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Monday, April 30, 2007

Softball schedule

Monday, 04/30/07
10:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs John Howard Motors

Monday, 05/07/07, Liberatore Field
6:00pm S1 Judel Products vs MVP Paintball
7:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Lazy Lizard

Tuesday, 05/15/07, Ogden Field
7:00pm S1 The Augusta / McCoy 6 vs MVP Paintball

Monday, 05/21/07, Liberatore Field
10:00pm S1 Misfits vs MVP Paintball

Monday, 06/04/07, Whiston Field
10:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Morgantown Honda

Thursday, 06/07/07, Ogden Field
6:00pm S1 Mylan Express vs MVP Paintball

Monday, 06/11/07, Whiston Field
10:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs REM Men's

Monday, 06/18/07, Liberatore Field
8:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Town Hill
9:00pm S1 Rugratz vs MVP Paintball

Tuesday, 06/26/07, Ogden Field
7:00pm S1 Triple S Harley & Koval Supply vs MVP Paintball

Monday, 07/02/07, Whiston Field
8:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Valley HealthCare

Thursday, 07/05/07, Ogden Field
6:00pm S1 We Save vs MVP Paintball

Tuesday, 07/10/07, Ogden Field
7:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Advantage Health & Wellness

Monday, 07/16/07, Whiston Field
9:00pm S1 Buck's vs MVP Paintball

Monday, 07/23/07, Liberatore Field
6:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Chestnut Ridge Church II

Monday, 07/30/07, Liberatore Field
10:00pm S1 Classic's vs MVP Paintball

Monday, 08/06/07, Whiston Field
9:00pm S1 Finish Line Motors vs MVP Paintball
10:00pm S1 MVP Paintball vs Deaver's Electric / B&D Transp

Yesterday went pretty well

Yesterday was a pretty good day. I spent the day with Amy and we went out for a late lunch to Cheddars, it was the first time that I had actually ate at Cheddars. I was impressed with the place, the quality of food was good and the prices were very reasonable.

We sent most of yesterday afternoon basically running all over the county so that each of us had an opportunity to start to meet and greet each others family for the first time.

We started off by me meeting her parents, strange that this is the second set of parents I have had to meet in 23 years if you believe that one. It was a nice little time and they appeared to be some very nice people. Her Mom is a school teacher at Mountianview Elementary and her Dad owns a Buisness in Star City. Steve Dodrill from my softball team works with her mom, but I drew a complete blank when trying to remember his last name because we always were to him as Steve Staff.

I also had the opportunity to meet her Maternal Grandparents. He Grandfather and I both worked at Sterling Faucet, but at completely different time periods. He retired in 1970 and I started there in 1982.

I also had the chance to meet her brother, needless to say we were running all over the place for a few hours.

Today, I have another DR's appointment this afternoon and we have that dreaded 10:00 PM time slot tonight for our first game of the season. We beat John Howard Motors last year, but these two teams should be pretty easily matched and hopefully we can leave the field with a win tonight.

Have a great day.

Sunday, April 29, 2007

Update on Goals for 2006.

About 14-15 Months ago I posted a series of goals that I had and wanted to accomplish for the year 2006. I updated them at the end of the year for 2006, now it needs one final update.

I guess the best way to update this is that it has extended into 2007 and probably needs a little of an update, some very obvious and some not so obvious or haven't been revealed as of yet.

Family Situation

This is the most obvious one, and was a very hard one to get through. Kim and Terri had ended their three year period of not speaking. My goal was to try to initiate a conversation and let it go from there, but after Thanksgiving Terri called Kim and Kim returned the call. Kim and I later went to visit Terri once at the bar.

Career

I couldn't be happier, I am still working from home and even received a larger percentage raise than last year even after I figured in all the transportation costs that I was saving when they offered me the opportunity to work form home. I still get random calls from companies seeking my availability.

