Not hungry anymore :)

Everything looks cool according to the doctor.  Went in, they gave me a shot to knock my ass out and buh bye in about 3 seconds.  Don’t remember and didn’t feel, a thing.

Came home and immediately had a cup of coffee and a bowl of cereal.  I wanted to go to the diner for some lunch, but the nurse said to take it easy or I’d get bad cramps.  So I came home and had a bite, and crashed for about an hour and I’m feeling pretty good.  Got the laxatives out of my system and I’m feeling human with a full belly, and drinking a LOT of water.

Here’s something that might shock you – normally I hover around 220 lbs.  I’m 6′1″ and could stand to lose a few pounds, but I’m in fairly good shape.  I weighed myself this morning – 214.5  Dude.  I had no idea how much food and water weighed.

Had to share

Think of a half gallon.  Think of a half gallon of gatorade.  Not too bad right?  I could suck that down on a bad day easily.

Now add 238g – about a full cup – of Miralax.  Stuff to make you go.  Now your nice sweet gatorade has the consitency of jello, tastes rather sickeningly sweet, and seems never ending.  Now drink a half gallon of it.  Oh yeah, 30 min after your done?  Take 4 (FOUR) Ducolax.

I believe I am clean from top to bottom.  Honestly, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be, just have to make sure you go regularly.  I go in for my procedure around noon, they put me out, should be done in around 20 min they said.

Add to all of this – it started snowing at around midnight while I was watching season 1 of House – great show btw – and all I could think to myself was: “Dude, you know it’s going to snow too much, they’ll have to reschedule the procedure, and you’ll have to do this all over again”  Was not a fun thought.  Just called and checked tho and we’re still on.  Fae’s going to drive me over there in around an hour.

I

AM

SO

HUNGRY!!!!!!

Going to eat a side of beef, a field of potatoes, and half a veggie garden for a salad.

Guys: Honestly, besides being really hungry, it’s not too bad.  I had to do a presentation yesterday, so I didn’t want to get shaky – Fae sent me into work with a box of chicken broth, which I drank the whole thing of.  Bland as hell, but it helped.  You can also eat Jello too.  As of 6am, I can’t even drink water, so now I’m hungry AND thirsty.

All that aside, I actually feel kind of better than I have in weeks.  I think I’ve been eating incorrectly for a long period of time and now my body is taking a deep sigh.  Maybe I’ll make today the first day of a new way of eating.  Hmmm

Not eating

So I have to go in for a colonoscopy tomorrow, and this morning as of 6am, I can’t eat solid food.

Dude, it’s 11am, and I’m STARVING!  Fae gave me some chicken broth to drink so I wouldn’t be dying, but man, it is BLAND and untasty.

My Dad has some history with Polyps so the doctors want me going in at 40, rather than 50.  Yes, I’m discussing this on the internet, sue me!  It’s my blog and I’m going to post what I want

The great part about today is I get to present in front of all of the Partners, VP’s & Region Presidents, and I have to do it starving to death!!  Unfortunately, I go last so you know how much they’re actually going to be paying attention to me.  Not!  There’s also a chance that they may put it off until tomorrow, in which case, my boss will have to do it for me because I’ll be on my date with a doctor and a three foot hose.

Yeah, sorry.  That was a little graphic   Can you tell I’m just a little nervous about it all?  I know everything will turn out fine, I just want to get it over with so I can eat a steak the size of Montana.  With a baked potato.  And everything, YES EVERYTHING ON IT!!!  It’s truly amazing what sounds your stomach can make when it’s not being filled.

I’m hoping that the whole thing goes smoothly and I can go to Kendo tomorrow night.  I’m definitely bringing the kids because I know Gillian is excited, and Aidan’s happy to have her there as well.

Stop grasping for more

You ever notice that we’re all caught in a constant struggle for more?  I want a bigger house, I want a better car, I want a promotion, a cooler blackberry and the list goes on and on.

Seriously, is it just me?  Everything we see is aimed at more.  Excess has become the norm.  I watched Supersize Me, which actually made me really ill, but one thing stood out in my mind that pertains to this.  The small fry, the one in the white paper(ish) bag is what used to be the large when I was a kid.

Why do we need more?  Why are we all constantly working to get more, to have more, to ‘need’ more?  Is it something inherent in my generation?  I grew up never wanting for anything I needed, and occasionally got something I wanted that was a little silly, but it just seems like it’s always more more more.  (can you sense a trend in my thinking?)

Fuck it!

