April 2004 Archives

Today has been a hectic day so far. Woke up at 6am and got ready to go. Fred was already packed and pacing the floor, his plane left at 9am. Lucky Fred. I went to the Flicker Records breakfast with Kurt, it wasn't anything special so I left early and went to the booth.

Worked the booth till noon and then went to the GOA luncheon. They had the best lunch of the week, I heard Todd Agnew, Across the Sky, Jason Morant, Nate Sallie & Warren Barfield. All great performances. GOA should be proud.

After the lunch crowd had passed, we ripped down the booth and packed it away. We also packed the WJTL van for the trip home.

For supper we went out to eat with Val, Anita, Steve, Joe & Jodi It was a good time to hang out and chill after a busy week. After Supper we went to Tim & Harry's Karaoke after Dove Party. It was a very amusing party most everyone took their turn at the microphone. Somethings I want to remember for a long time, other things I hope to forget.

On an amusing note Patrick Swayze was hanging out on curb in front of the shop and was mobbed by a handful of people.

Another day at GMA, I wish I was at home, but I am making some good contacts here. Today we got up at 6am and had to be at the iworship breakfast by 7am. Got there on time, they had great food. I had Eggs & Sausage the first breakfast food I got all week. Heard Casting Crowns, they are grrreat. I recommend them. iWorship gave out leather backpack bags filled with stuff, very nice. After casting crowns I ran down to the booth and hung out there all day.

I went to lunch at the William Morris Luncheon, saw Anthony Evans(tony's son), Joy Williams, Matthew West, George Rowe, and a few others sing. To be honest I wasn't that impressed with anyone, i did like George Rowe. After Lunch I had a few good talks with a few promoters and sold a few future email blasts. Denver from Denver and the mile high orchestra stopped by the booth to thank iTICKETS for being a great support. Things cleared out by about 5pm so I went upstairs.

I met fred on the way back up and we hopped in the elevator to go back up to the 18th floor. The elevator started acting all freaky at the 3rd floor. It started shaking and it raised and dropped a half a dozen times and freaked everyone out in the elevator. The weird thing is that this same thing happened yesterday to me. As soon as the doors opened everyone ran off the elevator and refused to get back on it. I will not ride in the elevator for the rest of the hotel stay. Too freaky weird.

When we got back up to the room Val called. She used to work at WJTL and now lives in Nashville. She came over with her two daughters to see Fred and me. What cute kids. Made me miss mine.

Fred & I then walked around searching for a place to eat. We finally settled for the Hard Rock Cafe. I had a horrible steak, tasted like dog meat compared to the steak I had last night. When we were done we went into a bunch of tourist shops and looked at cheap stuff.

Kurt went to a bunch of evening concerts. I went back to the hotel and wrote my blog. then I went to bed. night!

Well the morning started off early, getting ready for the GMA morning presentation. Tim & Harry were honored by the GMA for their lifetime of work. It was a nice presentation and Tim really thanked his wife for her role in helping him be the man he is. I thought it was great.

Once in the booth it was business till lunch. Standing for hours on end is not my specialty, but that is what i did. Lunch came and I went to the Jeff Roberts luncheon. Once again, Seventh Day Slumber was great. I was also bored by Avalon. Tree 63 did well. Before it was over I was back out at the booth. Getting ready for the crowd to exit. All the promoters are forced to walk by the itickets booth after lunch so I waited for them.

I ended up talking to a bunch of young artists, like Everyday Sunday who just had performed and were coveting the iPod mini we are gonna give away. The rest of the afternoon was a blurrrr. I didn't leave the stand all day, not even to go to the bathroom. Somewhere I need to remind myself people don't like jolly ranchers, I need more chocolate.

Fred invited me to go along to the William Morris Supper after the booth was closed. Both NJ & PA offices went with William Morris to Morton's Steak House. It was a good night. The William Morris Guys were very nice and the food was great.

