Operation Momentum: Mission Abandoned

Some of you may remember that dammit, I had goals! There were plans to improve my physical health through weight loss and exercise, and to improve my mental health by getting help with my needle phobia and taking a break from fertility treatments.

I lost 28 pounds, restored my relationship with The Husband, found ways to incorporate activity into my everyday life and uncovered some joy in the little things like playing outside with my kid. But now, I have to abandon the mission for a little while. Don't chastise me! I have a very good excuse:

Kidlet 2.0: ETA June 2013

Lest We Forget

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place: and in the sky
The larks still bravely singing fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead: Short days ago,
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved: and now we lie
In Flanders fields!

Take up our quarrel with the foe
To you, from failing hands, we throw
The torch: be yours to hold it high
If ye break faith with us who die,
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields

- Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, 1872-1918

The Fall of Entrecard

Many of you won't have heard of Etrecard, and that's OK because it's now defunct anyway. Entrecard was a blogger network where you visited other sites in the network and clicked on their ads. Along the way, I found a lot of great reading material. The traffic boost that came from Entrecard was nice, but like any system that rewards for hopping around to different sites there, were a lot of people spending a lot of time accumulating points but not actually reading the posts they were landing on. A predictable increase in bounce rate ensued.

BUT - there was also a lot of bloggers using the system as it was intended, which was to advertise your own blog while finding other great reads. And then the lights went out. Outages were common and a lot of people grumbled but I always thought you get what you pay for, and in this case you paid nothing. This time the outage was for good. I had gotten around to adding some of the blogs I read regularly on Entrecard to my Google Reader, but not all. Shit.

Lucky for us, Grandma's Goulash features a link list of Entrecard bloggers so we can find each other again. Hooray!

Operation Momentum: Week 6 Update

The universe has been working against me! When I started bootcamp in the park, I came the realization that I loved it because I just don't like exercising indoors. Now I've had rain in my house and the straggling bits of a hurricane to work around. I haven't done so hot with the new goals, but life happens. I'm not letting it knock me off the rails. Let's see how things are going, shall we?

1. Keep up the increased activity: Aquafit was cancelled again this week, but I made it last week. The pool is nearly hot tub temperature. Seriously, it's 90F in there. It's quite pleasant after a long day. I just wish they'd get their shit together on the schedule. Walking most of the way home a couple of times a week works well until pouring rain makes the notion unappealing. Things are clearing up this week and I'm looking forward to the crisp freshness of fall in the air.
2. Lose another 15 lbs by the end of the year: 44% complete. Yes that SHOULD be 50% at this point, and thanks for noticing. I put the blame squarely on the collision of rainy weather and Halloween candy. 
3. Do something fun, as a family, outside, at least once a month: Our plan for a day at Whittamore's Farm was thwarted by rain, inside and out. I'm going to have to investigate more indoor alternatives because this kid has entirely too much pent up energy.

Sure, it's mediocre progress, but it's progress!

On being a friendlier blogger

In addition to posting somewhat sporadically, I've also been a pretty lousy reciprocal blogger for months. I don't reply to comments. That's not because I don't value what you have to say. It's because I always mean to, but the stock Blogger comment system doesn't have a reply to thing, I can't reply in my email client when I first get the comment so I have to do the @CommenterName thing, and by the time I get around to that it has probably been weeks since you left the comment in the first place. So then I'm expecting you to remember that you commented here and come back to check it.

Let's face it... You have better things to do.

That's why I have installed a new commenting system. It should allow for more discussion, give you the option to follow replies, and allow me to reply directly from my email, thereby greatly reducing the chances that I'll forget all about it. I'm not saying that will never happen, but baby steps here people! Baby steps. Thanks for sticking with me, even when I'm a horrible blogger friend.