Make me just wanna holler…

One of my most cherished childhood memories involves Christmas Eve.  When I was young (less than 10 years old), our church, Zion Lutheran Church in downtown Akron, Ohio, had a Christmas Eve pageant on Christmas Eve night.  Afterwards, my mom and dad would walk my sister and I down the hill (you’d have to be from Akron to know what  I mean — it was some hill!) and we’d walk along South Main Street and look at the animated windows that Polsky’s and O’Neil’s had up.  Then we’d walk back up to the church parking lot and go home.

What is mostly attached to that memories, besides remembering my parents, is how peaceful that night was.  There was very little traffic, I can’t ever remember feeling unsafe, and there was an almost unworldly calm that I associate with Christmas to this day.

Yesterday is what is known in retail parlance as “Black Friday”. It kicks off the “selling” season that has NOTHING to do with Christmas, and it was anything but peaceful.  Here in Northeast Ohio, in a relatively prosperous community called Strongsville, there was a virtual riot at a Victoria’s Secret.  Listen to the video below, filmed just before the store happened and the “riot” occurred.

In California, a woman pepper-sprayed the other shoppers in her vicinity so she could have the advantage.

I despair, sometimes, because many people who call themselves Christians aren’t and damage Jesus’ name. This “holiday” and all that it has become goes one step further in making a mockery of my faith. The magi didn’t claw their way through a mall to bring Jesus gold, frankincense and myrrh to honor him.

And the real reason for remembering Jesus’ birth is about his ultimate gift to us — he died on the cross, suffered rejection from His Father, so we could have eternal life. Not so we could mangle each other for a gift that will likely be returned or broken or be ultimately meaningless.

This is not my Christmas, not any more. I have decided I don’t need a special day for remembering Jesus. Yes, I will probably participate in a few things –  do the “secret Santa” thing at work, for example — but Christmas isn’t just one day. Not for me.

“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year” Ebenezer Scrooge

Love is Blindness…

‘”Love is drowning
In a deep well
All the secrets
And no one to tell…”

U2, “Love is Blindness”

I’ve spent the last few weeks thinking about and praying for a lot of friends. My contemporaries and I have started to hit the age where parents and even siblings are encountering serious, even life-ending, illness. While I’ve already had my adoptive mom and dad pass, and seen my sister through some health scares, I still (not being an island) am connected to what those around me are going through.  And I still have some involvement with my birth father. To make a long story a little shorter, I’ve spent a lot of time pondering mortality lately. But that’s not what this post is about.

I have one particular friend who means a lot to me.  No.  I’m tired of being a coward about my feelings — although part of me is glad that my friend doesn’t have time to read blog posts.   This person is special to me in a major way. And again I’m not being straight up about this.  I love him very much. And right now, he’s helping to see his dad through cancer treatment, as well as running his businesses and taking care of his family on a day to day basis.  Also, I think — though he’s never confirmed it and I won’t press him about it — that he is dealing with health issues of his own.  If you ask him, he’ll say he’s fine and then change the subject to ask you how you’re doing.  He’s that kind of guy.

I’ve never told him how I feel.  I never will. Not that he sees me that way — at most I’m just a nice person he talks to on the Internet — at worst, I’m probably a major pest. And I have commitments, too, that preclude this being anything but a long-distance friendship; promises I intend to keep, although there are days when I could cheerfully walk away from them. Sometimes it all gets to be too much. But I keep on keeping on.  And for my friend, I express my love the only way I can — by not saying anything at all. Just to be there as much as is possible, to hold him in my heart and pray for him.

Some times love is muteness, too.

Weight Loss II: Back to the Future

The weight loss has stalled. I’m where I was at my low point in the Summer of 2010 and while I’ve lost a few more inches, the pounds aren’t budging.

I’ve decided that there are three reasons for this (I think):

1. Some occasionally BAD eating choices (get thee behind me, lasagna! [note: and it did, trust me...])
2. Not doing as much weightlifting. This time around I’m doing more swimming and water aerobics. I need to work weight lifting back into the routine.
3. Having developed the bad habit of waking up in “fight or flight” mode and then laying awake worrying about the hole in the ozone layer and lots of other similar things I have no control over and no way of solving. This is a problem for two reasons: one, I’m not getting enough sleep, which every weightloss/fitness expert in the known universe says is critical and two, I’m sure I’m generating enough cortisol to drown a small island nation, which is also supposed to be a problem, especially with weight around the middle. Sigh.