Afterwards I went up to the room and crashed. Kurt went to the Tooth & Nail Showcase. I am sure it was worth it, but I was tired. Brian needed sleep.

Today was setup day at GMA. I got up early and went with Kurt & Fred to worship service. Worship was lead by Darlene Zschech and it was great. I had to leave about 15 minutes before it was over to get the van and drive my stuff to the convention center. I didn't want to leave. It was an awesome time.

I drove the van into the convention center. The convention center is huge and has underground tunnels, i drove into a garage door in the side of the building and down some ramps and ended up three floors below the ground. I unloaded all the stuff for the booth and carted it into place. It took a few hours but I got everything set up, including the web cam(look for link). So tomorrow this whole thing gets underway, but today I already had about 50 people in my booth while i was setting up. People were asking questions and eating candy. I also gave away a handful of iTICKETS iSlices and some iTICKETS Pens. (Both very cool give-aways).

After setting up the booth I went to the CAA showcase at Rocketown. Saw Amy Grant, Starflield, Sarah Kelly & Point of Grace perform. Sarah Kelly was great, she is worth a listen if you have a chance. Her voice is unique and her songs were great. So far she is my best pick of the week. (oh, and point of grace, once you heard one song, you heard them all.) After CAA, went to the CRW showcase and saw some just signed bands, nothing too impressive, but what made me happy about this event? They had huge deli trays and I must have ate about a pound of sliced roast beef & ham. Since I hadn't eaten all day this was a big bonus for me.

Came back to the room late afternoon and called home and talked to my wife & kids. I miss them all and would rather be there. But there is more work to be done here. After a little rest we picked up and went over to the Ryman Auditorium for Michael W. Smith Worship with Darlene Zschech and about 40 other Christian Artists. What an incredible 2 hours of non-stop worship. If I could take all my friends to this event I would. It is indescribable unless you see and hear it for yourself words do not do justice.

After the worship, i headed back to the room to rest. Tomorrow is a huge day. Tomorrow AM, our company Creation/WJTL/itickets.com is being honored with the GMA lifetime achievement award. ITICKETS is only 6 years old and will be the youngest company to be co-honored for lifetime achievement. It is riding on the coat-tails of the Creation Festival, but I will take the small mention.

After the awards ceremony I will be busy till 6:30pm working at the booth standing on my feet and talking business. So who will I meet and what deals will i strike, you never know.

feeling lonely, you can join me at GMA. I have my webcam and will be broadcasting pictures every few minutes.

Webcam

Well today was day one at GMA. It started for me by making arrangements to get my gout medicine prescription forwarded to a pharmacy here in TN. I then went to the store and picked it up. Yes, my joints in my foot started throbbing yesterday and I need to get some meds in me quick to stop the swelling before it gets so painful I can not walk. So while I was out Fred and Kurt suggested I look for a store where I could by an iPod mini. This way iTICKETS could give away an iPod mini at our booth. So I drove by the local Mac store here and picked one up. $249 for a 6oz. piece of aluminum that plays music. Very nice.

After that I stopped by the local Subway store and bought a Baby Spinach and Grilled Chicken Salad, this is my second BSGC Salad of the trip and will not be my last. After driving back to the hotel and putting the van in valet parking I went back to my room took my meds and passed out(meds make me sleepy).

So far the day had been a total business waste. But then things got interesting. Fred and Kurt came back from radio meetings and took me to meet a few people. Not mentioning names, we ended up discussing some deals that could be very good for itickets in the future. So I am very happy to have had the chance to meet these guys. For Supper we went to a local eatery and i got another grilled chicken salad. Two in one day(#3 for the week), wonder how many more yet this week.

After walking back to the hotel I went with Kurt to Integrity Music's Chocolate lover's party. No a big thing for me since I couldn't eat anything. But I pocketed a few snickers bars and some m&ms. Jason Morant played acoustic guitar and sang. He has a new album coming out soon and I think he will do well. After that Kurt and I got to talk to another guy who is head of marketing at the record company and we talked about itickets and how he could use it to his benefit. This was another great conversation.

