What's Beautiful to you?

So the other day I was coming back from a meeting that I had attended in Brainard.  As I was driving a song came on the radio I sat there listening to it, smiling and shaking my head on how perfect this song matched my marriage.  There are songs that you hear that fit your mood, give you encouragement, fit the situation, or will just always spark that memory that you hope you never forget.  So this day, before I had a cell phone with cool features that could find a song and download it for me, I had to scrounge for a piece of paper and pen, yes while driving, listening to the words to see if there was any hint to what the song would be called in case the DJ failed to tell me afterwards all while driving down a dark country road...and they say texting while driving is dangerous.  I was successful in discovering the song was "That's Beautiful to Me" by Jason and the Long Road to Love.

Why am I telling you this, as I was driving in to work this morning it came on again, this time from my personal playlist, and I teared up was sentimental reminded of the first time I heard it and I though I would share it with you.  This song is not our song by the way, Savage Garden gets that claim to fame.

Really the enjoyment of a song like "...beautiful..." is that you see things that are "special" to you but as I re-listened to it, and thought outside myself, I realize that its probably pretty common.  I mean what man doesn't like seeing lines on his wife face from her sleeping on his chest or enjoy her singing the wrong words to his favorite song.  These are the things that make your relationship special but the same as everyone else's.  I'm sure I don't have the only wife in the world who gets tired of red roses.  She wants variety, so as soon as she says "you know, I wouldn't mind other colors too" you can connect to this song as being special.  Add your wife's decision to drink coffee on a weekend without putting on make-up and you can almost tie it all together.  See when I hear this song, all those moments that this song writes about come to my mind and even if I need to reach to tie meaning together like "I drove you down the boulevard" and it's obviously he's talking about our first date when, after going out to eat, I drove us down "Kirby Puckett Boulevard" on the day it was re-named or the fact that he wrote "What you doin' with a guy like me?...I don't deserve to have a girl as beautiful as you" and I smile cause he is so right.

So men, if you Truly, Madly, and Deeply love your wife; take this moment to tell her about that special something that is Beautiful to You.(Song of Songs1:15)  She'd appreciate knowing what it is that she did, the other day.

Working my way back

So the other day I blogged about the needed to get back to my losing weight. I planned on the idea that if I gained it quick I can lose it quick, something I picked up from all my weight loss adventures.  Well it's not coming off as fast as it went on.  I'm seeing this as a opportunity to learn that this weight battle will always be a slippery(sometimes bacon fat slippery) slope.  I cannot, even after hitting my goals, assume that the weight will stabilize and stay flat.  It will need to be a focused effort to stay at any weight I want to be at simply because I LOVE food.

So, why am I telling you this, because in the last 3 weeks I have learned a couple of things that I want to pass on... as well as the results so far.

1. If you want to drop weight that you already lost once, it is OK to go the same route as the last time...
1. Last time I was successful in losing these pounds I had worked out 1-2 times a week (in addition to volleyball).  So far, I have not hit the gym even once, funny I haven't lost the weight as fast...
2. If you are thirsty, drink-if you are thirsty don't drink pop, drink water. If you don't have water don't just sit there, go get some water.
1. One of my hangups till this week would be my desire to drink carbonated beverages (specifically Diet Dr. Pepper, cause it tastes more like the original).  I enjoy my pop, no not soda but pop (maybe I can go on a rant some other time about this and "duck duck grey duck" not goose)  So anyway, I would drink 1-2 bottles a day.
2. I told myself that I needed to stop/minimize the amount of pop I drink in a day.  Unfortunately this usually meant I would sit at my desk with nothing to drink...not useful in flushing the fat from my system...Funny I haven't lost the weight
3. Working more than 40 hours can be a hazard to your health.  
1. I (my wonderful wife) packs a lunch to get me from lunch to dinner, typically dinner is at 6:00
2. If you leave work at 8:00pm, it's hard on your body and mind to not eat.
3. People in offices have candy at their desks and they are happy to let you eat as much as you want if you give them money in appreciation...Working more than 40 hours can be a hazard to your petty cash too.
4. Buffalo Wild Wings is not part of a balanced diet.
1. Unless your diet is Beer and Wings
2. oh and Onion Rings
3. 3 times in a week may be too much
4. or then again maybe not...

Tomorrow's blog, why I'm happy being fat.  Brought to you by, and written from, my local BW3.  No, not really...I think my progress has been acceptable considering all of the above hang ups.(Psalm 37:24)

For those of you keeping track at home, I am down 4.4 year to date. that means I have 23.6lbs left to go. At this point, I see that I may need to work even harder than I thought I would have to the other day. 

Google- I love you - "The only workout I truly enjoy"-refound

So the other day I posted this, lost it, and it was found again,(Luke 15:32) so for those who didn't read it before...Here it is...

