Those that have followed this site for years might remember that in 2000, I decided to lose weight. I lost 49 pounds in about 6 months. Unfortunately, starting with the move to San Francisco in 2001, I gained the weight back, and as of July 2005 I was 20 pounds heavier than where I started. From July 2005 to July 2006 my weight was steady.

At a July doctor's visit, my doctor and I planned a physical. I had it on August 18th. Obviously, the result was going to be the doctor giving me the riot act about committing to losing weight and living a healthy lifestyle. So, I, um, lived it up while I could, and gained 7 pounds between visits. (Oops, doh, etc)

The riot act was delivered as expected, but I was prepared and had already decided weeks before that I would make the lifestyle change immediately following the physical.

Since then I've been eating a low-carb, low-fat, low-cholesterol, low-sodium, high-protein, fruit-and-vegetable-rich diet, and have been exercising. I'm going to the gym at UVic at least 2 times a week now (it was supposed to be Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 1pm but then I enrolled in a class that is Monday and Thursday, 1:00-2:30), looking to bump that up to 3 times as soon as possible, and eventually 4 times.

I've lost about 11 pounds so far, in just over 3 and a half weeks. In 2000, I lost 26 pounds in the first 5 weeks of my diet, but then I was exercising significantly more, was more generally fit when I started, wasn't nearly as busy, and was extreme with my diet. I'm being more moderate this time, I think moderation is the key to long term success.

I'm tracking my progress in a spreadsheet. I'm using Google's spreadsheet service, which so far seems extremely good. The user interface is extremely intuitive for anyone with spreadsheet experience, and it's possible to share with everyone or a select group of people. The only thing missing that would be nice for my file is a chart of the data, but it exports to Excel, so it's very easy to use Excel's chart wizard when I want to see one.

You can view the spreadsheet now or any time you want to see how I'm doing. I'll update the spreadsheet at least once a week. Once I've lost 100 pounds (45.36kg), I'll set a goal for where I want to be/stay, weight-wise. I know my frame can stand to lose at least 100 pounds so I'm going to use that as my first milestone. Once I get there, I might be satisfied, but by that point I might want to set a "final" goal. Of course, 100 pounds is a lot to lose, it would put me 23 pounds lighter than the last time my diet ended, so I expect this will take quite a long time, at least 18 months (and that seems wildly optimistic), to 2 or 2.5 years.

If I lose 100 pounds, I will reach a weight I have not been at since 1996 (the year I was married).

Wish me luck!

Thread: 0 replies. reply Last updated: 9:07 PM

AP/Yahoo: Gunman wounds 20 at Montreal college

I'm sitting in class right now, read this a few minutes ago (I go to yahoo.com to get my browser to redirect to UVic's wifi authentication page), and now I'm having trouble concentrating.

I hope those people are okay! Argh.

Thread: 0 replies. reply Last updated: 4:20 PM

myBCcampus: Changes to PASBC

I went to PASBC tonight, as I do from time to time, just to see if the application I was responsible for building in 1999 was still online. It's not. It's been replaced with a new version.

I'm proud that the application we built lasted from December 15th, 1999, until July 26, 2006, over 6 and a half years. While it's sad to see our application has been retired, but it's good that PASBC is still available to students, because it's a great time-saver for students and the post-secondary education system in BC.

According to a BCcampus report:

Over 130,000 students in 2004 alone! I'm very proud to have been a part of something that was used by so many students. I wonder how many used the now-retired application over its lifespan...

Love live PASBC!

Footnote: For what it's worth, the retired application was written in Objective-C, was deployed on WebObjects 4.0.1 with Netscape Enterprise Server on Windows NT and used an Oracle database for storage.

Thread: 0 replies. reply Last updated: 11:08 PM

We had a bunch of people over last night for a BBQ and some poker. During the game I checked my computer and saw the news about Steve Irwin on the Yahoo home page.

I shared the terrible news, and everyone was in shock, as I was, and still am. How ironic that he should fall to a creature he hoped to do so much for. I hope that some good can come out of the tragedy, that more people will be exposed to his work, hear his message, and that animals and habitats he loved will continue to have wondeful guardians like Steve was.

R.I.P. Steve, and thank you for all the good you've done.

Thread: 0 replies. reply Last updated: 3:58 PM