Changing Things Up

Today’s title has nothing to do with the weight I constantly desire to lose, or the exercise I need to get, though both are valid.

I am a creature of habits, habits which I plan to change up a wee little bit this year…

Five Of The One Hundred Simple Secrets Of Happy People
I am currently, and deliberately slowly, reading a super-easy read called The 100 Simple Secrets Of Happy People. Each morning I read three of these “secrets.” (Remember when I mentioned exercising my mind?)

Here are five “secrets” on which you can ponder

• If you can’t reach your goals, your goals will hurt you
• Exercise
• Little things have big meanings
• It’s not what happened, it’s how you think about what happened
• Develop some common interests with loved ones

You may find this hard to believe, but I’m trying to live my life under the concept that it’s the only one I’ll ever have so I better enjoy it.

Over The River And Through The Woods (And Under The Mall?) We Go
For the most part Saturday’s Pinelike (or as I like to call it Pine Lake) hash went off without a hitch. Well, there were a few hitches all related to the security at my office building.

Knowing the area well I decided to take the “easy” route and lay the trail in the Perimeter Mall area and end at the office parking deck as a protection against the predicted rain. What I hadn’t planned were people “reporting” that a guy was spreading white powder (luckily I had been seen entering the building earlier in the morning by the guard to whom this was “reported”), or the multiple interactions with two other security guards as we set up the on-in. I was even chastised for not clearing the gathering with building management. This was not the first hash I ended here, and the last time I never even saw security on Saturday.

The trail was attended by nearly twenty hardy souls who braved cold temperatures and gray skies to come run my trail. I was fairly pleased with my trail although it wasn’t quite everything I had imagined. I took the pack from the Publix on Hammond Drive near Peachtree-Dunwoody Road down under I-285, into the woods, back over I-285 on the overpass the pack went under earlier, through some more woods, around Ravina, and then to a “Turkey/Eagle” split. For the “Turkey” I simply took the pack to the end via the road. For the “Eagle” I entered a tall tunnel, down a spillway, into another tunnel, and the out to the end. My initial plan was to use another tunnel as well, but my feet were cold and wet and at that point my trail had taken me nearly two-and-a-half hours to walk to I shortened it a bit.

Of course the lack of food combined with the beer I consumed at the end did me in for the rest of the night.

ITP Flickr Pic
I am now a bread maker.

Well, my new bread machine is a bread maker. I’ll be satisfied with my position as a bread eater.

Over The Interstates And Through The Woods To Mom’s House I Will Go
For the past two (three?) years I’ve spent Christmas partying at ITP-Reader Betsy’s house. Each of these Christmas gatherings have been much fun.

With Christmas falling on a Friday this year the stars will align to allow me the time to head home to spend Christmas with my mother this year. It’s been many Christmases since I’ve done so, and thinking that I need to shake things up a bit, I’m deciding to travel for Christmas. The amount of fun I’ve had on Christmas recently made the decision to skip this in order to go home to visit my mother a little harder, but I think that I’m making the right decision this year.

Stats & Goals
Daily
Current Mood – fair, but quite busy still. looking forward to a little R&R around Christmas
Current Music – listening to last week’s Survivor since it didn’t record at my house last Thursday.
Website Of The Day – Wolfgang’s Vault is all about the classic music — listen to it, buy it, buy t-shirts about it, whatever….
Mode Of Transportation To Work – my car
Exercise (b)Log – nothing
Morning Weigh-In – didn’t check

Monthly
Foot Mileage – 0 miles, Wheel Mileage – 0 miles
Pushups – 0, Situps – 0
Consecutive Days Of Bed-Making (Longest Streak) – 1 (10)
Vegetarian Days – 1, Carnivorous Days – 12
Marta Rides – 0

December Goals
– Not get fired from my job

2009 Goals
– Reduce my weight to 190 pounds (today’s weight was 199.5 pounds)
– Completely read the book 1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die
РEarn at least $150 through photography sales in order to cover the cost for the renewal of the Jalape̱o Beach SmugMug account I opened the other day.
– Save $500 for the sole purpose of donating to charitable organizations of my choice
– Attend at least one professional photography workshop

The Unmeasurable
– Continue backing up all data, including the off-site storage
– Become a proficient programmer in Objective-C (iPhone development) and Ruby on Rails (Black Sheep web page concept)
– Do not create a solution for something which is not a problem

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]