My New Computer

Today I went to Fry's and picked up my new computer. I've had my last computer for over six years and it was a great computer it was time to retire it and buy a new one. I did some research the past few days and decided on an HP Pavilion Elite HPE-440f PC. Details:

• Intel i5 760 processor
• 8GB PC3-10600 DDR3 SDRAM memory
• 1 TB of hard drive space
• Wireless LAN
• Blu-ray Player/SuperMulti DVD Burner
• Built in TV Tuner, HP Media Center Remote Control
• ATI Radeon HD 5770 graphics card with 1GB DDR5 dedicated graphics memory, HDMI, dual-link DVI, display port, and VGA capabilities, and support for Blu-ray and Microsoft DirectX 11
• High Definition Audio with up to 7.1 surround sound capabilities
• Front panel 15-in-1 memory card reader:
• 6 USB 2.0 ports (Back); 3 USB 2.0 ports (Front); 1 FireWire (IEEE 1394) port (Back)
• Headphone; Microphone; Audio left/right-in; S-video-in; Composite video-in (Front); Optical Audio Out; LAN; Microphone/Line-in/Line-out; Rear speaker-out; Side speaker out; Center (subwoofer)
• Windows 7

This system is so much better then my old one. I was looking to get a Intel i7 but it was a few hundred more for that one which I was willing to do except it didn't have the built in TV Tuner and I really wanted that.

So far it's great I'm trying to get use to Windows 7 as my last computer had Windows XP. Only downside I can find at the moment is there are discs with this system. The recovery/backup is actually partition on the hard drive. Which kind of makes no sense. What if the hard drive crashes there would be no way to recover the computer's main operating system. Gonna see if I bump this stuff over to an external hard drive just in case. Other than that I'm very happy with it.. of course I've only been on it for a few hours but so far good.

Going to be spending the next several days uploading and downloading some 32 + programs that I use. Along with figuring out all my passwords and bookmarks.

Missing Friends

This has been on my mind lately so I figured I'd blog about it. I think because I had such an AWESOME time with my padawan Troy last weekend it got me asking myself why I don't do that more often. Meaning just hang out with friends, no agenda just enjoy ones company.

I have some of the best friends in the world and I consider a few of them my closest friends (you know who you are). But as I get older I see them less and less. I know as our lives get busier and busier free time tends to be dwindling but I miss the good ol' days when we would just hangout, watch some TV, go to lunch, do a movies, play some video games or just sit in the living room for hours talking.

Yeah we still see each other at birthdays, or plan a lunch or dinner meet up once a month but it's different then just hanging out with no agenda and deciding on what you want to do together. It's like we have to slot each other into a schedule to make sure we spend time together and I don't know why or when this started to be the norm.

Maybe the good ol' days are gone, maybe we have to many responsibilities now, but does that mean we can't just hang out at least once a month and not really plan anything just spend time together and see where it goes? I hope so because I really miss my friends.

A Healthier Me - Day 61

Did a full workout today.. since I'm devoting my Tuesday and Thursdays to an extra long cardio workout I started doing my weights on Mon, Wed, and Friday.

Today's Workout:

30 minutes of cardio on the elliptical
3 sets of 10 on the chest fly for my chest (75 lbs)
3 sets of 10 on the curl arm for my biceps (45 lbs)
3 sets of 10 working on my back (75 lbs)
3 sets of 10 for shoulders (45 lbs)
3 sets of 10 on the front leg press (45 lbs)
3 sets of 10 on the free weight (110 lbs)

Happy for the weekend, no workout.. might try and do some cardio over the weekend.. but will see.

Lunch with Brian

Today I went out to lunch with my buddy Brian, we I worked on Deadliest Catch and actually even before that when I worked on America's Toughest Jobs I would go to lunch with Brian. We'd go out 2 or 3 times a week and I really got to know him. Towards to end of my stay on Deadliest we did lunch more often and it just became part of our routine. I enjoyed our talks as Brian is a very quiet guy but once you get to know him you find out he's a sweetheart (which is will admittedly deny). Anyways since I left Deadliest we've only been able to get together once so it was nice to finally get to sit down with him and enjoy his company once again. Hope we don't have to wait another six months to do lunch.

Knights of the Guild Ep 21 pt1

Download from itunes http://bit.ly/KotGCast or Direct Download / Listen http://knightsoftheguild.com

Show Notes

Here it is Episode 21 part 1 of Knights of the Guild… Enjoy!!!

