The Little Thing.

If I were ever to monetize my blog, I would seriously consider becoming a spokesperson for PopChips.


My monthly case of PopChips arrived on Thursday. There was much excitement because I decided to go with 11 different varieties in this case instead of the standard six. I tried the That Sweet Chili Potato flavor and the Sweet Potato variety to much delight. Today was my first experience with Parmesan Garlic Potato.

Delectable.

Now, when you’re in line at Subway trying to eat healthy by ordering a Veggie Delight on wheat bread with barely a suggestion of dressing and a complete absence of cheese, take a moment to look at the bag of the healthy-looking SunChips. They’re really not that healthy. In fact, I think the caloric count of the SunChips will outweigh the caloric count of the healthy sub you’re ordering.

PopChips? 100 calories a bag. No saturated fat. No Trans Fat. Total fat 3.5g. And quite frankly, I don’t see anything in the ingredients list that I can’t pronounce.

I won’t ever ad ads to my site, after all, you have my vivacious personality to enjoy, but if anyone ever asks for a snack recommendation, I recommend PopChips.

14 January 2013 by Fun and Games Dept 0

The Inspiration Inclination.

So, back at the end of August, on the day that I shaved off that big mustache that wasn’t as popular as the absence of it, I weighed myself. This is not unusual in itself, because I weigh myself every day. I know that people say that a person shouldn’t weigh themselves every day, but this is something that I’ve done for years and it’s the just the way that I am.

Anyways, on that last day of August I weighed 209 pounds. It’s not the most I’ve weighed in my life but I was headed in that general direction. And quite frankly, I didn’t really like the way I was feeling. Riding my bike was not as enjoyable as it had been in years past and I just didn’t feel comfortable in my skin.

Now, I’ve always had a “cub gut”. I will always have a “cub gut”. There is a picture of me playing basketball at 7 or 8 years old with my Dad’s cousin (we called him Uncle Bill) and when I posed for the picture it looked like I had a little tyke-sided basketball under my shirt. My abs have always worked undercover and they will always continue to do so. I am a realist and I know that I’m never going to be the chiseled type. My only goal was to feel comfortable in my own skin. So I decided to start doing something about it.

Removing the daily 75 minute commute each way was a big step in the right direction. By working from home three days a week, I had the opportunity to get out and do something instead of spending daylight hours behind the steering wheel. So I ramped my alarm back to 0500 ET (I always write that in military time so that I feel disciplined about it) and started getting up early and going for a walk. After a few weeks of doing this, I started riding my bike again. I found myself wanting to tackle hills I hadn’t climbed before. I found myself wanting to get out and feel the fresh air. My body thanked me after its initial confusion. The daily weigh-in, which never left my routine, did not result in disagreements with the scale. There was no drop-kicking. If the number crept back up, I decided I need to work harder.

I didn’t crash diet. I’ve tried that before and it has never worked. SlimFast did not enter the picture. Protein shakes did not become part of my routine. What I needed was a lifestyle change, not a quick fix. So what did become part of my routine was keeping track of everything on an app that our friend Jeff introduced us to, MyFitnessPal. I have written about this before and I have found it to be very valuable to this whole approach. It tracks my calories in, calories out, water intake and my weight, and it syncs between my iPhone, iPad and any computer with a web browser. I have no excuse for not keeping track of these things. It even has a barcode scanner that looks up nutrition information for you!

When the daylight hours grew short and the weather didn’t lend itself to bike riding, Earl and I joined the gym. Other than a break during the holidays, we have been going to the gym on a regular basis.

My area of concentration has been weight loss. I set reasonable milestones along the way and I even changed my goal once when I felt happy about where I was headed.

On the first of September I weighed in at 209. This morning I weighed in at 178.4. I have lost over 30 pounds.

