Skip to content

2012-366 Day 234 – Catch-18

I learned from a Mental Floss article that Catch-22 was originally titled Catch-18, but a recently released novel at the time had already used the number 18 as a suffix. They were right at the end though, Catch-22 does sound way better.

Why bring it up? Because I’m currently stuck in a catch-22 at work with the mobile photo id systems. They work fine when they are in our home environs, the problem is when they go mobile up to the Housing area. The Housing wireless is separated from the main wireless by a firewall, and our server with the photo id information on it sits on the other side of that firewall. Here’s the problem in a nutshell:

-I can connect through the firewall if I use the campus VPN as an intermediate layer and access the server. Yay, problem solved! Yeah, you know it’s not that easy . . .
-If I turn on the VPN, I can no longer print to the card printer on the desk, since, even though it’s a USB connection, it treats the connection like a network one and blocks it.

So, long story short – VPN on: yes-data no-printing, VPN off: no-data yes-printing. The printer manual’s suggestion? Shut off the VPN. Thanks guys. I’m in discussions with our networking group, we’ll see how fruitful they are.

Going to Gregg Hurwitz’s book launch for The Survivor tonight, and it’s always a great time (I believe this is our third our fourth one). Gregg’s a really cool guy we had the fortune of meeting as the husband of one of Jess’ part-time faculty members and is a real rising star in TV and comic books as well as being a best selling writer. In fact, he’s currently writing one of the Batman books for DC (too cool). Looking forward to a fun time and ripping through the book, which I’m sure you’ll see a review of soon.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 258.1 miles
Fitocracy Level: 25 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , , , , .

By Matt
August 21, 2012

rev="post-641" No comments

2012-366 Day 233 – Lazy

I had gotten lazy. Allow me to correct that a little bit: I had been lazy for a long time. The last thing I had put my full effort into was my thesis, and that was four years ago. Lazy in my work, lazy in my thinking, lazy in my playtime, and lazy in my spiritual life. I was fortunate that even in being lazy, most people couldn’t tell, but it had become increasingly apparent to me about six months ago. I had plenty of excuses, mostly stemming from my “lost year,” but I was growing tired of them and was dissatisfied with where I was.

Now this isn’t to say that I have turned it all around and am accomplishing everything now, that is actually far from the truth. In recognizing this laziness, however, I have been able to start making the changes that are going to help me long term. I needed to address my physical status, as well as re-engage my brain, and rekindle my spirit.

One of the initial realizations of laziness in my physical status was in Karate class, when I got mad at myself over how out of shape I was. I’ve been improving my conditioning and flexibility (although not very quickly), but change has not been easy as I’ve been dealing with mechanical problems in my body that can make being active difficult. The inflammation in my neck and shoulders ebbs and flows, though it is most evident in stressful situations, which in the physical case mainly manifests itself during long runs. It is this condition that worries me the most when training for the Half-Marathons (and next year’s Marathons), and I do wish that our schedule and the weather (particularly the weather) had been more conducive to getting long runs in (the short runs I’ve been doing at our indoor track). The long run in Ragnar (11 miles) also bolsters my confidence, because I was able to that one with minimal long run training, I just have to remind myself that I can do it. I’ve also been battling Plantar fasciitis in my left heel, but self treatment has thankfully gotten that down to mostly a morning issue with occasional spikes during the day. It’s been a slow road back, but I think I have the structures in place to ensure that my laziness in taking care of my body will be a thing of the past.

My mental malaise has been a bit tougher to shake. The summer months have been the easiest to check out on, since I don’t have to teach and could easily veg with computer games and TV rather than reading. My long term goal is to go into teaching at the college level full time, but I had stalled out on that goal. It’s great to be teaching my one class a semester, but it certainly does add to my workload while still doing my regular job full time. I’ve been trying to read more recently, which is helping, and am looking at getting my Doctorate, which is the next step on my path. There is a program through CSUN which I might be able to get one through, but the next cohort for the level I’m interested in starts next fall (2013). In the meantime, I have to get all of my material together and make sure that I present the best application possible. With the combination of more reading, teaching again, and getting my academic house in order, I’m hoping that will continue to jump start my brain.

