Jeez!

• Get over the Rangers choke, please.
• Run this morning resulted in a sore throat because it was so cold outside. Not sure, maybe 45.
• At age 78, dad still has some hot sports opinions. "Why doesn't her just die" referring to Clint Eastwood. He never was a fan and doesn't sound like he's going to change his mind.
• Mom would have been 78 on the 22nd. Wonder how she would have looked and how well she would be getting around. I always thought she was where we got our athletic ability from. Story goes that she was the fastest in her class.
• Zach drove to Sherman which took a little over an hour. Only two "clinch" moments and a few reminders like both hands on the wheel, go the speed limit, etc.
• If you drink a lot of coffee (from beans) do your farts smell different?
• Probably shouldn't have written that last one.

Where oh where have you been

• Right here boys, right here
• Twitter is stupid
• The color red is cool
• Too many cat videos in this world
• Just the word "loogie" is gross much less the action
• Why is there no double "uu"? There's "oo" and "ee". U racist?
• Can November be SMU Tate Lecture Series month? Please? Where are the archives?
• Wind chill 18 playing baseball would be crap!
• It's hard to find a good pair of lamps. When you do, BUY THEM!

Sunday Update

• Weigh in yesterday reflected a 27.5 lb reduction since January 4. Keep the faith, only 11.5 to go for my first goal
• Running total for the week was only 11.8 miles but there were some time constraints. Long run was 4.8 miles and felt really good perhaps because it was a morning run at about 65 degrees.
• Funeral sermon on Wed. had a very good correlation between George's life and seasons of the year. I'm sure the non Catholics agreed.
• The grave site was about 50 yards from my mother's grave which made it difficult to contain my emotions. Think I did pretty well until I met up with my sister.
• I need a new weed eater as I have two in the garage that don't work. One is about 15 years old and the other was given to me because she couldn't get it to work either. It worked fine for me for about 3 years but has met it's maker.
• Last Sunday we took apart the both carbs on the boat, cleaned and put back together. Fired right up but when I took it out Wed. it kept smoking like crazy. It ran fine but we used a lot of WD-40 and it's going to take a while to get it all burned off/out of the motor.
• Ever feel like you're in competition with a smart phone? Seems like every where I go it's more important to answer that text, play that game, check that web page. Can't we all just stop for an hour, event, day? I'd like a "cyber-free" day perhaps replacing Valentine's Day.

Wait Just a Minute...

A snake? Seriously? I can now say I've caught one, with a jig no less. When I first pulled it out of the water I almost, well, you know. All I saw was fangs and an "S". It would have been fun to watch me get that line cut though. I wanted to keep it out of the water so I could keep an eye on it but with a 9' pole it was kind of difficult to maneuver. I was trying to not cut my line at the reel so I let out about 5 feet of line, pulled it towards me from the tip and then cut it. With my teeth. That darn thing balled up a couple of times and when it was free, swam to the shore with a blue/white jig still in it's mouth.

I'm convinced that people just don't know how to drive. Lack of education, practice, feeling of invincibility, or maybe just a lack of a brain. Stopping in the middle of a school zone to find your phone and then texting will you proceed to the front door...bad idea but only if there's someone to enforce it. Some days I want to call the authorities but it just won't do any good.

NASCAR still = power down.

Sure thought I was going to do better on my bracket but the games are not over yet. Same with hockey, there's still 10 games to play so hang on!

Of course it was a flop!!

Killing Time

• Fantasy hockey is kicking my butt. Seven players were injured at the beginning of this scoring period and my team is in last this week (overall 3rd). I predict a finish in the middle of the pack, maybe 5th.
• Longhorns play in about an hour. I'm hoping for epic failure.
• Yesterday's run was about 4 miles and it was extremely windy. I was shocked to discover my time was faster than Tuesday.
• Getting a birth certificate takes 4-6 weeks unless you pay an extra $20 to expedite. I wonder if they do that because of past bribes. Paying the extra speeds it up to 1-2 weeks. Business days only of course.
• The wind is continuing to blow at 20-30 mph gusty. I have the boat ready but just can't take it out in these conditions. Safety before crappie.
• Want a killer video game? Nazis team with dinosaurs?
• The laundry room shelves are completed except for a coat of paint. I've lost my motivation and the boys make too big of a mess. Over/Under on completion: 1 month.
• Biggest Facebook Security Risks?
• Texted the boys to stop listening to The Ticket as they were talking to a girl about girl fantasies and the like. Sometimes I want to take away everything electronic from the kids including alarm clocks. They don't seem to work and the boys can't turn the off in the dark.
• Weigh in yesterday results: down 26.5 lbs. since January 4. Went out last night and had a few green beers which bumped me back up a few.
• I did not know: "A real macchiato has just a stain of milk foam and no sugar", yahoo.com. But it sure does taste good with the extra milk.
• 
  

