Day 4

Today is day 4. For most of the day I've had no issues with smoking, I had my coffee this morning, cruised the web a bit, caught up on news and played a game, all without thinking about it. I went out and shovelled snow, dug my car out, talked to a couple of neighbours, all without problems. This afternoon I took Kim to an optometrist appointment, and even though that took an hour and a half, I had no cravings. I even took the time to snicker at two ladies standing outside having a smoke break. A friend called while I was waiting for Kim, she quit 6 weeks ago, and is still on the patch. We traded stories for a while - all very therapeutic. All this reinforced my desire NOT to smoke.

Kim and I have been trying to have a lunch date since Christmas and today we finally went, off to Kelsey's, Kim had a pulled pork sandwich with Guinness BBQ sauce, I had a peppercorn sirloin burger. As Kim fixed the waitress's Blackberry, I had my first craving in a couple of days. After a good lunch, I always had a smoke, it was all habit. We drove home with full stomachs and tobacco-free.

After a couple more errands we made it home, and enjoyed family time with the kids, now home from school. Now, I'm sitting here typing this, and I'm struggling. For the first time today, I'm really having a hard time with the smokelessness. I know it's entirely psychological, but that doesn't make it easier. Kim's patch fell off a couple hours ago, and it doesn't seem to be bothering her at all! (there is a lot of talk from the next room about donuts and me going to Timmy's, but I'm not biting). I'm inching closer to the end of the day and a new one tomorrow, a day closer to being a non-smoker. Hopefully, I can make it through without any cravings. Realistically that's a long way off, but every day is closer to that goal.

Cheers.

Day 3

Damn, this patch itches. It fell off last night because I kept trying to relieve the itch and it finally gave out, so I sat there for a couple hours without the patch on. I really had no desire to smoke at that point, but eventually the urge came back. I've crashed a couple of time over the past couple of days, but most of the time my issue is purely habitual, not physical. The patch is ensuring I have a constant uninterrupted supply of crap I don't need and am trying to stop.

Kim started her treatment yesterday, one day behind me. She says she's doing well, again, the problem is habitual more than physical. I haven't seen her since Monday, tonight we'll compare notes and admit to each other that we've either caved in or come very close. We'll see, but so far this has actually been easier than I thought. However, it does require assistance. Will power is not my forte.

Last night we were hit with the "storm of the century", as the Windsor Star called it. We made all kinds of preparations, as three of us in the press department live at least a half hour down any highway from here. We got the boss to sponge for a hotel room close to the office. If we were to get wailed, the presses would still run. Two of us went there last night, got some pizza, munchies and some drinks, and watched the hockey game. Then shot the shit til 2am. I'm not exactly on top of my game today, this morning began hung over with no coffee and no smokes. Yuk. I quickly fixed the coffee situation, but I'm finding myself now struggling to resist the smokes. I still haven't had one, but it's tough.

The storm wasn't half as bad as predicted, even so the winds and freezing rain alone made staying in town worth it, no to mention the camaraderie of the evening. Today is crawling, and it seems like I've been here for two days - frankly, I have. I'm taking tomorrow off, and spending it with Kim. Hopefully, we can make it without the cravings.

Cheers.

Patching things up

This morning I put on the patch. I intend to quit smoking.

So far so good, I really don't have any cravings, except of course the habitual ones, it's such a habit to run out for a smoke if you're waiting for the computer to chew on something, or if you're bored. I'm finding that right now is a hard thing to overcome. The ride down to Kingsville this morning wasn't bad, I had no desire to smoke, as a matter of fact I had the window cracked open (even though it's -11 here), and took in the cold crisp February air. I'd like to say there was something different about how it tasted, but It had only been 2 hours since my last smoke at that point, kind of silly to expect results that quickly.

When the pang hit me to have a smoke though, I find taking a deep long breath can push that aside quite quickly. The sore cracking lungs quickly make their prominence, and suddenly the craving is gone. That's why I'm doing this, I can feel it in my chest, I can feel myself running out of breath. I feel like I'm 70. I'm 42.

When I've gone without before I feel the weight lifting off my chest. I feel the rush of air in my lungs, I feel better. Smoking is taking that away, and I miss it. Spring is coming, my favourite season, and I want to enjoy every minute of the warm spring air with all it's wondrous scents a and feelings, I don't want my lungs to fight back.

