Weightloss- 

I started last year at 325 and was doing well for a while.  I made it down to right at 300 in just a few months.  I am back up to 320.  In fact,  320.0 is going to be my official start for this year.  I think this year my goal will be 50 pounds.  I know what I need to do to make it work.  The trick is to do it.  My big thing is my diet.  I have a new strategy for that this year.  I have been reading about the Paleo Diet for quite some time.  I plan on trying to follow that plan the best I can to see how it works for me.  There will be some tough parts, like no dairy or grain, but I will see how I do.  I am also looking into eating better quality food.  Reading has lead me to learn that food isn’t the problem.  The problem is the food itself.   What I mean is that the quality of food that I eat and that is common in today’s markets, isn’t the food that we should be eating.  I am going to be eating a lot more meat but it will be grassfed, free-range, and hormone/drug free. 

This will mean doing a few new things and shopping in a different way but I think Jo is at least also interested in this as the health benefits are very real.  I will write more on this as there is a lot more to say.

Certification-

I didn’t do everything I planned for my certification goals last year.  However, my goals have changed.  The technical certifications ar not as important to me now.  I may still go back and get them but my main priorities will be the management type of certifications.  I am looking at an intermediate level ITIL exam and possible an MBA.  I have already done some research on both of these.

Finances-

There has been some improvement here but not nearly enough.  I have started a third job teaching online with CTU.  It will be much more involved than working with ECPI but the money will be welcomed.

That is all for now.  I am hoping to keep up my posts.  If I do, I will post many of the links to the research I have done for my goals.  I also want to talk more about my exersize plans for this year.  Some good stuff in the works there too.

Since the last entry I have lost just a little steam on tracking my food  I was tracking it everyday and doing great until I got sick.  Once I got sick I never got back into the habit.  It is definately something I am going to get back to.  I actually gained a pound last week.  This week I am eating better but still not tracking it.  I need to commit to this again.  It is so important to losing weight.  I will go back to using the dailyplate.com.  In fact, I think I will post what I ate so far today after I finish this post. ….. X that!  I just posted it.  Even without tracking my food to this point, I have been doing better this week.  I am confident that I will lose a couple of pounds.  I haven’t been keeping up with the push-ups or stretching as much as I would like but I am doing it sometimes.  I will track to get that back to a regular habit again soon.  The only reason I put it off right now is that next week is going to be such a busy work week that I don’t know what I can realistically expect myself to accomplish.  I will talk more about that later.

My running has been going well so far.  I was able to budget for some shoes.  It is great to finally have some real running shoes.  They are not the pair I thought I was going to get but it is still good to have them.  They were out of the ones I originally planned to get.  I do like the ones I have however.  Mom offered to get me some shoes for my birthday coming up.  Another pair of shoes would be nice but I think I could also use some better shorts, shirts, socks, glasses, etc…  The shoes were definately an important piece.  I am now less worried about stepping on my foot wrong while running.  I have been prone to twisting my ankle for quite some time. 

I have found a new place to run.  The Davidson College track is open all the time.  I went Thursday at about 1 in the morning and the lights in the area were enough to light the track so that I could run.  It wasn’t just like daylight but it was very reasonable.  We had another warm night so I was able to run in shorts and a tec-T without a problem.  My last run consisted of 3 five minute runs with a 3 minute walk in between.  There was also the normal 5 minute warmup and cooldown walks as well.   I felt good after the run but I think completing it made me feel even better.  I did need to ice my left knee and right calf after the run but it seemed to really help.  My next run (sometime tonight ?) is going to be 2 8 minute runs with a 5 minute walk in the middle.  I am hoping that the weather cooperates and lets me do this.  It is threatening to get cold and nasty again. 

I have also been doing some stretching on a semi-regular basis.  I need to make this more of a habit as just sitting straight up with my legs extended and my feet pointed up is a bit of a stretch for me currently.  Luckily, I can do this while watching tv.  I do need to get a mat  The new floors are killing me. 

I also started doing some pushups but I let work get in the way.  I am going to restart this program.  The first one is just doing pushups everyday for 10 days in a row.  This helps to build the initial strength up.  I will try to follow this up with the 100pushup program a week after I finish this.  

Work has been busy as well.  Next week is going to be even tougher.  I have been able to complete just about every task needed for the LOD IDP.  All I have left to complete is the class.  I will take it as soon as it is offered. 

I have also decided to change my certification path just a little.  I am going to try for the 70-290 server 2003 exam next before retaking the Vista exam.  While I think I could pass the Vista exam with less work, I think it will end up being less meaning full when Microsoft 7 is released latter this year.  I can still take it later if it is all I need to complete the MCSA: Security exam.  I am hoping to register for it soon.  I would also like to purchase the Transcender practice tests for it as well but it is another $100 that I don’t really have to spend freely.  I might be able to make it happen.  We will see.  Work is suposed to be buying us training materials that I requested but we will see when that happens.  Right now they are worried about next week.  We are going through Disaster Recovery and our move to the Mooresville office.  This all happens during our 7 on and I might have to work all 7.    I will be the last one to go to the new Mooresville office as I will have to be in Wilesboro as LOD until the move is complete.  At least it is coming soon.  I can’t wait for the 20 minute commute.  It will save me both time and money. 

