Hitting the Gym

Recently I noticed my gut was sticking out more than normal. Not good. I get a workout once a week doing yard work. But that is not enough. Couple that with eating a lot of bad foods means poor health. Time to hit the gym - our indoor gym downstairs.

I figured I could spend 5 minutes on the treadmill and 5 minutes on the stationary bike. First I wanted to lift some weight. Little Kat's bench press was unused in the corner of the room. There were not even any weights attached to his barbell.

I struggled to figure out how to unlock his tool box that housed the clamps to secure the weight to the barbell. It was a trick lock. Then I loaded the heaviest weights onto the edges of the barbell. I lift it to check it out. Still not heavy enough. Added some of the second heaviest plates onto the end. Good to go.

Then I walked on the treadmill, reading my latest eBook on my Kindle app. After 5 minutes of walking, I actually felt good. I was sweating. But I was not out of breath. That might be because I had the treadmill on no include and a slower speed. I decided to go 15 minutes on the treadmill and 15 on the bike.

Watch out world. I am getting fit 15 minutes at a time.

New Car Shopping

Little Kat is going to test for his license next month. He is now practicing with Kit Kat's car, a 2011 Honda Fit Sport. Little Kat has decided that my old Scion xB is not fit (no pun intended) to take to his driver's license test due to some dings in the windshield.

In the bigger scheme of things, I previously planned to let Little Kat drive my xB when he got his license. Momoko already bought a car for Kit Kat. There is no more budget for another car for Little Kat. But Little Kat says he finds my car underpowered. Yeah. It is not a sports car. It is a fun looking car.

I told Little Kat that I no longer had any strong ties to the Scion xB. The only reason I had no sold it when I got another car was that I figured we would need an extra car for Little Kat. So I plan to swap it out for a car with more horsepower. Little Kat requested that I buy a sedan instead of a hatchback fo him. We will see what we can do.

I would like to buy an entry level, minimal options new car for a low price. Little Kat is advocating for a slightly used car with a lot of high end options. Here are the 2015 models that Yahoo autos says are good (and that I think I can afford):

• Honda Fit
• Hyundai Sonata
• Volkswagon Golf
• Toyota Camry
• Chrysler 200

Fast and Slow

I bought Little Kat some red Converse knock off sneakers online recently. They were a size eleven. But they ran small and did not fit Little Kat. Had to go to the Post Office today to return the shoes. I was following an old lady from India into the Post Office. She walked slow. I was patient behind her.

Inside the Post Office, there were a few people in line but they were not ready. So I blew past them and got helped right away. That was quick. As I exited the Post Office, there were a long line of people waiting to be helped. Glad I came early on my lunch break.

On the way home, I did a right turn on red. Punched it as I pulled out in front of an 18-wheeler. I had time to spare. Plus my manual transmission lets me accelerate fast. Turned the corner on the main road to find that it was blocked off. Cops closed the road for a funeral procession.

I figured once the people got out of the funeral home, I was safe. Nope. The cops closed off all intersections all the way down the road. I just had to be patient. Sometimes you get lucky and jump to the front of the line. Other times you hurry up only to wait.

WiFi Woes

The kids complained that their videos were loading and playing slowly. I noticed that a game I play on the IPad kept getting disconnected from the server. Something was wrong with the Internet in our house. Little Kat said we needed more bandwidth.

Hey. I am willing to give anything a try. I had the economy style Internet bandwidth which gave us a 3Mbps pipe to the Internet. Recently I upgraded to 25Mbps to appease Little Kat and give us more speed. I also replaced our wireless router with a "dual-band" one that had three antennas on the back. Three antennas!

What was the result? Well I still get disconnected from my server, just not as often. Kit Kat still gets bounced off WiFi in her room. Little Kat still cannot play YouTube videos at full resolution, or even get consistent playback at lower resolution.

This is going to be a long running work in progress. To solve the upstairs wireless issues, I figured I would need to get a second router upstairs that connects to our main router. Maybe that will solve some issues. Little Kat says his friend's house has no trouble YouTube. I told him to do a real-time test to see if he and his friend can watch the same video at the same time.

I also recommended Little Kat directly plug his computer into the router to see if WiFi is killing him too. If necessary, I told him we could try upgrading to a whopping 105Mbps bandwidth. However I suspect something else is wrong with out setup. Maybe it will be as simple as tweaking a setting or two. Just got to find out which settings need adjusting.

Hallowen Comes

Momoko said that Little Kat was requesting some red Converse tennis shoes that cost $150. No way. That is just too much money for some sneakers. Momoko thought maybe Little Kat was succumbing to some peer pressure or something.

