2845

Well, I decided to count up again and see where I am at in my consistency of walking (and now walking and/or jogging) five miles a day:

As you can see from the image, it has now been 2,845 days in a row that I have done 5 miles, come hell or high water.  It has been great for me in many ways.  On Monday, when I weighed myself, I was happy to see I was at 180 pounds.  That has me still being in a normal BMI range for my height.  I had a resting pulse rate of 60 when I woke up this morning.  I was able to push my heart rate through jogging 3 of the 5 miles today to (when I finished jogging the three miles) to 150, and it was back to 65 or so when I checked it 5 minutes later. 

So, for me, I think this aspect of what I am trying to do to be a more physically fit person is working.  Back when I weighed close to 300 pounds (actually ~285) my resting pulse rate as an inactive person was usually about 85.  I still have a helluva lot of things still to improve about myself to become the person I should be (quitting the damn pipe for instance, being less melancholy) and there are other avenues of my life that I am getting some success with such as being more careful and less emotional in communication with my wife when we have a disagreement, and in being a kinder person.  But I still have a long way to go in many areas.

However, I wanted to post about this particular aspect of success I have been having to really reiterate to myself that I *can* change myself if I put my mind to it.  I *can* become the person I wish to become.  I *can* have successes.... if I stay focused, do the hard work, and try to the best of my ability.  Sometimes I lose sight of things I am ok at because of the many things I need to become better at for my family and for my work.  But, I do have to keep looking at how I am an "ok" person as well.

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Productive

I have felt very productive today!!!  I ran three miles today (jogged) and walked the other two.  At work I did a lot of busy paperwork for hiring adjunct people.  It is normally dull and annoying, but I put my mind to it and did well.  I have been helping my wife with dinner (fish with a dull sauce and vegetables and stuffed tomatoes and stuffed zucchini, and a regular salad and a watermelon salad). We are going to go swimming!  All, and all a nice day thus far. Fewer pipes than usual too.

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Home

It was a great trip. The meeting was nice and my wife and two of the kids all had a great time too!  I would say I did about 90% percent of what I wanted to do to be a good, calm person and did not get upset or frustrated which has been a focus I have been working on to become a better person.  I did take my pipe, but like BBC suggested, I cut back.  And had only about 1/2 of my usual.  Not perfection, but progress and I am keeping with that for today so far too.  

Plugging away at trying to be who I want to become.  

The most fun meal I had was a dish at a Mexican resturaunt where I had Cajun spiced whitefish tacos. 

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Leaving on a Jet Plane

That song is running through my head at the moment because I am heading to Florida for a research meeting tomorrow afternoon after I give my students their final exam.  I am thinking about NOT taking my pipe to jump start my effort to quit.  I have been thinking about it but it makes me nervous.  I would be unlikely to easily find a pipe or even pipe tobacco while down there so, I have been trying to psyche myself up about how I need to look at it positively, and how I should not allow myself to get riled up and angry  because I will not have my damnable pipe pacifier with me.  Part of me still thinks I should take it, but we shall see what I end up doing.  

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Momday

Had a nice weekend.  Painted some old, rusty metal outdoor chairs, bought and at up a new BBQ grill because our old one rusted through.  It is a small, two burner, propane grill, pretty much like the old one that was close to twenty years old.  We went to eat breakfast with my elderly father-in-law for Father's Day.  

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The Pipe

I am working through a new plan to quit smoking a pipe.  I want this time to be successful.  My friend, Billy "BBC" Cook, has been successful, so I am going to try to model his success.  

It frustrates the hell out of me that I feel nervous just thinking about it.

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Much Better Than Anticipated

The journey to the wedding was much better than anticipated.  The wedding was about three and a half hours away from home, and we set off early in the morning with several folks in with us, including  our son and a daughter, an elderly pair of my wife's relatives, and our dog.  We had to bring the dog as we were going to be gone at least 12- 20 hours.  

We got to the site of the wedding, and it was a sunny, hot, schorching day, hitting a high of 94 degrees.  The wedding was a "barn" wedding, not in a church, but outside at a big old barn.  We ended up sitting on bales of hay.  Because the wedding was not Catholic, it was very short, barely 20 minutes.  Afterwards, the bar was opened so guests would have something to do while the wedding party took a bunch of photos.  

It was enjoyable talking and drinking with my wife's relatives, and with the country theme, dress was casual so it was comfortable... I wore jeans, a plaid shirt that sort of looked a bit "country", some old, worn boots, and a straw hat.  My wife commented that I could pass myself off as an Amish fellow, with the way the hat fit the rest of my outfit. 

