For the month of August, I am going to try not eating any meat* and see how it goes. This will be a MASSIVE dietary change for me. I am far from being able to attempt a vegan diet and honestly I’m not even sure if that makes sense to me yet.

*any, for me, includes: chicken, beef, pork, and lunch meat

NOTES

7.31 Idea: I may still eat seafood and shellfish. I’m not sure yet. At least for now, I think I’ll try it. The main meats I want to cut out are chicken, beef, and pork anyway.

8.1: This may actually more difficult than I thought. I have never really paid attention to how many convienient food items have meat in them. Around 10.45am this morning I was starving and had a severe shortage in time, so I stopped by the Shell mart (against my better judgement). The ONLY item I could find in the deli without pork, beef, chicken, or lunch meats was a piminto cheese on wheat. This was a terrible waste of $2, but my hunger is subsided for the time being. This month may be challenging…

8.3: One of the main concerns I have at this point is getting bored with eating the same things over and over.

8.4: Last night we went to Applebees. I seriously considered several meat entrees then decided against them in favor of spinich and artichoke dip and drinks.

8.7: This isn’t even really that hard anymore. I weighed 240 last night as well, at least 10 lbs down from what I was a 4-6 weeks ago.

RESULTS

July 31 (practice day) - Pass (fruit, mushrooms, peppers, onions, bread, veggie lo mein, shrimp)
Aug 1 - Pass (piminto cheese on wheat, penne w/ marania, bread, fruit)
Aug 2 - Pass (peanut butter, mushrooms, peppers, onions, bread, yogurt, granola, veggie lo mein)
Aug 3 - Pass (yogurt, granola, baked penne, fruit, spinich artichoke dip, chips)
Aug 4 - Pass (mushrooms, peppers, onions, juice, fruit bread, peanut butter + jelly, baked penne)
Aug 5 - Pass (?)
Aug 6 - Pass (waffles, mexican, )
Aug 7 - Pass (Mushrooms, peppers, onions, cereal, juice)

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Time to stop and figure some stuff out. I’m not sure how, but it’ll be figured out as we go.

Things that effect my happiness

7.25.08 - 7.27pm @ etcetera - idea #1: Acceptance
A great deal of my happiness is still, for some absolutely confusing reason, based heavily on other people. Perhaps I really don’t know how to get over this. The need for acceptance isn’t perhaps something to be eliminated, but instead I wonder if it could be shifted into other focuses–such as going to the gym or running.

7.27.08 - 3pm on I-24 driving to MSU for an SCCA event - idea #2: It’s a Mid Life Crisis!

idea #3:

7.18.08

7.21.08


7.23.08


7.27.08

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Scientific American Mind is a fantastic magazine; one of the very few I ever bother to read on a month to month basis. This month they had an article about creativity and motivation and how they are directly correlated with production. This article couldn’t have been lying on the shelf at a better time for me. I had just walked into Books a Million and was struggling with motivation to finish the writing assignment on alternative work arrangements for my organizational behavior class.

Grad school = nothing more than using $2 words for terms you learned as a undergrad.

Creativity = productiveness
Creativity = discipline

A few ideas the article had for creativity are to write 3 pages on anything each morning, spend at least 20 minutes each day outside, and to go on some sort of adventure once each week.

The contributors to the article believe the creative process is not an inherent talent and can learned and practiced. Key elements are:

.capturing: when you have a great idea, jot it down, or do something to make yourself capture a creative idea

.challenging: keep yourself challenged in your daily life.

.broadening: talk to people who have different lives and ideas than you to keep fresh input coming in

.surrounding: put lots of creative and interesting people around yourself to spur your creative mind

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Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

 The Twitter form of the Trip

The weight coivered by… Weezer…wtf? And its awesome?! Huh? about 16 hours ago from txt

What just happened? about 17 hours ago from txt

Daft punk…. Boom-ch-Boom-ch-Boom-ch-Boom-ch- about 19 hours ago from txt

Nashville + angels and airwaves + pizza could almost trick me into thinking I’m happy. about 20 hours ago from txt

New weezer album ftw! Good call justin! 03:13 PM June 02, 2008 from txt

Dinner was awesome at the brewery. Deathly tired… 10:06 PM June 01, 2008 from txt

$4.14 / gallon! Yes! 05:23 PM June 01, 2008 from txt

Omgidkwtfigo! 09:24 AM June 01, 2008 from txt

@ the aquarium! 06:07 PM May 31, 2008 from txt in reply to the

Ridin’ da trolley! Woot! 03:14 PM May 31, 2008 from txt

Eating lunch @ Hofbrauhaus resturant and cheese cupboard. Happy. 01:38 PM May 31, 2008 from txt

