ok,it has been a long long while since i last wrote a journal entry. lots of things going on in my life from work to family. i suppose now is as good a time as any to post an update.


lets see, where to begin. well lets start with work. our company went from being a department in a very large bank, to a small startup company, back to being a department in a very large company (not a bank) but in many ways just as divine. the development staff took it hard at first, and who wouldn’t. we had put a lot of blood, sweat, and time away from friends and family all for this product that we believed in. after all was said and done, and we listened to the management, we all decided to give it a chance, myself included. that is not to say i didn’t look around for other opportunities. but in the end, for me at least, there were a lot of new and interesting opportunities here at divine so i figured i would give it 6 months and see how it all feels. it also helped that the other developers stayed as well. i am not sure if i would have continued on if the team was lost.


i’m still working on the new web site. i know, taking forever isn’t it. i will try and have it up as soon as possible. i think i took on more than i could chew with this whole java, xml, xslt, transfer of account thing. but it is nothing if not challenging.


this past weekend was the wedding of my great friends michael and lori klein. it was a spectacular wedding. i don’t think it could have went any smoother, it went off without a hitch. it’s not often that you get a perfect day for an outdoor wedding, a perfect hall to have the wedding and a perfect bunch of people to celebrate it with. but they somehow were able to get em all. i was in the contingent that had the honor of standing up for mike, so that was cool. amy flew into detroit to go to the wedding with me and join in the festivities. it was really a great time. we danced all night, had good food and made merryment. mike and lori seemed really happy … they are so made for each other and compliment each other so well.


amy and i went mountain biking a few weeks ago. i finally got that expensive bike of mine on some dirt … wooo hooo … heheh .. anyhow, we went up to devil’s lake state park for the first leg of the weekend. the first 30 minute climb was hell incarnate and we were pretty destroyed and about to stop and turn around when we finally got to the top. it was like 400 feet of elevation change in the first 20 minutes. needless to say we walked the bike most of the way up the start. the rest of the trail was not bad though, not very technical, but it was really nice and had some great scenic views of the valley. the decent was a lot of fun, but watch out on those turns. at least in the spring, there were a lot of leaves on the ground. and under the leaves it was a bit wet and there was rock underneath the water. needless to say i felt that i was going to wipe out a few times but held it together. the second day of riding we drove down to the john muir trails. there we found some sweet singletrack that weaved through the kettle moraine trail. this was a ton of fun, honestly, amy and i had a blast here. there were challenging climbs that you thought you would die on but when you finally made it to the top you felt like you accomplished something. there were fun and scary descents down root and rock encrusted trails. it was pretty technical in all honesty. some people don’t like it, others say it’s not technical enough, but really i had a blast and think we will go back quite a few times this summer. in the evening during our weekend trail biking we messed around at the ho-chunk casino. we actually won enough to pay for a lot of the weekend.


i spent easter with amy and her family. it was nice to see them all again, i see her parents quite a bit now and we get along great but i don’t see her extended family much. so it was nice to see everyone again. amy and i are doing well … moving along on this path called relationship. i would be lying if i said everything was great all the time but most of the time we get along great. we see each other a few times per week (2-3) and we do most everything together from biking to movies to you name it. we both have things we are trying to work on that cause the other pain and anguish .. hehehhe … but we are trying. i know i have quite a few of my own quirks, but i’m giving it a go to address them. all in all we are doing great.


i’ve been trying to save a lot … getting together a down payment for a house. i had quite a bit saved and since i have about 4-5 months before i need to use it i threw some into the stock market. i know, dumb right, i don’t think so though. i couldn’t ignore the fact that all of these stocks were at like 52 week lows, it was insane how low they all were. so i dumped what i had into about 6 different stocks. anyhow, i have made about 26% on my investment in a little over a month. not to shabby if i do say so myself. i am looking at a october/november move out/in time.


my exercise program, where to being here. since xmas i have been up and i have been down. but all in all i have not lost anything. in my previous journal i said i was going to get back on the program, and in all honesty i did but as life does, it threw me a few curve balls. between job woes, house woes, financial woes, relationship woes, and family woes i had it all. i know, they are only excuses, and i agree. i lost my composure, and i lost something else. not my drive or my dreams, not my determination … something else. that little something that allows you to turn off the environment around you and focus on the problem at hand. it’s like i have lost the ability to multitask my health with the rest of my life. well, i am starting anew, once again. i am refocusing, revitalizing, and reprioritizing this life-style. don’t get me wrong, i never stopped working out, and i never stopped eating right, i just stopped doing them 100% of the time and instead only about 70% of the time. my goal is to get back to 100% starting this week. i am going to reweigh myself, remeasure myself, and get this ball rolling today. expect me to update my timeline tonight or tomorrow some time. this time i am setting a goal of august 28th 2001 to break the 300 pound barrier. i know it is a huge barrier, and i may even fail, but you know what, it is something i have to try. why that day? well it just so happens that i was born on that day, some 26+ years ago. it’s as good a day as any.


i think that is everything of any significance that has happened since the last update.