I haven’t reached the number I have as a goal yet, but I’m in the ballpark. I took my blood pressure the other night and it was 120/82, and that was after a day at work! Ten years ago I was on daily medication because I had chronic high blood pressure. My weight yo-yos a little bit still, I’m sure I’ll clock in a little over 180 within the next week, but it just keeps me more determined.

Folks are starting to notice the weight loss and I find it flattering when someone says something. The folks that have always seen me with a beard or with the big mustache wonder why I’m clean shaven. It’s part of the effort; a more disciplined approach to my morning routine helps me get on track for the day and having a naked face helps me stay that way.

For the first time in many, many years, I am looking forward to the longer days so I can start walking or riding my bike in the morning before work without risking getting hit by a car. In the meantime, Earl1 and I are going to keep doing what we’re doing and holding tight to the effort.

It’s good to feel good, both inside and out.

1 Earl has made amazing progress as well and while I wouldn’t be so presumptuous as to talk about his goals and achievements, I will say that he is impressing me VERY much with his efforts. I am very proud of him.

12 January 2013 by Fitness. 6

The Lunchtime Whine.

I am working from home today, and as I sit here at the kitchen table and enjoy my lunch, I can’t help but notice that the house is being buzzed by some very large airplanes today. This is not surprising; this sort of thing happens when you live a couple of miles off the end of one of the longest runways in the United States, despite the fact that the Air Force Base that houses this runway has been officially decommissioned for nearly two decades.


He’s bigger than he looks in the photo.

I find these planes fascinating. From what I can tell, they’re Lockheed Galaxy transports and I believe there are students flying the plane. I think two planes are taking turns doing touch-n-gos. One of the planes markedly pulls back on the throttle just as they’re approaching the house and it looks like the jet is coming to a complete standstill. The other plane opens up the throttle and the engines whine about it, higher and louder. The second plane was loud enough to get Tom’s attention (must be the frequency of the whine) but not loud enough to wake up Jamie, who’s still asleep as of this writing.

Maybe they’re both used to the noise.

So the planes go ’round and ’round and I watch them fly over wishing I was up there with the students and whoever else is on the plane. I bet they’re massive on the inside. I could see myself enjoying the view with a parachute strapped on my back and awaiting for the leader to give the signal to jump. That’s a different passenger approach than the planes that most people fly on. There’s probably no first-class section divided from the rest of the plane by a limp, blue curtain. The curtain probably isn’t even camo or anything because there’s no first class. Honestly, skydiving would be a first class experience to me. The idea of skydiving from a big plane like that (or even a small plane) is awesome. I told Earl that I want to skydive for my 45th birthday this year. He looked at me with fleeting panic but then calmed down. He knows that I’m adventurous enough to do such a thing. To tell you the truth, it’d be quite an adventure to just be in one of the Galaxies when they feel like they’re coming to a halt in the air.

For now, I’ll listen to them whine while I whine with envy a little bit.

Just as I was finishing up this entry the whine was replaced by the traditional roar of jet engines usually heard around passenger airports. Since Griffiss doesn’t have commercial service, I had to take a look to see what was flying in and saw that DHL must be having some jets serviced by that does that sort of thing on site. Nifty! I need to work at home on Thursdays more often.

10 January 2013 by Geek Ponderings and Musings 0

The Resolute Week.

So it has been a week since I set some goals for myself for 2013 and quite frankly I’m feeling good about them thus far. The scale and I are getting along. I have completely revamped my workflow at work and I am markedly less stressed (though sometimes I played the harried part to keep people off my back). At home, well, the cleaners come back in a week. Two out of three ain’t bad.

Earl and I went to the gym the other night and I snagged the last available elliptical machine (otherwise known as the ‘Spazz-master’). It seems that there are many people trying to get fit for the New Year and I applaud their efforts. The social engineering person in me is curious to see how long the overpopulated gym situation lasts. I think some make a list of dozens of resolutions and lose interest in them. I know that I would. I’m finding by concentrating on less than a half dozen goals, instead of trying to revamp my life, I’m focused on what I want to get done and I’m actually accomplishing something. This is a good feeling.

