aneurysm

As the title suggests, I just found out I have an aneurysm... It sucks. The good news is that I caught it early. Its only 3mm (less than 1/8 inch), and its near the front of my head. Each of those facts means that it is less likely to rupture. Now, I just need to sit tight and wait for a doctor's appointment with a specialist.

My diet is now being heavily controled for sodium, and most things I like to eat are high in sodium. Trips to the grocery store are more than an hour just so we can go through the labels.

I am continuing my excercise because it will help my blood pressure. Perhaps the triathalon is still a possibility. Well, enough for now...

Fat man running

Well, it was daily, then every other day, then weekly, and now its been a month. So much for my initial energy for blogging. But now I got something else to keep posting... I was at the CHOP (Children's Hospital of Philadelphia) Triathalon yesterday and got the odd notion that my wife, my father in-law, and myself could do a triathalon relay team. Unfortunately, I would end up getting the running leg of the triathalon. My wife is an excellent swimmer, and my father inlaw bikes year round.

Well, I have a year to prepare... which begs the question, can a 240+ lb man who has not been physically active in the past several years get himself up to running a 5k run leg of a triathalon within a year?

Yesterday, I walked with my dog around the block (0.6mi total) and ran the last 0.3 miles. I was winded but not exausted. Hopefully this blog will help me keep my running up and (if anyone sees this) perhaps get some advice.

Well, its been a nother stretch between posts. Today was not good. The best part though was cutting up some harddrives on the waterjet. Other than that, it stunk. I didnt get the five specimen run that I wanted to get done. Instead my entire afternoon was spent cleaning up the warehouse and the clean room in the lab. Now, I'm going to need to get someone else to run the waterjet tomorrow....

And now after being good, my family is just driving me mad, asking me when I'm going to have some kids... I mean weve been over this several times and we were told that it was completely our decision when and if we do, but wow this was a very abrupt change!

I really need to find some way out of this one...

Well, I'm still trying to keep this up. I've been able to sit at my desk for a lot more than normal. The lab is just packed with people. Two new hires, the boss's son for summer work, and more people from the design side are back laying up fabric. With the extra manpower, I've been able to do some programming for the WJ, as well as some other administrative efforts.

This morning, my back is just throbbing. I'm not sure what I did to cause this, so I'm wondering if I'm sleep walking again... Well, time to get started.

Well, its been half a month since my last post... really slipping here... so much for daily. Maybe I can kick start myself back into this...

The last several weeks have been bad. Extra assignments pusing back what I really needed to take care of, phone tag with multiple people for multiple things, getting the exterior of the chimney refaced, and lots more.

The desk is assembled and has a nice plexiglass cover for it. Next is the hutch, but I got too much on my plate to worry about that yet... then onto a table for the living room to cleanup and organize the daily clutter that we take back and forth to work, church, and elsewhere.

enough for now, I need to get home and get ready for a yard sale.

Well, about a week since last... I seem to be slipping a bit here and I think I can tell that I'm not as focused. The writing seems to help me remember and keep everything together.

Last Friday's work was pretty normal as far as I remember. That evening I met dad over in Jersey for a quick chat, then stopped by my sisters to fix her lawnmower.

Saturday was good. We went out in the morning and ended up sleeping through part of the mid-day. We also put the finish coat on the one desk section.

Sunday went pretty well. Went to church and came home to do some cleaning. Then we went over to my parents to do some "work" for my sisters wedding stuff. Another arguement with dad over nothing and came home.

Monday was a quick, long day. The morning nearly blew by and I got some compression done. The afternoon, I was cutting moisture travellers and sorting out some chaos with raw material that seemed to be missing. I ended up working for 9.5 hr to help out with some custom testing where we looked at fiber orientation under the microscope.

Tuesday was ok, but hot. The exterior chiller was off all day so the indoor chiller was on all the previous evening and all day. it was 77 and noisy inside. I ran two tensiles and shipped out the missing material that I found Monday. Also, I ran some fiber volumes with the new guy.

Today was definately noteworthy. I've been trying to run tensiles all day, but keep getting interrupted. The biggest event is that the torsion system is now going to be a priority to get fatigue running. (Just for the ones of my fans... I designed and assembled the torsion system capable of enormous load and destructive capability using 3000 psi hydraulics) Of everything in the lab and shop, including having specimen fail catastophicly within inches of my nose, this is the only piece of equipment that freightens me.

The torsion system is menacing enough when I had direct control of the valve at my fingertips to run static testing. Fatigue testing needs to run automatically unattended for extended periods of time. I've redesigned the control system from the ground up to correct the original design problems that plagued me before from trusting the system. So, I'm going to take a week and tweek up the software to be compatable with the new electronics and let it rip. This is either going to end beautifly or horribly, but at least then we will know.

Wednesday was quite productive. I got all of the squares sliced off for shipment. Then I continued on the WJ and with some help finished blaning the OHT/OHC specimen. I got just a little testing in with the DCB fatigue, but the hinges popped off both sides.

Today was OK. I realized that some specimen were incorrect and spent quite a bit of my morning searching for the panels to get them remade. I think the machinist might still have them, but apparently they are going to be shut down until Monday. I helped setup the mill for processing the blanks we finished yesterday into specimen. The glass ones machined quite well, but the LIL was just a mess. After all that, I got some ILS testing done for a program, realized that we need to order some material from McMaster, and discussed automated chiller changeover operations with someone.