Two-and-half men.
December 9th, 2008 by admin
Every day I sit in from of my computer for 8 hours plus. My laptop looks like a piece of “bling” on my lap. Its no wonder that my lifestyle of work, school, being a father has created an nearly perfect environment to create a super-sized man.
Here is a typical day.
Wake up. (snooze button, moaning, covering my head with pillow, wishing I had just “ten more minutes”, wanting to go back to the cool dream I was having, dreading getting up, looking for the bedside phone to call for room-service (I wish), looking for the bedside phone so I can call for maid service (I wish). Basically, all the same things a boy would want just in adult form.)
Bathroom and morning house chores. Pick up dirty clothes. Load / or unload dishwasher. Pick up stray toys left by Baili around the house. Pick up stray ‘coke zero’ cans left by me around the house.
Make breakfast. I normally have a high-protein and low-carb breakfast. Example: couple turkey sausage links and a wheat english muffin. (About 350 calories, 25 grams of protein, 20 carbs.)
Clean breaksfast mess. I usually put everything in the sink (putting off until later what I can put off even later when later arrives).
Make coffee and start my work day. Usually by 9am. Laptop comes on. Blue tooth in my ear. Two phones near me, home and cell. CNN on the big screen (or light jazz). Candle lite on the mantle. My work day has begun. Working from home is the best perk of my life. Depending on the day of the week (Monday - Wednesday) I normally work 10 hours a day. Thursday & Friday I normally work 8 hours a day. With occassional phone calls in the evening. - Approximately 50 hour week.
Eating lunch. I normally eat lunch with my laptop open (sitting on my lap) my lunch sitting to my left. I rare stop and just “eat” lunch. I think this is a mistake. I think contributes to thoughts of hunger later. Because eating was such an ‘non-event’ I think my mind felt cheated out of the ‘experience’ of the meal. Here is a confession. I have eaten lunch before and kept working only to forget that a) that I ate luch at or b) what I had for lunch. I have done this numerous time. This is very scary because I think this has allot to do with the psychology of hunger. My mind needs to comprehend that I am full.
Finishing a busy day. Many times in the evenings I still have my computer on my lap around 6:30 pm or even later. Because the ‘home office’ is in California; I tend to work later to be available to the PST crowd. It is not unheard of for me to be sitting with my laptop at 8pm working.
College. Just like John Belushi I wear a ‘college’ shirt everyday. I have been taking class at the University of Phoenix for about 1.5 years now. I love the idea of being a student. I have many goals in life that are attached to educatioin. FYI - I have scheduled myself to take the LSAT on February 9th of 2009. Can’t wait to see how I do on the test. Each night I spent between 1 and 3 hours doing school work. Writing papers, posting, reading etc. Knowledge is fun.
Dinner? Did I mention that I ate dinner in fron to my computer? Oh yeah. I did a repeat of the lunch routine only this time for dinner. I most-likely ate dinner while on a phone call with someone from the home office or while creating a contract for a client. Again, my mind feels cheated out of the ‘experience’.
Its after 9pm do you know where your day went? There are days when I can honestly say I cannot remember stopping for a single moment to rest, ponder, and or just ‘play hookie’ with my mind. I am exhausted. My day is nearly done and I am trying to achieve some ‘down-time’. One of my favorite down-time things to do is watch Two-and-half men. I know, not much social redeeming value there but, it makes me laugh. But, my watching this show is not the reason I named this blog after the name sake show I love to watch. Keep reading.
It’s after 11pm do you know how long you have been sitting in the same place? I estimate I sit and or work from the same place on my couch for approximate 10 - 11 hours. Not withstanding bathroom breaks, drink runs (coffee, etc), occassional snack run. Its now wonder that my legs feel stiff and my joints don’t want to move when I get up to do something.
Bedtime. I get myself ready for bed. I turn off the big screen. I blow out the candle (been on since the morning), I turn off the lights and put myself to bed. I lay there wondering how productive I have been and if I accomplished anything that I wanted to achieve?
Did I eat to much today? - I can’t remember.
Did I get any excercise? -No.
Did I spent 20% of my day doing anything for me? - Not really.
Did “I” exist today or did the alien invader who makes me a dependable person take over?
It’s no wonder that a person in this scenario could end up weighing the weight of two-and-half men. If the average man weighs 180 lbs then two and half would be 450 lbs. I think I see why weigh gain is so easy. I think I recognize a pattern in my life that sets me up for descruction. But, in order to break this cycle I have to do the following:
Stop eating in front of the computer, tv, and make it an ‘event’
Get some excercise. Even 30 minutes of walking would be better than the ZERO I have been getting.
Let work know that I have boundries. After 6pm, I will only answer the phone, AIM, or emails at my discretion. I have to separate work and life. I cannot continue to be pulled into “emergency” phone calls that are not even close to emergencies.
Remain positive about my self image. I am doing great compared to 626 that I started with.
Make good food buying choices. If you don’t buy it you can’t eat it.
Remember life is too short. Life is too short to give up so much, to gain so little, to end my day with so few moments I call “mine”.
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