I’m employing technology in my new routines where I can; I still use MyFitnessPal to keep track of my healthy stuff. I have a FitBit that is keeping tracking of my steps and sleeping patterns. I was a little surprised to find out how many times I wake up during the night and after the first few nights I adjusted my sleep schedule so that I would get more restful sleep. My organizational goals at work have focused on a completely paper-free desk. I wiped out a bunch of unused apps on my computers and iDevices. I’m getting rid of older technology that I used to keep around for nostalgic purposes and only keeping the things I actually use.

It’s a good feeling. I guess when your only resolution is to set up achievable goals for yourself, you’re setting yourself up to win.

And that feels good.

9 January 2013 by Fun and Games Dept 4

The Weather Coaster.

So yesterday it was bitter cold, which made taking a morning and afternoon walk at work less than as enjoyable as it could have been. It’s important to get exercise, plus walking at work has the amazing benefit of clearing my head and making me more productive when I return to my desk, so one must do what they must do, even if Mother Nature doesn’t want us to do it. Still, it was quite cold.

This morning when I got up for work I noticed that it was 9F. It was another chilly morning in these parts, just like it’s suppose to be in January. It’s what’s expected. Except now it’s over 40. And now only is it over 40, it’s over 45. The weather folks are saying that it could hit 50 by the weekend but I rarely believe what they say so only time will tell.

I feel like we are on some sort of weather roller-coaster this winter. I’m not complaining about it, mind you, as this appears to be the new norm, where the winters are more mild than they were when I was a kid. Earl tells me that it’s all cyclic and it probably is, we are just in a part of the cycle that I’m not familiar with.

But I have to admit that I do miss having that “really big storm” of the season where we get dumped on with several feet of snow within a 24 hour period. Sure, it’s inconvenient and I’d probably complain about it myself as it’s happening, but it’s a good way to get the adrenaline pumping and nature knows I love the pumping of adrenaline. Maybe after our spring in January we’ll get something wacky like a sno-nado or something.

Good times.

8 January 2013 by Ponderings and Musings 4

The Life Enjoyment.

So I haven’t written in my blog in three days. This is unusual for me, though there have been weekends where I haven’t written much in the blog simply because there has been too much going on in our merry lives.

Apparently such was the case this weekend.

At the beginning of the year I decided that I was going to reassess my social networking ways and decide what was microbloggable, what was bloggable and then act accordingly. This weekend I decided that I just wanted to enjoy life without telling the world about it through every inane detail. Earl and I had a lovely date night on Saturday night, saw an enjoyable movie and accomplished many chores around The Manor yesterday. It was a simple, yet effective way to enjoy the weekend and quite frankly I loved it. I feel good today.

Yesterday I actually sat down and read. I didn’t read to find things to talk about on the blog, I didn’t read to get the latest trends in technology news, I read because I wanted to read and enrich my mind and stoke the creative fire. I loved it. I feel stoked.

Sometimes it’s good to take a short break.

7 January 2013 by Fun and Games Dept 2

The Shorts Conversation.

So when we woke up this morning, I noted that it was -10ºF at home. That's pretty dang cold. By the time it was time to leave for work (an hour later), it had warmed up to -8ºF. There was hope of getting above zero during the commute in; I actually saw a reading on the Jeep thermometer showing 2ºF, but then when I got to the office it was back down to -7. During the morning walk with my co-workers, it was still -1ºF and I feared I had managed to get frost bite on my face. I slapped myself a few times to make sure. Everything is still intact and not a gross color.

One of my goals of 2013 is to come out of my shell a little bit. I'm always going to be a bit introverted, that's just the way I'm wired, but there's no reason I can't reach out and be sociable once in a while. So I have a goal of talking to at least one stranger a day. I wouldn't have made this a goal if I didn't feel it was sustainable, but it is a little bit of a challenge for me, because I'm not in a job where I can accomplish this by asking “would you like fries with that?!?” in an excited voice.

