It's been a pretty good week. I took Friday off so I could relax, but it didn't seem like I did much of that on Friday. I did, however, relax quite a bit on Saturday so all was good. Friday I was able to join in on the Goober Zone, and I greatly missed doing that.

Some really cool things happening at work. I've received word that making bonus is going to get a whole lot better, so much so that even my supervisor was saying he wanted to go back on the phones. I'm looking forward to that, if only I could make call time.

The days inch closer and closer to the surgery. I'm eager and nervous and afraid and hopeful all in one and I don't know how to deal with it. I'm trying to take each day at a time, as I always will. I can't wait!

I also made some plans on visiting Amanda this year instead of Rhode Island. Amanda is keen on the idea(she came up with it) and I'm sure we won't run out of things to do. It's all hinging on the surgery date, and how long it takes for me to recover. Amanda and I chatted for a couple hours and it was awesome. Since my cell has limited minutes, my chances to talk with her are limited, and I hope that we'll get more opportunities in the future. Hurray for Skype!

That's all I got for today, unless you care about my warrior reaching level 61. No? Didn't think so.

Sad to say but Goob was telling me that he probably won't have time to do Rhode Island this year. Something about his parents wanting to visit Japan but never bothered to go until now, so that's where most of his vacation time is being spent. Oh well.

More updates! The Custom Hatter page is rolling along quite well. I've come up with a plan for the hats page and the process page with the help of Goob(he's so handy to keep around). Right now I need to finish the long process of cleaning up the many pictures of hats and get them in a format that's useful on the page. I contacted Gary and asked him if he would check it out and he called back today to tell me that he loved it and it looks fantastic! He also corrected my spelling of headwear. Being a techie, I'm so used to seeing hardware :o I can't wait to finish it!

Also, I started DJing an online radio show, and it's turning out pretty cool. It's simple, very little effort, and it's music I enjoy. Despite Goob's insistence I will not have any breaks through the show as it's trance music and is supposed to blend from one song to the next. Plus I don't like having to talk a great deal, so it's better this way. If you want details on the show, hit up the ActiveWorlds Radio page.

Couple of awesome things just happened. First, I finally purchased an epic kodo beast for my warrior in World of Warcraft. Thanks to all those suckers buying up my farmed items! I can now cruise around Azeroth at twice the speed of normal walking. Hurray for intangible and meaningless video game goals!

Second, I just had my checkup with the surgeon. He was quite satisfied with the fact that I've lost 15lbs(I'm 515lbs now ) in 5 weeks, and also that I did all my visitations with the other doctors in time and all the information was gathered. He will be sending the approval today and I get to see him in 5 weeks. He also stated that I can expect the surgery to happen sometime in May. This puts me in a good position to make the AW Reunion in July. If not I should at least be recovered to have a trip to Rhode Island.

Things are looking up!

Sorry for the lack of updates- I feel like I'm holding my breath these days, just waiting for everything to go forward. I haven't weighed myself since last week but I'm sure I've lost a few more pounds. The surgeon's office called today and asked me if I completed the necessary appointments, and I have. The dietitian and psychologist have not sent in their reports but the office would call them up for me and find out. Here's hoping things go smoothly!

I talked to Gary today as well and told him about the progress on his website. You can get a taste of it located here. The ultimate design is finished, but the content is not. I plan on getting the hard pages done this weekend. He seemed quite excited about it even though he wasn't able to actually see it. He told me he would call me again with his thoughts and with more content to put up. I can't wait to see it finished.

I'm going to get back to holding my breath waiting for things to happen!

I'm a million dollar customer. To my insurance company that is. Today was my appointment with a psychiatrist (I understand the reason for this is to determine if I'm doing this for health reasons or cosmetic reasons- let's just say the doctor gave me an A+). I also learned several things from him and it gave me a new perspective: The insurance company doesn't care about my health, they care about money. To them I am a million dollar customer. If I stay obese I will eventually cost them a million dollars in degrading-health costs, expensive tests, etc. So they will approve me for the surgery on that basis alone, so that I can save them tons of money.

I love capitalism

The doctor also gave me a new perspective and maybe you, my loyal reader, can imagine what my body is dealing with every day. I'm 520lbs right now. That makes me roughly 320lbs overweight. Now imagine a 20lb cement block, or even a 20lb bag of cat food. Now imagine carrying 16 of them around, all day. That's what I'm carrying around. Impressive huh?

I also learned from the psychiatrist that my chosen surgeon, Dr. DiBenedetto, will stick with me for the rest of either of our lives. The psychiatrist compared it to a marriage of a sort and said that's very unusual for a doctor to do. Most bariatric surgeons will see their patients once and then refer back to their primary care physician. This is not the case with Dr. DiBenedetto, as he'll keep watch long after the surgery. I find that impressive and I have confidence in him. I feel like I'm in good hands and what better hands to be in than a surgeon's hands?