Both of those areas have had a major impact on my spiritual laziness. I was already dealing with some residual doubt and questions when a couple we knew from high school had their younger son bravely battled cancer a couple of times and lost, then laying on the physical difficulties and uncertainty of recover after my neck and shoulder injury never allowed the spiritual wound to heal correctly. A new bible study put together with our friends at the start of the year has helped with that process on the intellectual side, but only recently has the flickering sparks been rising from the embers. It was shamefully easy to oversleep a few Sundays this summer, with regularity only recently returning (although our absences were sometimes just due to being out of town). Thankfully I made it to this weekend’s sermon, as a lesson on pain was given that was sorely needed. It will take a while to build it all back, but I think I’m finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

Apologies for being a little deeper than usual, but I felt the need to get some of this off my chest. I want to make sure that everyone realizes that I know I am improving in these areas, so please don’t worry about me. Just wanted to document where I was and where I am going.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 258.1 miles
Fitocracy Level: 25 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , , .

By Matt
August 20, 2012

rev="post-640" 3 comments

2012-366 Day 232 – Volleyball Playoffs

Well, that takes care of that. Down two of my stronger players, our first round playoff loss was accomplished via 25-16, 25-17 scores. We were just outgunned and there wasn’t much we could do. Sadly enough, all of my effort to keep us out of seventh place actually backfired, as the seventh place route was easier than the sixth place one due to the fact that they had to play the last place team to get in and then play the second place team who didn’t have their coach and best player. They were the only team to pull the upset.

It’s going to be a while before volleyball rolls around again, we’ve decided to switch the seasons next year so softball is in the summer and volleyball is in the fall. This does mean that my favorite season is on deck (heh, on deck), we’re just around the corner from softball! Still have to run the championships next weekend for volleyball (they say I can’t just shut the league down since my team lost), we’ll see if Brandon can defend his crown.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 258.1 miles
Fitocracy Level: 25 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , .

By Matt
August 19, 2012

rev="post-639" No comments

2012-366 Day 231 – Knott’s Berry Farm

A very late post today because we just got home from Knott’s and celebrating Jess’ birthday a week early (well, technically it was a week and a day until about an hour ago, but never mind). Jess has decided that this is going to be her “roller coaster” birthday because, as she explains, roller coasters aren’t scary, it’s the climb up to the top with the anticipation that is the scary part (she has admitted to reconsidering the not scary part on behalf of others after a ride or two today). So we got together with a good number of our friends and went to Knott’s (because Disneyland doesn’t have enough roller coasters and Magic Mountain’s roller coasters are run and maintained by teenagers) for the day.

We actually left around eleven with the intention of making it into the area around lunch time. We hit some traffic on the 5 and audibled to the 134-210-605 route, which saved us about 10-15 minutes. We headed to a Chicago-style joint called Portillo’s on the recommendation of one of Jess’ friends from high school who couldn’t make it and all proceeded to have really good Italian Beef sandwiches (I, of course, had the combo with Italian Beef and Italian Sausage). Properly weighed down, we made our way to the parking lot, which is quite a way from the main gate, and took the “shuttle” (read: our feet).

I’ll let Jess fill you in on the details if she desires, as it was her day, but I will give you a couple things. I had been to Knott’s exactly once before, way back before I was a teenager. I don’t remember much other than panning for gold (don’t think it’s there anymore), the dinosaur ride (definitely not there anymore), a parachute ride that I would never have gone on today (also not there anymore), and winning a bright red stuffed triceratops from a claw machine outside of the dinosaur ride (which I still have stashed somewhere in the condo). I apparently have kept my winning ways at Knott’s, as I won a giant bear by knocking over two clowns on two shots with a baseball. I was convinced to push my luck and try again with everyone later and knocked down the first one there before finally missing my last throw. It didn’t seem that special to me, but no one else got more than one with multiple throws, so a 75% success rate seems pretty darn good. I had fun with the boardwalk games and tried to make sure no one had to worry about their stuff while they went on rides (because we know that I don’t do rides).