Standing in line at Dunkin' Donuts this afternoon I noticed that the customer ahead of me was dressed for warmer weather. Well, this manner of dress was noticed on his bottom half.

I didn't say anything about it and went about getting my unsweetened iced tea with lemon, accompanied by the usual confusion that occurs when I pay with my Dunkin' Donuts iPhone app. (They always scan, forget to press a button on the register, and then scan again).

My drink was delivered to the pick up area, where the man in shorts was still assembling his straw and such for his drink. I decided to be friendly and ask a simple question, “Dude, are you cold wearing shorts?”

Ok, I don't know why I said “Dude”. I sometimes say “Dude” and it makes people nervous because it doesn't sound natural coming out of my mouth. I think “Dude” is less annoying that “wicked”, which I say a lot more than “Dude”, but “wicked” didn't really apply to this situation. Now that I think about it, I could have fit a “wicked” in there with “Dude, aren't you wicked cold wearing shorts?”, which would have scored a tally of “2” in the weird vocabulary column, but I left off the “wicked”.

In one second he looked at me, looked me up and down and said, “No, not at all.” He sounded strident. Perhaps he didn't like the “Dude”. Maybe he thought it was wicked cold. There's a chance that someone else had asked him the same question but without the same flair for language.

A little put off by the fact that I had asked him this, what was now very apparent to me, very personal question, I was a little embarrassed and simply said, “Well have fun with that.” I could have said, “well you have very nice legs” or even “you have wicked nice legs” but I didn't want to make him blush. That would have been a little too much.

At the very least, I can say that I spoke to a stranger today. Maybe I'll try a different approach tomorrow.

 

3 January 2013 by Uncategorized 2

The Positive Intentions.

So the geek in me was rather excited about an announcement coming out of Canonical, the company behind the open-source platform of Ubuntu. Ubuntu is a distribution of Linux, one of the many operating systems available for computers and computing devices. It serves the same purpose as Microsoft Windows or Apple’s OS X, and like the differences between Windows and OS X, Ubuntu does things in its own way as well.

Now while we are an Apple household, my primary laptop computer is actually a Lenovo ThinkPad T430. A recent purchase, this laptop runs the latest version of Ubuntu Linux (12.10 or Quantal Quetzal). It does take a little extra effort to get my Linux laptop to fully cooperate with everything that goes on behind my walled garden of Apple, but for the most part I love the experience and I really appreciate what Canonical is doing with Ubuntu. (Though I can get cranky and state otherwise once in a while).

Anyways, today Canonical announced the planned release of Ubuntu Phone. This looks like an exciting project, and watching the video now available on YouTube, it looks like it’s going to have a really cool interface. The new guy in the smartphone category is going to have a really tough time competing against the likes of iOS and Android but I think they are coming up with their own spin on things and I wish them the best of luck. I appreciate their excitement. It is infectious.

The thing that has bothered me since the announcement, which was less than an hour ago, is the snarky, naysayer, doomsday comments from the tech crowd. “Good luck with that.” “What commands do you have to type to respond to a text message?”, etc. Folks are already populating my Twitter and Google+ feeds with crappy, barely witty one-liners all in the name of dooming this project before it even gets off the ground.

What a crappy way to start 2013.

So I’ve been deleting people I follow on both services. In fact, I haven’t been limiting this practice to the Ubuntu-commenting folks. I’ve decided that if someone can only repeatedly complain about life on their Facebook feed or whatever, I don’t need the negative energy in my life. I don’t need other people bringing me down when I am looking straight ahead and reaching for the stars.

