New Year, New Goal

Get down to 200 pounds by my 50th birthday... March 4, 2013...

Today, I weigh 251... that's 51 pounds in roughly 60 weeks... that's doable, I think.

My job now is pretty sedentary, so that's a problem. But I've set myself a goal of walking at work everyday, and for every day I work from home--or during weekends--I'm going to use the new XBox 360 Kinect to work out. I've got the UCF Trainer "game"... I tried the Kinect Adventures today and it kicked my ass--full sweat, out of breath, and calves now sore--so this UFC thing should do the trick... IF I CAN KEEP UP WITH IT.

I also have a calorie counter app on my phone... my goal for January is 2000 cals per day, then drop the cals per day down 50 cals a day for each week until I get to 1500 cals per day sometime in April.

Time to do this...

I'm baaaaack....

Kinda.

The Shakespeare Project is running strong.

I lost my job, the paying one at least.

Lisa has told me to write a book, and I've started outlining it.

And though I didn't want to restart any of the old blogs... I just might have to:

Hope Pedaler

hulu... damn you again

OK, I'm getting sucked into another new show. Ridiculous. Feather-light. Silly at times. But Fun.

Castle.



And it doesn't hurt that the leads are attractive and have smokin' hot chemistry.

long time no write

sorry... life has been crazy, and all the "free" writing time has gone toward the Shakespeare project... which is going well...

UCLA football not so much...

Mold... interestingly... it's the roof, but more on that later...

the issue today of which I need to rant is: GRADES

a little over a year ago, I wrote the following:

Kyle sat out the game two Thursdays ago for grades (just one game, but I think it made an impression... grades are up and he's back in the pool).

This year is worse.

Yes, I know he's taking four Honors/AP classes... I know they're harder. (thank god for the extra grade points in Euro and Bio... I could at least look at the GPA and not feel that bad... well, that is until today)

I don't know the full extent of the damage of today's grade check (as his Bio teacher doesn't post grades online... but given his percentage for the last three weeks has hovered at 80% and "she lost" an assignment of his, I'll assume it's less than 80%)...

so that would go:
European History AP: B (four percent lower over the course of the last two weeks, and only two percent away from a C: 82%)
Biology Honors/AP (only kids with A/B at the end of the quarter can qualify for AP): C (tentatively, see above)
French 2: B (the only class he's showing improvement in... over the last two weeks, an increase of 7 percent... it had been a C two weeks ago, now 82%)
Algebra 2Honors: D (holy fuck, folks... 69%... down three percent from last week... his last three assignment/grades in that class are F [missing assignment], C, and F [test])
English 2Honors: C (at 72% [down one percent from last week], it's just way too freaking close to a D)
Water Polo: A+ (woofuckinhoo)

His social life has just disappeared. Party on Saturday night... oh, think again, my son.

Water polo? I'm not sure. The coach said playing time would be jeopardized by a D... I'm wondering if he's going to look at this week's grades...

Social is a given... it's gone. I'd like to say today's water polo game (the penultimate game of league before a CIF title run, and one of the few varsity games he'll see time in this season, since it's against quite possibly the worst team in the league) will disappear as well. But Lisa and I have made an agreement that we're going to focus mainly on social restrictions. But I feel like a hypocrite on this one. He's supposed to dress out with varsity on the CIF playoff run and I know he'll see no time in games since he's the backup and our first stringer is really good... so he won't be PLAYING... but who am I kidding?... he should sit.

Last night, we had a long talk with Kyle about all this (just like the one we had two weeks ago... and last week's grades were mostly improved... does that mean we have to have this talk every fucking week?).

My take is that he drop the honors classes and take college prep, where he'll feel more success. (of course, the risk is that he will feel that he won't have to work as hard, and we'll have the same shitty grades in worse classes) The honors classes were only there (in my opinion) to get him into a good school straight after graduation. I no longer have that delusion. So why honors? I see no reason.

He doesn't want to drop the classes, though. I think partly because he'll see this as a failure. But it's my hunch that this is only a secondary reason. The REAL reason is that these classes are where his friends are... and we're back to the social life.

sigh... looks like another talk tonight...

glad Pa's out of town...

the freakin' price you pay

from Philly earlier this week



One of my favorite songs of all time... hasn't been played in concert since The River tour 28 years ago... I get chills watching it...

But just across the county line, a stranger passing through put up a sign
That counts the men fallen away to the price you pay,
and girl before the end of the day,
I'm gonna tear it down and throw it away

and if that wasn't enough... the night before he played this gem, also not played for 28 years...



I remember hearing this the first time I saw him back in October of 80... jeez, nearly 29 years THIS WEEK... he introduced it this way:

"Now this is a story of unrequited love..." The crowd sighed a long "ahhhhh." To which Bruce responded, "Aw, man, you don't even know what that means..."

I did, as all high schoolers do... and it was freaking awesome...

classic kid moment of the day

Jack comes down to go to school wearing shorts.

Lisa reminds him that it's going to be cool today.

"You didn't tell me," he says.

"Yes, I did... before your shower" is Lisa's reply.

pause

"Yeah, but you didn't YELL IT AT ME."

uh, ok...

As he's heading off in a huff, I call him back... "What?" he asks exasperated.

"I LOVE YOU," I yell.

He is not amused.

in ben I trust

Looks like it could be a "rebuilding" (read: loooooong) basketball season, too... but I've got faith in Howland... we'll be OK...