No, I’m not going to quit my job and move into the forest and gather nuts for my family.  Tho, I have thought about starting a commune – short dream, don’t worry.

I am, however, going to start taking less work home, sitting and watching tv* or playing games with the kids, reading to them, working on the house and other things that will enrich my life more than being constantly plugged in and trying to make more to buy more to get more.

*we watched Phineas & Ferb tonight – what a funny ass show.  The evil scientist is hilarious.

40 things about me

Since I am now an old man and I will soon start forgetting things, I thought I would write down 40 things about me.

1. I am married to a wonderful woman and have an 11 yr old son Aidan, and a 9 yr old daughter Gillian.  My wife is Fae and we’ve been married 14 years.
2. I have never been to Japan but it is the first place outside of the country I want to go.
3. I am right handed.
4. I met my wife Fae playing a role playing game called a MUSH over the internet in 1993, before online ANYTHING was around.
5. I have been studying martial arts in some form or another for the last 17 years.
6. I have a 2nd black belt in Tae Kwon Do.  I was an instructor in it for over 3 years and I really found out a lot about myself.
7. I am the youngest of three.
8. I have lived in NY, NJ, TX, & VA and not counting dorms, I’ve lived in a grand total of 8 different places.
9. I like playing video games almost as much as my kids.
10. I collect comics and baseball cards.
11. I listen to everything from the Eagles to Velvet Revolver to Chopin to Ludacris.
12. I’ve never learned to breakdance and I never want to.
13. I am an accomplished air drummer.
14. I love good food – Risotto and Sushi are probably my two favorite things.
15. I don’t like confrontation.
16. I love my job, but there is so much more I would like to do with it.
17. I actually love that I can say that I like my boss.  He’s 8 years younger than me and so much smarter than I am
18. I like the fact that I do Kendo with my son and my daughter is joining next week.
19. I need more money.
20. If someone told me I could have any dessert, I would say Chocolate Cream pie – graham cracker crust, chocolate pudding, cool whip on top.  That’s it.
21. I’m afraid of getting old, but I am fighting it every step of the way.
22. I like Top Chef, Lost, and Heroes.
23. I participate on a ride to help a care center in NYC for Gay, Lesbian, Bi-Sexual, and Transgendered.
24. I would move to Japan in a heartbeat given any opportunity.
25. I was born in the wrong country in the wrong century.  If I could choose?  Feudal Japan.
26. I like chewing gum.
27. I fart quite a bit, and for some weird reason, it usually doesn’t smell.
28. I don’t drink, smoke, or do drugs.  It took a large toll on my life, see 29.
29. It took me 11 years, 8 different attempts at degrees and 4 different colleges to get my degree.
30. I have a Bachelor of Arts in Accounting.
31. I lasted all of 6 months as an Accountant, I was good at it, but I didn’t want to do it for my whole life.
32. I would like to move all the restaurants I loved in Houston to Bridgewater.
33. I am still amazed that I grew up in Long Island hating NJ and now I live here and love it.  IT’S NOT ALL GARBAGE DUMPS AND REFINERIES!!!
34. I am sore as hell right now because I finally got to start wearing the Kendo Bogu(armor) and it made it SO much harder to swing my shinai(bamboo sword).
35. I need to oil my shinai.  Yeah, take that one however you like.
36. I love the fact that I am friends with people I have never met.  Terri, RagingDad, Mike, Movin, MammaDawg, and Mrs444 are way cool, please go read them.
37. My best friend is my wife.
38. I would step in front of a train to protect someone I love.
39. I’m a nice guy, and people like me.
40. I survived getting hit by a 26 foot truck in my little Honda Fit and rolled my car three times.  Somehow, I walked away from it to be able to say to you all – take every day as a gift and reach out to the ones you love and care about.

Four Oh

So what does it mean? What does it signify? Am I at a crossroads, turning point, milestone in my life?

Dude, I’m turning forty, big deal. It’s another day, another birthday, why is it such a big deal?
Because when I was 10, 40 was ANCIENT! When I was 10, my Dad was 40 or so. I don’t feel that old, or at least that mature.

Lets see what’s up…

• I work out 2x a week in the gym, I do Jujitsu for 2 hrs on sunday and Kendo for 2 hrs on Wed. Okay, I’m in better physical shape now than when I was 35.Unfortunately, when I put in my info on the treadmill, now I’ll have to put 40 instead of 39. Why is that feeling like a big deal?
• I still play D&D with my kids every once in a while and No, I’m not sure who gets a bigger kick out of it.  Sue me
• I am on Facebook less now than I was a few weeks ago, but i am playing World of Warcraft more now.  Tho even that’s getting lame, love the 10 day trial, not paying the 15$ a month fee.  Not that big of a dork.
• I’m  lot more confident than I was 5 years ago.
• I’m a better father than I was 5 years ago.
• I’m fairly close to where I thought/wanted to be when I was ‘old’.