I want this so badly — to keep seeing the pounds come off, even if they do it slowly.  Just to see the scale drop and keep on doing it. So I’m considering Tom Venuto’s “Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle”.  Not that I have any secret yen to look like a female bodybuilder (somehow I can’t get the image of Jim Carrey’s “Vera De Milo” character from “In Living Color” out of my head)

Jim Carrey as Vera De Milo on "In Living Color"

but a lot of people seem to have used his plan safely and seen results, so maybe I should give it a go.  It’s ultimately my choice about how low a BF% I hit (assuming I can get things kick started). So — onward and downward, yet again?

(since 11/4/2011: +/-0.00%; since 3/1/2011: -5.74%)

Weight Loss II: To Everything … There is a Season

I spent the weekend thinking: about the change of seasons, the problems I’m having getting my eating back under control and about loving people who aren’t going to love back.  With the exception of the beautiful Autumn weather this weekend, it wasn’t a particularly happy set of thoughts.

Bally’s was on the menu this weekend, though, both Saturday and Sunday.  The major reason I chose BTF over the Y was that Bally’s has AbBenches.  (They also have PowerFlex classes, but that didn’t come into play until after I joined). So I did core exercises Saturday and then decided to do some more Sunday, which is not one of my more inspired decisions. I quit after one sequence when my abs decided to remind me that they were muscles, too, and needed  a day off.

I did swim both days and I’m feeling that in my arms and pecs this morning. Aleve is my friend.

I’m holding off on weighing in until Fridays from now on.  I intend to get back to daily workouts and I want to see how that will play in to weight change.  If it does. If I can break the carb habit I’m having.  Down, sugar!  Away from me!

(since 9/7/2011: +1 .47%; since 3/1/2011: 5.74%)

I will remember you… (RIP Steve Jobs)

MacClassic

Back in the dawn of time, when dinosaurs still walked the earth and computers filled an entire room (i.e., 1977), I was  a student at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, toting a big box of punch cards to FORTRAN class.  In those days, most computers were mainframes or midranges (like the DEC VAX or IBM’s System/3x) and what few “personal computers” existed weren’t seen as much more than toys.  That was also the year Apple Computers released the Apple IIC and it gained some popularity in secondary education, but no one would have based a career on using/supporting them.  The more widely used Commodore Color Computer (known to the cogniscenti as the “CoCo”) and the Timex Sinclair wouldn’t come along until the early 1980s and the IBM PC wouldn’t be generally available until 1981.

That was then.

In 1985, I went to work at a company doing spreadsheets in Lotus 1-2-3 and Symphony. They had an early IBM PC with a monochrome (green) monitor, two 5 1/4″ floppy disk drives and no hard drives.  Everything was stored on floppies and to start the computer, you inserted a DOS disk (3.1, if I recall correctly) and then put in a key disk to get Lotus to run.  You used the other drive for the disks that stored your data.  As much as a revelation as it was for accounting, it wasn’t much help for anything else.  Word processing was done on a Wang system.

About three months after I started, the engineering department suddenly had this odd little oblong box, sitting upright.  They told me it was a Mac Classic.  I didn’t know what that meant, but it had an immediate impact on my professional life.  Previously, making a bar chart meant using cardboard cutouts and rulers to draw what you needed, and if anything was wrong, or the numbers changed, you had to start over again.  Very annoying.  However, this “Mac Classic” had a piece of software on it called “MacChart”. With MacChart, you could build your graphs on the computer, and if anything changed, it took a couple of keystrokes to make the changes. At that point, you still had to leave space in your document, cut the chart out and paste it in (the origin of the term “cut and paste” ). But not having to start over from scratch was a major breakthrough. These Macs were something else!

As I look back over the past twenty-plus (nearly 30!) years from the vantage point of the present, I see what a profound impact Steve Jobs’ vision for Apple and his subsequent successes had on all of us, but especially veterans of the IT industry.  What ever you may think of Mr. Jobs and Mr. Gates personally, there is no doubt in my  mind that their “anything you can do, I can do better” battles resulted in more, better and faster improvements to personal computer operating systems, hardware and apps than would have happened if either had stood alone. In my humble opinion, Windows (whatever its failings) would be as good as it is if Bill Gates didn’t have Steve Jobs upping the ante, as it were, by his ongoing improvements to Macintosh.

And then there are the changes provoked by the post-Mac iNnovations (sorry, couldn’t resist) of the iPhone, iPad, iPod, Apple TV, and so on. Each of them kicked off new technology in their respective areas and spurred other innovators to create competitive products.  Technology thrives best when there’s competition, and Apple provided plenty of that, due to Mr. Jobs’ ideas and forethought.