But, like I said, I’ll let Jess get into anymore details if she likes, as it is late and I have church and playoff volleyball tomorrow. Wish us luck, I will, of course, have an update for you all tomorrow.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 258.1 miles
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record, 6th place regular season)
Fitocracy Level: 25 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , .

By Matt
August 19, 2012

rev="post-637" 1 comment

2012-366 Day 230 – Classy

Classy is not an adjective that has often been attributed to me (much to Jess’ chagrin, I’m sure). I’m certain adjectives such as “Simple”, “Folksy(?)”, “Midwestern”, and “Plain” are the more common descriptors, and I count the times I’ve dressed up in a suit on both hands (probably, I can’t actually remember exactly, but you knew that if you know me at all). So I was taken by surprise today when I kind of felt classy.

I am a collector at heart (cut to Jess and a big “no duh”). While I have my usual vices of cards, games, comics, books, DVDs, and other paraphernalia that I bounce between, you may not guess one of my largest collections. It’s actually music, and it started way back in high school when I was doing sound for our youth group. I have a ton of CDs that I bought both new and second-hand, rarely paying more than five dollars per CD. Once music went digital, however, my collection really exploded. I now have thousands of songs, first in iTunes and now through Amazon.

My cheapness still holds, however, so I’m rarely spending more than five dollars an album and my bar has actually lowered now so that more than three or four dollars gives me pause. But Amazon has so many deals that I still end up buying one every week or so. Even better is that they’ve started doing ninety-nine cent albums for a day only (which is the main reason I follow them on Twitter).

How does this very long divergence from the topic of class relate? I’m glad I asked. One of the albums I bought recently was a ninety-nine cent, twenty-two song album of Frank Sinatra’s songs. All the classics were present and remastered. I had my computer playing my recent purchases while finishing up the grunt work of preparing our new mobile Photo ID stations for their first deployment when Old Blue Eyes came on. It’s amazing how simply having certain music playing can change how you feel. I listened to the entire album and felt that the proceedings, as mundane as they were, had just a touch of class.

Random, I know, but these are the things that I think about when slogging through the last few hours of a Friday making sure I hit a deadline (I did, exactly at five). I could write a similar post on classical music and feelings of intelligence (or with a certain playlist I once made, sleepiness), I’ve long been fascinated with how music affects attitudes and emotions. That’s probably why I own so much of it with so many varying types of genres.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 258.1 miles
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record, 6th place regular season)
Fitocracy Level: 23 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , , , .

By Matt
August 17, 2012

rev="post-636" 1 comment

2012-366 Day 229 – 2012 Movies I

Way back in February I did a post detailing the movies I saw back in 2011. Since we’re around two thirds of the way into 2012 and I’ve seen two movies the past few weeks, lets see where we’re at so far and give some brief thoughts.

The Hunger Games – I was curious what people were going on about and with all the hype, I was a bit underwhelmed. The story felt a bit contrived and predictable, and trying to figure out how this civilization got to the point where a blood-sport was socially acceptable had my mind travelling some rather dark paths (it’s not that I don’t believe the human race is capable of it, in fact history and human nature have proven quite the opposite, I was just trying to figure out how a future United States remnant might get there). It left me with no desire to read the books, but did have some interesting scenes in terms of spectacle. I’ll probably see the next two just to see where the story goes and maybe get some of the background I seem to be missing.

The Pirates! Band of Misfits – A fun little movie from the creators of Wallace and Gromit (which I’m a fan of), I was expecting more from it than I got. I’d put it squarely in the category of “amusing”, while I was hoping for “funny”. I remember thinking that there were several areas in the movie that could have been taken farther to be more funny. I should have saved this one for cable, but then I probably never would have found it.

The Raven – I covered this one in a blog post, so you can go look at that one if you like.

