elmodog

Yes, I think about that a lot. I think most of the time it impedes my progress. I am too much of a perfectionist when it comes to creating things. I am perhaps my own worst critic, though.

I have some ideas for short stories. I should just write one, even if it's bad, than try to perfect one.

I prefer to sit in the front row. I don't want to get distracted by what people in front of me are doing. The same is true at the movies. It's especially true at the movies so I don't have to see the bright screens of people's cell phones as they text throughout the movie.

I saw this story the other day. A Visa cardholder noticed a charge for $23,148,855,308,184,500. That must have been quite a purchase!

(story)

On Drudge Report tonight, this picture, followed by the headline "Second Stimulus Package!"

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/slideshow/photo//090709/ids_photos_wl/r3356552547.jpg/

I couldn't help myself from laughing.

This is a very funny Daily Show interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist. He talks about Pluto and its status as a planet.

( video )

Jen started an account for me at calorie-count.com. It's a site where you can keep track of what you eat and how active you are, and gives you the totals for the consumed calories and burned calories.

I had a pretty good day today, even though I have not done as much exercising as I would have liked so far. It says I consumed 1762 calories and burned 2726 calories. Almost 1000 calories difference.

Dinner was definitely the most challenging meal for me today. It is always so tempting to have a second helping or to have more food than I need. There are two reasons for this. One, I don't have to be anywhere after dinner, for the most part. At breakfast and lunch, I usually have to finish my meal so I can get back to work. Secondly, I tend to feel more tired at the end of the day, and it's so pleasant to sit and eat.

Thank you Jen for all of your support today!

I am starting an eight week weight loss challenge. I am competing against two other people, two of Jen's friends, to see who can lose the most weight in eight weeks. I really hope that this will help me lose weight and finally keep it off.

We had our initial weigh in tonight. I weighed in a 240! I couldn't believe it. I weighed myself this morning and I was only 235. (heh. only 235. I say that like it's such a small amount.) I guess there is a big difference between what you weigh in the morning and what you weigh at night.

Anyway, I am really excited about this opportunity. I don't care so much about winning the contest, although it would be nice. What I really want to do is start a healthier lifestyle.

I have some strategies about how I am going to do this.
1. I will stop eating second portions.
2. I will eat smaller portions.
3. I will eat healthier foods. I will cut down on fats, fried foods, sweets and pastas. I will eat more fruits, vegetables, lean protein and whole wheat pasta or rice.
4. I will write down everything I eat and drink, every day. I started that today, and I think it helped me.
5. I will exercise every day. I will start out with walking in the morning. I will add some sort of stretching routine in the evenings.

I'm sure that I will develop some more strategies as I go along. I am hopeful that I will be able to make myself much more healthy.

I don't think I have ever gotten emotional about the death of a celebrity.

September 11, 2001. It was as if the whole world stopped. I remember just staring at the television coverage. I could not believe what had happened. I wondered if we would ever recover from those attacks. I wondered if the world would ever be the same. I still have those same questions.

I am not much of a concert aficionado, but last year I took my daughter and her friend to the Hannah Montana Best of Both Worlds show, in a movie theater. Two things stood out. First of all, it was in 3D, which was pretty cool. Secondly, I don't know of too many acts where one person plays two different personas. I suppose Miley Cyrus needs to get her fans used to the fact that she won't be Hannah Montana forever.

I think that the vice most likely to be outlawed is pornography. For some reason, this society has huge problems with sex. TV shows and movies get sexier, and more and more people complain about it. There will reach a point when a majority of Americans would be in favor of eliminating porn altogether.

I don't think cigarettes will be outlawed because governments depend on the tax revenue they generate. The government does not want people to quit smoking, in my opinion, because the tax revenue would be smaller. That is exactly why they have been going after online gambling, whereas brick and mortar casinos and state lotteries are just fine.

Although it's still heavily in syndication and I have five seasons of DVDs, I would have to say Seinfeld. I can watch an episode of Seinfeld that I have seen countless times before and continue to laugh at it. I can't believe it has been ten years since the final episode.