Kurt is a good guy to hang out with in Nashville. He is not afraid to talk to people and the two of us have some great ideas. I think we can both talk a pretty good game and it works!

On an exercise note, this is the first time in 6 weeks i didn't run. The gout in my foot kept me from it. I still walked a ton today so I got some exercise. I also was able to keep up with everyone I was walking with and not break a sweat. that was a first.

I am typing away on my powerbook in the front seat of the WJTL van on the way to Nashville. Kurt and I just switched places and he is driving. I would like to thank Chris Strayer for somehow hooking up a power strip in the WJTL van so that i can have my powerbook plugged in. He is truely the man. Kurt and I are having a good trip The sun has been shining the trees are green and some are in full bloom. Kurt has a cool little iPod device that lets him play his iPod on the van stereo. Currently we are listening to a wide variety of music. I found a new group I like called train. I need to acquire their cd.

I regret leaving my family at home today, it was hard for me and I am sure it was harder for Shelly. Hopefully the week will pass quickly and we will be together soon.

Today I went on my usual run. I left the house pretty early in the morning and it was foggy. I could barely see thirty feet infront of me, but that was enough. I started thinking our journey in life is similar to my foggy run. We continue ahead on the road before us and we can see a short distance but the rest remains a mystery. Running up hills and not knowing where the top is, knowing where the finish line is and knowing what it looks like but not seeing it until you get there. That is life.

3.6 -- 43m -- 39.1t

Ruth had her three week check up today and is doing great. She weighs 8lbs. 7oz. and the doctor is pleased. I made an announcement up for Shelly to send out to some long lost friends and relatives. For my internet friends here is yours:

Ruth's Announcement

3.6 - 44m - nice day 35.5t

Today is a big day. I am crossing over the half way point between 300 and 200. I can now feel like I weigh closer to 200 than 300. 250 is also my second to last original goal. So WOOOO HOOOO 250.

It has been 9 weeks since I crossed over my last goal. So it has been a while since I felt like I have accomplished something. My original goal was to be 250 my March 30. So in some ways I am late, 17 days late. In other ways I am very happy with myself cause I have a hard time sticking to diets when I have missed my goal. My next and my final original goal is 225. I really don't want to put a time limit on it cause my weekly pound loss has slowed down.

Today also marks the beginning of my 5th week of running. It is hard to believe I started walk/jogging just a few weeks ago and the last time I ran a pace of less than 12 minutes a mile. I know in the running world this is not stellar but for a big old 250+lb. boy who never could run one mile, 3.6 miles seems good.

I am wondering if I should be happy or sad about pausing my Atkins diet for two days a few weeks ago. Did it mess with my metabolism and help my Atkins diet kick in my recent weight loss or would I be further ahead had I not took a break? I will never know. I am just happy to have crossed another mile marker on the highway to health.

3.6 48-m hot hot hot 31.9t

Elsie finally got a real cast. After breaking her arm 3 weeks ago the Dr. put her in a forearm cast. Elsie picked her color: bright pink. I was the first to sign it. It has been a long time since I signed anyone's cast.

3.6 43m -late afternoon -windy

I ran out of Mayo on Thursday last week. And on Saturday when I went grocery shopping I accidentally picked up Miracle Whip. I do not enjoy the tangy zip of Miracle Whip, nor do I want the calories that come with it.

So last night I went on an emergency run to the store to pick up some Mayo. I love Mayo it is the glue that holds my food together. So as I right this I am consuming some chicken salad with a generous portion of mayo. mmmmm mayo.

3.6-46m wind & rain

Easter was yesterday and Dieting over Easter or any holiday is not fun. As of now I have gone through Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and Easter on my lifestyle change. It is not the diet that is the killer it is being different. I suppose in some extremely limited way I can relate to being a minority.