The Avengers – Surprised I didn’t have a post on this one, it was a lot of fun and my second favorite movie I’ve seen this year (the first, of course, being Dark Knight). The atmosphere was so much different though, so it’s difficult to make a direct comparison with Dark Knight (thus, I won’t). There were so many great character moments in this movie, and that’s what really drew me to it. Having seen all the prequels with the individual movies, the way they tied them all together really was amazing. I’m looking forward to the next arc and am particularly interested to see how they deal with the next big bad for Avengers 2 revealed at the end of Avengers (no, I won’t spoil it, because someone spoiled it for me and I’m not perpetuating that cycle).

Rock of Ages – And yet Rock of Ages got it’s own post. Go figure.

The Dark Knight Rises – Amazing. Such a phenomenal wrap up to an amazing trilogy. My only complaint, and it is so minor that I shouldn’t even quibble, is that, due to the structure of the story, there was a smaller percentage of Batman action in this one and a lot more focus on Bruce Wayne. Again, understandable considering the story, but I did find myself wanting a little more of Batman kicking butt. The movie had me swearing under my breath once or twice, particularly at the reveal of the twist, which I REALLY should have seen coming and made so much more sense in retrospect (again, not spoiling yet). The wrap up and ending were note perfect, a stellar ending to a stellar set of movies. I look forward to being able to see them all back-to-back at some point in the near future.

Brave – Pixar’s latest, and as a fan of Scottish culture I found it to be quite charming. A strong return effort by Pixar after Cars 2, which I found to be the most disappointing Pixar movie. The visuals were absolutely amazing, and really added to the depth of the story. I would easily put it into the upper third of Pixar movies, in my opinion (that would make a good blog post, remind me to do that one), although there were some issues I had with choices that a couple characters made (but I guess that’s how it’s supposed to work). I’m curious as to where Pixar goes from here. Oh! And the pre-movie short was spectacular as usual and had a giant smile across my face by the end of it.

I still have to see Spider-man, I’ll see if the cheap theater in Simi has it at some point in the near future. Going back through the releases this year, I saw quite a few movies that I went, “Oh, I wanted to see that,” but never did, so I’ll have to start looking for those on TV or On Demand. I enjoy movies for there ability to immerse you in a story and take you to different worlds, I just wish they weren’t so expensive. I’d probably make more time for them if they didn’t cost me an arm and a leg to see one.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 258.1 miles (+4 miles)
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record, 6th place regular season)
Fitocracy Level: 23 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , .

By Matt
August 16, 2012

rev="post-409" 1 comment

2012-366 Day 228 – Blank

(This space left intentionally blank.)

(This space too.)

How is it only Wednesday? This week is taking forever, and, while behaving a little better today, work is not helping. What was supposed to be a simple drive fix has turned into a potential replace the whole rig. No wonder I can’t think of anything productive right now.

(Pretend the space above was blank.)

(I’d draw a blank, but I don’t know how.)

(This week has been blankety-blank-blank-blank.)

(I should probably go now.)

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 254.1 miles (+3 miles)
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record, 6th place regular season)
Fitocracy Level: 23 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with .

By Matt
August 15, 2012

rev="post-634" 1 comment

2012-366 Day 227 – Work V

Work had a minor catastrophe today which ate up my whole day (technically it started yesterday, but we thought it was a different problem then), and then we had our Bible Study tonight, so it’s been a busy day. I don’t have much left, so here’s some random thoughts from the day:

-Mr Dell Support guy, I don’t think you knew what you were getting into when you decided that you weren’t going to listen to me and run through your script anyway. If stubbornness and patience were Olympic events, I’d have two gold medals. You really should have saved us both those two hours and set up the technician visit at the beginning. I apologize for not making that more clear at the beginning.

-Once we got that problem out of the way, however, and I got the information I needed, I can’t complain about the rest of Dell’s service (even if I did have to go a bit over someone’s head, sorry again Dell support guy, you really think they’d have a file on me by now).

