MikeBenton.org

Of the year…

Okay so the fires really weren’t all that interesting, that’s why there is only one post about them. My unit was backup to the backup so we spent the whole time sitting around and coming up with things to keep ourselves busy. If it wasn’t for the lack of barracks I would have thought we slowly evolved into an active duty unit.

As a result of the massive amount of time I spent in CA doing nothing I was unable to finish my semester in school with an acceptable grade. I ended up withdrawing and it has cost me an entire additional year in school. I only need three classes to finish this degree. One builds upon the other two and they don’t offer that one in summer school. I have to wait until fall to finish. THEN I can go to the next school. I am disgruntled about that .

On the other hand, I have been super busy with other business. Pocketnow.com asked me to be Senior Editor for AllShadow.com and it has proven to be a tremendous success. The site grew geometrically for awhile and now it’s time to supe up some efforts. It’s really fun to watch a community grow from the beginning and know that you had your hands in it.

On military side, I was recommended to compete in the NCO of the Year competition for my battalion. I reluctantly accepted. I had never been to a board before so I was a bit anxious. I over studied and aced the board. Then I competed in the Brigade board, which I won. More recently I competed in the California State NCO of the Year board and will find out Feb 9th if I won or not.

It has been a positive experience. I have greeted each challenge with positive anticipation and look forward to the next. Growth has been unavoidable through this process and in a way it become a Rite of Passage. Many of the events are easy and for the ones that are challenging I remind myself that there is only this once.

Saturday I returned from Utah after 2 weeks in a Warrior Leaders’ Course to further my military professional development. For some reason I don’t feel like I get enough of this stuff.

I joined LA Fitness a month ago and have been working out religiously. I’ve dropped 15 pounds and feel a lot better. I am not at my goal yet though. Unlike most people, I do not have a goal weight, maybe a goal body fat. Thing is, I remember FEELING great and able to do anything. Now, I am getting closer but I know some activities will give me a tough time. I ran an 11 minute 30 second 2-mile once for crying out loud. I’m nowhere close to that now, but I inch closer everyday.

If I had to nail down a goal it would be this:

• 12% - 18% Body Fat
• 12 minute 2 mile
• 300 pts (max) on PT test
• Never feel tired
• See that six pack again
• Turn some heads

Diet change has had a lot to do with it. I’ve been eating A LOT less unhealthy food and actually have a slight addiction to healthy food now. I pass on a lot of snacks because I know what they are doing to my body. I still smoke, but I’m working on that. I like the comfort of it for some reason (I know, no lecturing okay!)

I’m trying to stay balanced with the physical fitness thing. For the most part I have been doing mostly fat burning exercises. Now it is time to beginning transitioning into strength and endurance as well. One thing that I keep in mind is flexibility. I have no desire to resemble that semi truck looking dude that can’t tie his own shoe. I want some Bruce Lee/Jet Li/Jackie Chan type manueverbility.  

I also got a new bike for Christmas. I love it. It is a Montague Military Folding Bike, so I can put it in the trunk for some travel. I’ve put it through it’s paces and still look forward to trashing some trails. Feels great to ride again. My brother and I went on a bike ride a few weeks ago that reminded us of our childhoods as we explored and found some new trails.

On the HOA side, things are slowly moving along. Leaky roofs, unhappy residents, landscaping is usually a mess. It’s tough with a small budget but we make it work. Elections are coming up again. Wonder if I’ll go for a third term…

Well there is a lot in this post already. When I get some time, I’ll break down some stories for ya. If there’s anything you want to hear more about, let me know in the comments!

Kind of hit a stand still on posts here. Not that there isn’t anything to post about. But for awhile I got so busy that posting just stopped. I also stopped giving a damn about the money making posts.

Why? I thought about it. There are different levels of posters, some have lower level blogs like mine that no one really looks at. Just valuable for the search engine links and helping someone else’s site become more popular. Us dredge, get paid a bit for our posts but the real money comes from people who have actual content on their site. That is why I started this blog. I wanted to have a forum in which I could post my writings of actual stories, not my day to day activities, and maybe receive some feedback. Hopefully, someday, I would have enough material to print a book. Somehow along the way the path deviated from the goal, the purpose.

I suppose there is some original content here, but not enough to make me proud. I even stopped promoting the site. Well, I would like to get back to it, back to the purpose of it all. Even if the stories make no sense I should post them. Someone will like them…right?

Not much in the way of press about this but all of a sudden this kindling has turned into a fire. Amazon has brought E-ink digital paper technology to the backpack and reading chair overnight. The Kindle is sort of like a notebook and sort of like a paperback, but not. It uses Amazon’s Whispernet to download new volumes, books, newspapers, blogs etc. It even has Wikipedia access. The display is readable in all types of lighting that normal paper is readable in. I can’t describe how cool this is so you will have to check it out yourself.

See the video

Should see a gallery below

[Show as slideshow]

this is a test post

These companies burn my ass like a fire about 3 feet high. They offer Veteran’s Day discounts anywhere from 20-50% ‘in honor of those that serve’ However! If one of ‘those that serve’ were to walk into the store any other day and ask if they have a Veteran’s discount they would get a solid ‘no’. Whatever happened to Veteran’s Discounts?

This time I reviewed the Logitech QuickCam Pro for Notebooks. It’s an awesome little piece of technology. Go here to read more.

First off, I commend everyone that is assisting in the fire fighting effort in California. Yesterday I was alerted that my unit was being mobilized to assist in the efforts. It is kind of funny because I just dropped off my car an hour earlier for warranty work that would take a couple of days. For those of you that do not know, my unit is in California, which requires some driving.

So after a little stress moment a very sweet family member let me borrow a vehicle to come out here.

We have been sitting around all day pretty much just waiting to be sent somewhere. Now I understand that a good part of the fires are under control but I do not understand why we are not being sent to help with the other fires. I was actually excited to get to do some proactive work but we have no activity going on.

Just my two cents worth of a gripe. On the other it is good to be with the guys again and laugh and joke around again, my favorite past time.

Vista is problematic, too much doesn’t work and if it does it usually costs money (yes Linux I hear you). In the past I have used PDFCreator (the free open source version) on Windows XP/2000 however it doesn’t work on Vista. So in search of a solution I found CutePDF. I just installed it and performed some test prints. It has worked flawlessly so far. So if you just need to print an occasional PDF and don’t want to shell out some dough take a look at CutePDF.

Like I said before, it has been awhile since I took part in some formal martial arts training. I love it! If you haven’t or aren’t doing so right now, I suggest you look up a local dojo near you and take an intro class or if they let you, take part in an ongoing class. It feels good to be active and roll around on the mat for awhile.

For the class, Sensei suggest we wear a gi, sweatpants/shirt, or something else that won’t rip. So I ordered a uniform so I could really get involved without worrying about what happens to my clothes. I am taking this at my community college but what I would really like to do is go to the dojo a few times a week. So I am going to find room in my budget for that. I’ll let you know how it goes. Peace!