We interrogated Little Kat. Turns out he needs red tennis shoes for his Halloween costume of Bo Jack Horseman. Bo Jack is an anime series. It depicts a horse that got rich as an actor. Now he lives in a mansion and has a lot of problems.

I guess Bo Jack is a commentary on the world of acting and Hollywood. The show is actually really funny. When I have time, I watch the episodes with the kids. Bo Jack has a friend that is a dog. He also has a leech roommate who is a bum.

Bo Jack's agent is his ex-girlfriend and is a cat. Go figure. The paparrazzi are always after Bo Jack. I hope Little Kat can pull off this custome. Not sure where he is going to go when he assembles the costume. I just have to remember to take a bunch of pictures when Little Kat puts it on.

Back to School Night

Little Kat's school had their annual back-to-school night this week. Momoko could not attend because there is just too much fast paced walking involved. I did not think Kit Kat could attend because she would just not ask all the hard questions of the teachers. Therefore I was up to bat.

I made Little Kat accompany me. In fact, I made him drive to the school to get in some driving practice. The school lot was full as we arrived just as the event started. As usual, the principal was giving his pep talk. He also had his lietenants speak to us. I was impressed by the athletics director. He was a top notch public speaker.

Some of Little Kat's classes were in temporary buildings. Strangely enough, Little Kat prefers them because the heat can be manually controlled in the winter to guarantee a warm environment. I spied a number of good looking young girls that Little Kat should be meeting this year. Momoko and Little Kat disagree with me. So I am outvoted.

I took lots of notes and asking important questions such as what the teachers' emails addresses were. Little Kat's chemistry teacher went to my alma mater. The final teacher we visited was Little Kat's English teacher, who just started the day before since she replaced another teacher that left. Little Kat and I cut out of that class to beat the rush out of the parking lot while driving home.

I have already reached out and emailed each of Little Kat's teachers to ensure we have their correct email addresses. Got to start out on the right foot.

Final Tasks for Mom

Dad took care of the funeral home expenses when mom died. My brother took care of the cemetery plots. I only thought it fitting that I take care of the gravestone. Our cemetery actually does grave markers, which are granite square stones laid in the ground, topped with brass plates.

The cost of grave markers from the cemetery was high. Fine. I thought I would buy from another source. The cemetery makes that next to impossible. They have a ten page document outlining the requirements for outside grave markers. I could not find a manufacturer that could meet their specs. Criminal.

Instead of fighting this, I bowed down and placed an order with the cemetery. Dad was getting anxious that it was taking a long time to get the grave marker settled. I ordered a double wide one to cover both plots my brother bought. It should arrive in 8 to 10 weeks. This chapter will be closed out by the end of the year.

I went by mom's grave after completing the grave marker business. Grass was finally groving over her grave. I saw the potted plants my brother had left. They were staked down with some metal rods.

I still recall very vividly the many conversations I had with my mom as I visited her each week when she was sick. I often wonder if I missed some indirect guidance mom tried to provide in those last couple months. One thing was clear. She wanted me to get closer to dad. I diligently work on that task now.

Change in Plans

Kit Kat was supposed to cook us pancakes tonight. Little Kat dreaded it. He just does not like pancakes. Not sure what is wrong with him. He came up with a scheme: Little Kat found a coupon for our favorite Mexican restaurant. He proposed that he drive us there and I buy us dinner.

That was almost a good plan. But we already have plans to visit that restaurant for lunch tomorrow. Plus they are too busy on Friday nights. Little Kat's backup was for me to choose another restaurant that I had a coupon for. We decided on a new all-you-can-eat seafood buffet. It was really a seafood Chinese restaurant.

We used Kit Kat's GPS to get us there. Ended up waiting forever at this really short left hand turn signal. We even missed one of the light rotations. Then as we neared the seafood buffet, Momoko wanted Little Kat to merge into the center turn lane. He did not understand and instead did a sharp left across opposing traffic. Kit Kat and I feared for our lives in the back seat.

The seafood restaurant was really busy for late on a Friday night. They had a lot of weird looking and tasting foods. Little Kat assured me we got our money's worth just from the load of sushi he ate. The waitress was quick to refill our sodas and take away our used plates. This restaurant reminds me of a similar buffet really close to our house, but this one was not as good.

Thrift Store Surprise

Little Kat met a boy on his bus that also has a custom built game computer. This boy apparently has a whopping four computer monitors attached to his computer. Little Kat got jealous. The secret, according to this boy, was to buy the hardware at thrift stores.