Found one momma black bear so far. She had two cubs. Attempted to start a fight. Failed. Maybe next time. 01:12 PM May 31, 2008 from txt

Sweet! Power at the hotel just went out as I his “submit on an assignment with a few minutes left”… 08:15 AM May 31, 2008 from txt

Zzzzzzzz… 11:27 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Knoxville… 10:34 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Cookeville + refueling 09:15 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Carthage… 08:49 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Lebanon… 08:34 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Nashville + “fly away on my zephyr” 08:07 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Clarksville… 07:36 PM May 30, 2008 from txt

Hoptown….   07:30 PM May 30, 2008  from txt

roughly 6700ft up, a panoramic shot

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I can think of ways to make money with these. :)

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My personality from last winter:

My Personality today:

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I am seriously considering walking out of my job with nothing else lined up.

I would have laughed at that a few weeks ago as well. But, I am serious.

Months ago, I mentally checked out. Since then, I have had zero interest in preserving my job for the long term. I think it may finally be time to get out. I have done the math and we could easily support ourselves for 2-3 months without anything besides Jillian’s income and taking money out of our savings account. Not that I want to be without a job, just that at least that cushion is there in case I have a hard time finding something.

One of the biggest decisions in my life up to the point, for sure. I really don’t know what I will do yet.

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About 2.5 weeks ago, I predicted, over a drink in a cafe with a couple of people, that most of our social group would fall apart within the next 6 weeks.

So far, I am right! (sadly.)

Meggie and I have had a huge conflict rolling since she sent me a random, personally insulting text message a few weeks ago. Following a couple more messages like this, I unloaded my actual thoughts to her, including how she is wishy-washy with what she tells her friends, how she is hyprocritical, and how she has been acting differently for the past couple of months. The ensuing personal flame war between us makes me pretty sure we will either never be friends again, or never be nearly as close as we were.

DJ, largely I believe due to the fact I am not getting along with Meggie and due to the fact he feels the need to be involved in any conflict within the group, decided that he and I had some sort of problems as well. I was fairly polite to him when he tracked me down the other day to “talk”, which consisted of him basically blaming himself for expecting everyone in the group to care. After letting him ramble for a while, he finally said “no one cares about anyone but their self and Bianca.” Most of his problems get back to him being insecure and self-centered.

I rarely talk to or hang out with Sam or Zach anymore. Different specifics, but the same basic story: we have just become different people with different interests.

Some of the people I was really good friends with last summer, Nate & Kat for example, are almost a memory now. I barely keep up with them any more and they don’t seem that interested in me when I do see them. Its nothing against them though, just another situation of people heading different directions. Tristan and Bianca, two of the people I am getting along with best at this point, will probably both be leaving very soon. Bianca has a one-way plane ticket to Germany leaving 5/20/08. Tristan is moving back to Louisville at some point this summer to attend college again.

While part of me is upset about this fallout of friendships, a larger part of me doesn’t really mind at all. I have lately been content to just sit around and play video games with Penny on my lap, or spend time with Noah. My desire to be a hermit is increasing on a daily basis.

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I have never been quite so unmotivated to do anything in my life as I have been lately. I have written, at least in my paper journals, about this several times. However, it just continuously gets worse and worse! I am finally to the point with work that I am having an awful month. Still, I cannot seem to push myself to do anything work-related beyond the absolute minimum to avoid losing my job and being able to preserve the slight possibility in my supervisors minds’ that i may actually not be sitting on my ass all day.

Being ready to switch to a new job - any job - is an understatement. I would take whatever came along right now. I will never, ever put myself in a sales position again. I loathe the actual requirements of the job. I don’t at all believe in what I am doing or selling, and as such even a half day of work (which rarely occurs) is utterly soul sucking.

I have applied at banks, warehouses, retail stores, etc and can not even get so much as a phone call. I am bordering on hopelessness re: the job search situation.

My general happiness level is also painfully low of late. I don’t enjoy life except in short, fleeting moments which are inevitably followed by waves of the real world destroying my soul.

I can see myself being very happy right now pretty much just sitting at home, going straight to work at a factory job, then straight back to the house. Oddly, this is exactly what I thought would never make me happy. Perhaps I am lost and don’t know what I want at all.

I have gotten back into gaming seriously for the first time in several years. My student loan funded Dell XPS M1530 makes that possible. Games have the wonderful ability to fully suck you in and let you forget about the real world. Maybe it’s not fully healthy, but I am pretty much it is vastly superior to drinking my problems away (which I have thought about).

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The amount of money I make has no relation to my happiness level.

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