So the other day I was finishing my first semester of college, yes it was my last but that's another story. I was very proud of my GPA with all the distractions going on like having a pregnant girlfriend and my impending academic probation. Yes, I was sitting with a nice 3.8 GPA but apparently if you drop 2/3 of your credits on the last day before it counts as an incomplete (Psychology, Math and English) they frown on that. So what was the 1/3 I kept? Glad you asked.

I kept Band, Band Technique, and Volleyball. How I survived, I'll never know. So why am I telling you all this, simple I still play volleyball...And I love it. I would play every day, unless I was playing golf- you'll read more about that this spring as the itch to play starts growing. But Seriously I love it, I find it weird though that as tall as I am my favorite position is often Setter. I take pure joy out of putting the ball exactly where it needs to be to have someone crush it. Honestly, I think I enjoy that more than killing a ball myself. I find it interesting that at 6'6" that I have a desire to do what is not my "bread and butter" position. I prefer being guard on the basketball court, and, well, ok, that's the only example I can come up with.

Lately volleyball has been the only exercise I can fit in. I have a gym membership but it's only open till 6:00 and I've been working past that too much lately, so my old church's open volleyball night on Sunday is just the ticket. Typically we have 10-14 people and for the most part it’s a high level pickup game. Last night, as my team got beat a lot so I found myself running a lot, and I LOVED IT. I know you shouldn't need to "run" that much when playing volleyball but some new people were there and it was nice to be able to encourage them while shagging errand balls. It also felt good to know that 30lbs ago I wouldn't have been able to get to those balls in the first place (imagine a freight train; Long time to get started, long time to slow down).

I'm hoping in the coming weeks to maybe make it to this new place I recently found out about that has a open gym night and then the weight will really be lost, not this post like the other day...See what I am setting up for you to spike down? huh? HUH? Nevermind....

Something i just learned...

So the other day I wrote this blog...I'm not too confident when I write so it can take me a several of hours to write it...sometimes over multiple devices, whether that's the desktop, or iphone I will work on it then publish it.

Well today I published "The only workout I truly enjoy" from my desktop computer-to those of you who read it congrats you did so in the first 58 minutes of posting...then I went onto my iphone and saw that the draft was still there...IT SAID DRAFT!  so I was like" oh, I finished that, I can delete it" and then you know the rest...

So why am I telling you this?  2 reasons 1-be careful- delete is forever and 2- if you are looking for "The only workout I truly enjoy" you may never see it because it wouldn't be the actual post again and I want people to know the real story not a fake reprint...

So when you come across a time and place when you are asked "delete-are you sure?"  remember me and that story I told that not many read, the other day.

PS. One thing from the original post that only like 9 of you saw...I will be attempting to always put a scripture in my blog...this will be something relative to the blog, if you want to ignore it that's fine it's and addition to not a required part of the story, something to keep me focused on learning His word further...So simply this is something that I challenged myself with, the other day (Matthew 7:28)

To the Cloud

So the other day my daughter and I went out to eat...I like being able to spend time with my kids and as a side note should be working on spending more 1 on 1 time with the boy, and I digress.

We went out to eat, Granite City, and then wanted to spend even more time together so we went to a local mall...and there...with all it's amazing awesomeness...was an istore, or an icloud store, or an "ineed an itowel to wipe away the idrool" store, whatever the fruit store is called, we walked in...

Seriously, AWESOME, but do I need an ipad to tell me what an itouch is? How do you think I would know how to work an ipad if I don't know how an itouch works??  There was so much technology there and a lot of it was duplicated...but that doesn't mean I didn't stop at every piece of gorilla glass covered electronics(regardless of the size) I could find.

So why am I telling you this? No reason. Turns out I have an iphone, which I am actually blogging from while shopping with my wife, and I thought I would see if I was maximizing my phone's ability.
Unfortunately, the store was packed and I was unable to get the attention I wanted from an iemployee, so we just drooled on their stuff and left.  Oh yes, idaughter drooled too.

Honestly though, technology has so many upsides I just hope that Apple got it right and that their logo - the apple with the bite out of it - represents our eyes being opened to possibilities like Adam and Eve, vs a "less than it could have been" life for generations to come...like Adam and Eve.

I'd prefer that one day we don't look at ourselves and say "I liked it back, the other day, when my life was more sunshine than iclouds"

Another example of the Blog's name

So the other day...I was talking to my wife as we were driving home from Sam's club.  This was just like any normal story and I hadn't even noticed that I started with "the other day".  The story I told is not important to the story and since I already posted once today maybe I will skip that story.

So I'm telling her this story about one of my coworker's new car...
Coworker # 1 - Blah blah blah...it's so high tech and it caused this issue
Coworker # 2  - yeah, that happened to me too...
Wife (interjecting into the story)-who was the other co-worker?
Me - Jan
Wife-Who?
Me-You know Jan- My Manager
Wife- Your manager from your last job- over SIX Years ago?
Me- Yeah- oh that really wasn't the other day than huh?
Wife- ya think?

