Ain't nothing going nowhere

Or so it appears. We're gearing up for round 2 of OMGWINTER around here. Just two weeks ago Atlanta was hit with one of the prettiest and most disruptive snow storms in recent memory. This time, they're calling for all different types of frozen and not so frozen water to fall. Words like "Worst ice storm in years" keep popping up. Let's hope it comes as snow or sleet instead of rain that freezes on contact. I'm not looking forward to the possibility of having no power!

Blog? What blog?

This thing has lain here dormant for many, many moons. Today I took a stroll back through time, reading what I posted over the years. I realized that I'm missing out in the long run by not continuing to blog. Therefore (yes, therefore), I'm back blogging. Going to really work hard to keep this thing updated, not for you but for me. Good to be able to reach back and remember what happened way back.

Since I've blogged last a lot has happened. We've lost a couple of special dogs, Lobo and Sweeney. We've bred puppies out of Rumor (an AKC GCh, FCh and ASFA FCh) and Everett (LCM 11 or 12), keeping both puppies (India and Marra).

Two of the kids have graduated and gone off to college. One decided that school wasn't for him right now, the other is finishing her Junior year at Kennesaw. Corey and his fiance' Hannah had a baby making me and R grandparents!!! He's a great baby and I just love it when I get to hang out with him. We love Hannah too and are glad that she's in the fam. The youngest kid is still in High School, finishing her Junior year this year. 

I'm still working at Clayton, mostly doing VMware stuff, server administration, security and a little networking. I'm back in school and taking an intermediate networking class that is going to be quite demanding. We're going through our SACS review soon and part of the remediation from the last time is to provide "more seats" for students. Translated, the library is too small with too few places for kids to study. What does this mean for me? Well, for the first time in probably 15 years, I'm sharing an office with someone. This will be it's own topic later, believe me.

R went back to school and got her degree in Human Resources with a focus on Training and Development. She worked for Satair for a couple of years in the HR department, learned some really valuable stuff, made good friends and even got to travel a little bit. Her boss at Satair has become her best friend and she and her friends have really become very close to us. Back in December, R got an opportunity to work at Suntrust doing what she was really passionate about in college - Training and Development. So far, she is loving the job! She's in downtown now, so the commute is a little longer for her, but not too bad.

Since she's working downtown, we've been thinking that this is a good time for us to look for a place closer to town. Something a little smaller perhaps since we're downsizing on kids and not planning on gaining any more dogs. We both would like to get in the Tucker/Atlanta/Decatur area where we have friends living already and where I grew up.

We're not running dogs nearly as much as we did. I served a term as Regional Director for ASFA and came away more disillusioned and disappointed than when I went in. I think that ASFA is a dying organization the way it's operating right now and unless they have some serious new blood come in with drive, desire and energy, it won't be around too long. CHASE, our longtime club, has few working members. We're to the point where we're almost totally burned out on putting on trials. Not sure how many more years we'll be hosting trials. If I could find someone who wanted the equipment and would put in the effort, I'd pass it on. 

One thing that I am doing more of now is running. I have run The Peachtree Road Race for the past four years. I've run other races here and there, most notably a 10k in 2011 in 53:44 and a 15k that year as well. I have my ups and downs, but for the most part I get quite a few miles in a week and am keeping myself relatively healthy.

Beer is still a passion, probably even more so than ever. I've found a few good brews that I like a lot and enjoy often. I plan on getting back into home brewing this year as well. I'm working on saving up the bottles now! :D

My gun hobby has developed quite a bit in the past few years. Me and the boys have begun to shoot sporting clays more often, necessitating (!) the purchase of an over-under shotgun for the sport. I bought a Yildiz 12ga three years ago and have shot it quite often. I enjoy shooting it and look forward to using it for a while to come. Joining my old standby Ruger in the pistol department is a Springfield XDs in .45 and a Smith and Wesson 642 in .38. They're light, easily concealable guns. I had the XDs first and realized how true the saying "Two is one and one is none" is when Springfield issued a recall for the gun in September. I was without it until the first week of January, prompting me to get the 642. I had gotten R one earlier in the year and enjoyed it so much I had to have one.

I did get some ink last year, but I'd have rather not have gotten it for the reason I did. I lost my dear Grandfather last February quite unexpectedly. In honor of him, I got the CBI patch tattooed on my calf. I miss my Grandfather A LOT. I wish he was still here to give me the guidance I need.

There's probably no one who remembers this thing, but hopefully I can make some interesting posts for anyone dropping by. I know I'll enjoy reading this stuff again in a few years! ::

Wow, the weather

I'm very thankful that we made it through unscathed after last nights tornado outbreak. Megan woke us up about 12:25 to let us know that we were under a tornado warning. Looked at the weather and the system that went through Sunnyside (a small community about 18 miles away) was headed our way. We hunkered down best we could in the closet and waited out the storm - the storm that fizzled out before it got to us. We got lucky. Folks in Sunnyside didn't. Two people lost their lives and a number of homes and businesses were either damaged or destroyed. Our prayers are with those who were affected by the storms.

It's been a crazy Spring. A few weeks ago, I was woken up by a storm that went through early in the morning. That normally doesn't happen, so I knew it was bad. Once again we made it through with some small branches down, but no damage.