ECPI is still going well.  I have two classes this term again and it is keeping me busy.  I do still enjoy it most of the time though I am teaching the harder of the networking classes.

We have been having our weekly financ meetings and we will have another tonight so I hope we continue to make progress.  Unfortunately, it looks like we will be paying a little this year instead of getting a refund.  One more expense to pay.

I guess that is it for now.  I am going to call it a post.  I spent most of it on the exercise portion but really it is the part that has me excited the most currently.  I am hoping to race in a 5k soon.  There is one in April that I would like to run but I am not quite sure if I will be ready for.  If not I will do one this summer.

Jo and I had our first financial meeting in a long time.  This month is going to be tight.  No blow money this month.  There is little room for error as we are banking on money not yet in our hands.  Not a good plan but it is the best this month could give us.  We will meet again on Thursday to check on this week’s progress.

My job and certification is going just okay.  I did make a little progress towards completing my LOD requirements.   I spent some time with the ITSD.  The IT Service Desk helps stores with their issues until they become big enough for the OCC.  I will schedule out the rest of the work as soon as I can.  I believe I will be able to complete it all with one week of working days.  I should be able to do this after the 7 off if BIA doesn’t get in the way. 

I still need to work on getting my cerifications.  This however won’t be possible until there is money to do so.

That brings up my next point.  I did lose some weight this week.  I think the key was counting my calories and tracking my food.  First it keep me from eating as much food that I shouldn’t.  Second, I knew right where I was everyday with what I needed to eat.  The DailyPlate is a great site and I am enjoying using it.  At the end of the week I found that I lost 5 pounds.  My diet hasn’t been perfect but it has been under control.

On the finance side, we have made some progress but there is plenty more to go.  We will meet every Thursday night to talk about our budget either to make the monthly busget itself or just talk about where we are that week.   No giant step but an important one. 

I haven’t done much in the way of certification this week.  I plan on rereading the book again this week with an emphasis on performing the labs.  I think that will be the key for me on the next test. 

Work is going well.  I have been told to go ahead and do whatever it takes to get my requirements for LOD out of the way.  The department has taken on new responsibilities.  This means that the managers responsibilities have increased.  There will be the need for an LOD every week.  I have a whole list of things I have to do to officially become a LOD.  I am going to be given as much leaway as I can with my schedule.  I will have to spend a few shifts at different hours but I have been asked not to do things on my days off.  I plan to comply with that.

Weightloss- I have completed the second week of the couch 2 5k program.  I am doing well running 3 times a week so far.  I am concerned that I may not be able to continue my progress.  The problem is not making the time.  I have been able to do this so far and, weather willing, I think I will be able to keep it up.  I am concerned more about injuries.  I am well over 300 pounds and everything I read tells me that running is just a bad idea until I am considerably less.  The catch is that I want to run to get to be less not the months it may take to get there before I start.  I am running at a slow pace.  I think that helps.  My pace is not much faster than my walk.  In fact,  I think I can walk in busts faster than my run.  I also need some shoes.  We had money put away for shoes before I broke my foot last year but that money disappeared when our finances went south. 

I am actively using a couple of websites that will hopefully help keep me motivated.  I have been posting in the Traineo forums regularly.  I learned about them by listening to the Fat2fit podcast.  It is a great podcast that has common sense advice without a lot of fluff.  The website is www.fat2fitradio.com  .    The same show also recommended www.Sparkpeople.com and The Daily Plate at www.dailyplate.com .  I have joined a couple groups and will start posting my daily food intake on that site starting Monday. 

Why Monday?  I am starting my week on Monday.  Don’t have a particular reason other than it seems to fit my schedule.  I will weigh and measure myself (if I can find a tape) today (Sunday) and every Sunday there after to track my progress. 

Finances- Jo and I are both aware that we have to make some changes but we haven’t actually sat down to make them yet.  Perhaps we can do that tonight. 

Certification-  I think that I might need to make this more about my career progress than just simply certification.  Recently, my career situation has taken a positive but unexpected change.  I have been nominated to take over the Leader on Duty position.  It is actually one of those promotions that give you more responsibility and more hours without necessarily putting more money in my paycheck.  It is still a positive move because it is a step closer to the management position that I want eventually.  I have come to recognize that it is a management track and not necessarily a technical track that I am really interested in.  The technical certifications are still very helpful for the career path.  The priority may have changed just a bit. 

ITIL will need to be pushed up a bit.  I am still going to take the Vista exam next because I have done the studying and I am ready for it for a little review.  I will also take the MCSA:Secrity requirements still and eventually the MCSE:Security.  Again these are a means to an end.  The engineering is not as important.   The ITIL track will become important.  The CISSP and CISM also step up in importance. Currently, I don’t meet those requirements anyway so I have time before they become an issue. 