We laughed about it the rest of the way home me pointing out that this is why I call the blog what I do and so on...hilarious, or maybe you just needed to be there, the other day...

Band Geek can't get no love!

So the other day I was trying out instruments trying to see if I wanted to play drums (of course, who wouldn't) trumpet, or sax a ma phone...I knew going in (in 6th grade) that I would only play one of these 3 instruments.  From that day on through my whole college career I played...wait for it...the trombone.  See it's not about what instrument I wanted to play it was about the instrument "that best suited me"  the one "that called my name" and "fit best with the inner me"...apparently I since I have large lips and long arms and that was that.

Why do I bring this up, well yesterday my son got to go try out instruments that he would like to play going forward.  When I was going through the trial period I was only allow to choose; Orchestra (in 5th grade) or if I missed that boat, Band in 6th.  But he got to go from room to room trying out Orchestra, Brass and Winds, he doesn't have the required 2 years of piano to play percussion.

So there we were, he immediately went to the Orchestra room to play the instrument that he has been telling us he would be playing for the last 5 years, the Violin.  We are excited to let him try it out but kept trying to make sure that he had an open mind.  There were about 5 kids trying the Violin so we said, "oh here's the Bass, the one instrument he said he wouldn't want to play because it was too big, but he tried it.  Then we went to Violin, Viola, and Chello. As we were reluctantly leaving that room he declared that he liked the Bass the best...this floored the Mrs. and I, but regardless it's onto the Band rooms.  First the Brass section, there he tried the trumpet (gave him a headache) French horn, not to keen on it but I will say for his first time...nice sound out of that.  Then over to trombones...he played like a pro- no not really- but since he had picked up mine in the past he was comfortable with the process more than any others.  "Eh" was the response that we got from that...

To the winds.  Cool thing about the boy is that he is good at not get stuck in stereotypes.  He had no reservations about sitting down at the flute section and trying it out...ultimately he thinks it's too hard, he was dizzy, and didn't think it would be a good fit.  We skipped the clarinet section and moved onto the Sax a ma phone.  His buddy was there- they sat next to each other and put a good 5 minutes or more on it and even learned Hot Crossed Buns.  I think that may have been where he ended up if he would have not have had an orchestra choice.
So back to the Orchestra room for one more run through.  He retried all the instruments and declared that he really liked the Bass best but that the Violin was a close second.  We're OK with that.

So looking back on my experiences; band, marching band, jazz band and pep band, I wish he would have chosen band but I am sure that he will find his nitch and will be able to tell tons of stories about the other day when he became an Orch Dork.

New Year - New Shirts

So the other day I tipped the scales at a lovely 336lbs.  This was the largest (to my knowledge) I have ever been.  Preferably also the largest I ever will be.  I don't like knowing that my skin could stretch that far and honestly I still have the scars from that weight (physical and mental).

(Buddies wedding Jan 2006)

This picture was from my buddies wedding in Mexico.  7 days of all inclusive liquids and food...and it was all soooo good. The next week I attended Sales Conference in Palm Springs, a work celebration for the top 10% of employees...more all inclusive food and liquids.  It ended with me tipping the scales at a very uncomfortable weight of 336lbs.  I have had many fluctuations in weight since then...2 steps forward 1 step back as they go...I cannot complain too much.  But now, I have my goal and the determination.



Last March my wife and I started Weight Watchers Online.  I started the adventure at 303 lbs, I was determined to hit my wedding weight of  255 lbs.  After I got married in 1998 I shot up not looking at the scale as I did.  First I lost 5% of my weight, then 10% then I hit my lowest weight in remembered history at 271lbs only 4 months after starting.  I pretty much looked awesome and became complacent as this is the best I have looked in 8 years.

Me and my Wonder-Teen

We are now just a measly 3 months from that great day and I am up to 283.  I can give you the excuses of I had a party last night (who didn't) and we had a great spread and some great beers.  BUT I need to be more responsible.  I looked at the scale each day and thought...at least it's not the 300s.

So why am I bringing this all up?  Well simple.  My family, in keeping with the celebration of my weight loss bought me new clothes for Christmas.  It turns out 12 lbs shows up on a body.  So my 6 new tee shirts, a new polo, 2 sweatshirts and 2 pairs of jeans don't fit "comfortably" right now.  OK, I look like a stuffed sausage.

And to add to that reason, these last 3 months my wife has been kicking my arse in weight loss and is looking HOT.  She has a goal to reach by April 1st, so I will be doing the same.  3 months to 255.  This was suppose to be a simple 16 pound push but I had to go and gain 12 lbs. Now 28 is the goal.  2.3 lbs per week.

I don't plan on updating you all with the details but I'll check in on this topic when fitting, but hopefully it's the clothes that will be fitting in no time at all.

I wish you all a blessed New Year and much success to your goals that you set now, and the other day...