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First!

So, that was random…

In the past, I’ve had blogs focused on single subjects (cooking, blogging, SharePoint Governance), or related subjects (my career + career management).

I’ve genuinely wanted to go back and write more on those blogs, and eventually I will. But things in my life have been unfocused for a while now (not in a bad way, but in a preventing-me-from-focused-writing way).

I love writing. In my previous blogging run, I found that the more I write, the more I have to say. So it makes sense to me that just the act of writing out my random unfocused thoughts will help me get back in the swing of writing on my more focused areas.

But since I have already established “brands” for my existing blogs, none of which are really suited for just randomly writing about whatever, this requires the use of some other venue for what I am about to write.

I could do what I used to do, and post my random thoughts to Facebook. Facebook actually used to have a specific format for writing longer posts. But that seems to be gone now, and I haven’t been active on FB for years. I’ll look in on it occasionally, but it really not a major part of my online life. Really, for me FB is a rolodex of people I would like to make sure I don’t lose track of.

Which brings me to the Random Thought Generator. Like a Random Number Generator, its mostly not really random (just pseudorandom).

Like my other blogs, I promise to try to be entertaining and/or informative. I hope you find it enjoyable.

Whither Social Media, Wither Social Media

Social media has reached an interesting point.

It’s been a regular staple of my daily life for a while, interacting with people that I know, people that I know of, and people I don’t know but share similar interests.

I haven’t been a regular user of Facebook for quite a while, but I keep the account as it provides me a way to keep the contact information (or at least a contact method) for people I know but that I am not in regular contact with.

I’m on Twitter quite a bit, but mostly to interact with a very few specific people and others who follow them. Those accounts tend toward the very quippy, and it is fun for me to jump in with a bon mot or a bad joke of my own. There are a few writers, musicians and other creative types who I follow to keep up with their latest endeavors. I don’t spend a lot of time on it, but, as I said, it has been a regular staple.

Under new ownership, Twitter has announced changes to the cost of having a verified account, among other changes, which has led to folks considering quitting the service.

These departures may or may not eventually happen. But if they do, and Twitter’s utility and/or entertainment value vanish, it will be hard to justify continuing to be an active user of the service myself.

If Twitter eventually requires a subscription fee to use the service at all (unlikely, but possible – it didn’t seem possible they would charge an annual verification fee with an expense that looks to outweigh the benefits, but here we are) then I might end up not being on the service at all.

In that eventuality, I wanted to make sure that folks who are interested in me and the… stuff that I have to say have a place to continue to be amused, enlightened, informed, or bothered by it (as the case might be) going forward.

Changing Habits

My dad has diabetes. He’s been living with it for years.

Last year, my doctor told me that my blood sugar was at the top of the normal range, and had me do additional testing, the A1C test. That also came in at the top of the normal range.

The doctor recommended cutting back on my sugar and carb intake in general, and I concurred. From watching my dad, I know that diabetes isn’t something to play around with, or bury my head in the sand.

Prior to this warning, my eating habits were… well, here’s an example. I’m a person of habit – I find something I like and that’s the thing I do. Variety is fine, but I like what I like. SO I was eating the same thing every day for breakfast and lunch, like clockwork.

Breakfast was three granola bars, and lunch was a can of pineapple. Pineapple is fruit, so that is too terrible, but every day? And on top of the granola bars… well let’s be honest: chocolate covered granola bars are really just candy bars with some oats thrown in as a fig leaf. I was eating three candy bars and a can of pineapple every day.

And I ate corn chips any chance I could. In quantity. And a big bowl of ice cream at every opportunity for dessert, and any candy or cake that was available…

Again, diabetes isn’t something to mess around with. Since last October when I got the warning, I changed my breakfast to hard boiled eggs, lunch to a can of soup. I (mostly) stopped eating chips (I failed at the three team happy hours we’ve had to resist chips and salsa – my kryptonite – but at least the last time I actually ate moderately, so there was a win!). The doughnuts and cookies and cake that get brought into work frequently (that I used to partake of)? Ignored (though occasionally with a whimpering sound tbh).

And here are the dessert items I have eaten since October:

  1. Two spoonfulls of cheesecake (one each at my daughter’s two birthday celebrations)
  2. Five spoonfulls of ice cream (from three different batches of home-made ice cream that my daughter made (she’s a bad influence?)
  3. A cookie
  4. A VERY thin slice of cake for my birthday

And that is it.

I’ve been avoiding optional carbs, like when we have spaghetti I have the meat, the sauce, and the cheese, but skip the noodles, and like not eating the bread that gets served at restaurants while you’re waiting for them to bring your food.

I have been avoiding almost anything that is sweetened, but when sweetening I use Splenda instead of sugar. I still sweeten my coffee with flavored non-dairy creamer, but I have been using less and not supplementing with Splenda.

Amazingly, once I stopped, the craving for sugar (and carbs in general) is mostly gone, and I use a LOT less sweetener because I no longer need things to be as sweet.

For dessert, I have been eating frozen grapes (red grapes are best for this). Freezing them causes the cells to burst, making their sweetness more accessible. Just a few is all it takes to satisfy the craving for something sweet.

Basically, I made changes as though my life depended on it.

Which, while I’m not even pre-diabetic, it does (from a long-term point of view).

Please Allow Me to Introduce Myself

I’m a man of wealth and taste. (Thank you, Rolling Stones)

Is one out of three bad? (Thank you, Meatloaf)

I am, variously:

  • The SharePoint Therapist
  • The Spam Guy
  • A SF and comics geek
  • [Redacted]
  • Dad of two
  • Husband
  • Frustrated thespian
  • Nascent writer
  • A decent cook, a pretty good mathematician (Thank you, Jewel)
  • Music appreciator
  • Internet addict
  • Former television show host
  • Handy around the house
  • VP of a local non-profit
  • Co-organizer of the local SharePoint User Group

Some of these are more relevant than others, and their relative relevance may vary depending on the context.

I have existing blogs on three or four of the above topics (depending on how you count them), as well as blogs on other topics.

Check out my various other internet presences and affiliations.

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