If you look at the current status and past history of personal technology, the road is littered with once-thriving companies who are barely more than peripheral these days (Lotus, WordPerfect); companies who had their day, weren’t willing or able to evolve, and died; companies that made a big splash and then sank without a trace; and the up-and-comers whose destiny has yet to be determined.  Then, there are the survivors and major players: Microsoft, Adobe, Google — and Apple. I expect Apple to be a part of that select company for many years to come.

Rest in peace, Mr. Jobs. You had a major impact on the 20th and 21st centuries, bigger maybe than even you knew.  You will be missed.

Ebook or bust – Help, y’all! I need advice.

(sorry … broke my own meme by not having a song lyric as a title, but I can’t think of one right now )

I spent some time yesterday whilst waiting for my landlady to show up researching anthology submission requests. What I found was 1) a lot of people looking for stories for non-profit anthologies and 2) the odd e-book publisher thoughtfully offering a whole 50% of profits.  Hey, fellas, got some news for you — I can not make money on my own.  Really.

So in addition to my commitment to the Clan of the Flying Pens (about to undergo a name change since it appears we’ve lost a couple of participants), and my ideas for Shawn Riddle’s Civil War horror anthology, Jeremy Shipp’s short-short anthology and Jim Bronyaur’s animal horror anthology, I am going to sit down and look at my current story inventory, kick the tires on some ideas that have come to mind (that don’t fit any of the above — those stories are “written” in my mind anyway) and winnow things down to my best 16 pieces. I have a title, an image for my cover — gonna see if my graphic design degree is worth the paper it’s printed on and the Smashwords guide.

So, to any of my fellow writers who read this:

1. Is/Are 16 stories enough?

2. If you’ve done your own e-book, did you use Smashwords to create your ebook? Was it a good choice?

3. If you’ve done your own e-book, how much did you charge? And where did you sell it, other than Smashwords/Amazon?

4. When I’m done, could I coax you to read through the book to see if there are any weak spots?

Thank you. I hope to hear from the experts who have blazed this territory before me. 

Weight Loss, Round II: Oh, and by the way…

By good rights, I should be posting this on Wednesday, but I anticipate a strange week this week, so I probably won’t get a chance then.

So… I’m pleased to say that my (very gradual) weight loss continues.  I haven’t had a particularly good week or so eating wise, and I’ve (not intentionally, but due to circumstances) not been working out as much, but I am definitely down. Right now, I’m just below where I was at my “low water” mark last summer, so now it’s “onward and downward”, so to speak. It’s my intention to work out at work this week, plus I hope to get a ‘second shift’ in at the Y on Tuesday and Thursday.  I’ve managed to get to a couple of water aerobics classes and liked them very much.  It was funny — the first time I went, I got out of the pool thinking, “Gee, that didn’t seem as hard as I expected,” a sentiment that lasted until I got up the next morning and realized how much work I had really put it.  The water carries some of the load, making it a rather deceptive process.

Saturday I came to work briefly and walked on the treadmill/did the elliptical.  I’m sorry, but no one is going to convince me that the elliptical is easier and less work than the treadmill.  I just don’t believe it.  I’m working longer and at a higher level on the elliptical than I did before, and the stupid thing’s trying to tell me that 20 minutes on it (I split my 40-minute workout between the two) is about a third of the calories of the treadmill workout.  Not a chance. I mean, with the elliptical, you’re moving your arms as well as your legs. I don’t see how it can be less work.

Oh, well.  In the meantime, I think my fantasy football team lost again — at least this week it was closer.  My fantasy hockey league drafts on October 3, and I’m looking forward to that, if only because it also means we’re just three days away at that point from the real thing starting. I<3 my Habs.  (I suppose I should post a warning on Twitter and FB for the non-fans… )

Still praying for my friend.  Really storming heaven on this one.  The thought that I might lose this person is absolutely devastating to me. Please help this special being, Lord.

And for all the rest of you, hope you are well, too.  Always have time to listen and care if you’re not. {{hugs}}

(since 9/7/2011: .97%; since 3/1/2011: 7.11%)

Wishin’ and Hopin’, Prayin’ and Thinkin’ …

It’s been a long time since I’ve had to think about something like this.  The last time was when my mom was diagnosed with leukemia back in the day (over 25 years ago, now).

I’d forgotten how it feels to hurt, to cry to the heavens and negotiate with the Lord, offering to bear someone’s else’s burden because you could handle that better than watching them go through it.