I do not like watching everyone else over indulge in anything and everything they desire while I stick to a specific (carb & calorie) regimen. When asked what i missed about not eating what everyone else ate I really couldn't think of a specific item as much of the feeling of being limited.

So what did i eat? I had Ham and Broccoli and lots of it. I actually like both of those items very much, so no loss in yumminess. But watching everyone else eat a ton of food and as much as they want and looking at all the chocolates, desserts and candies was not easy.

Added to the fact that I was tired Easter was a hard day to eat differently than most people.

Weeks ago Shelly and I decided that we would do Easter at our house. We knew our baby would only be a few days old, but after reviewing our options we thought Easter at our house was the best one. If we didn't we would be invited to go to multiple Easter meals at other people's houses and that seemed even more difficult than having people here. We were dead wrong.

Shelly was in charge of Ruth and the home made Mac & Cheese, and I was in charge of everything else. Ruth behaved rather well last night. She slept in two chunks, one three hour chunk and one four hour chunk(good baby). Our first mistake was we also invited our parents to go to church with us. I would have cancelled this part, but the youth were doing a musical drama and neither Shelly nor I wanted to miss out on seeing it. So when the alarm rang we started our first of what will be thousands of morning productions to get our family ready to go away. We were masters at getting ready with three growing kids, but adding a fourth(baby) to the mix has increased the difficulty level.

We arrived at church only 5 minutes late, another miracle. Sat with our family and Ruth was restless the whole time, but didn't cry. We got to see the youth do their thing. It was very good and I was moved emotionally. I am very impressed with the youth of our church, they are great kids.

After church we dashed back home and finished the feast, which was already cooking and time-delayed baking in our oven. We ate by 12:30. After which I cleaned up and everyone else went to the living room to open gifts. Holy smokes their were baskets everywhere. Since all grandmas were at our house we had been bombarded with baskets. Every child including Ruth had at least 3 to open. Which meant easter grass, wrap, paper, boxes, bags, little toy pieces and candy wrappers were everywhere. Within 30 minutes our house looked like a nuclear disaster area. And then it was time to clean up.

Well then it hit me, about an hour after the baskets & the clean up, pure exhaustion. I couldn't do anything else, my body needed to sit, my head needed to shut down. I don't think I have ever felt that tired in a long time.
By 5pm everyone had gone. I popped in a movie for the kids and I laid on the sofa and slipped into a coma for an hour.

The rest was good, but upon waking it took me about an hour for my brain to focus on anything. The rest of the night has been totally unproductive. Hopefully sleep will come sooner than later.

Ok a few good things happened today.

1. I am back in ketosis after 5 days back on induction.
2. I am also back to 256, my weight before my two day splurge, seven days ago.
3. I ran around the block today. 3.6 miles. I had only planned on doing this in another week or so. I just thought I would push myself and it worked!
4. Got to take the family out on a drive for the first time since Ruth came home.

Anyway a good day!

3.6miles/1pole 48m

Well when I jog I like to listen to my iPod. One of my most played artists on my iPod currently is Steve taylor. He is the man! Good Music, good lyrics, thanks Steve!

One of my favorite songs:

SMUG --from the album squint

Strike this little pose
Chin up in the air
Lips together tightly
Nostrils in a flare
Now look like you care
Very nice!

Practice in the mirror
Brushing back a tear
Very sincere
A promising career could begin right here at home
If you've got that smug...
That smug...

chorus:
Hey mama hey mama lookee what your little babies all have become
Hey mama hey mama don't it ever make you wish you'd been a nun?
Vain and fickle, were we weaned on a pickle?
Is it in our blood?
Rome is burning
We're here turning smug

Strike another pose
Power politics
Swallow their conventions
Get your power fix
We love to mud wrestle
We love to be politically Koreshed

Practice that smug
Post it like a man
One part Master Limbaugh
Two parts Madame Streisand
Now pretend you're in a band
My, my, we're looking smug
Very very very very

(chorus)

All you smug-starved millions in the thick of the search
Welcome to our church
Whatcha wanna solve?
We can help you evolve from merely self-righteous
To perfectly smug

Strike the proud pose of our country club brethren
Friendly as a tomb
Fragrant as the bottom of a locker-room broom
Now what's the matter?
Hey...get off your knees...that part don't come 'til later...
God will not be pleased...