Tomorrow I have to meet with the dietitian to learn how I will have to eat after the surgery. Should be interesting. Before I go, Happy Valentine's Day to everyone, single or taken, and hope tomorrow isn't too disappointing.

PS. I also updated the Progress Bar to show I'm moving closer to Approval! Only one major hurdle left!

A quick update on the spam- in order to combat it I have locked all past posts that are not on the main page. This should help cut down on the spam and keep it limited if it shows up again.

I received a letter from my pastor at my church in Wyoming, NY. Apparently she is engaged to be married. I'm very excited for her, too. I never admitted it to anyone before but I had a crush on her when I first met her. I'm sure the lucky guy is wonderful and perfect for her. I mean, he's marrying a pastor, how much better can you get?

I also recently emailed one of my former coaches. He wasn't a teacher at my old high school so it took a little bit of internet snooping to find him. I was trying to sleep late one night and it came back to me just how much he influenced my life. It was fantastic that I was able to get a hold of him. He taught me a lot about toughness an discipline and I wouldn't be the person I am today if it wasn't for football and his guidance. He thanked me for my kind words and since he's still coaching football for another school, I hope to visit him in the fall for one of his games.

Well that's enough of that. Got a big weekend planned- Doing chores! Yay!

What the hell. I had to delete a ton more spam. I really need to find a way to block it. I have not found anywhere in here that allows me to disable commenting from certain URLS. Oh well.

I guess it's time for an update. I've been trying to lose weight now, and the Slim Fast stuff has reached the "I can drink it without flinching anymore" stage, so that's good. I'm still getting used to eating so little. TOmorrow I plan on waking up early to get some bloodwork done, and next week I have my appointments with the psychiatrist and dietitian. It should be a fun experience I'm sure.

I also picked up The Burning Crusade two weeks ago, and if it's apparent that's when my last post was, hehe. I've managed to curtail the time I spent on it for now. I had a good chat with one of the guys from Boys of Beef and they really thought I was a funny guy and wanted to invite me. I told them that I only play my characters with my buddy Goob and they were upset about that. Since the Draenei characters are rather new I told them I wouldn't join my draenei character as I wanted to play that exclusively with Goob, but my night elf druid could join since we've done a great deal of exploring, and it could mean an in-road for Goob and I to get into some of the level 60 dungeons with a good group. I hope Goob doesn't mind too much. He seems rather upset that I play World of Warcraft without him.

Anywho, if anyone finds any spam, let me know. And if anyone knows how to block by IP address, also let me know. There's a couple ISPs in Belgium I want to ban. Thanks.

I've been finding spam on my blog. It's an arduous task deleting it all so if you folks find any let me know so I can delete it. You might find certain words or combination of words that are banned on this site. I hope it doesn't provide too much of an inconvenience, but if it does let me know.

As for everything else I am encouraged by the support I've been receiving for my weightloss plans, from family as well as friends. I appreciate it all and I look forward to it. Speaking of friends, someone told me I needed some real life friends, and I think I've made a step in that direction. More on that later. Also, I did fill out the paperwork for school. I can hold off school for up to two years without penalty to my degree, and all I need to do start back up is to just sign up for classes. How spiffy is that? Not much else to report at this time but as the weeks progress this place will get busier!

In order to keep my friends and family informed, I decided to put up a progress bar on the right hand side of my page here. I'll keep it updated and everyone can keep track of where I am in this stage of my life. I'll briefly explain each stage.

The first step was the Physical performed by the office of Dr. DiBenedetto. That was on Tuesday the 16th. It gave me a clear path towards getting ready, as I explained in the previous post.

The next step, Candidate, is where I am at currently. During the next five weeks I'll need to complete a meeting with a dietitian, an psychological examination, and bloodwork that pertains the the surgery. So far I have appointments for the first two, and I only need to walk in for the third. During this time and also after approval, I will need to lose weight. I'm planning on doing the Slim Fast diet.

Once all that information has been gathered, I will meet with Dr. DiBenedetto again and he will submit my information for Approval to my insurance. Dr. DiBenedetto anticipates easy approval and has worked with Univera, and is apparently good friends with them.

Once I am Approved, I will be scheduled for Surgery. While I was told to expect to wait 6 to 7 months from now until that happens, I am hoping for sooner. Understand that while I didn't rush to this decision, I do wish to have it done as soon as possible, now that I have made up my mind.

After that, I will begin the Recovery process. After I am out of the hospital, I'll consume mainly a liquid diet, followed by puréed food, then soft foods, and eventually normal foods. Sometime during this period I'll also return to work- it won't be immediate but thankfully my job isn't very physically demanding. I will consider myself out of Recovery once I have returned to work and can eat normal foods again. After that, ongoing weight loss will be fast and effective. I plan on exercising more too once I've reached a less painful weight.