-It pays to have been on campus so long that you’ve developed good relationships with key people, and I’m very grateful for the person who took an hour out of their day to help me clear some things up even though they don’t work for Admissions and Records.

-At one point I had Dell on the line while looking at my email to get an extension and later a password without ending or pausing the call. I love my phone.

-Of course the servers break while our server guy is on the way back from his month long pilgrimage to France with his family (although I’m surprised we’ve done so well for the past two months without him, this was our first major hiccup).

-Our documentation (which would have cut five or six hours out of this process) for the drives that I needed were on the drives that failed. Going to have to re-evaluate that plan.

-Finally, I don’t know how three drives in the same row of the SAN all get ejected by a quarter of an inch, but that was a pain in the but to figure out that was the problem that was masking one of them being a bad drive.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 251.1 miles
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record, 6th place regular season)
Fitocracy Level: 23 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , .

By Matt
August 14, 2012

rev="post-633" No comments

2012-366 Day 226 – Karate IV

The servers at work blew up after I got back from my run today, so I didn’t have a chance to write something up earlier. It worked out, however, because after getting home and then going out to sparring class, I had the topic for today’s post hit me (only semi-literally).

It’s been a while since I’ve written a karate update, and that was mostly a product of my feelings about myself, rather than karate itself. My lack of flexibility was seriously hampering my karate ability and I was starting to get down on myself after classes. With my recent uptick in running and sports, as well as continued training, I’m feeling better and slowly (VERY slowly) becoming more flexible and better able to perform the maneuvers. This is good, because the maneuvers are getting more complex (have me show you the ground circular combination some time if you see me in real life) and requiring more and more flexibility.

I also made an important realization in sparring class today, just because it feels unfair for me to be aggressive when sparring doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to actually do it. Usually I just play defense, which generally results in me deflecting some punches (or taking them against the Black Belts), getting some counters in, and then absorbing a charge attack and bouncing off to do it all over again. Since the majority of people I’m fighting are smaller than me (although better trained), it feels unfair to take the attack to them. I don’t know why it took me this long to realize that’s the whole point. Yes, I’m slow sometimes.

I’m still learning other basic things too, like kicks can change directions, so don’t expect it to stay low when it may suddenly come up to your face, especially if you lean over for some dumb reason. Also, keep your hands guarding your head and your legs to guard your torso, I keep wanting to block everything with my hands and leaving myself open. I’m looking forward to learning more, I feel that it’s starting to come together.

Already less than a month to the next test, and I’m looking forward to moving up to the Green belts. I definitely would recommend Cutting Edge Karate to anyone out there who wants to start training in Tang Soo Do, and you’ll have the extra joy of seeing me there, as well as a great and supportive group of Black/Upper Belts and a great leader in Master Kemmer (no, I’m not getting paid for this, it’s all true :).

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 251.1 miles (+4 miles)
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record, 6th place regular season)
Fitocracy Level: 23 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , , .

By Matt
August 13, 2012

rev="post-632" 1 comment

2012-366 Day 225 – Volleyball Game 9

The final game of the regular season has come and gone, with another game on the windy side of the field that totally does not like us. We seriously have not been able to by a break the last two weeks with the top of the net being our number one enemy (and the wind a close second). We finished the regular season in sixth place, which will allow us to skip the play in round in the first time slot next week, then play the number 3 team in the second time slot (which will be a rematch of this week).

We’ve had a hard time with our chemistry in the past few weeks, with different people missing every week for the past couple of weeks. Between that and our bad luck, we’ll be going into the playoffs with a need to regroup and try our best. Playoffs are my favorite time of year, unfortunately I haven’t had much success in the Volleyball version. We’ll see if I can turn that around this year.

Weight: 229 Loss: 11 lbs – Running Yearly Mileage: 247.1 miles
Volleyball Match Record: 5-4 (13-14 Game Record)
Fitocracy Level: 23 ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , .

By Matt
August 12, 2012

rev="post-631" No comments