I’m pretty full.  The lasagne tasted better than I feared it would (maybe a slight step down from Stouffer’s frozen lasagne)  I’m happy.  This means that I can deal with the food and be successful.  Brandy made the mistake of making Pillsbury biscuits that looked and smelled *SOO* good.  I had to literally leave the room.  I went upstairs and read — I didn’t want to be anywhere near them.  I figure with the weight I want to lose (total of 120 lbs, but my goal for the year is 50), I’m going to be on this for a year.  It’s going to be hard.  I will probably have times where I break down.  The biggest boost I think is that my meals are filled with sweets (a lot are sugar alcohols - will see how my digestive system deals with that soon)  If you’re interested in knowing more about the program, let me know and I can tell you more (it’s a simple online ordering process, no pyramid schemes, etc.) — I do get a small referral bonus though, so let me know if you’re interested.  Check out Nutrisystem.com for more details.

All that being said, I’m going to spare you the rest of the gory details.  I plan on updating on weight progress once a week though, and hopefully will be able to see some good progress soon.

Lunch today:

• Nutrisystem Chicken Noodle Soup
• 1 oz. of beef jerky
• a banana

Pretty tasty actually.  I also tried Brandy’s Red Beans and Rice, and it wasn’t bad - I’d consider eating that for lunch at some point.  I might just be able to complete my “Try 12 new things” goal!

For Breakfast, I’m having:

• Nutrisystem Apple Strudel Bar
• Yoplait Low-fat Yogurt
• 3/4 cup Blueberries

Yummy.

• Lose 50 lbs.
• Be able to ski blue runs
• Finish and release the music site that I have been working on for years and years
• Try (several times) 12 new foods
• Blog my progress

I hearby commit to these goals.

Signed,

Ed Salisbury

We started the celebration by going over to Brandy’s mom’s house for dinner (mmm, prime rib) and I played some Magic with my nephews.

At around 8 or so, we went back to our house, with nieces and nephews in tow, where we proceeded to play Guitar Hero World Tour for a couple of hours.  At about 11 or so, we came upstairs and found something else to do — Munchkin!

As the new year approached, we watched a little bit of the NYE countdown, and I almost broke down when I saw Dick Clark on there (I haven’t watched in years, and didn’t know that he had a stroke) .  Back to Munchkin.

For the countdown, we raised our glasses of apple and grape cider, and toasted the new year.  We went out to the back deck, and saw several fireworks shows going off, and I got the first kiss of the new year from Brandy.

After our Munchkin game, we headed downstairs to play a few more boardgames.  First, Carcassone.  Great party game, especially for people who haven’t played before.  Then we played a game of Risk, which of course, I won the global dominance

All in all, a good evening.

There is no magic pill that will make you tech savvy overnight, and you have to want it.   This means that you have to want it bad enough to where you are willing to let it take up a major part of your free time.   You have to be able to devote many hours a week to this, but it should be *fun*.  If what your doing is a chore, I would say that you probably aren’t doing it for the right reasons.  Yes, there is good money to be had in a tech career, but you have to like what your doing (and want to put in the time).

One of the things that drives geeks is the desire to figure things out.  Having lots of questions is a key trait of the geek — it’s one of the primary ways to learn.  You should never be afraid to ask questions.  As you get better at things, you’ll have more and more questions, but the great thing is the internet is chocked full of info, so the answer won’t elude you for long.

You will need a computer, Ideally one working, and as many others you can glom onto, working or not.  You *will* be getting your hands dirty!  Having parts laying around is a good thing too.  I have several boxen laying around just sitting there waiting to be ripped apart.  If you don’t have any other computers, I’m sure you can probably find some at a garage sale for cheap, or you might ask neighbors or friends.  One thing you’ll find, is when you start to become “the computer guy/girl” - people will ask you to help them all the time.  It can get a bit trying sometimes, but one thing that’s cool is that you’ll usually get free stuff out of the deal (here, you want this old piece of junk?  I bought this new computer, and don’t know what to do with it…)

One great thing about this is that this whole process should *not* cost you much money.  In fact, if you’re considering buying a computer to learn stuff, I’d advise you to wait, till you really know what you want.  Who knows, you might build it yourself!

A rough outline of the topics I want to cover:

Careers - What kind of jobs are out there for the geek, and how much money would I expect to make?  I plan on having Tracks of some sort, that would apply to these careers, namely:

• Programming
• Web Design
• Systems Administration
• Network Administration
• Hardware Tech

Basics - Things that all geeks need to know - all tracks would start here.  Here you will find such things as:

• Search Engine Usage - you’d be surprised how many people don’t know how to find the answers they’re looking for
• Basic computer usage checklist - You’ll need to know how to do some basic things before starting into the heavier stuff
• Computer/Internet History - Nothing too heavy, but having some knowledge of the roots is beneficial
• How a computer works - the basic functions of a computer - input/output, etc.