So day one is well under way. It's 11:30 and I don't want a cigarette. I'm really hopeful and optimistic about this lifestyle change. It's step one to fixing myself and reversing the trend towards feeling my age.

Step two begins in...... days? weeks?

Cheers.

Those poor newspaperists

I'd hate to be working in our head office today. Last night we pronounced our server dead. Yup, no files. The remnants of the server presently sit on my desk at home while I eagerly devise a solution to not having any files to create newspapers with. I'd hate to be in there right now, as I'm sure sharp objects would be thrown at me.

I'm the guy who's supposed to fix these things, and I couldn't, but not for lack of trying; I was still at it at 11pm last night, while on the phone with our IT department in Vancouver. Apparently I have to mail a pizza to Lawrence, the IT wizard because he was doing this work from home. I wasn't so lucky, I was 50 km away, in Kingsville.

I was actually done work at 11am yesterday morning, but because I work with the Kingsville cadets on Thursday nights, I was going to hang around, off the clock. I didn't feel like driving back to Windsor just to turn around again. At 3, I got a call that the server was non-responsive and they wanted me to immediately go to Tecumseh. So I did, in the blowing snow, I made it there in 45 minutes, took the drive out, and headed to our repair guy here to see if he could rescue the drive. Luckily, I had another machine there that was just being finished up, so I had a working G5 to test. It didn't work. So with Vancouver on the phone telling me what to buy, I walked out of Marty's shop with $700 worth of new drives and other crap, and headed back to Tecumseh. My thought was to try to mount the server drives in the G5 (they're identical machines) and try to mount them. Nothing worked.

Back on the phone with Vancouver. We brainstormed for a while, the only thought on my mind at this point is how to get the contents of the Kingsville server moved. Lawrence's idea was to clone the server onto the G5. Interesting idea, so off I went into the storm, back to Kingsville. I hooked everything up, called him to let him know he could start, and headed off to meet my corps friends for dinner - all this was conveniently timed! After food I headed back to the office to check progress, but there wasn't any. We couldn't clone the drive. At least we tried. Right now, it's 9:30am, and my boss is heading back to Kingsville for me to get data moved so they can at least try to rebuild.

This is a lesson in backups. Three papers going out on Tuesday with nothing archived. Yippee. I'd hate to be in that office right now. I'm sure there's people swearing. Alot. At me. I don't control the equipment, I just fix it. Now, a valuable lesson has been learned, and hopefully this never happens again. As for the drive that failed, made in China. Need I say more.

Cheers.

Time to get ethnic

I'm ordering my new kilt. Yup, it's about time I did something selfish and egocentric. I've wanted to for the longest time, but I couldn't justify the cost. I still really can't, but hell, I'm doing it anyway.

I found a great website that custom makes kilts, at a great price, and best of all, they're actually in Scotland, not Zambia, or Guam, or Bangladesh. I have nothing against these places, but a true kilt should come from the place that made them famous. Check out http://www.scotweb.co.uk if you feel you should also fulfil your destiny as a crotchety old Scot. They've got some great stuff.

I'm a Wilson, so our tartan is but-ugly. However, I am of the Clan Gunn, which if I was getting picky (and I am), they have much better colours. It's a difficult choice, even the Gunn offer 3 different tartans. If I hate it after I get it, I can't just have them redo it!

So this is my first blog entry since Remembrance Day, and I'm going on about buying a kilt. Kinda silly, but that's where my head has been lately. So much going on at work and at home, constantly running around and taking care of things elsewhere, I've decided to treat myself to something I've always wanted. Problem is, shopping for highland kit isn't the same as going to Moore's and buying a suit. The kilt is just the start, then there's the sporran, the hose, hose tabs, jacket, kilt pin, Sgian Dubh (small knife sticking out of your sock) and whatever else your heart desires. Lots of stuff, lots of money. So the idea is to assemble everything over the next little while, and be ready to wear it... ???

Doesn't matter, I feel the heritage in me, and I want to honour it. I know the jokes will fly about me in a kilt. It doesn't bother me at all, it's not the first time I've worn one. Beside, if anyone asks what the difference is between a kilt and a skirt, the answer is simple - a punch in the head.

Cheers.