In the late 90′s, I lived within walking distance of a Borders store. It was the first time in my life that I’d had easy access to that kind of place. I enjoyed regular trips to the store’s cafe, where I’d usually order a vanilla Coke and then spend some time browsing the nearby magazine racks. I’d start with the music magazines, reading anything that looked interesting. Then, I’d move on to the technology mags (usually the Mac-centric ones), if I was still in the mood to read. I’ve often wondered if this type of behavior is exactly what these stores had in mind when they all opened in-store cafes. It’s likely that Borders made more pure profit from my purchase of vanilla Cokes than it would have if I had just bought all of the magazines I happily read for free. And while that’s great for Borders, it’s not so good for the magazine companies. Even so, lots of people were still buying magazines, so maybe it didn’t matter if some of us were using our local bookstores as libraries. Or, maybe not.
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Some cockatiels are more vocal than others. We have (at least) two birds who sing regularly. Here, Pepper expresses his appreciation of the day with a nice song. It’s fun to watch him sing because sometimes it looks like the notes are really being pulled out of him by some external will.
(Another cockatiel, her name is Poke, does some video bombing towards the end.)
I’m somewhat discouraged to note that FIVE MONTHS AGO I wrote about how I had determined that, in order to lose weight, I had to keep my daily calorie counts under 1500. And since then, I’ve only managed to lose a couple pounds. This is kinda pathetic, and it’s the ultimate proof that I’ve been having far too many 1700 – 1800 calorie days. And when I get to this level of caloric intake, I don’t gain weight, but I don’t lose any, either.
Since the beginning of 2009, I’ve lost 25 pounds. And that achievement shouldn’t be downplayed. But I need to lose more. At the beginning of last year, I set a weight loss goal for myself. I started the year at 253 pounds. I wanted to get below 240 by my birthday (July 11th). I beat the deadline on that goal by almost a month. It was a big deal, because I knew that if I managed to get below 240, it meant I was doing something right, as all of my previous weight-loss attempts never passed the 240 mark. Right now, I’m at 228. And I’ve been at 228 for awhile. I’ve decided to give myself another goal. This time, I want to hit 220 by year’s end. It’s a reasonable goal, and I believe I can do it. I know what I need to aim for on a daily basis (1500 calories total). I just have to do it. And yesterday and today, I have! I made specific choices about my meals that helped me to keep my calorie counts low. Of course, these are things I’ve known about all along. But habits tend to control a lot of my behavior, especially when it comes to eating.
Breaking the cycle. It’s never easy.
Yesterday, my sister held a luau-themed get together. Partially for fun and partially to celebrate her 10th wedding anniversary.
Jen, enjoying a pina colada.
Ma with grandson (my nephew) Kyle.
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Inside My Head episode 130
Im back from an unexpected hiatus. Been super busy lately writing, writing, and, oh, yeah.. writing. 
Was super tired and on extra allergy medication when I recorded this episode, in the wee hours of the morning. An alternate title for this episode could be : “Jen Babbles On”.
Got some excellent music for you to listen to!
* Loomis & The Lust , with a song called “A.D.D.”
You gotta check out the amazing video for the song “A.D.D.”:
* Piblokto with a song called “Vacant Vessel”
* Frank Falvo, with a song called “All Summer Long”
* Bedford , with a song called “Hot Summer”
* Craig Morrison, with a song called “Miss You”
* The Apple Brothers , with the song “Dirty Money”
* Full Circle , with the song “Never Again”
Podcasts mentioned in this episode:
* Blast FM
* Blast From The Past
A big “Thank You” to Judy, for introducing me to the music of Craig Morrison! 
And, here’s the show:
It never ceases to amaze me the length some gold seller will go to in an effort to attract attention to themselves.
After a while, they fall to the ground and spell out the name of a website.
This is NOT something Blizzard has put into the game. There are the actions of a gold selling website. I’m not going to name them, because I don’t want to give them any more attention then they have already attracted.
Anyway, if you see these floating, falling, spamming wizards in Stormwind, just ignore them. I’ve seen them on two servers now, and reported it. Blizzard is taking steps to fix this. If you see it on your server and are of the mind to report spam, click on the names of the individual characters, and the “report spam” thing. Or, just ignore their shenanigans entirely.
Jen and I met with our insurance agent today. We wanted to go over our existing homeowners and car insurance policies to make sure they were still adequate for our needs, and we also wanted to get some information on life insurance as well as health insurance.
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