(chorus)
Hey mama hey mama lookee what your little babies all have become...
Rome is cooking
My, we're looking smug

Well during my jog today I covered 3 miles for the first time. My new personal record. So only .1 more miles to go to hit 5k. Also I am hoping to be able to run around my block(3.5 or 3.6 miles) by the end of the month.

BTW- Atkins is going good again, over half the water weight has come off in the last 24 hours

59/60 38m

Our neighbors have a sign in their front yard along the road. One of those types of signs that have a Bible verse written on it. Depending on which way you are going there is a different verse on each side of the sign.

For the last few weeks the verse on the south side of the sign has read:

The Lord Jehovah is my strength Isaiah 12:2.

At one time in my life I poked fun at people who put these signs in their front yard. (esp. the ones that said things like "The hour is near." Not that the unchurched world has any idea what "The hour is near" means.)

Anyway since I have been jogging past their house every other day I have been reminded that God is my strength. And since I spend over 30 minutes huffing and puffing down the road I have a good bit of time to think about that verse.

At first it was a immediately comforting verse cause obviously pushing my body everyday to exercise I like thinking that God could help me with my physical strength. But today I got to thinking about other things that I need strength for other than my exercise. And I was kind of think/praying about those things when it hit me. Shouldn't God be my strength for everything? Am I selectively choosing things to allow him to be my strength and reserving a few things for my strength?

Well this gave me a good bit to think about while jogging the rest of the way home. And new appreciation for our neighbors and their sign.

51/52 33m-- very windy

Today we took pictures of our kids including ruth. It took 3 sessions and about 60 pictures to get one we liked.

I like nice pictures but the work that goes into getting a nice picture can take forever. Having four kids in a picture means lots of pictures with 3 perfect posed kids and one not so perfect.

We will use the picture in a baby announcement we are making and I think I am gonna have a copy framed. Hopefully you will get one and if not I will post one on the site sometime soon.

BTW, my first day back on Atkins went fine.

Well I did it for the second time in the last 6 months. I blew my 'lifestyle plan' and cheated. I started out yesterday eating what i wanted and actuallly continued through late tonight.

Why? Why would I throw it all away? Well I am not throwing it all away. But I took a break from my strict 20 carb a day life. So what did I do? Why did I do it? and what am I going to do?

Well I ate whatever I wanted for 48 hours. I had a slice of pizza, candy, crackers, milk, a few desserts etc.

Why? I am not sure. I have been thinking about what I am gonna do when I hit my lifetime goal weight and how will my body react. Will I continue on Atkins and just raise my carbs? Will I switch to a different diet? How will my body react? Well it was time to test the waters. I had been trying to hold off on increasing carbs but I dunno, with the stress of the baby, lack of good food in the house, etc. It was just the day to break free.

Well my carb binge held over to Sunday and when a friend who was making us a meal called to reschedule I took the liberty to order out. I got Shelly Italian and me Chinese. There were probably more carbs in General Tso's Chicken than I ate all last month. But I hadn't had Chinese for at least 7 months so it was good.

What am I going to do? Well back to induction Monday AM. Hopefully this 48 hour carb shock will have messed with my metabolism and perhaps jolted it back into a carb burning machine. We shall see.

So any negatives to breaking from Atkins? YES! tons of them. Well let's see, I immediately gained 13lbs. In my estimation, water weight. I used to pee a ton all the time, that stopped. My body feels bloated and I feel more tired. My blood sugar did go up a few points right after eating(which is normal). And testing in a few hours my blood sugar is back in the 80's.