Back to the 70-620.  I do need to take it soon to get back on track.  If I have time to do a chapter a day over the 7 on I will take it in early February.

Certification- I did pass the Security+ exam but I blew the Vista 70-620.  I think that I played around too much in the sims and it counted against me.  I didn’t know that before but I have learned since.  I am going to take and pass it in the next several weeks.

Weightloss-  I am still about the same weight I was.  I still don’t mind the excersise but the diet part kills me.  I am ALWAYS hungry.  I don’t know why.  I am going to be doing a few things to work on that.  First I will try to start a food log starting Sunday.  I don’t know if I will post it here or not.  I am reading an interesting book on the subject.  Harvey Brooker has some good ideas and focuses on men’s weight loss and the problems that go with it.  No offense ladies but most of the market seems to be focused on you.  I am also working on a Couch 2 5k program as well.  I am in week 2 and I like it.  I really want to be able to run a couple of miles at a time again.  I am worried that my weight may get in my way and may need to go from a 10 week program to a 17 week program.  I am hoping to be able to run the 5k on July 4th.  We will see

Finances-  What can I say.  We fell off the wagon.  Luckily, we both realize it and are willing to get back to monthly budgets and weekly meetings.   Unluckily, we waited too long and have to catch-up again.

That is all for now on this recap.  I will post again soon.

I haven’t done as much excercise this weekend as I was “studying” for the exam.  I do plan to make it a habit and I am not too concerned about being able to do that as I have been successful at it in the past.  On the plus side, Jo has really taken off on her wieght program so I am forced to eat better than I have for a long time.  We also bought a scale.  Later I will post my measurements for comparision and progress purposes.

Still no budget meeting.  Working on that.

On other news I was able to workout before going to work yesterday.  I had to shorten the time so I increased the resistance.  I still got a fine workout.  I will try to leave earlier next time so that I can do the full amount of time.  I have just started increasing the time to 35 minutes.  The idea is to increase 5 minutes every week until I reach 1 hour and then I will increase the resistance.  Pretty soon I am going to have to start lifting again too. 

Still haven’t had a finance meeting with Jo for a while so I will have to have one this week.  Last week I simply forgot all about it.

That’s it for now.

I have signed the family up for the local gym again.  I have done pretty well with going.  I missed today but I went Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.  I am looking for a new social networking site to track my progress.  SparkPeople is ok but it feels a bit busy for my tastes.  Ironically, for its “busy” front, I see very little chat or social activity in the forums.  It may just be the ones I go too.  They have a constant growth in material so obviously it is working well for someone.  I may need to give it another try later.

So far I am just doing some cardio to get back into the swing of things.  I started with 20 minutes the first day and moved to 30 there after.  I am going to work towards doing hour long sessions again.  Before I was buring about 1200 calories a workout.  I hope to bring that up to 2000 eventually.  I will also start working strength training next week.  I will bring out the old work out sheets and try to start over and work to where I was before. 

I haven’t taken any measurements to this point.  Even the scale at the gym is broken.  The scale should be replaced this month they said so hopefully I can start tracking my weight weekly.  I am not certain how often I will do the other measurements but once a month might be reasonable.  I will give that a try.

I am taking on another project this month.  Our church is working a Habitat for Humanity house.  The take-off meeting was just a week and a half ago.  There will be another meeting on July 14th.  Fr. David talked about several of the groups that will play a key role during the process.  The publicity group struck a chord with me.  The purpose of this group is to keep the church community informed about what is going on with the process and keep interest and enthuiasm up.  I thought a blog would be perfect for this.  I am no expert on blogging (obviously) but I am learning a bit as I go.  I bought the WordPress for Dummies book and plan to go through it and learn more about what can be done.  Luckily, my friend Chris has made him self a bit of an expert in social networking so I will get whatever help I can from him as well.  I think this site will need to be self hosted so it will give us more control but also have a bit of a cost involved.  It still shouldn’t be too expensive but free is so much better.  The nice thing is that we can start using a free hosted site and convert later. 

Well that is what is happening in my world for now but more is on the way.  I am trying to do better with posting more often but we will see how that works.  I figure that I really don’t have enough to say every day to make a worth while post but I think once a week should be a good amount of time to get the post going without getting stagnant. 

I will leave for now with just a bit of a teaser.  We may have some new home business ideas floating around our family.  More on that later.

 I was scheduled to take the exam Monday but that morning I received a call from the testing center.  The person on the phone told my that there had been a death in the family.  I was curious about this.  The testing center is at the same ECPI campus that I earned most of my AAS degree.  There are many people who administer the tests.  I didn’t press as I didn’t want to be rude.  The person told me that he would reschedule me for Wednesday and I could go online and reschedule.  I didn’t want to wait so I went in to take the test.  I learned that it was actually on of the instructors who past away.  His name was Mr. Hamby.  I never actually had a class with him but he was well known on the campus when I was a student there.  Extremely popular with the students and well liked by all, he will be missed.