of this year.  More likely, 2014 would be the target time period.  Either way, I'm working my way towards improving myself on the physical level.

However, I also recognize that physical appearances never tell the entire story.

Tanya Slade wrote an article for my website about an individual named David Elmore Smith.  With help, he lost an extraordinary amount of weight.  The problem was that he put it back on due to internal issues as well as external issues.  Thankfully, he's trying to get back to the good point in which he was at.

In addition to taking care of himself physically, he's also sought psychiatric help as well.  Those interested in following this individual might want to check out his YouTube Channel.

I'm getting to know myself better during the whole process.  One of the things I'm going to reveal at the moment is a very important key to understanding who I am as an individual.

I may take my time when it comes to many things in life.  When I'm fed up enough with a particular situation, I'll do everything in my power to change it.  That's why I was able to find my current living quarters on the first try.

I was tired of living in a dump.

There will be more revelations as time goes on, especially regarding a couple of mini vacations that I'll be taking (one in February, and one in March).  I'll have something very important that I want to discuss when I arrive at my first one.

In the meantime, the dishwasher is in drying mode, so I better go turn the water off (it connects to a faucet).  After that, I'll definitely need to go to bed.  Have an awesome day, everyone.  :)