Well, I was beyond lucky,  one of my wife's relatives who rode with us felt it was necessary to leave the party early!  We left around 9pm!  So I ended up only drinking a pleasant amount (five beers), and I wisely steered away from the whisky that was available. So, I felt pleasant on the long ride home, but nothing at risk of leading to a hangover!  We even stopped to get an ice cream cone on the trip home.  I had a "moose tracks" ice cream on a cone.  My wife had salted caramel, my daughter had blue moon, my son had moose tracks as well, one of the elderly passengers had mint, and the other had toasted coconut.  We ended up getting home at midnight (much earlier than I had feared).  The dog must have gotten a little motion sickness, because she threw up on herself, so I had to give her a bath, but that wasn't too rough, and I was in bed by 2am, still feeling pleasant.  It turned out to be pretty nice!

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Crummy, Sh*tty, P*ss*d Off Mood

This is not currently going to go down in the record books as on of my favorite days in my life.  I feel out of sorts in a whole helluva lot of ways:

1) allergies -  hell, I normally don't get allergies, but for some damn reason the pollen, etc. this year is kicking my butt.  It is reported that pollen counts are at the highest level in my region in about 25 years.... but damn, I feel like crap.... I have a far greater sympathy for folks who regularly have allergies if they feel like this all the time.  Damn.

2)  anger about sh*t that is a pain in the *ss at work - as the head of the department, one of the very horrendous tasks I am saddled with is interviewing and hiring adjunct instructors.  Due to their slave-level wages, they are understandably a flighty bunch... but damn, they are worse this year than any other year I have had to hire them  I have had so many changes to make that I am having trouble keeping it all straight.

3)  heat rash -  the surge into the 90 degree weather we had about a week and a half ago left me with the worst case of heat rash I have ever experienced.  Usually, I get a little bit in the form of a patch or two on my chest or a small patch on my arms at the start of every summer, but dammit again, I have never had it cover most of my body before... my arms, legs, my rear end and my whole torso are all covered with red splotches and it itches like hell!  It is also taking its own sweet time to dissipate as well.... normally it lasts a few days, but this has been more like 10 days and it is still rampant and annoying as hell.

4)  there are also a few melancholy inducing changes that are occurring in my family as well.  Nothing bad, in fact, when looking at the "big" picture, the changes are good....  but they are transitional changes with things going on with some of my kids that make me  feel melancholy and sad, but I do not want to get into them right now or I will start blubbering.... which of course will not do me any good at work. 

I am tired and ornery at the moment.  And like I mentioned a few weeks ago on Mike's blog (Welcome to the Bozone), I have a wedding to go to this weekend.  I know I am going to drink at this wedding... which is fine... and in fact quite enjoyable, but I also probably will end up drinking *too much*...  out of boredom, because my wife will want to stay, and stay,  and stay...  far longer than I will want to at the wedding.  I am the type of person who likes to go to the reception, eat dinner, have a few drinks, dance one or two dances, and maybe chat with folks for an hour or so before heading out.  My wife, on the other hand, likes to get to the reception well ahead of the start time, and stay until we are typically damn near the last to leave.  My wife does not like to drink, so there is no worry in that regard... but damn, staying until the bitter end of a wedding reception.... that has NEVER been my thing.... EVER.  So, as I get more and more bored, I have a fairly strong tendency to grab another drink or two or three from the bar.... and I often times, out of sheer boredom end up drinking enough that there is at least a 50% chance I will have at least a mild hangover on Sunday.  Yeaha!

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Fishing

I did end up fishing today.  It has been a helluva long time since I last went, and I had forgotten how nice it is!  I went with my son and it was a really nice time.  I am truly thinking I will do more of it this year.

I didn't do anything fancy this time, just casting off a dock, but it made me feel really good!  We didn't catch much... A few panfish and a few catfish, and we released them back as neither of us were in the mood to do any cleaning.  It was just about relaxing.  The catfish are always interesting to mess around with, especially.  I like holding them and looking at their very interesting body design... I have always found them especially pretty as a type of fish.  Looking at their gills and their fins is always enjoyable.  A fellow there showed us a few flies he had tied, and said that the local Cabellas offers a fly making class.  My son and I thought maybe we would see about joining the class, it could be a lot of fun.

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Wednesday

Well, it has been a tiring day.  I am considering going fishing tomorrow.  We shall see.

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