Health

One I was dragging my feet on, I had to get my Diabetes under control before it did any more damage than it potentially could have. Over the past few months I have been going to my Doctor, had my diabetes education classes and not only learned how to control it, but how to help control it for a lifetime. I actually had an eye exam last week, and there is no damage to my eyes from diabetes, just a little from age. It's nice to hear my eyes have deteriorated to 20/20. I still need my reading glasses occasionally though, but they are the lowest level of strength you can buy.

Personal life

It's softball season once again, could it be a better time of the year? Mountaineer football should be in for a big year and this could very well be a special year in Morgantown and another one to remember.

Relationships

OK, here is the big news. At the end of 2006 I said I had accomplished three out of the four of my major goals for 2006. It Should have been five for I think I can now officially announce that those percentages just went from 80% accomplished, actually it was 60% because I hadn't addressed my diabetes and health yet, to 100% accomplished.

I had used dating services but to no avail, I just really never felt comfortable around anyone to a point where I wanted to be with them. The last person I really dated was in 1998 and that was Jackie. I'm not saying I had given up, but I had come to the conclusion that I may be alone the rest of my life and had accepted that. dating services were a joke and up until recently I never felt that comfortable being with someone.

I first met Amy (her name ironically) roughly ten years ago when we both lived in the Valley in Van Voorhis. At the time she was married (been divorced a few years) to the other afternoon shift cashier who I worked with. I had been invited to their place once for a Christmas Party, and because of bad weather I was the only one who was there.

I had seen her once or twice through the years, either on campus or at the mall. Recently we ran into each other a couple of times at Wal-Mart (hence my statement in yesterdays BLOG) and have spent a few evenings in each others company. She has a beautiful and spirited three year old daughter named Josie who is just full of life.

I can say I wasn't actively seeking to find someone, but I found someone that I really liked for the first time in a long time. As everyone knows I'm quite picky and there has to be something special for me to get involved in a relationship with someone. Maybe that is why I am still cordial and friends with just about everyone I have ever dated.

Have a little patience because we both have large families that we are going to have to get to know.



I had established these goals in February of 2006 and had it well documented through my BLOG. Presenting my life on the internet as an open book establishes a certain amount of credibility in anything I may say. This prevents me from off the hip emotionally charged statements on the internet and just exposing everything about me for the world to see and read. I have reported the good times and the bad times, happiness and sorrow, dreams and failures since I first started writing a BLOG going on three years ago.

It's nice to set some very serious and very real goals and to see them all through until completion. Whether it be me entering college in 1999 after I had basically lost everything or this most recent set of goals that I am happy to have completed.

These recent goals were five things that I felt I needed to accomplish before I could honestly set forth another set of goals for my life. I think I am ready to enter the next phase of my life and should set forth another set of goals sometime in 2007. I look forward in continuing to develop these five goals and to watch them grow and flourish. I have a feeling as these five things continue to grow and develop that other goals and dreams will be set and established. Things that will help my life become more complete and just to add a few more happy stories and memories to the time we are here on this earth.

..Next Chapter of my life is starting and coming up.

Saturday, April 28, 2007

Rain Rain...

...go away, come back again on some weekday, not the weekend.

What is it with this weather, it's nice, then it snows. It's super and it starts to rain. Come on mother nature, hurry up and get these April showers over with, or at least let it warm up a little.

West Virginia University has a baseball game at 3:00 I might consider going to, if the weather holds up but it's not looking promising at all.

I was going to try to take a brief trip to rails to trails this morning, I grabbed my iPod and walked outside only to get rained on. So, I sacrificed and took a nice little trip to Wal-Mart. You got to love Wal-Mart, you just never know who you are going to see or run into.

Thursday, April 26, 2007

Will the weather hold up?

They have been calling for thundershowers all day today, however we have been blessed so far and it has been a pretty decent day. My fron t door is open and the fresh air is eminating through the room with the smell of spring. Flowers are starting to bloom and the better late than never spring appears to be here.

Boparc finally has our softball schedule out and ready, we play our first game of the season this coming Monday and we have the dreaded 10:00 time slot for the start of the season. Somehow by the unluck of the draw we managed to get quite a few of the late games this year. I count a total of 6 (that's 1/3 of our games) will have a 10:00 start time. Yuck, but I'm not complaining.

