August 2002

Earl and I are sitting here at Wellesley Island State Park in the 1000 Islands as I write this. This is the first time that we’ve been here. We are both big fans of the NYS park system and we really enjoy going on picnics and such. This state park is along the St. Lawrence Seaway along the Canadien border. The weather is beautiful, though it is a little windy. We just got done eating lunch, a hot dog and Torengos with salsa. As soon as I finish this entry, we’re going to go on a hike and see what this island has to offer. By the way, we are on an actual island, the signs outside the park say “U S Mainland –>”! 🙂

I’ve been successful in slowing my mind a little bit through relaxation and meditation. I think its helped me become less reactionary and more focused.

Back from our walk. We were taking pictures near a rocky cliff when something stung me. It felt like 110volts or a burn more than a sting. It surprised the heck out of me and stings like the dickens. Still hurts like hell, but I’ll deal with it. I haven’t dropped dead yet, so it couldn’t have been a bee sting. Maybe a dragonfly or something.

Earl is reading ”What If God Were The Sun” by John Edward. He seems quite interested in it. I hope to read it after he’s finished.

I enjoyed a nice dip in the river. It was considerably warmer than Treman State Park last week. There was a handsome man down at the beach with a nice full beard, with the ”full” part mostly under the chin. Gave me an idea for this fall and winter. If I hit my goal weight by the end of September and stick to it, I’m going to go for it.

My hand is still hurting me a little bit but I’m dealing with it. Earl is grilling pork chops that smell absolutely wonderful.

I just took a long walk around the entire park. There are some beautiful campsites here. I hope to go tenting before snow flies.

9:45 p.m. – Home. What a beautiful day. My pinky is still swollen and aches, but I know I’ll live. Just got to finish up the laundry before calling it a night.

I thought I’d take a moment and write a little bit more in the blog before calling it a night. Earl and I got back from Syracuse a little while ago. We took it easy while we were out there, not a lot of activity, just a relaxing day at the mall.

We decided to go to Carousel Center (the future DestiNY USA) because there was a bit of a cloudburst going on as we got to Syracuse. So instead of Barnes and Nobles we ended up a Borders, which was a good thing because I was still able to find the book I was looking for. It’ll make work that much easier! 🙂

We also went to CompUSA, where I purchased Microsoft FrontPage 2002. I’ve been working on the websites more, and I had heard good things about this latest version of FrontPage, so I thought I would give it a try. Let’s see if this experiment is a success! I’ve had mixed feelings about previous versions of FrontPage, but as I do more studying of HTML and such, I’m beginning to see why the software does what it does, and now I feel more comfortable with it.

We also moved over to our new home of jpnearl.com tonight. If you go to the old address, you’ll still get to our new home (we left a forwarding number!) but update your bookmarks if you’re a regular. We moved to our own server because there’s a lot of stuff we want to do with the site and we haven’t had the opportunity to do so. We’re probably going to webcam more of the house, in a sort of “Big Brother” way. We both think that’s kind of neat. I’ve also been working on videos I’d like to share, and we’d like to upload more pictures and stuff to our photo gallery, but we were limited in space with our previous “residence”.

I’ve been thinking about going to a massuse the last week or so. Actually, I’ve been thinking about it for about a year, but now I feel comfortable enough in my body to go and have someone rub me down. My legs have become quite muscular if I do say so myself, but my chest and arms are still those of a city boy (what happened to the hay and poop slinging arms I had on the farm?), but as of today I’ve lost 28 lbs since May 1st and I’m feeling pretty good, so I think I deserve a really firm, good massage.

We’re planning a visit to a state park tomorrow, though we haven’t decided which one. I better decide tonight before going to bed.

Well I’m writing a short little ditty while Earl is taking a shower. Just got back from a bike ride, my first in seven days. It’s just been too hot to enjoy cycling this past week, with record highs near 100 all week long. Went to the Canalway trail, about 3 miles in there’s a tree that must have fallen in the thunderstorms last night. A cyclist was skimming his bike underneath the tree. I didn’t want to exert that much effort, so I decided to turn around and head back and call it a day. I was very hungry and hot anyways, so that was o.k. Ended up going 14.75 miles.

We’re going to Syracuse tonight for supper and to stop at Barnes and Noble. I really enjoy going there – I need to pick up a couple of books for work. Then tomorrow we’re going to go to a state park for the day again. Probably Fair Haven, on the other side of Oswego.

