First of all let’s go over some of the goals I had set for myself before I stopped blogging:

• I didn’t do the greatest at keeping up on the guitar. In fact I quit practicing all together. It’s sad, because I still really want to learn to play, but right now I just have so much going on (lame excuse I know).
• I stuck to my dieting goals, eating smaller portions mainly, but also eating healthier in general. Well this one is a big whopping success! I went from 215 pounds when I first posted I would try a healthier diet, down to a much more appropriate 185 pounds today. Yay me!
• I’ve stuck to the excercise….mostly. I’ve been trying to hit the gym about 3+ days per week. I’ve also been trying to run as much as possible. This comes and goes. Some weeks I do great, others not so great. I know I can run a 5k in about 22-25 minutes though.
• I’m still working on building my financial strength. This proves harder for me than I realized, but is still chugging along at a positive pace. I’m working on improving my credit/savings enough to buy a house next summer. More on that next.
• School. It sucks. I’ve been at a loss about what I really want to do with my life other than making money. I work in healthcare and love it. So naturally I decided maybe nursing would be a good fix for now. I thought that to be an RN (LPNs never get the respect or pay they deserve) you needed 4 years of college (BSN). I was wrong! I discovered this week that I qualify for a 3-semester RN program at a local college. I’ll be spending my next year retaking one or two classes to improve my odds of being accepted, but I’m excited about my new direction!

So to recap, I’ve been busy! But I HAVE been making improvements in my life, so it’s not for waste

Because of my increasingly hectic life and my goal to maintain great grades this semester in school, I decided to drop one of my courses for this semester. This still leaves me at a full-time status in school, but I feel like having this one less class will help me manage stress, get better grades, and focus on all my goals. I also signed up for a condensed summer course. I plan on taking some paid time off from work during the summer classes so I can get them out of the way.

My eating also slipped up this week. I found myself eating out several times through out the week because I was too busy to stop at home and prepare a healthy meal. Along with that, I didn’t work out at all this week (maybe once or twice). Yup…I feel like crap already. It’s amazing how fast you can go from feeling like you’re in great health to feeling cruddy.

In other news, I bought a few new websites and am working on restoring some old ones, since I let all my internet hobbies drop a while back. Who knows if anything will come of them, but it’s a skill that can only benefit.

This next week is a lot less hectic for me. I work my three 12-hour shifts, but they’re spaced out better this week. My class that has been dropped will allow me to have a little more normal schedule as well. So plans/goals for this next week:

1. Write some good, quality articles for this blog

2. Practice the guitar

3. Sell my car (Oh yeah, forgot to mention that. I’m selling my Nissan 240SX)

4. Work on my other websites, especially the forum on a particular site.

Internet Stuff

I’ve been reading a lot lately and trying to really sink my teeth into CSS, XHTML, and PHP. It’s been really interesting to watch my learning curve. Because I’ve been so busy and because I’ve set myself back a little bit by deciding to learn PHP/CSS/XHTML better, I haven’t accomplished as much in the last month as far as final product goes as I would’ve liked to. I’ve got some really big plans in my head right now, for three sites in particular. Another thing I did recently was upgrade my webhosting from just a basic plan to a larger reseller plan so that I can manage my sites a little more easily (hopefully), but migrating can be a bit*h. I’ve had a lot of downtime the last week because of it. Oh well, life moves on.

New Toys

While scouring eBay one day (I do get a little free time), I noticed that Dell Latitude laptops were going very cheap in particular. So, on a whim, I decided to bid $200 on one and guess what…I won it. It’s only about a year or two old and is in sweet condition, it was a heck of a steal I think. I’ll make a full review a little later I think .

School (Ugh)

So as you gathered earlier (I hope), school has been in full swing for me and it’s kind of killing me. I don’t think I’m doing poorly in my classes, but between the 18 credits (I dropped them down to 12 right before mid-term), working three 12-hour shifts a week, and trying to keep up with internet stuff and everyday life…it’s a killer! I think for next semester I’m going to have to scale some things back a little. BTW, my advice for anyone considering college (because if you’ve been through the shock already, you don’t really need this advice), do all you can to avoid working while going to school. I realize it’s a necessary evil for most, but it’s so much easier if you can devote all your energy to studying.

New Year

As 2008 is approaching, I like to kind of think about what I want to accomplish in the next year. Usually I put this together into some sort of list for myself, but this year I think I will post the list on here. It’s not done yet, but it’s coming along so watch out for it.

Well that’s it for the moment. I’ll try and be more dilligent about posting, but I can’t really guaruntee anything

1. Read the chapter before the lecture. Reading the material before you have the lecture should make sense. It allows you to get a basic understanding of what’s going to be covered and formulate any questions you’re going to have so you can get answers during the lecture. If your questions don’t get answered during the lecture, be sure and ask them. Every professor I’ve had encourages questions and discussion during the lecture time, don’t be afraid to ask.
2. Outline the material. I like to do this in stages. While reading the material before the lecture I read it one section or topic at a time. After I’ve read that topic, I go back and outline the key points, then move onto the next section. If I have questions, I write them down so that I can ask them during lecture.
3. Type your outline. After you’ve had your lecture and have all your questions answered, you should have a pretty good outline or set of notes. I wait until the end of the week to type up all my outlines and notes. That way it gives me a little refresher of what I’ve learned that week.
4. Start studying for tests BEFORE the day of the test. Cramming doesn’t work. Just face it. You need to be in a constant state of study to be successful at test time. You’ll be surprised at how much information you retain when you simply glance at all your outlines once a week, and you’ll remember it longer. A week or two before an exam go back over the outlines a little more in depth, focus on what you know will be on the test. You need to do this in three to five separate sessions to be effective.
5. Keep your notes. Your classes are meant to give you knowledge you’ll use for the rest of your life, and other classes. So keep your notes and study aides, you’ll almost definitely use them later on down the road.

Yeah, I know this sounds like a lot of work. Hey, I just spent the last 2 1/2 hours outlining my one chapter for biology. College isn’t supposed to be easy, but if you’re going to be paying for it, you might as well succeed!