Planning on hitting rails to trails this afternoon, I haven't been there since Monday because of other events that were planned or scheduled. I'm just hoping that the weather holds up.

Have a good day and we're almost at Friday (except for Amy is has already started her weekend.)

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Had my eye exam today

I had my eye exam rescheduled for today and I received some very good news. 20/20 vision and no damage to the eyes at all, mainly from diabetes was the concern.

They dilated my pupils and they are still not back to 100%, but I can read this and type without my reading glasses.

I did see and get a chance to talk to Mary while I was waiting to go in for my appointment. She was there picking up some glasses.

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Help save a life

Ok, first of all most of these things are hoaxes, however someone took the time to go to snopes and see if it is legitimate.

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/charity/mammogram.asp


It is real.

Go to the Breast Cancer Awareness site and click on the Fund Free Mammograms. A free mammogram is given for every 45,000 clicks (from everyone), you can click it daily, but only once a day. Right now they are supposedly averaging 58,000 clicks a day.


Click it daily. Feel free to share this with everyone you know.

Kind of a tidbits

* I have no idea where all these companies are getting my name, but Boeing just called me to see what my availability was for a Job in Virginia.

It's nice to know that you're wanted, I'm really curious where everyone is getting my name and information. I haven't applied anywhere or updated any online resume's in well over a year.

I think I know how it's getting out there, and it was something I did to my resume when I added a keyword to it about a year and a half ago. I think once I used the word "Geo-Spatial" on my resume is where the majority of the activity started.


* Mom called me this morning and informed me that my great uncle Dana has passed away earlier this morning. He had been battling diabetes and had a few other medical problems. The last time I spoke with him was at the Koon family reunion last year.

* I have my eye appointment this afternoon for diabetes. I guess they will dialate my pupils and perform a few tests.

* What could be interesting is I have a softball scrimmage at 6:00 this evening. Could be real interesting if my eyes haven't returned to normal my then. You need your eyes especially catching a small spherical object coming at you in upwards of 80 MPH at times. Misjudging it can tend to hurt.

* Get out and enjoy the weather today, I guess they are calling for showers the next two days.

* I went out walking yesterday and this weekend took its toll on my legs. You could tell they were starting to get tired at 4 miles so that is where I stopped. I walked a slightly slower pace, but I still did the march.

* I went down and visited Terri yesterday, her and Nick are going to buy 4 acres of ground off of Gum Springs road. Nick pulled up the Platt map on the internet yesterday, and ironically it is the exact same spot as where I crashed the 4 wheeler in 2000 when I broke a portion of my shoulder blade.

* I think I have added a few pounds of the weight I have lost, but it's an up and down type of thing. I gained it when I was most active ironically.

* Have a good Tuesday.

Monday, April 23, 2007

Monday

Oh well, the great weather weekend is now over with and it is back to putting the nose to the grindstone. Weekends with nice weather are just way too short, and I wish I could have done more.

Yesterday we scrimmaged in softball for a couple of hours, only last years defending champs showed up fot the scrimmage so we had a good time. We started off red hot in the first inning and then cooled off later on. We didn't keep score or count innings, but there was a lot of hitting put on by both teams. I left bases juiced once by hitting a hard line drive up the first base line and their first baseman made a great play, but other than that I had a good scrimmage.

We're planning on having another practice tomorrow, which will probably be the last one before the start of the regular season next week.

We're still waiting on the status of a few players, we won;t know until this week if we have our shortstop and our pitcher from last year is going to start the season on the disabled list. Other than that, we should be solid this season.

Have a great Monday.

Sunday, April 22, 2007

Who could ever have imagined

Check out a few of these ebay auctions.



Walther P22 standard 10 round magazines 2 pack

Ok so what? blazers5505 is Seung-Hui Cho the idiot who just killed 32 other people this past week at Virginia Tech.

A couple scrimmages today

Today our softball team gets a chance to get a little bit of competition when we play against last years regular season champions March Westin and a team that forfeited against us last season in Finish Line Motors.

