Doubting Thomas Blog

Archive for the ‘health’ Category

Instead of making resolutions, I’m writing down plans…well, not plans exactly, but stuff that I want to do.

I think most of these ideas are feasible. What do you think?

1. Finish the house we started in 2009. I’d like to incorporate green technology, but we’ll see.
2. Get back to running my favorite seasonal business, The Buffalo Bike Taxi Co.
3. Go to more pro baseball games than we did in 2009. I’d like to see my first major league game. In Toronto. I know what you’re saying…someone my age has never seen the MLB in person? Nope.
4. This one is related to #2 above. I will lose a little weight and continue to improve my cardiovascular health. Riding The Buffalo Bike Taxi Co, it would be nearly impossible to gain weight.
5. Do more writing, even if it just more-frequent posts on this blog. I do want to get back to real writing, though.
6. I’d like to learn to speak another language. I studied French in high school and college, so I remember some of that, but “Quiero aprender a hablar español de este año.” (Without having to use Google Translate.)
7. I have a bunch of audio cassettes that I want to convert into digital files, so that I can actually listen to that music. (Younger readers may want to ask their parents if they have any audio cassettes in the basement that they could look at.)
8. I say this every year, but this year is different (partly because of the divorce). I want to spend more time with old friends. I have not ever visited my friends Jesse, Rich, Craig, or Greg at their houses.
9. I’d like to buy an electric car. A Tesla Roadster would be nice, but I would “settle” for a a hybrid Fusion.
10. We live near a lot of water, so I’d like to make sure we get the canoe wet a lot this summer. The Buffalo River is a lot more scenic than you’d expect.
11. Another thing I’ve wanted to do for years, but somehow haven’t found the time to do, is ride my bicycle across New York State. The Erie Canal is a great way to go.
12. I want to take the boys camping, somewhere that they’ll never forget. I think the Adirondacks would be great.
13. We’ve been attending church more regularly, but this year, I would like to make it such a standard part of our life that the boys don’t resist going, when they are at my house on a Sunday. But here’s a problem I haven’t figured out how to resolve: I like three different churches, but I can’t go to all three on the same Sunday morning. Ultimately, I think it will be better if I am more actively involved with one of those three churches, doing things besides just attending morning church services.
14. Many of these things can be done, and some should be done, with family. Baseball, bicycling, and church, for example. This year, I would like to have time to visit my family members at their houses, but also to make the house we’re working on large enough for everyone to gather here for Thanksgiving or Christmas.

What about you? Will you be doing any of these activities?

I am glad I’m not a “normal weight” person, because, apparently, being a little overweight means I’m going to live a little longer.

A few extra pounds can add years to your life: study
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Carrying a little extra weight may actually be good for you, according to a Canadian study that showed a few pounds appear to protect people from an early death.

Researchers found that while underweight and extremely obese people die earlier than people of a normal weight, people who are slightly overweight actually live longer than those of a normal weight.

Everyone who has ever completed a marathon seems to have a sticker on their car that says 26.2.

The person who got this license plate must not like the idea of putting stickers on the car.

For the first time in the 7 Halloweens that I’ve worked here, I put a bowl of candy on my desk today. I think so far, only one or two people have taken any. So much for buying popularity.

I was lucky to have friends in town for a mutual friend’s wedding this weekend. It’s amazing how many people I know from “the old days” that I’m not in touch with anymore, even though they are good and decent people… we just don’t make the effort to drive to faraway cities (or to the West Coast, for that matter).

The men I talked to were mainly all dads, and I think the consensus was that we take trips mainly with or to family, so other trips to see friends are squeezed out of the schedule. I mentioned to another friend the other day that I’m trying to get all my friends and family in one place, something I called “Total Thomas Convergence” (or TTC for short). I have a few great friends in Buffalo, but in fact everyone I know is extremely busy, as is my little family, so we rarely have social time with grownups who are not immediate members of our family. (Fortunately, the grownups who are immediate members of our family are also good and decent people!)

We did end up having a little bit of a pool party, too, because we had a few people who were in town for the wedding come over. The thermometer in the pool said 80, but none of us who went in the water felt that was an honest reckoning. In fact, one swimmer was sure it was 80 Kelvin, not 80 Fahrenheit.

And I did manage to finish the steps up to the deck before the guests arrived. After they left, I finished the railing and the gate on the deck, so it is now as safe as could be. I have a little more to do on the deck, however, including a handrail for the steps. I’m also going to do a little wiring, so that there is an outdoor, grounded power outlet for the pool filter, and I’ll install a motion-sensor light on the peak of the garage to shine down on the pool. (The web-cams are already installed, but they are not infrared cameras, so the lights will come in handy at night.)