Fit Bit and the Wii Fit

For Christmas, I got a Fit Bit Surge. I had mentioned something to my wife about it while I was working at Macy's as a seasonal picker. I did a lot of walking during the ten hour sifts and mentioned that it would have been cool to know exactly how far I walked each night.

By the time Christmas rolled around, I was informed that my services as a seasonal employee was no longer needed. So, I didn't really get to see how far I was walking while working but I still like the device.

It has given me insight into how lazy I am while not working so I decided to get my lazy ass onto the treadmill, going on walks and resuming using the Wii Fit. I actually did see some weight loss the last time I used the Wii Fit, but had a hard time getting into a routine.

Since it is the new year and I now can track my progress better, I have decided to try as hard as I can to keep exercising in some manner, every day. According to the Wii Fit, I am overweight and my Wii Fit age is 51. I am actually 50. Now, if I could just get a job to keep us from going bankrupt. I found that no one really wants to hire a 50 year old with grey hair. But that is a story for another day.
I am hopign that the combination of the two and quitting soda will at least get me in the right direction.

I have gotten soft in the middle after ten years as a stay-at-home dad and need to get healthy, not just for my sake, but for my family's.

Now, if I could just get a job to keep us from going bankrupt. I found that no one really wants to hire a 51 year old with grey hair. But that is a story for another day.

All About a Bird

So here it is. My sad story for "the happiest time of year". It all started a number of years ago when I quit my profession to become a stay at home dad to my kids.

Fast forward ten years. Because we were a one income family, we have found ourselves in a financial crisis at a time when when we should be celebrating the birth of best person who has ever walked the Earth.

But here I was, a pathetic fifty year old, who can't get a regular job, at the beginning of a ten hour shift at a "fulfillment" center working a seasonal position my kids can have a Christmas. They have cut back the staff in my area because the "season" is winding down. I was walking up and down the isles picking products off the shelves to give to the packing department to send off when I heard a bird chirping. A bird in a warehouse.

How did this little bird get in? I thought to myself. Actually I said it out loud. Don't worry, no one was around. I often talk to myself at work.

Throughout most of my shift, I kept hearing this bird chirping away. After a while, I started feeling sorry for it. I mean, I highly doubt that a warehouse is a good place for a bird to be in. No food, water, other birds. So, I started feeling sorry for it. It was all alone, calling out for another bird. But there were none. At least none that I could tell.

Now, here is the pathetic part. For the rest of the shift, I keep thinking about this lonely bird and it made me sad. Then I asked God to help this little creature that had probably flown in when one of the loading bay doors was open, not knowing what it was getting itself into.

Of all the things I could have asked God for, money to pay our bills, rent so we don't get kicked out of the house, fix our broken down van, things the kids need for school, money so my wife doesn't have to kill herself working, or a million other things. No. I walked around asking God to help this bird. I mean a bird. Pathetic isn't it?

While writing this post, I am getting sad all over again for this little bird.

Damn, fucking bird.

God, please let this bird get out one of the doors again and not die alone in that warehouse. Amen.

Football Follies, Band Bonanza

Friday night, under the bright lights, my youngest daughter, her older sister and oldest brother performed with their respective bands at the high school football game.

I am really proud of each of them for playing an instrument and performing in front of a big crowd. My youngest son also plays an instrument (violin) with the string orchestra but they only perform two concerts during the school year. I doubt people want to hear violins during a football game.

I thought the band did well. I did spy a elementary kid or two pretending to play their instrument for one reason or another. They had a few hours earlier in the day to practice marching but it didn't show when they performed. But that was OK.

Before and after the band took the field, my wife and I watched the high school get the tar beat out of them as usual. The two previous years that we came to watch our 8th grader play at the game, were big losses also, but not like this time. Until the end of the 4th quarter, the score was 48-2. By some miracle, our team got two touchdowns and missed a field goal for a final score of 48-15.

I think we had a good time though but my wife and I are at the point that we can't really sit that long on the aluminum bleachers. Next year we will have to bring cushions.
After the game and everyone was leaving, we were wondering what was taking our daughters so long to exit the bleachers. When they got to the stairs, we realized that our 8th grade daughter was helping their band teacher out of the stands. He is blind and I guess everyone else left him. She usually ends up the one to help him when he needs it.