Finish line has Rich's grandson Brandon playing on the team, or at least they have the past few years. He's a big time hitting third basemen who can give teams a lot of trouble.

Hopefully this will be the first time our entire team is assembled before the start of the regular season the following week. We have taken a good bit of infield, but our potential new shortstop has yet to be seen. Hopefully he'll be there this afternoon Huck will show up and we can get our timing, that is if he is playing with us this season.

The weather is perfect and is another beautiful day, a day that is just too nice for anyone to be sitting inside watching television. Maybe I'll take my camera today and get a few pictures.

How about a plug for our sponsor . May 20th is the day for Paintball, keep it on your calender for any of you braves souls who wan to play.

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Great day for a walk.

Wow, is the weather nice today. It finally feels like springtime has arrived and my favorite time of the year is upon us. The time when you can get outside and be active.

Today, I took full advantage of the weather and grabbed my GPS unit and my Ipod and headed to rails to trails. How nice was the weathwer? Nice enough that I managed to go the longest distance today since I was running 9 miles every other night in 1987.

It started out as a typical walk, but I was feeling good and decided to keep going, to the point where I managed to walk 6.59 miles this afternoon. It's been a long time since I knowingly went that far for exercise, roughly 20 years. Today the weather was nice and I was feeling real good, so I managed to add the extra distance. I usually walk anywhere between 3 and 4 miles when I go to rails to trails, but like I said I was feeling good today and decided to add some distance.

I walked my normal route but even expanded it and when I got back to the car it was 4.2 miles, so I decided to try 5 then 6 miles, but once I got so far out I went to a specific point on the trail and returned. Todays total verified by my GPS unit, 6.59 miles when I returned to the car.

It's been a good day.

Friday, April 20, 2007

Friday ramblings

We are once again at Friday, the start of the weekend and the end of another week at work. The time when we can start enjoying thr fruits of our labor.

I had my diabetes education class yesterday and everything went pretty well. I am now going to start lowering the frequency of my blood glucose testing. I could have cut back previously, but I wanted to document what my numbers were doing after the change in medication.

Yesterday evening we had softball practice and things went real well. After practice BOPARC had thei annual managers meeting where we learn our teams fate for the following season. Two years ago we finished second in the regular season and were moved up to AA. Last year we had a duplicate record from the previous season, but finished in third place for the regular season. We were told we would be moved up to AAA to play this season so nwe started recruiting a few players to fit a few gaps from players who have moved away from last years team. We think we may have a guy come in to play shortstop who was with the Braves organization and I have played against for years. Last night we found out we are not being moved up and will be able to play AA again, the two teams who finished the regular season ahead of us were forced to move up. Could be an interesting year.

Sunday, we are going to go out and have kind of a double scrimmage with two teams where three teams are going to round robin scrimmage with each other. One is the team who finished first in our league and was one of the teams moved to AAA for this season, and I'm not sure who the other team is. So, during scrimmages we're going be challenged pretty intensly to prepare us for the season.

How do you like this weather? It's warming up and I will be able to get out and around this weekend. I'm over the flu and the weather is going to be nice.

MVP Paintball is doing a woods tournament tomorrow that I may go and play. It's going to be against a bunch of air force recruits.

Have a great Friday

Thursday, April 19, 2007

I think I picked the right field

Got a call about a month ago from a company wanting to hire my services in Ohio, it was an out of the blue call and I didn't expect it. Over the last couple years I have had a half dozen or so inquiries for my services, some of them some very nice offers. Never solicited, just reading my resume on the internet.

Today I am sitting in my diabetes education class and I receive yet another call. I was very happy with the significant pay raise I had received this year from my company, however they better thank there lucky stars that they made the offer that they did.

I got a call from a company in Clarksburg today wanting my services and it was more than I was making just a few weeks ago. I referred them to a couple people who might find what they are looking for and am probably making some soon to be geography grads day by doing so.

It's nice to be sought after professionally, now I'm just waiting on someone presenting me an offer I can't refuse.

