You Are Viewing Insane or Genius

Not too long ago I stepped on the scale, it read 222 pounds and supposedly 24% body fat. I stepped off, looked in the mirror, just thought, ugh, you’re one gross fat fuck. As I was having my shower I tried imagining some hot actress joining me only I struggled to picture one that’d want to have sex with a fat fuck such as myself. It was bad, I could barely see my junk, I felt like crap. My lower back was in constant pain from sitting 12+ hours a day from work. I wasn’t walking anywhere and my knees made the most excruciating bone cracking noise ever. I could easily drink a bottle of wine a day, I could eat a lot and it showed. By now the water turned as cold as my imagination, I got out of the shower feeling sorry for myself. I leaned over to grab some mouth wash from under the sink, in the process of bending over then getting up I suddenly became dizzy, vision blurred, felt light headed, the room shrunk into spinning black hole of nothingness.

When I regained consciousness I thought perhaps it was just from the long hot shower, change in temperature, who knows. It was a bit of a trippy experience that’s for sure. Fast forward a couple months, a dozen or so incidences of syncope occur. After a number of visits to the doc, chiropractor, neurologist, and cardiologist I’m told that I can try drinking less water (I was drinking about 120 ounces a day) or add some electrolytes to it, try some blood pressure medication, or go in for heart surgery. What the fuck!?

One of the immediate side effects of all these fun trips to nothingness was a pretty bad depression, probably some of the worse I’ve experienced. I couldn’t help but ask myself some big questions; contemplating life more deeply I told myself something major has to change otherwise I’ll get lost in this nothing. Sounds overly dramatic I know, but the feelings were very real. Thanks to the depression I lost my appetite for a month or so, this was a good thing really, it got me started on my original goal of getting down to 180 pounds. I also realized that drinking wasn’t really helping make me lose any weight or make me feel any better so I stopped that too. Sure enough 222 to 190 in the course of 2 months or so. My stomach and appetite have shrunk drastically by this point.

Another couple of months go by and I’m on a much better and more balanced albeit reduced calorie “diet”. Lots of fruit, veg, protein, less bread (oh how I love bread), less sugar, no HFCS, the usual normal crap that everybody tries to do. Nothing special. Now down to 180… My back pain is pretty much gone by now though I’m still getting dizzy randomly.

So that brings me to today. I’m now apparently 165 pounds and the scale says about 15% body fat. I used to wear a 34/36 with a belt and am now wearing a 29 (grr more money for new clothes, at least I could donate the old).  I’m eating quite a bit, or at least I feel like I am, but am still losing. I can only guess that perhaps my metabolism has gotten a nice kick in the ass, I’m not sure. At any rate, and more importantly, I’ve been trying to make some of those major changes. To help reduce the stress, I’ve been working from home for the past month and it’s made a huge difference on my general happiness. Especially with not having to commute, this makes me feel good on so many levels; if only I could sell the car now. I also found the most amazing puppy off Craiglist and so far Terra has been awesome at keeping my life active and structured. Six daily walks with her including errand runs and I’m probably averaging 10K. Instead of sitting on my ass waiting for the computer and the tools to respond, I take the time to do some exercise with an exercise ball (my chair), 35 pound kettle bell, and a pull up bar. It’s a bit surprising how often I’m actually doing some sort of exercise thanks to complicated modern technology . I did join a local CrossFit which will be amazing but I think for now it may be a bit too much for me and the heart, perhaps I’ll start that up again soon.

There really isn’t any point to this other than to mark the moment in time so I can look back a year from now and measure the results and think about the changes. I’m not really a fan of the MySpace dude pics but I do like the idea of recording a photo a day for a year to do a time lapse. Posting now and doing another in a year might help me a little bit with getting into shape, though I really don’t know what I’d call “being in shape”. Even now I still get dizzy randomly but am much more aware of the symptoms and can work around it. Perhaps in shape for me means the incidences dropping to null. We’ll see .