A special person in my life has been going through an exacerbation of a chronic illness, one that will very likely be the death of this person. (You’ll notice I’m not being very specific here — but I haven’t asked for permission to discuss this publicly so you’ll have to ask God for the details.  I always figure I can pray for someone without knowing everything because He does.)

A big part of my life recently has been working out and eating better to lose weight.  I’ve actually been pretty successful at this. My friend has been my inspiration in a lot of ways, partly because they have a connection to the industry and partly because I want to meet them in person.  Oh, yes.  This is an Internet friend — and anyone who thinks you can’t connect to someone over the Internet the way you do in RL doesn’t know what they’re talking about.  They live a fair distance away — about a half-day’s car ride (literally, as in 12 hours) and it has been my goal that come next April or May, when I’m at or close to my goal, I would call my friend, schedule a time and go to where they are to meet them. I’m kind of holding onto that, actually, through all the events that are my life.

I knew that there was a problem with how their illness was going — I’d seen a picture a month or so ago and recognized a major physical symptom that is the side effect of the most common medication for his illness. And then today, I heard from a mutual friend that it was a little more than just the usual; that ultimately, it could be quite bad for my friend. And my heart just broke.

I would willingly take on this pain and illness if I could. I just spent the last the last half-hour begging the Lord to make it all right, to give my friend back the energy needed to run a business and take care of family, and the courage to see things through. I offered up my hopes and dreams, if they could only be all right.

Which, of course, is not the way it works. But I’ll keep offering and praying.  I only wish I was close enough to offer more service, to offer up more than prayer, even though I truly believe God hears us and it works.  It’s part of my control freak nature, I suppose, to think that if *I* was on the ground, everything would be all right.  What arrogance!

Still, Lord, if you don’t mind, give me my friend’s burden and make them well. Amen.

Where were you when the world stopped turning?

Yes, I’m a day late with this.

I cried yesterday when they played “Taps” before the Browns game, but I’d been upset before that, watching the video someone made with video and photographs to Alan Jackson’s song. Today, I have what a friend of mine called a “9/11 hangover” and this post is the result

If anything should come of the aftermath of the events of 9/11, even ten years (and one day) on, it seems to me it ought to be a reassessment of what’s really important to us. Over and over again, I’m brought to a realization that no one who died that day is likely to have woken up thinking, “Well, this is it. I don’t get any more mornings after this one.” I doubt they did anything majorly different from the things they normally did. They fed the cat/dog/fish/bird, thought about what they’d make or get for dinner that night and tried to organize their work day, setting priorities and deciding what to tackle when they hit their desks.  Some of them went to vote — but most of those folks didn’t make it back to the office in time to be victims of the terrorists.

Not that I think we ought to spend our whole lives focused on death, but it might not hurt to occasionally realize that now is all the time there may ever be. No one is promised one second more than the one they’re in right now. It’s a good idea not to defer the kindness you mean to do, to tell a loved one that they matter to you, to do whatever it is you can do to improve the world in your immediate vicinity.

Forgive me for saying this — I’m sure it will come across as morbid — but I have always wondered what passes through someone’s mind when they realize that THIS time, there won’t be any second chances. I don’t think it’s possible to die without regrets. I don’t think anyone’s life is so perfect that there isn’t at least one thing they wish they had or hadn’t done — unless they’re really deluding themselves. I do think it’s possible to reduce the number of regrets. And maybe that’s the ultimate gift those 3,000-plus people give us; to honor their memories by making whatever difference we can.  It has to be a more positive legacy than hatred and war, don’t you think?

Weight Loss, Round II: Slowly I Turned

Only a little over a half pound off this week. Sigh.  I can’t complain though — I had a seriously bad Saturday, including a turtle sundae (*hangs head*). Weekends are bad because at work I only bring what I’m allowed to have. At home, resisting temptation is a lot harder.  Not that I usually give in and pig out or anything, but I know I don’t do as well there as otherwise.

I bought an Omron body fat analyzer off Ebay so I can test that as well and have another metric.  I do hope I’m building (or at least maintaining) lean muscle mass.  I’m trying very hard to keep my protein levels up — got to be the hardest part. At least in theory (according to the websites I’ve read) I should be getting 130-150 g of protein.  Most days, I feel happy if I make it to 100.  And that’s with all the changes I’ve made.  I can’t imagine how badly I was doing before when I ate willy-nilly.

My intention is to go to the Y tonight and do water aerobics.  I hope I can. I’ve been so horribly tired lately.

(since 7/13/2011: .20%; since 3/1/2011: 4.37%)