Found a nice historical picture site

I have found a really nice site that has many historical pictures of not only Morgantown, but West Virginia. There are 20,045 digital photographs on this site, so it could be time consuming, but entertaining and educational to look through.

I have my diabetes education class today.

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Hump Day

It is Hump Day, that is when the work week hits its midway point and starts to coast towards another weekend.

The picture you may ask, that is the back side of the foundry at the Helmick Corporation, where I worked from 1991-97. It's coming on ten long years since the notice that plant was going to cease manufacturing operations. It was a time when my days and weeks were very long and so were my paychecks. It was also the place where once it ended my weight gain first began. I was 265 when I was laid off and my weight ballooned after that. I haven't seen my weight at 265 since, well a few minutes ago when it was 263 ( this coming from 314 18 months ago.)

Times have changed and I no longer have to work the 11 to 12 hour days in oxygen depleted closed environments. I now work remotely from home and enjoy working in the same field my degree and course of study is in. I've stayed the course and it's now starting to pay dividends on my investment in time, money and resources for an education.

I'm thankful that my hump day is from the comfort and convenience of my own home rather than a longer day that could lead to some serious health implications.

Once I get through with today, I have a diabetes education class and softball practice tomorrow. The next day is Friday, so we're inching closer and closer to another weekend.

Have a good hump day.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

MySpace reveals a lot.

These two are supposedly the first two who were shot by the shooter yesterday at Virginia Tech.

The ex girlfriend of the shooter, Emily Hilscher

The other victim, Ryan "Stack" Clark

I don't know if this was her new boyfriend or the Resident Assistant who was also murdered.

The VT Timeline

Timeline of Events
7:15 a.m.

Virginia Tech Police Department (VT PD) receives a 911 call to respond to a dormitory room at West Ambler Johnston Residence Hall.

Within minutes, Virginia Tech Police and Virginia Tech Rescue Squad respond to find two gunshot victims, a male and a female, inside a dormitory room within the Hall. The residence hall was immediately secured by VT PD and students within the hall were notified and asked to remain in their rooms for their safety. VT PD immediately secured the room for evidence collection and began questioning dorm residents and identifying potential witnesses. In the preliminary stages of the investigation, it was believed the deaths were an isolated incident, domestic in nature.

Blacksburg Police Department were also on scene assisting VT PD with establishing a safety perimeter around the residence hall and securing Washington Street.
7:30 a.m.

Investigators were following up on leads concerning a person of interest in relation to the double homicide. Investigators from VT PD and Blacksburg PD were actively following up on various leads.
8:25 a.m.

Virginia Tech Leadership Team, which includes the university president, executive vice president, and provost, assembled to begin assessing the developing situation at the residence hall and determining a means of notifying students of the homicide.
9:00 a.m.

Leadership Team was briefed on the situation by VT PD Chief W.R. Flechum on the latest developments in the ongoing investigation at the residence hall.
9:26 a.m.

The Virginia Tech community – all faculty and students – were notified by e-mail of the homicide investigation and scene at West Ambler Johnston Residence Hall, and asked to report any suspicious activity to. The Virginia Tech Emergency/Weather Line recordings were also transmitted and a broadcast telephone message was made to campus phones. A press release was drafted and posted on the Virginia Tech Website.
9:45 a.m.

The VT PD received a 911 call of a shooting at Norris Hall, which contains faculty offices, classrooms and laboratories. VT PD and Blacksburg PD immediately responded to Norris Hall. Notice in leadership command center via our police rep of a shooting in Norris.

Upon arrival to Norris Hall, the officers found the front doors barricaded. Within a minute the officers breached the doors, which had been chained shut from the inside.

Once inside the building, the officers heard gunshots. They followed the succession of gunshots to the second floor. Just as the officers reached the second floor, the gunshots stopped.

The officers discovered the gunman, who had taken his own life. There was never any engagement between the responding officers and the gunman.
9:55 a.m.