February totals

• Ran over 30 miles, didn't get an exact total as I discovered I was running further than I had originally mapped out. Ten days with at least 3.25 miles on each occasion. My trip to Austin and the ice storm put a damper on things.
• I ran what I thought was 5 miles last Saturday but it turned out to be 4.8. Bummer yet cool at the same time.
• My two months on Atkins was yesterday and after dinner wight was down 22.5. Weigh in today was another lb. less so I've dropped 23.5 total. So we're talking about 12 per month, 3 per week. I'll take that since my online BMI still says severely obese.
• Anyone else ready for March Madness? Believe it or not I'm getting psyched and think it's going to be a good one. Tip: don't trust the Big East.
• I cleaned house for about an hour and half today and barely put a dent in it.
• Did yard work for about and hour and barely put a dent in it.
• The tulips I bought two weeks ago were about 4 inches tall and have grown like weeds. They are already blooming. That might be a first.
• Sorry no pics or links today.

Diaries of a Snowcation

Thoughts during this wonderful 6 day weekend:

• For people not getting out of the house there are a lot of people out of the house
• Missus woke me up at 3:30 to complain of a strange noise. Discovered it was a wind turbine so I'm giving her hell all day. Nonstop. Shh. What was that? Greatness.
• My dogs are German. They don't like snow. Um was ist dass alle?
• I need a haircut so bad but the barber has been out all week and will probably be today as well. Gotta get one by Monday so if anyone wants to volunteer...
• DVR is empty now so bring on the crap. Example: Lady in Cement
• Weight loss has stalled for now but I'm not getting any exercise. Snow is not an excuse, just don't feel like doing anything. Have only gained back 1/2 lb.
• Public Enemies is a good movie. Not a fan of Johhny Depp but I like a good shoot 'em up.
• I knew we got a lot of snow when I woke up and the shades were bright white. They seemed to be brighter than when the sun is out. Current count from the eldest, 5 1/4".

Adventure continues

So I've continued Induction on Atkins and I've slowed a little bit but still losing a little bit. When I weighed today I came in 17.5 lbs lost, almost half way to my goal. I cheated a little bit with dry roasted peanuts but just a couple of handfuls. Phase 2, OWL, introduces nuts so if I'm cheating it's best to choose an item from the next stage. I should being that phase Feb. 8 which will be 6 weeks of induction.

I've also run every other day for a couple of weeks with 7 straight days of at least 2.25 miles. My times were getting better each time so I increased the distance and on Thursday put in 2.65. I'll look to continue that distance today and throughout the week. My time was 26:24 so I'm still on a 10 minute mile pace which I'd like to increase. I'll get back to 5k distance and then begin improving my speed. Wish me luck.

New Adventure

I began Atkins on January 4. I haven't logged or entered any journal entries because I didn't know how successful I'd be. I have only cheated with two bite size dark chocolate Hershey bars and a couple of cookies a couple of weeks ago. Other than that I can't remember anything I've done to cheat. Previous versions of Atkins didn't really include vegetables but the newer version has most of the carbs coming from veggies. You have to find ways to change your current diet to include some at almost every meal and in snacks.

I've started reading the new Atkins book and it's pretty good. It can be a little complicated but I attribute that to sitting down and reading 89 pages in one day. There's also a featured article in the Feb. issue of Reader's Digest (on the cover) that's pretty good. I've also found a couple of good websites for support, atkins.com and fatsecret.com. The latter has really cool features including tracking of food, exercise, calories, net carbs, etc. Very helpful.

So down the the results. Since I began 20 days ago I've lost 16 lbs. I'm still in the induction stage and plan to stay there for two more weeks. After that I'll slowly add other food choices. Welcome to my adventure, I'm about 1/3 of the way to my first weight goal.