Well you can tell it’s the middle of August. I’m beginning to make television resolutions – I’m not going to watch new sitcoms this fall. On Thursday I really wanted to see “The Rerun Show”, since it was featuring a Bewitched segment, and I am a die-hard Bewitched fan. So I caught the tail end of “Will and Grace”. First of all, some feel that as a gay man I should automatically be in love with the show. I’m not. I think it’s a waste of time and actually a vehicle for more humor to be derived from the so-called “gay life”. Then I got to thinking about a lot of the sitcoms lately, and they’re all the same and can all be termed under a three word phrase. “Blah blah blah”. The dramas aren’t much better, but at least their watchable. I can tolerate “Judging Amy”, but even that’s bordering on idiotic.

I don’t know why I’m feeling so hostile towards television today. Maybe because I watch some of the shows from the 1950s and 60s and they were just of higher quality. It really irritates me that the actors and actresses feel that 19-22 episodes a season is bordering on too much work. The first season of Bewitched was *39* episodes long, and that was including Elizabeth Montgomery’s pregnancy AND all the special effects that they had to do “the hard way” (without computers) for each episode. And it was for like a tenth of the money. At least the reality shows are somewhat enjoyable in that it’s allegedly normal people making asses of themselves for a somewhat normal amount of money. The folks on Big Brother 3 make $750 a week for only the weeks they’re on the show. I think that’s cool. It’s not an outrageous amount of money.

It’s been so hot and muggy that I haven’t ridden my bike the past couple of days. On Saturday, I left at 5:30 a.m. and rode to Homer (near Cortland) … just shy of 80 miles, in 7 hours. It was very hot, and very, very hilly. I’m quite sunburned, despite the sunscreen I had on. Earl met up with me and we went to Robert Treman State Park just south of Ithaca. A great state park for swimming! I’ll have pictures on the site by the end of the week.

I’m writing this at work, I better get doing something productive!

Here we are winding up another weekend in our happy little household. Woke up a little bit late this morning, 9:20 to be exact. I guess I just felt like sleeping in. Decided to go for a bike ride, so I was on the road at 9:50 from 2 hours and 20 minutes – ended up riding almost 25 miles around the area. Came home and weighed myself for my weekly weigh in, 194.5 pounds! Absolutely blew me away! I started my whole exercise/diet regime at 219 pounds, so I’d say that’s quite an accomplishment. I hope to stabilize at 190 lbs., I think I’m going to have to go below that for a little bit so I have a little room to fool around and finally stabilize at my intended weight.

Earl has started up golfing again. We went and bought him a new set of clubs yesterday, which seemed to make him quite happy. I’m glad that he’s getting out an enjoying the summer sun. Actually, we did quite a bit of shopping yesterday in Syracuse – I needed a new keyboard at work so I picked up the Microsoft Office keyboard. It has some extra buttons on it to make work easier – I bought it because I really liked the feel of it. The keyboard on my HP here at home is nice enough, though it is a bit mushy to type on. I’m very picky about keyboards.

Earl and I also went for a walk tonight, which was quite nice. We walked for 2 miles this evening after supper. I hope to do at more often as well, as we both seemed to have enjoyed it very much.

It’s very, very humid – it’s been that way all weekend. It is suppose to cool down considerably tomorrow night, so I’m planning on cycling to work on Tuesday and Wednesday.

We watched Big Brother today. It’s official. I’ve become obsessed, as I dreamed about being in the house with the rest of them last night. It happens whenever I get hooked on a reality show. I’ve dreamed I was on Survivor, I’ve dreamed I’m on the Amazing Race, now I’m dreaming I’m on Big Brother. I’ve also dreamed I’ve had a walk on role on Queer as Folk and Judging Amy. I guess television really gets to me.

We went to the movies last night and saw “Signs”. First of all, we went to the theatres in Carousel Center, which was a mistake because people are always rude and talking on their cell phones or just being plain inconsiderate. Then, sitting to the side and back of us was a mother of three with her children, including a NEWBORN baby! Why on earth would this woman bring these kids to a movie theatre? Then, to top it all off, I really didn’t care for the movie. I thought it was boring. It just sort of rambled on… We had an enjoyable sandwich at Au Bon Pain in the food court afterwards before heading home.

On the techy side, I’ve gotten really, really deep with my Palm m515. I’m really liking this. I picked up the Rand McNally atlas on chip last night and was messing around with it on the way home. I’ve also started reading ebooks and emagazines on their as well. Plus, I picked up Tetris for the Palm, which I love and have been playing away at that.

I’ve begun studying for the MCSA Exam 70-270 “Microsoft Windows XP Professional”. I’m taking the test first weekend in October. I’ll earn a MCP certification and then go on from there for the MCSA track. I really want to earn this certification, and it’s going to be my ‘project’ I concentrate on this winter.