Hopefully you and yours are faring well during this weather.

Is anyone home?

I pretty much suck at blogging. I need to get back to this.

Last weekend was the American Whippet Club National Specialty Field Trials. This year they had AKC and ASFA coursing on the first weekend. I drove up to Richmond, KY Friday evening with Everett to see how he could do and to help out my good friend Steve who was Field Trial Chair for the weekend. It was a busy weekend with lots to do, but also an opportunity to see some really nice running dogs. Everett ran well in Veterans in the AKC trial, placing third, and placing fourth in Field Champions in the ASFA trial Sunday.

Oh, I didn't mention that Everett turns 9 (NINE!) today. Yeah, at nine years old he's still holding his own against the youngsters. He was recovering from an injury that he suffered earlier this year so he wasn't in great shape, but I thought he performed superbly!

My club, CHASE, is hosting ASFA trials this weekend in Cartersville. We're going to do three days this weekend, and host an awards banquet on Saturday night. Hopefully we'll have a decent turnout, but we're up against a couple of other events. We'll see.

Yeah, um, about that....

Hello again everyone, and welcome to a new year!!! I'm not going to say 'the start of a new decade' cause that happens *next* January 1.

Anyway, it's time to look back at my goals from last January and see where I am now.

Continue getting fit - I reached my lowest weight since high school earlier this year and it feels great! I started running seriously in June. I had a bit of a setback in August when I tore the meniscus in my right knee and required surgery in October. At the time of my surgery I was up to five miles at an average of a little over 10 minutes/mile. Not speedy, but a decent pace for a fat guy! Now I'm back up to running four miles and I averaged under 10 minutes/mile my last run. I feel like I'm in the best shape of my life and am really enjoying running. My goals this year are to run the Peachtree Road Race in July in less that an hour and run a half marathon at Thanksgiving. I'd also like to get back in the pool and do some cross training.

I still have bad eating habits that need to be worked on. I'm better than I was even last year, but still could stand to eat better.

I didn't get any tattoo work done last year. Sweeney remains unfinished and though I have a ton of ideas rolling around in my noggin, I keep finding other things to do with any excess fundage I collect. Maybe this year! :)

I have not returned to school, but will in the Summer semester. I did take a VMware class that I took a lot away from and plan on doing more classes and getting my VCP later this year.

Yeah, the family pretty much takes care of itself. Loving them comes naturally. The kids are great and my wife is a wonderful, understanding, patient woman. Thank god.

Not sure about smiling, will continue to work on that. The exercise helps there by relieving some of the stress of life.

I have been backing up my data, but I just switched laptops from a MacBook (I hate the damn thing) to a new Dell with Win 7. Win 7 makes backups easy, I just have to do it!

Music collection is cleaned and streamlined. I love the digital format just for the portability!

Ruthanna and I didn't get to do a lot of travelling, but we did take a vacation to my favorite place in Florida, Cocoa Beach. I took the girls down a few days early while Ruthanna finished her classes after which she flew down and joined us. We all had a great time and look forward to getting back down there later this year.

I did not blog more. Blogged much less as a matter of fact. I blame Twitter and Facebook. Those two sites make it way to easy to just throw a quick post up and it shows up on a bunch of folks computers. I love it, but do miss the longer form of blogging. I'm going to try to do better this year.

Pretty good wrap up of what happened this year. Look for more later.

Almost 4 month update

I'm still here, alive and kicking. Twitter and Facebook have pretty much taken over for blogging for me. You can follow me on Twitter @sithndman or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/sithndman .

A lot has been going on here. Kids out of school, the oldest graduated High School, kids back to school and Corey gone to Kennesaw State University. I'm working myself into better condition than I've been in many years, running 15 miles or so per week and still cutting trees on the weekends.

The BMW has been a lot of fun this summer, but is out of commission right now. Seems that a seal has failed in the rear drive which made itself known by soaking the rear brake shoes to the point where they no longer provided any stopping power. I have the parts ordered and they should be here by mid-week, so I'll have the motorcycle back on the road soon!

Haven't run the dogs since the II, but that will start up again soon. We're planning on going to the WRA nats in October and I'm judging in November in California, that's about all we have planned so far.

We're actually going to get a vacation this year. I'm taking the girls down to Cocoa Beach in a couple of weeks (they'll be on Fall break) and Ruthanna will fly down and join us after her Tuesday evening class. Haven't been to the beach since 2007, so I'm jonesing pretty bad and really can't wait.

The inanity of it all

It really just makes me shake my head. Clayton County School System lost their accreditation a couple of years ago for multiple reasons including school board interference with day to day operation of the schools. Another problem cited was a so-called teachers unions actions. So what shows up on the homepage of the Atlanta rag? A story about how said 'teachers union' are protesting the hire of the new Clayton County School System. All six members. Six. Yeah, I said six. Yes, this makes front page news.

Here's the money shot. A quote by the chairman of the teachers union: "'I don’t like the fact that he’s from California,' said John Trotter, chairman of MACE. 'They don’t know the people. Clayton County likes their home folks.'" Yeah, that's a hell of a reason to oppose the assignment of a new superintendent.