Woke up from a dream last night… with the sensation that I went on a flying trip over Seattle, some lakes, forests, and waterfalls; all the way out into space where I was weightless, chilling out over Earth.

In the process of trying to fall back to sleep I pretty much thought about the following:

1. Design a tattoo in Illustrator and Photoshop that fits the scene in my head/dream.
   • Think about a conversation with Grandma in a hypothetical future situation. “I’m not getting it yet, but as soon as I get into great shape that tattoo is coming.”
   • Use Illustrator and Photoshop design as background for site.
   • Use Illustrator design to create a movie with AfterEffects.
   • Convert movie to Silverlight/Flash for site.
2. Print some photos I’ve taken at Costco.
   • Design and create a DIY wire photo frame which features the photos in between two pieces of glass suspended in a 1x4x9 frame.
   • Share results online with a process video.
3. Join the CrossFit gym across the street so that I can go every Thursday morning in addition to the regular gym visits every Tuesday evening.
   • Buy some weights for home and figure out some more home workout options.
   • Get in great shape.
4. Get tattoo.
5. Looking at ceiling from the bed realizing that I should take a photo of what I’m looking at. Then using Photoshop and Illustrator convert it to a line drawing to then create a design for what I’d like to have built.
   • Thinking of the design. Thinking of how it’d best be accomplished. Creating the mental lines.
   • Use screen capture app to record the process of converting a photo into a design.
   • Take design get it built then do a making of the entire thing.
6. Take long beach vacation.
7. Take a road trip to visit family in California after November 2nd.
   • Return from California very chill and ready for great times ahead.
8. Idea for blog post about the way I think.
9. Need to buy camera gear for Leetspeak’s first show.
   • Need to attend show and hook up audio recorder to monitor output to be able to make a decent quality video.

Trying to go back to sleep now… Thinking… Man I need to find something new to fall asleep to. I’m really starting to pick out individual instrument patterns. Damn, that really is a pattern. I wonder if I could recreate this. I should try and recreate song, record process.

Okay, I need to sleep… I’m laying on a beach listening to the waves and there’s an awesome girl next to me. We go snorkeling in the really clear waters and see some turtles. Chilling on a board, now there’s some dolphins off in the distance. Flash forward to getting out of water after splashing around a bit with the awesome girl. Have sex with awesome girl in awesome villa on the beach. Lay out on beach as the stars come out and fall asleep to the sight of the milky way.

And after all that I eventually fall asleep, I think, at least that’s the point where I forget everything and eventually wake up. Getting ready for work, realize I need to create a list of shit to do. Realize that I should just record every idea I had while trying to fall back to sleep.

Record list.
Post.

I think it’ll end up being exactly what caused me to vote for him in the first place.

I filled in that dot next to his name for the fact that he’s an very intelligent grounded leader with good morals and a strong philosophical sense – a passionate open thinker.

The problem for what I think is a disproportionate amount of Americans is that they’re lacking in these very qualities themselves. (more…)

At work, fine, email works (for the most part). Except for the people who can’t figure out DL’s, and expand groups, etc, it works well enough.

At home though, what the hell is the point? The only email I get are bill reminders, for bills I’ve already paid; and receipts for crap that are stored anyway. Then every day I get a handful of emails from family. Nearly all of which is some random thing that spread around the web months ago, is likely false, inaccurate, makes no sense, full of bold faced type with tons of spelling and grammatical errors, etc etc etc.

To top it all off most of the time it’s sent out to a bunch of other people which just perpetuates things. I’ve tried informing family about sites like snopes.com and to just do a simple search before sending stuff out, you know, simple fact check. I’ve given links to the Microsoft security pages so they know what’s what, I’ve provided links to all the virus information things and so on. Yet every year I get an email about Bill Gates giving money for every email sent. Crap about Obama’s birth certificate, or the same crazy talk over and over…

I’ve just decided to post up this email through though because it’s a prime example… I’ve gotten into the habit of replying all to most of  my Dad’s stuff, mainly because most of it is bullshit and the first hit off Google reveals the stupidity. Anyway I love this reply from the person who forwarded the original email, he goes on this right wing rant. Why? I’m not sure, since the original email was about some supposed Smart car accident which wasn’t even a Smart car:

——————————————————————————–
From: JACKIE/DAN ROBINSON
Sent: Monday, August 03, 2009 1:40 PM
To: Corey Gouker
Subject: Re: Still want a Smart car?