I remember in South Side High School, when it was a few weeks before graduation, one of my teachers asked us to take out a sheet of paper and write down what we thought we’d be doing when we were 20, 30, and 40.  I think I wrote something to the effect of married with 2 kids and happy.

Well, I’m pretty close   My joints ache a little more, it takes me longer to warm  up my left knee and right ankle, and my shoulder is STILL kinda messed up. Considering the whole accident that I somehow walked away from after rolling my car three times, I am pretty lucky to be alive, much less have walked away with some shoulder issues.

I want to thank the good people of this country for getting together and getting me a decent present this year.  Y’all decided to all chip in your vote and give me a decent President to lead my country.  I am hopeful for the first time in 8 years.  I am not embarassed to be an American for the first time in 8 years – don’t get me wrong, it has only to do with the person Representing us to the world.  My wife made a great joke the other day.  “We’ve all spent the last 8 years sleeping under a Shrub (Bush)” and it feels that way.  It feels like we all took  deep breath in the beginning of 2008, shook off the doldrums, helped Obama get the nomination and then helped him win the election.  I haven’t been as involved in politics as I have been lately, and I haven’t had someone to vote for, to respect, to be happy and hopeful about in such a long time that I feel like I can take a deep breath and be hopefully optomistic about the future.

Is he going to solve things immediately?  Nope.  Is he going to be scrutinized more?  Yup – the media won’t have someone to make fun of anymore.  Will he be the charasmatic leader we need to salvage our tarnished and dented image in the world?  YOU FUCKIN BET

So as I spent the last hours before middle age, I leave you with a parting thought…

Look what happens when all of us think globally and act locally?  Look at what we can do.  Look at the change that is possible and the hope that is possible after so many years of disappointment and slumber.  Here’s to us.  Enjoy tomorrow everyone!!!

Getting closer

So 40 is coming up on Tuesday, and truthfully the more I think about, the less it bothers me. My friend A has been getting in shape and has lost a LOT of weight ~40lbs, and we talked last night how we’re both in better shape than at 30, and feeling physically, mentally, and emotionally better than last year at the very least.

Plus, the United States all got together and got me the best president – Obama will be inaugurated on my birthday.:) YAY!

Yeah, I moan about being sore, but it’s a good thing because it means I’m still continuing with my regimen. My wife’s boss came in and gave me a hug the other day and thanked me for working out with her husband. Told her it was a mutual guilt thing that kept us both going, she got a kick out of that.

A&B, our dear friends, go out to dinner in the city a bit more than we do and had heard about this place called Buddahkan and took us to it, because I simple love Asian food.

Guys, go. You need to. If you come to NYC for any reason and you like asian food? yeah, this is the place. We had yellow tail sashimi that just about melted in my mouth and lobster/shrimp chow fun. Yes please, I’d like more and more and more:) And they got me this brownie that I’m not sure what was in it – you ever have to close your eyes because something tastes so good? Yup, you get it now.

Yummy yummy yummy. And a beautiful place, and good conversation with good friends. Nicest night out I’ve had in a while. We’re getting ready to go to my brothers place on Long Island for my neices bday family party, and then dinner is for my bday for family. Yep, sushi IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!!!

Hope this finds you all well, and that your day is going as well as mine

Bleah

I’ve been running around like a look, trying to get things organized for some serious project work at my job, so I haven’t really been able to write much, much less think about it. And then it dawned on my why I was in a bad mood.

I promised myself that I was going to write, and I haven’t for about 4 days. I don’t post everything here, but I am trying

Physically I feel pretty okay. I’m not losing any weight, but I am definitely losing fat so my combination of jujitsu class, run/medicine ball, kendo, run/medicine ball workouts have been yielding some decent results. Honestly, if I changed the way I ate, I think I’d do even better. The problem is, I like food I like eating snacks around 3, and NO I don’t want a freakin orange, I want a SNICKERS BAR!!!

