Monthly Archives: January 2009

The Big Picture

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I’ve been looking for a new TV for awhile. Well, not so much looking as thinking about buying. Which is weird, what with the fact that I watch almost no TV and that my 27″ Toshiba is still working; good picture, good sound, no troubles. Tasha says it’s a guy thing. Maybe it is, I don’t know. I think it’s probably a prelude to a new game console. What I do know is that I’ve been getting closer and closer to pulling the trigger on the big purchase.

I was thinking 1080p, LCD, 46″ or better, and not ugly. The problem with that is, I don’t want to pay what a 46″ LCD is going for. So my frugality is fighting with my bigger-is-better mentality. And of course you get in these stores with their giant showrooms and high ceilings and even the 50″ TV’s look reasonably sized.

So tonight after the gym, Tasha and I went to Sam’s Club and picked up a new TV. What did we get? Let me tell you how I made my decision before I tell you what I decided on.

As I already mentioned, I’ve been watching a 27″ TV for years now. We bought a 31″ before we got married in 1998, but it went with Tasha and then with Kirra, when Tasha moved here, and then it died. So anything bigger than 27″ is going to be an improvement. All I really want is that I don’t lose any height on the screen. I don’t want to spend a thousand dollars and would prefer to spend less than seven hundred. And lastly, my apartment isn’t all that big.

So I went with the 42″ LCD by Magnavox. And I’m damn glad I did. It didn’t fit in the car. And when we got it home we realized just how big it really is. Big. Way bigger than what we had. Hell, it makes my 26″ monitor look small. That’s how big it is. I like it, but I’m damn glad that I didn’t go bigger.

Next step is the game console… Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.

Finally A Loss

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So I stepped on the scale this morning, as I do every monday morning, and my exercise and diet have started paying off. I’m down 6 pounds from last monday. Sweet.

It’s hard work, but it’s work I need to do. Later.

Tasha's Birthday

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Happy birthday Tasha. Today is Tasha’s birthday, she’s not yet 40.

The day started with me going to meet with the personal trainer. It was a “talk about your lifestyle” meeting, not a “exercise” meeting. So really nothing to talk about there. Then I came home and took Tasha to dinner and then to the hockey game. We saw our first Grand Rapid’s Griffins game, they won 3-0 and we sat right behind the penalty box. It was a good time.

Rumor has it that my buddy Doug is trying to talk to me about  my Baenrahl setting. Not trying very hard apparently, but that’s the rumor.

I’ve got to say, this whole character blog thing is a lot more work than I expected it to be. I mean the writing part of it isn’t hard. It’s the research and the sifting through the games background info, followed by determining what to include in the posts and what to leave out of the posts. What I mean is I want to point out the stuff that the character would point out without leaving out the world specific bits that aid in the understanding of the setting. It’s a challenge.

The Chronicles of Boring

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Tonight we watched Chronicles of Narnia: Prince whatever-his-name-was. I’ve just got to say that I’ve not been impressed with the Narnia movies. Admittedly, I never read the books as a kid. Though I did read the first book just before the first movie came out. So I don’t have fond childhood memories of wanting to go to Narnia and I do have a skewed adult perspective of Narnia through the lens of all that christian mythos and symbolism. But for a series of movies that have all the stuff I want in fantasy; centaurs, minotaurs, dwarves, satyrs, and a host of other humanoid critters. These two movies are just plain boring. I can’t relate to or have any sympathy for any of the characters, and just seeing cool special effects got old a while back. Now mind you, I’m not the target audience for these films and I’m not a big fan of the movies in general, but still, I expect more for my entertainment dollar.

I’m just sayin’. Later.

Fifteen Percent

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I took a sick day today and slept ’til noon. Some day’s that’s all it takes.

Tonight was the On Target Living Seminar at the East Hills MAC. It was a seminar that was free to I Lost It participants. Chris Johnson was the speaker, according to his website he’s America’s Peak Living & Performance Coach. The gist of his message is that little changes make big differences, thus the 15% difference. Meaning the first step, the first 15% is the biggest part of getting fit. He talked about the importance of diet, not calories, but quality of food. The necessity of rest, balance and white space in your life. And he showed some simple exercises that anyone can do almost anywhere. I say almost because he wanted us to try them and it was a bit too crowded to actually do exercise. It was a good seminar, I think even Tasha liked it, and you know how fussy she is about food. But two hours is a long time to sit on a folding chair.

My fast today went badly. I went without food for most of the day, but right before we left I had some taquitos, about 340 calories. Not a total failure, but definitely a failure of willpower. Tomorrow will be a better day for my willpower.