You may find alot of things unbelievable, but that’s ok, if the left wingers keep getting their way EVEN You will be in deep shit if you can’t think and defend you and yours ! obama folks wants servants not citizens !! Ask yourself why does the black house need over 40 carzs ? That are not accountable to the “PEOPLE” ?? But you spend more time to point out things that DON”T mean Shit kid. We are LOSSING our Nation and those of us that have given body parts to Protect your rights can’t see what is going on today. Hell you are probly at work stealing your employers time and money sending e-mail, but you Don’t see anything WRONG with that do you ! I wish people like your generation would spend as much time looking and thinking about why you have the FREEDOMS you have and are about to lose. Just something for you to think about. Dan

On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 1:18 PM, Corey Gouker wrote:

This isn’t even a Smart Car. Not saying that a Smart Car wouldn’t have the same fate, like you said, any compact car would likely have the same outcome from being sandwiched in between two trucks like that, especially with the rear one going at any speed.

But these stupid crappy emails that get sent around are just stupid when they can’t even tell the truth and real story.

First, look at the wheel right beneath that red trucks’ bumper. Notice it has 5 bolt holes. Smart Car’s have smaller wheels and only have 3 bolt holes which you can see in the picture below. In fact, most sub-compacts (like my Mini Cooper S) only have 4 bolt holes. Most likely this was a regular sized/compact car. On top of that, all the body panels on the Smart Car are plastic and pretty much snap and lock into place. These would’ve flown off the car in a bunch of pieces, clearly the car in the photo is a huge hunk of steel aluminum and other junk.

For more info about this stupid email see here:

http://www.smartcarofamerica.com/forums/f3/crash-not-24793/
http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/07/photos_two_cars_overturn_in_wr.html

This was linked in the forum. What’s amusing about it is that both the Smart and SUV overturned. The driver of the Smart was able to just get out on his own. The driver of the SUV needed to be rescued after the officer smashed the window open. The SUV was smoking and leaking.

At any rate, I find this to be really amusing considering the number of people that’ll drive a motorocycle but wouldn’t think of driving a Smart.

Take a look at this video though:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ju6t-yyoU8s

Shows a Smart going into a wall at 60mph. Sure you’d still be dead from doing 60-0 in a second (would happen in any car), but they could still open the door without any issues to remove your corpse.

-Corey

——————————————————————————–
From: J. Clinton Gouker
Sent: Monday, August 03, 2009 11:37 AM
To: JACKIE/DAN ROBINSON
Cc: bill d shuster; Breanna Gouker; Corey Gouker; dave; sallyshopr; Stan

Subject: RE: Still want a Smart car?

Hey Dan! LOL, No need to spend $,$$$.$$ on a casket !Same goes for any small “COMPACTABLE” car. Honda ain’t no different in that situation. They didn’t crash test it that way. It’s obvious they don’t want to scare the customers away !!!!

——————————————————————————–
Date: Mon, 3 Aug 2009 08:03:15 -0700
Subject: Fwd: Fw: Still want a Smart car?
From: JACKIE/DAN ROBINSON
To: J. Clinton Gouker

Here’s a “obama motors car” If you go “green” you die !!!!!!!!

Well, I’m not really sure what to say in reply to Dan. I mean it really made no sense in the context of the prior thread, except maybe that little jab at the Smart car being Obama’s “green” car of choice or soemething. The racist and incoherent brainwashed tripe about the down fall of America really doesn’t coagulate for me.

There's more content here, but I must have some reason for keeping it private still. There is some secret project that I'm working on but this post may or may not be related either way.