I brought in a big water bottle and succeeded in draining 2 or 3 of them this week, so I’m not feeling as dried out either. I can’t this morning because I have a physical at 9:30. I have hypothyroidism, which means my thyroid doesn’t produce jack shit in the way of the hormones my body needs so I have to take synthroid. I need a 90 day supply because it’s cheaper and the doc said I hadn’t had any blood work done in a year, I’m about to turn 40, and I’m working out more so she wants to see me. (Man I hope her hands aren’t cold)

I’m feeling better already. Anyone who says blogging isn’t therapeutic doesn’t know what they are talking about. I’m gonna get the prince off to school and do a bit of writing before my dr. appt. Ack, I should take a shower too. Crud, I’m HUNGRY!

Right Place…

Have you ever had one of those moments where time stood still, or at least slowed down to the point where you could smell, feel, and hear everything so clearly you thought that time actually did stand still? Well, I had one of those moments this weekend. It’s the type of feeling where you realize you’re in the right place, when you are doing what you’re meant to do. It’s like the universe is slowing things down for a moment, shouting “SEEE?!?!?” and then letting everything go back to the speed it was going before.

I’ve been enjoying my kendo class, especially now that we have the same uniform as everyone else, and also the fact that I have been given permission to wear Bogu – the armor we wear in Kendo – starting this week. Now if I can just get in touch with the guy who is letting me use his, it’ll be perfect! The thing that I have been missing has been really getting my hands on someone and throwing them around. Don’t get me wrong, I’m probably the least violent people I know, but there is a side of me that really enjoys putting on pads and stepping into the ring for a heated Tae Kwon Do match, or tossing and being tossed on an Aikido mat over and over until I’m dizzy. My sister has a saying that her kids need to go outside and “get their Rah Rah’s out” and truly, it’s something that I need on a normal basis. Kendo is tiring, but I like the feel of blocking and punching, or grabbing someone’s wrist and laying them out for a roll or a pin in Aikido or Jujitsu.

As I might have mentioned before, I started going back to my old school in Princeton NJ, Hontai Yoshin Ryu. Fabian Sensei studied with the Soke (head of school) in Honbu Dojo (hq or 1st school) about 20 years ago and I started taking his class about 6 years ago. It’s only sundays (that I could make) and it’s always outside, yes, even in winter. When I got this job, I stopped because I was planning on moving to White Plains, but the housing market went into the toilet in 2006 and I started Aikido at a place halfway between work and home. When I joined Kendo, I stopped taking Aikido, and I missed it, but I couldn’t afford two schools – Kendo and something else.

But the school in Princeton is much cheaper and I could afford to do it, so I contacted Sensei again and he agreed I could come back and yesterday was the second class for me.

We do our workout in three sections – sword, staff, and jujitsu. We had finished with staff and were about to start with jujitsu when I had the moment. We had done a lot more aerobic this week than last week, doing breakfalls and rolls in the snow so I was winded and yes, a little light headed. That’s when it happened, and it wasn’t me about to pass out. It was the universe telling me that this was what I was meant to be doing, where I should be, and somehow I knew that kendo was not taking away from this , but enhancing it. I could see the individual snowflakes coming down, I could feel the cold air on the inside of my nose and throat, the wet patch on my left knee and right shoulder, and the deep breath I was slowly exhaling. At that moment, time seemed to slow and I smiled, feeling physically, mentally, and emotionally sound.

I’d even go so far as to say it was almost religious in that I felt the energy around me (getting a chill right now thinking about it), and it was warm and comforting. I was among brothers in our quest for martial perfection, people who understand that pushing yourself past the limits of what is normal causes a ‘forging of the spirit’ or Tanren-Uchi, that you don’t find many opportunities for. Many schools in Japan will take one day of this outside training to forge the spirit – we do it every sunday, and I have to say, I wouldn’t want it any other way.

TECH: Hitting enter?

Okay, so how many of you hit Enter to move between fields in a form online? I didn’t realize that hitting enter will submit a form because I’ve never done that. I either click in the boxes, or use tab.

Anyway, I built a form and the requestor wanted to disable enter on the whole thing.  Why?  I don’t know, but I wanted her to stop bugging me

I found a way to do it, but it’s kind of a pain.  The first part is the javascript function, make sure it’s between the head tags.

<script language="JavaScript">
function disableEnterKey(e)
{
     var key;

     if(window.event)
          key = window.event.keyCode;     //IE
     else
          key = e.which;     //firefox

     if(key == 13)
          return false;
     else
          return true;
}
</script>

The last part is something you have to put in every single text box (and I had about 100 – thank goodness for find and replace)

<input type=”text” name=”mytext” onKeyPress=”return disableEnterKey(event)”>

The important part is the part in red. Just slap that in each input tag, and you’re ready to go.

Anyone have an easier way of doing it?