The time has come for a change

When I was growing up, my brother and I were extremely active. This is back in the day when we'd kiss Mom good-bye in the morning and come home around lunch time because we were hungry, leave again after eating and come back around supper time cause...we were hungry again.

What did we did between meals? We rode bikes, built things, explored the woods, played baseball, football or any variation of a game near you. We were never sitting still.

In high school, I swam 9 months out of the year competitively and played tennis for about 6 months a year. Back in the day, a pair of shoes for tennis lasted me approximately 3 weeks. I kid you not. I had 3 tennis racks: 1 in the bag, 1 in my hand and 1 in the shop getting restrung.

My biggest weight problem growing up was losing to much. A few times I ran dangerously close to a BMI that was too low for a teenage male as active as I was. Oh, and I almost forgot, I worked too and maintained a B average in school. Nope...no weight problems for me.

College came and I did gain a few pounds, not a lot, but my diet sucked and I wasn't nearly as physically active as I had been. I was burned out on swimming.

After my first tour of duty at undergrad, I went through a few jobs trying to find my way. Most of these jobs were very physical and I felt the need to spend more money on beer and girls then food. No real weight problem here.

I met my wife and found a passion for computer science, I finally discovered the chair. No big deal, I still played softball and tennis and now rollerblading. Yep. I was doing well, weight-wise.

I came home from work one day and OhCountess has a surprise for me. It was a bib that said "I love my daddy." Really? Yeah, really. I was going to be a dad. I had no idea what this really meant, but I discovered one thing, my wife was now suddenly hungry and there was lots of food in the house. Before OhPrincess was born, I gained 30 pounds.

After she was born, I kept my new found weight about the same for 3 years. Never really losing the extra weight, but never gaining any more, until OhCountess tried the "I'm pregnant!" trick again. It worked, and I was able to gain another 30 pounds. CRAP!

In my entire life, I had never really had a problem keeping weight off, but now things were different. I am now a professional chair occupier. I'm really good at sitting on my ass. No, I excel at sitting on my ass.

Tonight, I've embarked on a new journey. I bought Wii Fit. I have my doubts that this will magically remove the weight, but what I'm hoping for is a reason to start a new routine. I've even started a journal to record my efforts. I spent about 30 minutes tonight trying it out. I'm one out of shape rounder.

I hope to chronicle some of this here. Post my progress, my accomplishments, my goals and hopefully, not too many failures, but with a little help my friends and a lot of poking me with a stick, I think I can get myself off the couch and into a smaller waist.

First goal - Lose 3 pounds in 2 weeks. Wish me luck!