By the same means as prior notice, Virginia Tech notified campus community of the second murder scene. Other notifications followed via other means


EDIT:

Faces of the victims

Monday, April 16, 2007

Typical Monday

I log on to work this morning and the server where I have all my data stored has either crashed or been shut down for the weekend.

What a way to start the week, but someone shoudl be coming in soon to assess the situation. I can't for the life of me understand why they would have shut down the server, I half wonder if it has crashed. It's a big rack server with 4 raids and none if them seem to be responding.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Sunday Morning Blaaahs

Can you believe this weather we have been having? OK Phil, it's the joke is over, bring on spring. For the last two weeks the weather has been less than acceptable with a snow fall, cold temperatures and a lot of rain. It's time for spring to be here. We are at ten and a half weeks since Ground Hog's day, I think the rat from the north is still made because I got him drunk on his big day.

Other than that it has been a typical Sunday morning for me so far, but the weather sucks and I'm stuck inside still recovering from a fight with the flu the past few days.

Today is April 15th, for those of you who haven;t done your taxes yet if you buy Tax Cut, both you and I can get a $10.00 rebate. The filing deadline has been moved back to April 17th this year because today is Sunday and tomorrow is some kind of a Holiday in DC, I think it is Emancipation Dayin DC. So, you have until the 17th this year.

I have another Diabetes Education Class this Thursday, and eye exam the following Tuesday and another appointment with my Doctor the following Monday. My numbers have been doing quite well as of late, they are almost all in the target range regardless of being before or after a meal. Some are a little higher, but the goal is < 130 before a meal and < 160 two hours after a meal. Thew main goal was to have 50% of my readings within target and just for the month of April I have 89% of my readings within target. I have had a touch of the flu the last few days, so that has helped elevate my fasting, early morning reading. Probably after this education class, I will then drop my readings from every day to every third day. I was told I could so it after my last meeting, but my meds changed and I wanted to track that briefly.

I'm eager to get back on rails trails, but the weather has been less than cooperative. I haven't been able to go since last Monday and I'm itching to get out. Just need Phil and Mother Nature to cooperate a little.

I'm thinking about buying season tickets this year for WVU football. I have a feeling demand will be high this year because expectations are once again high as I have seen us ranked as high as #3 in the early polls. I think this just may be that magical year we finally win the National Championship. Everyone will be healthy, will be back and we have added a big time playmaker or two. Should be an interesting year.

Saturday, April 14, 2007

Under the weather

I have had a touch of a headcold the last few days. This weather has been ridiculous, they are actually calling for 1"-3" of snow on Sunday, in MID APRIL!!!!

This isn't even funny, this is the time when cute girls should be walking around in tight shorts and bikini tops, not parkas!

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

No Practice.

How about another BLOG past of a video from yesteryear




Preston Waters is an old softball team mate of mine.

ROFLMAO

PACMAN and Chris Henry live in Flash animation

Will we make it

We're supposed to have softball practice tonight at 6:00, but it's been cold and rainy all day so I wonder if we are going to be able to make it on to the field this evening.

I'm feeling kind of blah today so I really don't care if we practice or not, but I do need to get out there and do something. I didn't go walking yesterday even though the weather was more than permitting.

Monday, April 09, 2007

Back to work

The long weekend was nice, but today it is back to the grind and a lot of editing. It was a nice relaxing weekend for me, I didn't do much of anything yesterday except for power nap. Needless to say I was well rested by the time I woke up this morning and started work.

The weather continues to be a royal pain in the butt, it's spring time and we still seem to be in the middle of a late winter. The temps are due to go back up by the end of the week, hopefully this is the last snow that we see for the year.



Try not to become a man of success but rather try to become a man of value.-- Albert Einstein

Sunday, April 08, 2007

Terri's Birthday

Yesterday was Terri's 40th birthday and there was a nice little get together down at the bar. Val and Amy started the day off right by going down to the bar and decorating it before Terri woke up. They were nice enough to program a couple of songs into the Juke Box and turned the volume all the way up before sneaking out.

