Pavlov'd

So I’ve been not drinking soda for 4 days now. Then my coworker Kristi opened a can of soda a little while ago, and I felt a severe compulsive urge. Luckily, I remembered my cranberry juice which is like a nicotine patch for soda addicts.

Reminds me of this:

New Year's Resolution--The Big One

Truth be told, I hate New Year's Resolutions. I despise them because people make them and break them. I despise them because a good idea is a good idea no matter what time of year it is. My usual question is Why wait until the calendar changes if it's such a good idea?

Anyway. I'm going to attempt one this year. This is a big one, so big in fact that I will need to take a couple months to prepare myself. Are you ready?

I'm going to quit soda. Yeah, that's right. My largest consumption of high fructose corn syrup is in soda. This stuff is not good for me. In fact, it's not good for anyone. So I'm going to knock out the biggest contributing factor. I'm pretty sure I feel its effects working in my body. Soda makes Hanna sick because she's been off of the poison for years. I'm going to try.

As with anything, I believe I can quit more easily than I could "cut back." So I'm going all the way on this one. I expect it will be hard. My tongue craves sweet drinks, so I will have to rely on cranberry juice to help. I only need a little bit of this juice to ease my longing. It's like the nicotine patch for soda addicts.

Keep me accountable, folks! In later blog posts, I will describe the negative effects of soda that are going on in my body.

Star Wars Marathon

We finally did it. We planned this event for three years, for shame. Yet the time came to pass where we finally watched all six Star Wars movies starting at Episode 1 and ending at the end (where else did you think we'd end it?).

It was about how I thought it would be. In a word: LONG. I don't plan on ever doing it again, but it was fun once.

Amber and Donald came over Friday, and spent the night for this event. We laid the futon cushion on the ground in our living room, which the dogs loved. All in all, 14 hours of TV in two days was fun but headachy.

All in all, I came to one conclusion that cannot be denied: many of George Lucas's ideas are the worst parts of the grand universe he created.

Penelope

Here is a long overdue post about my bleeding heart. I bike home, about 3 miles a day, 2-4 days per week. About 2.5 miles from my house, I saw the cutest puppy. (See my wife's blog for pictures.) I picked it up and biked home the rest of the way with only 1 hand steering and braking. This is much harder than you think, especially when you cross roads where through traffic does not stop.

Long story, but the crux is we gave her to my boss and her husband and their 2 teenage daughters after spending about 5 days deciding that no matter how cute the puppy is, we don't want a third dog.

Did I steal someone's puppy? Maybe. However, it was emaciated and flea ridden, and apparently had some abuse or over-zealous punishment issues in its past.

We named her Penelope for fancy occasions, with the shorter Penny for everyday use. Penny, as in, something you find on the street that someone else didn't bother to pick up or take care of.

The Neglect of My Blog

I am ashamed. Yesterday's post was my first in a month. It's not that I am lacking things to say; it's just that I spend much of my time doing homework and that uses up all my words.

Well, I'll try to remedy this problem. Keep tuned. I'll be posting more often.

Class #1 finished

Well, I fought long and hard for an A, and I got one. It seemed unfair at times, but thankfully, I now have proof that I can do school again.

I only missed 7 points in the entire class. 1 point from being late 1 day on an assignment that I didn't know about. I take about 50 percent blame for that one. The other 6 points missed were from the reading quizzes - proof that the system was unfair. How can I read and take good notes and then fail to properly answer the questions which were supposed to be designed to see if I read the material? Answer, bad questions.

Anyway, I got a 93 percent in the class. Yeah, you read that right. That means that in 5 weeks, we were only graded on 100 points of material.

Final tally: 93%

[UPDATE: I looked at it again, and I actually got a 92.96% in a class where I missed 7 points.

First, if it was 100 points total, I would have had a 93.00 percent.
Second, if it was 99 points total, I would have had a 92.92 percent.

I found the total number of points, though:

Total possible: 99.5
My total 92.5
Percent: 92.96

Go figure. I hate this teacher. Grade-wise, nothing made sense.]