This morning something very rare and unusual happened at work. A co-worker handed me a small picture book she found on Elvis as a present. I feel that the reason she gave me the book is because I have a lot of Elvis photos in my cubicle. The name of the book is called Elvis: An American Idol by Susan Doll.

People at work rarely give me things as presents. So I am not quiet sure what I should do. Does this mean that now I have to buy something for her?

The last person to have given me a present not during Christmas was was Ms. Helena. She gave me a set of small resin bears. I suppose she gave them to me because I have bears on my desk. Luckily, I did not worry too much over it because it was a couple of weeks before Christmas and I was going to buy her a Christmas present anyway.

Overall, the picture book the co-worker gave me is quiet lovely and there are a lot of Elvis photos in it that are new to my eyes. Thanks, Angela!

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10743
MILES....2.37
CALORIES BURNED....394

I’M BACK!!!

Sorry that I have not written much lately. I have been doing a lot of serious overtime at work. So for the next few days I will be filling in some of the blanks from May 4th to May 9th onwards. I say some of the blanks because there were days where I was so busy that I did not have time enough to type anything in my Alphasmart 2000. Hopefully, everything will be somewhat caught up by July 4th.

Oh, by the way I am still continuing on with my exercise program of walking 10,000 steps or more a day and doing yoga in the morning.

DAILY WALKING STATS
My stats today according to my trusty Omron pedometer is that I have walked 10,319 steps which translates to 2.28 miles and I have burned 400 calories. My ultimate goal is to just continue on walking for fitness. Who knows? Maybe someday I might become a professional race walker!

WALKING LOG

STEPS....7281
MILES....1.60
CALORIES BURNED....297

WALKING LOG

STEPS....8080
MILES....1.78
CALORIES BURNED....320

WALKING LOG

STEPS....5588
MILES....1.23
CALORIES BURNED....253

WALKING LOG

STEPS....13064
MILES....2.88
CALORIES BURNED....507

WALKING LOG

STEPS....6252
MILES....1.38
CALORIES BURNED....243

WALKING LOG

STEPS....14662
MILES....3.23
CALORIES BURNED....534

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10227
MILES....2.25
CALORIES BURNED....387

This morning the front door to my apartment building was acting kind of well, hinky. You know weird. It was difficult to get it to lock properly. I decided to stay home because I felt uncomfortable about the lock. If it was this difficult to lock, it might be doubly difficult to get back in! Besides I spent nearly half an hour trying to figure out how to get it to lock. At half an hour out I had already missed not one but two light rail trains! It was best to stay home and call it a personal day. So I left a message on the landlord's answering machine at about 6:30 in the morning and took a bus over my father's house. I figured that by the time I got back the lock would be fixed

While over there my father mentioned the problem might have been with the tumblers inside the lock. I have no idea what they are but it sounded like a reasonable enough answer to me.

On the way over to my father's house I stopped off at McDonalds to buy something for breakfast for him. I now try to make it a practice to bring him food whenever I come by. I do this because my sister says that he feels constantly hungry but does not tell anyone. I am not sure how true this is because my sister is a little out there. Besides I can not see any harm in bringing him food. If he doesnt want to eat it right away he can just put it in the fridge and pop it in the microwave a little later.

WALKING LOG

STEPS....7457
MILES....1.64
CALORIES BURNED....267

Today, I was very tired. This was because I got home very late from visiting my father. It is also very hot outside and I need to rest big time.

WALKING LOG

STEPS....5030
MILES....1.11
CALORIES BURNED....223

WALKING LOG

STEPS....12427
MILES....2.74
CALORIES BURNED....474

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10503
MILES....2.32
CALORIES BURNED....417

WALKING LOG

STEPS....11398
MILES....2.51
CALORIES BURNED....414

WALKING LOG

Today, I walked down to the light rail station in the morning as welll as down to the other light rail station in the afternoon. It was a banner day for walking!

STEPS....12460
MILES....2.75
CALORIES BURNED....430

WALKING LOG

Today, for the first time on the way home from work I decided to walk down to the other light rail stop. I only did this because I discovered that I was only at 7000 steps and I needed 3000 more steps to make goal

STEPS....11612
MILES....2.56
CALORIES BURNED....424

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10407
MILES....2.29
CALORIES BURNED....397

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10076
MILES....2.22
CALORIES BURNED....367

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10667
MILES....2.35
CALORIES BURNED....367

WALKING LOG

STEPS....10402
MILES....2.29
CALORIES BURNED....404

WALKING LOG

Today, I felt a little uneasy with the astronomical calories I was burning. So I rechecked the instruction book and discovered that I forgot to compute my stride length and enter it into the pedometer.

STEPS....10649
MILES....2.32
CALORIES BURNED....394

WALKING LOG

STEPS....11106
MILES....6.66
CALORIES BURNED....842

I felt uneasy all of yesterday. So I checked my answering machine and got the shock of my life. It appears that my father is very ill and my brother is in the hospital, again.

I am not too shocked about my brother being in the hospital because he has been in and out ever since he was a teenager. The usual cause of his being hospitalized is that he stopped taking his meds. When he stops taking his meds he usually becomes violent. This time he got in a physical fight with his landlord.

My father on the other hand is an almost paragon of good health. His only recent health complaint has been arthritis. So I was shocked to hear that he was in the hospital about a week ago. According to the message left on my answering by my sister my father has heart and liver failure as well as fluid in his lungs. They are also closely monitoring his heart. If I had not been so wrapped in doing overtime I could have been there for him.

Today, when I talked to him on the phone he sounded good, a lot better than he usually sounds on the phone. Hopefully, this means that he is getting better.

WALKING LOG
10515 STEPS
6.30 MILES
814 CALORIES

WALKING LOG

STEPS....11869
MILES....7.11
CALORIES BURNED....901

WALKING LOG

STEPS....7160
MILES....4.29
CALORIES BURNED....521

I did not go to church today because I was feeling a wee bit exhausted from all the overtime I have been doing.

Instead, I did my laundry and little bit of grocery shopping. I also wore my Omron pedometer with the intent of logging my stats for the day.

The big event of the day for me was accidently coming across the French Open. I watched a match between James Blake and Gael Monfils. I was riveted by it. Let’s face it I was riveted because I can not recall in recent memory ever watching a professional tennis match between two brothers. True, I can see two black guys playing tennis any day over at the park. But somehow this felt different. It was almost like a clash of black cultures.

On one hand you have Gael Monfils who is French but has this straight out of Compton look. He wore a black outfit instead of the usual tennis white. His hair was in corn rolls and he had on a big gold chain. He looked like any kid I would see hanging around my neighborhood. Except of course he is French and is exceptionally good at tennis.

On the other hand you have the American, James Blake. He has this very polished middle class vibe about him. His look is reminiscent of Vin Diesel.

While watching the match I had no idea who to root for, the kid from the hood or the brother from suburbia.

In the end the kid from the hood won. I really liked how he threw up his hand when he won. It reminded me of what an NBA basketball player would do. I can not wait to see Monfils play again.

And here for the first time ever is my walking log for today. As you can see I didn't walk to much today.

WALKING LOG
STEPS....4082
MILES....2.44
CALORIES....283