Do I think the Ubuntu Phone is going to be a success? Who knows. I know that they do have a tough road ahead of them and if I were going to hedge any bets at the infancy of this project, I would say that it has a better chance outside of the United States where the cell providers aren’t trying to financial rape anyone and everyone they can with their overbearing control. Personally, I’ve tried smartdevices outside of the iOS realm and quite frankly I haven’t been impressed. The Nexus 7 looks nice but there were too many glitches. If I were to tag any device that I really liked outside of my iOS world I would say it was the Zune that Microsoft gave up on a couple of years ago.

I like Ubuntu’s idea of plugging your phone into a dock and that it turns into your desktop computer. That is cool to me and I think it’s a step closer to the Corning Glass vision of what’s to come in the relatively near future.

I think the world would be a much better place if people concentrated on the positive and weren’t so quick or eager to find the negative. That’s one of my goals in 2013; to be a positive influence on society and to contribute more than I receive.

I hope others try to do the same with me. And best of luck on your project, Ubuntu Phone. I will be watching your progress and when the time comes, you might end up on the top of my phone consideration pile.

2 January 2013 by Geek Ponderings and Musings 2

The One About the Beginning of the Year.

So today is the first day of 2013 and people all across the world are taking it easy and relaxing, having partied like wild people last night. Earl, Jamie and I did not party like wild people last night but instead opted to sit in front of the television, enjoy some snacks and laugh a lot. It’s what we do.

I thought it would be kind of weird to have a New Year’s Eve Countdown without Dick Clark and I was right to an extent; it was actually much weirder than I thought it could possibly be. I mean, who in their right mind thought that Fergie and Jenny McCarthy should be hosting a tribute to Dick Clark? Jenny McCarthy was her usual incoherent self so that wasn’t the weird part, the weird part was Fergie, who was apparently auditioning for a sex tape where she was captured by spaced out, apparently drugged crowd people that glued her right hand to her hip as she nearly serviced the microphone and made people uncomfortable with her pronunciation of the word “Dick”.

Fergie

We couldn’t take Jenny and Fergie so we switched to Kathy Griffin and Anderson Cooper as soon as we could and we found them to be much more enjoyable. I’ve always found Anderson to be adorable (and I like his journalism ways) and Kathy can be fun in managed doses, so it was a good combination again this year. We watched the ball drop, there were kisses and hugs and text messages and then we called it a night.

Today has been a day of relaxation with bouts of productivity. I just hauled a bunch of stuff out to the curb for garbage pickup tomorrow. Cleaning clutter is always a good way to start a new year.

Happy New Year everyone!

1 January 2013 by Fun and Games Dept 3

The One About The End of the Year.

It is the last day of 2012.  I’m still here, the blog is still here and the world is still here. There’s a part of me that wants to ramble on about the things I learned, the people I met and the fun we had in 2012 but I’m not feeling overly rambly today. Even though it’s a workday for me, and I find it quite amusing that I am being somewhat productive, my head is already in 2013 mode and I’m looking forward to the challenges of the new year.

During a ride home from the in-laws yesterday, Earl made a comment: “which are the better years for us – the even ones or the odd ones?”  To be quite honest, I can’t remember which is which these days, partly because I have middle-age senility but also because I’m going to make 2013 a good year no matter what. Determination, coupled with a sense of relaxation (in the spirit of “what will be, will be”) is what is going to get 2013 off to a good start in my little head.

If I had to summarize 2012, I’d say that it was a learning experience. I learned a lot about people, I learned a lot about what money does to people, I learned a lot about big corporations and I learned a lot about our country. More importantly I learned a lot about myself and I like to think that I am starting 2013 a little smarter and more aware of my surroundings than where I was a year ago.

So tonight I’m going to raise my selected bottle of beer up in a toast to 2013 and welcome it with open arms. It’s going to be a hoot!

31 December 2012 by Ponderings and Musings 4

About J.P.

Just a guy with a husband. We’ve been together 28 years and he still makes me see fireworks on a daily basis. Hiker. Storm Chaser. Private Pilot. Tech Guy. Hackerish.

Weird? Eccentric!

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