My final Target is 200lbs. I'm 530lbs now, so that's 330lbs of weight to lose. That's my goal and I won't stop until I've reached it. Wish me luck

I haven't updated people on this very much, but I recently decided to seek the gastric bypass surgery known as Roux-en-Y. I have gone to a informational meeting with the local surgeon, and he explained many things. Obesity is a disease and needs to treated as such. Also, for the morbidly obese, there is a 95% failure rate(weight lost staying off for at least 5 years). Faced with those odds, I decided I needed help. I just returned from the surgeon's appointment, and I've got the ball rolling. In five weeks I need to see a dietitian, have blood-work done, and visit a psychiatrist. I'll be setting those appointments up today. The surgeon said I would have no problem being approved, and that I need to have this done. Frankly, I believe him.

I also have to start losing weight, starting as soon as possible. I was told to pick the diet that worked best, and that was the Atkins diet. I don't exactly have the money to do it, so I either have to seek alternative diets or alternative funding. The point is to just lose the weight now up to the surgery and after that I won't worry about gaining it all back. I'm even looking into Slim Fast because the surgeon says it does work if I stick to it.

If anyone else has ideas for losing weight(not necessarily keeping it off) please let me know.

Things are picking up. I think the past week was bad because of an acute caffeine withdrawal. It's funny how I'm getting so interested in this surgery and I'm told I need to lose some weight before I have it done. I'm already reorienting my thinking too. I am cutting down on caffeine not because I don't need it but because I won't be drinking pop anymore. Getting into that mindset wasn't tough for some reason, it was just happening. Another thing that I've found myself doing is no longer stopping at the fast food restaurants after work. Now if only I could stop going before work, that would be great. For some reason I keep thinking I need to eat big for breakfast, and I usually don't have time in the morning to make it. Sometimes I don't even have time to visit the King or the clown, but I still do. It is something that disappoints me right up until I hand over the cash. But then the food tastes good and I forget why I was angry.

I need to stop that.

Anywho, things are going pretty good. I talked to Gary on Friday regarding the website I'm making. I'd like to think I'm making progress, although I admit I felt like I was going to an exam without studying at all. I don't want to let him down! The great thing is I got plenty of content, and with my burgeoning knowledge of CSS, I'll have the page done in no time. As long as Goob is there to help me. Oh Great Goober King, Web guru and savior, I beseech thee!

We'll see how that goes. All in all, I'm 200% better than last week. Thanks to some warm and fuzzy time with my friends and sister, I'm ready to roll.

My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone
-Green Day

I don't know if it's the lack of sleep, or having to wait another two weeks to see the surgeon, or the post-holiday blues, but today I just can't seem to ignore just how alone I am.

Update
Might have been the alcohol talking, but I'm doing much better today. Outlook is much better. Sunshine!

Happy New Year!
I spent it mostly alone, but I suppose I'm used to it by now. I say mostly because there was someone who chatted with me online during the whole thing. It made it a little less lonely, and a lot more special. To her I say thanks, and welcome her to a new year of possibilities. I welcome everyone to the new year!

New possibilities for me especially. I went to the informational meeting with the bariatric surgeon, Dr. DiBenedetto and I learned a great deal. For example, the diet failure rate of morbidly obese(that's me) is 95%. I have a 5% chance of losing weight and keeping it off. I've learned a great deal and I've got a great deal more to learn. The doctor educates you on the entire program and continues to follow up even years after the surgery. How cool is that? I'm excited and nervous but for the most part I'm relieved that this is becoming a reality for me. Wish me luck!

I did take my car to a Ford dealership and they said that a clearing and reflashing of the computer won't do the trick, but a $100 induction service very well could clean out my catalytic converters and stop those engine light codes from popping back on. So I agreed. The guy at the dealership said it would be good if I drove for about 150 miles to make sure the codes are cleared. In a fortuitous serious of events, I ended up driving to Rochester and back to pick up my brother's girlfriend at the Airport. It was an uneventful drive, except that we got lost for a little bit and it rained the whole time. I did get to see Jin, of course my brother's girlfriend, and I must say she looks fantastic.

When I got home, the engine light still came on, so I felt pessimistic about the situation until Friday, when I attempted to finish the inspection. Fortune had it! They were able to clear the engine light, drive it around for a bit, and pass the inspection on the car! Woohoo! I do need a tie rod fixed(this Friday) so total cost of repair for my car has been $40 inspection + $150 induction cleaning/computer reflashing + $20 reinspection + $100 tie rod repair = $310. Certainly not as bad as the $1000 for replacement catalytic converters.

In other news, I ended up working Christmas day. Not too bad, as most people weren't the crazy angry kind. Those were reserved for Tuesday, the day after Christmas. Sheesh. At least the paycheck this coming week will be nice and fat.

I got my sister two gift cards- $25 for Michael's, a craft store, and $10 for Bead Creative. She really liked them and I'm sure she'll put them to good use. Also, my nephew is over for a few days. Dunno how long he's staying but I'm sure we'll have a fun time.