So what did i learn? Well Atkins definately keeps the water off your body. So my first week or two of weight loss was water. And immediately I put the water weight back on. This also had happened 3 months ago when I deviated from the Atkins plan one evening. So this will change my thinking when it comes to reaching my weight goal. I suppose the Atkins method of slowly adding carbs back is probably pretty wise. This will give my body the chance to acclimate and I if I slowly add carbs perhaps my water weight will adjust. Cause I would hate to get to 220 and then gain 10lbs of water.

Anyway it will be interesting to see how this deviation/devistation will effect the rest of my weight loss plans. And will I be able to use the info I gathered from this experience to make my lifetime maintenance better? We shall see, as for now, induction starts in the morning.

I know you have been wondering about two things. 1) What am I doing for aerobic exercise, am I still working out with denise? 2) What are the fractions at the bottom of my posts about.

Well today you shall be informed.

I have been walking/jogging 3x a week for the past 2.5 weeks. I wasn't sure it was going to be part of my lifestyle for long so I wasn't going to write about it until I was sure. Well I guess I am sure. I started out doing 1.5 miles(the distance between my house and the mennonite reception center & back). Every Saturday I have increased my distance. I am now up to 2.5 miles and I am shooting for 3 miles by next week.

I also started out jogging until i needed to walk and then catching my breath and jogging some more. I have been keeping track of this via telephone poles. So the fractions at the bottom of my page are how many telephone poles I jogged vs. the total telephone poles I jogged/walked. So Today I jogged 48 out of the 52 telephone poles. (in 32 minutes).

Currently I am averaging about a 13 minute mile. That seems awful, but I know it is my best for now. I do know that in High School I couldn't run a 15 minute mile and now I can jog/walk two 13 minute miles. Once I don't walk any telephone poles my time should pick up.

Also currently I run south on Prescott to Jackson and run most of the length of Jackson and then I turn around and come back. Soon however I will be able to run a country block. The shortest country block we have is 3.5 miles. I think I could do this now but I am trying not to push it. So I will give myself another 2 weeks to build up to my country block.

Anyway and now for my goal. I want to run in a 5k race/fun run. Something I never thought i would do. But now I can see it as part of my future. I am thinking about doing the Balloon Chaser's 5K in Hershey. I wouldn't mind finding someone to run with, but if I have to go it alone I will.

48/52 32m

Things were so busy today, I didn't have the chance to do anything. Shelly and the baby are home. That makes me happy. Now time to adjust to life with a newborn.

Christine S. dropped off some food which everyone enjoyed. I haven't had time to record my food yet today and probably won't. anyway we are home safe and happy and tired.

I know, i didn't do a good job with baby info. so here it goes. . .

The newest member of our family is Ruth Louise. Ruth is named after a few people. I had a Great-Grandmother Ruth, and a Great Aunt Ruth, and my mom's middle name is Louise. Shelly has a Great-Grandmother Louise and her Aunt Jeanie's middle name is Louise. I also had a Favorite Sunday School Teacher named Ruth Light she was a very friendly pleasant woman. The name Ruth means Friend and she was also a key figure in the Bible having her own book and she is honored by being a great-great-great . . . grandmother of Jesus.

Ruth was born on March 30, at 7:39 she weighed 7lbs. 15oz. and was 21 inches long. In her first 48 hours she has been a very gentle pleasant girl. Depending on who you ask Ruth looks like everyone :). She has dark hair like Elsie, a nose like Miriam and Cheeks like Caleb. She has my ears. and uh, she is a female like Shelly :)

Today has been a nice day to spend time with Shelly & the baby. There haven't beeen too many visitors and it has been nice to quietly sit and talk without interruptions. It also has been a few years since I have changed a diaper and held such a small baby, you will be glad to know I haven't lost my touch. I am sure my mind will change in a few months once life gets crazy but I could already deal with number 5.

31/40 26m