Tyler organized a little bring a covered plate get together later in the afternoon and evening. Terri was treated to a VERY fresh fish sandwich, she was a little disappointed that there was no tartar sauce to go with her fresh fish sandwich.

Personally, I would like to give her a fresh roasted groundhog sandwich, but Phil is hiding from me.

Saturday, April 07, 2007

Happy 40th Birthday Terri

Happy Birthday Terri, where have the years all gone is what I have to ask. It seems like only yesterday I was 21 and you were like 18. Now, you're 40 and I'm still celebrating anniversaries of my 21st birthday.

I hope all your dreams come true today.

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Beilein already replaced.

Wow, was that quick. Former WVU head basketball coach John Beilein bolts for Michigan and WVU hit's a game winning grand slam in bringing home probably one of the biggest nae coaches in College basketball in Bob Huggins. Here is another source confirming the story.

Bob Huggins had the town real excited five years ago when Gale Catlett retired and then broke everyone's hearts when he decided to stay at the University of Cincinnati. However, things have changed in the last five years and the nations best recruiter has been at Kansas State the last year, but is returning to Morgantown tonight and will be officially announced as our new head basketball coach at 3:00 tomorrow afternoon. Yous truly will be there with his camera in hand.

Tuesday, April 03, 2007

It's softball

it is once again that time of the year that I love so much, it is the start of softball. This evening we are going to have our first practice of the year at White Park. It will be the first time that the entire team was together since last year, but we have all kept in touch and have all eagerly anticipated the season.

I had contemplated retirement the last couple of seasons, but this year the thoughts haven't even entered my mind and I'm like a school aged kid on Christmas eve waiting for Santa to show up.

The weather is currently 80 and sunshine, although me and my old groundhog buddy Phil are going to have a serious problem if we get any snow like they have been calling for. It's April, it's springtime, it's time for little cuties to run around in bikini tops and tight shorts showing off those golden tans, not time for snow.

Let the season begin

Monday, April 02, 2007

Getting back to 1997 weight.

I am within an pound and a half of once again reaching my maximum weight when I was working in a steel mill 12 hours a day and six days a week. This is not a bad thing, because after 1997 my weight ballooned to a top weight of 314 Pounds in November of 2005. It had went down to 280 a couple years earlier when I took it upon myself to address diabetes, but that was as low as it got.

Now, my numbers are consistently in target both before and after meals. Targets are between 90-130 before a meal and under 160 two hours (highest reading) after a meal. However, a large percentage of my numbers have been under 130 (both pre and post meals) on a consistent basis since the change in my medications.

The highest I ever weighed when I worked at Helmick, was a pretty much consistent 265, today seventeen months after reading 314, the scale read 266.5 pounds. I still want to take off a lot more weight, but I think I have reached a milestone on my weight loss.

Sunday, April 01, 2007

Finally got back on the trails today

When I started out it was an absolutely perfect day, when I was 1.75 miles away from my car it started raining. I finally got a chance to take my GPS Unit out and play with it on foot, I drove around with it last night searching for Geocaches, and today I got a chance to pace myself to see how far I walked. 4.1 Miles was my final total before the downpour hit. I was back at my car about the time it started, so I wasn't out in it too long, but the drive back home was murder. My back yard was basically flooded, kind of funny when you remember I live at a pretty high point and there is about a 400'-500' drop off in elevation before you get to the river that is probably a mile away or so.

My back is still sore, but it felt good to get out and around for a little while.

Added new element to the blog.

I see that BLOGGER has added a few new features to BLOGGER, one of which being the video feeds. I'll test it out, but I don't want my blog to be too cluttered. I think if I do that I may lose the primary focus of doing a BLOG.

Edit: That didn't last too long, the primary objective of my blog is to inform and keep a we journal. I felt after looking at the new feature that it just cluttered it up. There is a simple rule in programming KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) and the excess clutter starts to violate that simple rule and takes away from my primary objective.

Other than that it is a cold and rainy Sunday Morning. I haven't made it to rails to trails over the weekend, I think I may have pulled a back Muscle Thursday and I'm trying to recover before we practice softball for the first time this week.