So yesterday Little Kat and I went driving to the local thrift store. This allowed Little Kat to get some more driving practice in, and to check out the cheap electronics. Little Kat almost ran a few people over in the parking lot. And he almost hit a car coming home. Just goes to demonstrate that he needs more practice.

Little Kat found a tall flat screen monitor in the store for ten bucks. It did not come with any cables. Not sure if he is going to be able to hook up the monitor. The big surprise in the store was the framed artwork in the back. Most pictures were under fifteen dollars. Some were lower than five bucks.

I picked up two pictures for my study. The family tried to convince me to hang them in the kitchen. Nope. These are all mine. I wish I knew about this goldmine earlier. I spent a lot of money decorating my study with new posters. I really with I knew about this the last time I went shopping for framed fine art.

First Concert

Kit Kat had scheduled to go with her college friends to a concert this weekend. One of her friends bailed on her. So she had an extra ticket that she could not sell. Instead of letting it go to waste, she invited Little Kat to come along with her.

They all got a ride from one of Kit Kat's friend's brother. The concert was up in a big city North of us. They just needed a ride home. Momoko told Kit Kat there was no way she would drive her home. It was up to me. Since this would be Little Kat's first concert, and one of the few times we let him hang out with Kit Kat's friends, I accepted the assignment.

I printed out directions to get there using MapQuest. I also studied the map around the concert venue. Also packed my GPS with me. I brought my old car because it has automatic transmission, and it stands out in a crowd.

I left with time to spare. Got into the city early. However once I got within a few blocks of the concert venue, the traffic came to a stand still. I decided to park on a street a few blocks away. I called Kit Kat on her phone and gave her directions to get to my car. Good thing my phone has a map app that is pretty good.

When Kit Kat turned the corner, I saw her and called her. They all loaded into my car. I cut across traffic and headed away from the madness near the concert arena. We were on the highway in no time, and back home in a half hour. I dropped Kit Kat and her friend off at the friend's house. I brought Little Kat home.

It was the first time Little Kat or Kit Kat's friend had ever seen a concert. The openers were not that great. But the headliner rocked the house. I was surprised that the concert was not a sell out. Guess this is just a town out in the middle of nowhere. There sure were a lot of people out on the streets after the concert.

Sliding Glass

We have an old sliding glass door that connects the kitchen to the patio outside. These days we do not use the door. The inside portion of it is obstructed by a large shelf and our full size freezer in the kitchen. The door has double pane glass. The outside glass pane got cracked a few years ago.

I meant to get it fixed. However my handyman said he could not repair it. He could only replace it for some big bucks. He recommended I have a glass company replace the glass in the door. That's what I did. Had the local glass and mirror shop order the window. It was a non-standard size. The glass came in this week.

Had some trouble with the scheduling of the install. The guy called me yesterday. I told him I would be available today. He promised to call me back. However when he called me back, he forgot about our conversation yesterday. We set up a time for the installer to come by. Then he calls me back 10 minutes later and tries to switch up the times. No can do.

The installer arrived at the set time. I needed to prepare by taking everything out of the big shelf. Also needed to move the shelf and freezer out of the way. That exposed a nasty back wall that had to be cleaned. Then I cleared the stuff off the patio that obstructed access from the outside.

The guy who came was optomistic that he could finish the job in an hour. I continued to work on my computer while he did his business. The sliding door was taken off and moved outside to work. The kitchen started to heat up as there was a huge open door to the patio. Flies also decided to come in the house.

I heard some groans outside. Guess this was harder than the installer thought. Later he told me it was difficult to remove the glass from the old window. It was wedged between the frame of the door. Ha. I had the same problem when I tried to remove most of the broken glass before someone got hurt. I compensated by putting up duct tape to cover the exposed jagged glass.

Now that the sliding glass door is fixed, I need to move onto the stoop just outside the door. It has been sinking since we bought the house. I just saw an ad where they can deal with such problems by jacking up the concrete and filling the space below. Maybe I will give them a call.

The Real Test

It is 1:30am. Momoko and the kids have gone to bed. I have done my laundry. I have just paid the bills. I want to go to bed. It would be nice to sleep on our soft pillow top bed. But that would be the easy route. It is time to push through the fatigue and study for my college class.

Nelly says that now is the time to demonstrate the heart of a champion. It is when nobody else is looking. You are in pain. You got a choice to make. Are you going to take the easy route and quit? Or are you going to push through the pain to train? Only champions make the sacrifice and choose the pain.

Sing it Nelly: Easy work is worthless. My work habit is not a habit man. I do it on purpose. I push myself to my limit so my talent is surfaced...