Since all the other elementary band members abandoned him, she helped him to the exit and I talked to his wife as to where she could meet us to pick him up. It was one of those fortuitious moments that life throws at you. It allowed us a few moments to get to know something about their band teacher. We have heard him play the piano during the high school concerts where he does an amazing job. Apparently he can hear a piece of music once and can replay it with little or no effort.

So, it was a good night despite the bug and the sore butts...

Braceface

It is only one more month until my oldest son, Zachary, finally gets his braces off. He can hardly wait. It has been a long 18 months but in the end, it will be well worth the small fortune we paid.

My youngest son, Jeffrey, had braces a while back to correct severe bite issues and has been out of them for over a year. Now, he will begin his ‘second phase’, as the orthodontist calls it, for a few finishing touches. We could wait if we wanted, but as opportunities, go, the longer you wait, the less likely they will stick around. So while we can currently afford it, we will get them put on.

Knowing what to expect, he wants to eat and drink a few things he won’t be able to after he gets his braces. He isn’t looking foreword to another round of Braceface, but he understands why and accepts his fate.

Zachary plans on eating and drinking himself just shy of sick, using those items that have been denied him for so long. He had to watch his siblings enjoy ingesting these tasty items while they made sure to rub it in. He is tough though and has endured the torture like a champ.

The orthodontist is watching our daughter Zoe’s teeth as well but she still has some time before she will need any corrective action…I hope. My youngest is 9 and is also being monitored but things look good for her and she might not need to be a braceface. We are keeping our fingers crossed.

My wife and I could benefit greatly from becoming bracefaces ourselves according to the experts. The chances of that happening or getting the more expensive Invisalign are pretty slim to none. Unless of course, that type of procedure becomes free under the next president or we hit the Powerball jackpot.

The Case of the Dusty DVDs

I am definitely no Sherlock Holms or Jessica Fletcher (for those of you in Rio Linda, she is the main character in a TV show from the 80s called ‘Murder, She Wrote’) so this mystery has got me.

This thing crept up upon us silently while our attention was elsewhere. The DVDs were sitting on the shelf in plain sight for some time when they decided to hide inside some boxes, occasionally showing themselves before we got distracted again. I really started noticing the ‘dust’ on the DVDs just after our last move, into our current residence.

One of my youngest daughters saw a Disney movie in her class and wondered if we had it. After clearing off the dust and looking through all the boxes, she was successful in finding a copy. She and the other kids watched it, a movie they hadn’t seen in some years. They enjoyed it and then over the next week, surprisingly, watched several more.  But then the dust began to accumulate again. And there they sit today, in the dark in several boxes, not knowing if they will ever see the inside of a DVD player again.

Does anyone even use DVDs anymore? Yes? No? Sometimes? When my kids were growing up and really too young to take to the theater, we would purchase them on VHS. When we could afford a DVD player, we started our collection, mostly movies for the kids but occasionally we would get one here and there for ourselves.

We purchased all the animated Disney movies, and the Toy Stories, and the Shreks. We purchased all the Christmas movies, Home Alones, Inspector Gadgets, Hong Kong Fooeys, Land of the Losts, and a myriad, a host, and various kid friendly movies and shows in DVD format thinking that it would provide entertainment for them when needed. Indeed they did, for a time. As they got older, their tastes in movies changed. They still watched the occasional kid movie, but less and less as time went on. Then came their hand held games. But we still continued to purchase DVDs and Blue Ray disks because the price of one was way cheaper than the price of 7 tickets at the movie theater. Then their attention went elsewhere again. Now, this marvelously diverse collection is sitting once more in boxes with a layer of dust.

What caused the dust? Netflix? Hulu? The kids got older? They are involved in things at school like band, sports and drama club? Are the movies not worthy of watching again? Is it time to off load your once glorious collection of video disks? I don’t know. But I am sure that the great Sherlock Holms or Jessica Fletcher would, although I would never invite Jessica to our house. Someone always gets killed wherever she goes.