Life, Kids, Technology & that move to another continent
Today marks 3 Months after I hit my weight loss target. So far I not only kept the weight off I am slightly down from my target.
I am watching what I eat but generally I am not hungry and when I splurge bad I bounce back rather quickly so I am very pleased. I have 9 months to beat the odds since apparently 80% of people who lose weight gain it back within a year.
Today I got a new Nexus 5. I had been pondering getting another Android phone for a while. Probably ever since i sold my old Nexus last year. I love my iPhone but I always hold out hope that I will like Android more. Every year or so I give Android another try. I am not jaded about the cycle. I end up just taking the money I earned selling the last phone and throw in a bit more and buy a new one. The Nexus ones make that easier since they are much cheaper than typical unlocked phones.
So far I have been pleased but less than a day is not a good amount of time to get a feel for it. The large screen is a nice change of pace from my iPhone.
Today I reached my weight loss target. When I started in May I didn’t even have this target in mind. I was thinking I wanted to lose 10-15lbs. When I was well on my way to that target I adjusted it and was targeting 20-25lbs. That quickly turned into a target that when complete would be 33.7lbs loss. I have a few other posts that outline what I did and how i achieved this goal. What is funny is after I got started I wasn’t afraid of the process of losing the weight. I am concerned I will gain it back eventually.
I just unlocked the 250 mile achievement since starting to use it in early September. For that amount of time I dont know if that is good or bad but it makes me feel good that i walked 250 miles regardless.
Yesterday MC’S friend called asking if we wanted tickets to a free fundraising dinner since her husband had extra tickets. We hadn’t had a night out in a while and our babysitter was able to stay late so we said yes. it was cool to dress up and goto a $500 a plate fund raiser. Added bonus it was for an cause that if i had money to give I would donate to.
MC and I also got a chance to hang out with two of her friends who we hadn’t seen since our wedding.
I keep waffling on what fitness device I am using. After lots of replacement units of the Jawbone UP I got a Fitbit Flex in September. I used both devices for most of October to see how they compared. Then I dropped the UP in favor of the Flex. Part of the reason I did that was that the UP was too big on my wrist after my weight loss in recent months. The Flex didn’t have the inactivity monitor that I liked with the UP. it also seems to record about 2,000 more steps a day for me than the up does.
Just as I was getting used to using the Flex Jawbone comes out with the UP24. It offered me the bluetooth sync that the Flex has and all the features that the original UP had. I took the risk and ordered one in Medium hoping it fits and i can go back to using the UP. I will write more once I get it and see how it works.
I have been a user of a Drobo for several years now. It meet my storage needs even if it wasn’t anywhere near as fast as i wanted it to be. I used my desktop computer as a server and had at one point two Drobo’s attached to it. This year my old one started acting up so I am down to one Drobo. I had been slowly upgrading the storage on it but it has become apparent that I needed an upgrade. Jayson suggested Synology since he loved his Synology NAS. I had read good things about them in the past but I wasn’t really sure I wanted a NAS. I ended up buying a much cheaper Transporter in an attempt to solve only one of the storage issues I had. I wanted a private cloud solution. That was a mistake. The Transporter was nice but I had issues with the software. It didn’t do exactly what i was looking for. It was close but just not enough. At that point I started to research all the things i could do with a Synology and I got very interested. It does what i want with private cloud storage as well as tons more features. I was sold and made the investment in one.
Today I received my Synology DS412+.NAS along with 2 4TB drives. I will upgrade to a 3rd drive after i get the system setup. 4TB of usable space wont be enough once I get started. I have already started copying my files onto the new NAS. I also got Plex configured but need to wait till I get my media moved over. That means it will be a few days as the transfer takes a long time.
Once I get all my data on the Synology I need to setup backups of the data back to my old Drobo so I have an extra copy. Once that is done I also have plans to try a cloud backup service. Backing up to one hard drive a year and putting it in offsite storage at my dad’s is not going to work anymore with this much data to backup.
In some ways it is hard to believe I have been at Thomson Reuters for 5 years. So much has changed in my life in five years and so much seems not to have changed at all. I love that I still get excited for things I am working for and changes in my group keep things new and interesting. I have been in the same position for a year and a half but after 11 months the responsibilities changed enough that it is half like a new position again. Working with great people on interesting technology helps also! Here is to another 5 years if the future is as interesting as the last five!
As always when I mention work I would like to note that anything written on this blog are my own opinions and thoughts and are not those of Thomson Reuters.
I have had my current Sony Bravia 40″ LCD TV for 8 years. I got it at a huge discount as part of a Best Buy store opening I got to goto working at Partsearch. My dad got the exact same TV but his broke at least 3-4 years ago. Mine kept on working. It even won out against MC’s tv when we merged our stuff of course I didn’t think there was much contest since she had a 27″ CRT or something! Over the past year or two I have noticed dim marks in a pattern in the middle of the tv. At first MC didnt see them but then they became more apparent. She didn’t think there was any need to replace the tv and in reality it works perfectly well. The dark spots got me wanting something bigger and newer.
Last holiday season i decided to take all the gift money i got and put it towards a new one. The only problem was picking the right one. Good reviewed LCD TV’s were more than i wanted to pay even if I could afford it. I wasn’t sold on Plazma even though everything i read says that the new generations of them are really good and much cheaper than LCD. Burn in horror stories of years past still stick in my mind so it was back to LCD options. Then I found what I wanted but it wasn’t released yet. Finally I got my head in the game and the model I wanted was on the market after what felt like several months (because it was several months from announcing them at CES to them being able to be purchased).
So yesterday after work I went to the store to order my new Vizio 55″ M series. I did in fact goto Best Buy. I am not a fan of that store anymore but I wanted the TV professionally mounted and they had better options that I know people have had good luck with vs ordering from Amazon. I also went with a Vizio TV. Several people have said they are built like crap. I am hoping the online reviews are correct since many of them say they are good value TV’s. I don’t need earth shattering features. This TV comes with 3d and “smart” functionality both of them I don’t even want. I don’t care for 3d and my smart features will be gotten from my Sony Google TV that probably is better than the built in functions. The price was much better than more popular name brands like Samsung and Sony. Interesting during my research I found that Vizio actually sells a ton of TV’s. I am hoping the TV lasts and is as good as CNet said it was.
I looked at both the 50″ & 55″ but I opted for the 55″. My official reason is my eyes aren’t the best but when I was in the store with both TV’s next to each other the 55″ looks huge compared to the 50. I am hoping not to have to buy another one for a while so i figured i would get the biggest I can fit on my wall. The 55″ will just barely (fingers crossed) fit on the wall space we use.
The earliest they can deliver it is on the 16th. I can’t wait to plug it into my Bose speakers and give it a test drive.
After years of pondering if I should get a new TV, and months of finally saying yes I will get one I finally went out and ordered a TV today.
Today i got a fitbit flex. I wasn’t planning on getting one but i was in BestBuy and walked past it and couldn’t resist. I have a Jawbone UP but have been wondering about the Flex evver since it was announced. With all my issues with my UP’s even though i like the UP i wanted to give the Flex a test drive. I plan on using both for a while to see what one i like better.