This video is quite funny. It is a short video about California's Proposition 8, which is a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. It is safe to say that the makers of this video did not vote for the proposition.

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/c0cf508ff8/prop-8-the-musical-starring-jack-black-john-c-reilly-and-many-more-from-fod-team-jack-black-craig-robinson-john-c-reilly-and-rashida-jones

I did some jogging this morning. I had not done that in a while. It was tough, but it was very rewarding. I jogged for about 10 minutes and walked for about 20 minutes. I did not want to push myself too much.

I jogged quite a bit when I was living in San Francisco. I wanted to get back into it. I think it is a great way to work out.

We have a great trail within walking distance of our house.

I would like to jog or to bike about three times a week. I felt really good afterward!

I have a new job. I'm working for a company called Comnet Marketing. They do telemarketing for nonprofit organizations to try to get former members to renew their memberships.

I'll be working in the IT department, working on various projects, including migrating databases from Access to SQL. They really want to improve on automation for their reporting processes, which can take a few hours to do by hand. I think I'll be able to help them a lot, since I have experience doing just that. They have other projects that they need completed, and I will be expected to lead some of these projects.

The pay is not that great. It is $17 an hour, with no medical benefits. (If I had wanted a benefit plan where they paid 50% of the costs, it would have been $15 an hour.) However, there will be bonuses for completed projects and the hiring manager said that if I could prove that I was worth it, I should be able to move up soon. I do have the opportunity to work some overtime, and I will do that when it makes sense for the job and for my family.

I am very motivated to prove to them that I can be a valuable asset to their company. This is a pretty good opportunity. I had a lot of questions and suggestions during my interview, and I think they liked that.

I felt really comfortable during my interview. The people seem pretty laid back. It will definitely be a lot different than working at Microsoft, but I am looking forward to the challenge.

I received the story of The Wooden Bowl in an email from my dad. I found it very inspirational.

( The Wooden Bowl )

I just installed Firefox 3. I had been using Firefox 2 for quite a while, and there were some noticeable slowdowns on a lot of the sites I use, especially Google Docs.

But Firefox 3 is so much faster! It is really a lot of fun to use. Granted, I have only used it for a day so far, but I have not run into any problems with it. The UI seems a little more polished as well.

This is the Mac version of Firefox. I have not yet used the Windows version.

I have been overweight my whole life. I cannot remember a time in my life when I wasn't overweight. There have been a couple of times when I lost some weight, 20 or 25 pounds. I did not really change my diet that much. All I did was exercise more, whether it was walking for an hour in the morning or riding my bike to work.

I want to lose the extra weight for good now. Currently, I am about 230. My goal is to get down to 180. One of my big problems is that I like to eat too much. I like the taste of food, especially "bad" foods like pasta and bread. Another problem I have is that I get bored with exercise. I hate treadmills and other cardio machines where you stay in the same place for your entire workout. I do better with running or biking outside.

Jennifer suggested to me that something I could do to help with my overeating is to keep a journal of everything I eat and drink during the day. I am going to do that after we move. It would be interesting to write down the calorie count of everything and have a record of how many calories I consume in a day. Also, I want to keep track of the exercise that I do each day.

I am excited about our move and our new house because of our proximity to a large park and a bike trail. The park is within walking distance, but I am not sure about the bike trail yet.

My somewhat short term goal is to be down to 200 by my birthday, October 10. We are planning a trip to Las Vegas at that time, and it would be a great reward for losing thirty pounds. :)

We officially have a place to move to in Oregon! Jennifer just got the call from the landlord. The house is in a really great area, about a block and a half from a park.

I am very excited about this! Lots of love and thanks to Jennifer for getting in touch with the landlord and looking for houses. Thank you very much! I love you.

I just started using the offline feature of Google Docs (http://docs.google.com). I love it. This has been a major limitation for me using Google Docs as my primary word processing application. I did not like the idea that I had to be online to access my documents.

This is made possible with the help of another Google technology: Gears (http://gears.google.com). It allows web applications to be available and usable when you do not have an Internet connection.