time for my monthly post

i don't think i'm quite made for this blogging thing. not sure exactly why not, as i post to twitter which only a few of my friends/family would read, so you'd think that writing a few more characters than the 140 that twitter allows wouldn't be difficult. i think that some of my writing is verbose, and this blog doesn't really have a theme anymore, so i'm gonna try to change things for the remainder of 2009.

with being out of work for a long time - much longer than i expected - and having the chance on a daily basis to look at what i've done w/ my time off i've been frustrated and disappointed that i haven't taken advantage of it. perhaps i think i should be traveling all around the world with this time off, but of course that costs money, and mine is slowly dwindling. it seems like a lot of the experiences one dreams of cost money or would be better appreciated if they were enjoyed w/ someone else. so maybe i shouldn't be so hard on myself?


as i was heading to my car to go to the gym on monday evening, i realized that i hadn't been out of the house all day. i was disappointed in myself for this. all this free time, and i'm seemingly wasting it. this feeling was in spite of the fact that i recently did something pretty awesome - taking a wonderful trip to new hampshire this weekend with my girlfriend, jen, to relax and snowboard/ski. so i thought to myself: self, wouldn't it be motivation to do something new / that i was proud of / great if i would post about it that day (or the next day in case it takes me the full 24 hours to do this thing). sort of like the reason this blog was initially developed: to help me train for the chicago marathon. it would also be a way regularly post to this blog instead of just writing a post once every month or two.

so here goes... the new thing: on sunday, while in new hampshire, i attempted cross-country skiing for the first time - specifically the "skating" style (as opposed to "classical"). i had always heard that xcountry skiing was a terrific workout, and watching the winter olympics it was easy to see these guys were studs - especially the ones carrying a rifle and shooting five targets throughout their race (technically the biathlon). anyway (gotta work on this verbose thing), i was terrible at the skiing. at the first turn, which was the one to get on the actual trail from the center, i bit it and tweaked an old should injury. that was one of many spills. though i did handle the downhills pretty well. jen tried her hardest to teach me how to skate on my skis, but i wasn't the best of students. it was pretty frustrating, and you quickly realize how much technique is involved in this sport. i would definitely be willing to try it again and hope the next time i do a little better.

and on monday i was proud that i already posted the pictures jen and i took during our weekend on facebook. usually it takes me a few days to take the pics off my camera's memory card, and then a few weeks to upload them for sharing. my normal timeframe is about three months to get them onto facebook (and in the correct order w/ interesting captions). for instance, when the legend and his wife came up in march 2009 for his 30th birthday it took me till my last day of work in june to get them onto facebook. and that was only because my computer was being confiscated! check out the pics of this weekend's adventure here.

i hope i'm able to keep this up and i hope you enjoy it. if you get the emails of the blog, but no longer wish to just let me know. i promise it won't offend me (for more than a day). and it'll free up a space for someone else. and if you feel like making a comment, come to the blog and post it here instead of sending it directly to me via email. of course, if you do just send it to me i'll be sure to post it on here for ya.