Today’s show features:

* First up a classic Vorkism
* We are recording this weeks podcast live in our studios and Jenni is back.. yay!!!!
* Guild News
* We have a Fantastic Crew Interview with the wonderful George Ruiz (Felicia Day & Kim Evey’s Agent)
* We find out what the cast and crew are up too
* We have some Listener Feedback
* We also announce winners of our end of month contest for September and our winner for our itunes Review contest as well as talk about continuing contests
* Then Business Time (I continue to use our contest entries as they are so good)
* Then our Good byes

Thank you again for all your support, we do this podcast because we are fans and more importantly for the fans.

Kenny & Jenni

Other Important Links

• Knights of the Guild Feeds/Downloads http://knightsoftheguild.com
• Knights of the Guild Daily Blog http://knightsoftheguildpodcast.blogspot.com/

A Healthier Me - Day 60

Whoo hooo.. today I finally did a full hour of cardio and it wasn't that bad. Did 40 minutes of it while listening to The Forcecast and then needed a boost for the last 20 so I listened to my "workout" music and that did the trick. Stopped at an hours.. think I could have gone on for at last another half hour.. felt really good.

Today's Workout:

60 minutes of cardio

So are online friends "real" friend??

I've heard "experts" say that they aren't, that people need to get off the computers and get out in the real world and make real friends. I think that's a bunch of BS, with social media networks like facebook and twitter, they have made the world a much smaller place. I have friends all over the world because of twitter and facebook and other online forums.

So what defines someone as a friend; someone who is there to listen, to chat with, to hangout with and keep you company, someone who can give you advice, make you laugh and brighten your day. It's true you may not have physical contact with this person but you do have emotional contact with this person.

Some people who live in smaller town don't have the luxury of finding like minded people and turn to the internet and social media groups for that. I couldn't imagine being gay and a geek and living in a small town.

It's funny as some people distinguish between "real" life friends and online friends, I do not. To me they are all "just" my friends. I have close friends who live near me and I have close friends who live 1000's of miles away and never met in person. I don't love them any differently, they are there for me when I need them most.

Now I would by lying if I said I didn't wish that some of them lived near me so we could physically hang out but just because they don't it doesn't mean I love them any less. It is funny though.. because the only way for us to communicate is over the internet and I tend to talk with my online friends more then my friends that live near by me. I don't know why that is, we're all super busy in our real lives and we do get to see each other once in a while but those friends who live near by we just don't talk that much over the net.

Online friends and social media groups can make you feel amazing. Several things happened to me recently, I started working out and blogging about my progress, the support I have gotten from those who comment on my blog has been amazing and it continue to inspire me. I turned 40 last month and I got over 150 facebook Happy Birthdays and over 200 Happy Birthday tweets from all my tweeter friends. Talk about feeling loved and appreciated. And again with National "coming out" day last week, I got so many encouraging tweets and facebook comments it was awesome. Then recently with getting my new job.. the barrage of support from my twitter and facebook friends was truly amazing. I've never felt so much love and support from people who I have never actually met in person but we have bonded over one thing or another online.

I have actually gotten to meet some of my online friends at comic con or visiting them on vacation and it's amazing how you instantly just click with that person. There is no awkward "getting to know that person" period, as you have been friends online and have chatted over time. It's like you've known each other all your lives.

The past few years have been some of the best of my life and it's because of all the fantastic online friends that I have made. So when people say that online friendships are not "real" friends, tell them to go f**k off as I have some of the best "online" friends in the world.

A Healthier Me - Day 59

Not much to report.. got my workout done.. actually got 45 minutes in for my cardio. Going to try and do an hour from here on out. I think I need more cardio to help lose the weight faster. 

Today's Workout

45 minutes of cardio on the elliptical
3 sets of ten on the chest fly for my chest (75 lbs)
3 sets of ten on the curl arm for my biceps (45 lbs)
3 sets of ten working on my back (75 lbs)

A Healthier Me - Day 58

Whooo a late workout tonight.. but luckily it was only cardio.. decided to do weights & cardio on Mon, Wed, and Friday  and cardio only on Tuesday and Thursdays and possible weekends.

Today's Workout:

30 minutes of cardio on the elliptical

I was hoping to do at least an hour tonight but I am just too tired.. I struggled to get to 30 minutes.

I GOT A JOB!!!!!!!!

After six months of being out of work I got a call today and accepted a new job with MTV. A former boss mentioned the job a month or so ago but wasn't sure when it was going to start. I sent her my resume and she turned it over to the line producer who called me today and we worked out the details. I'll be the shows Post Production Supervisor (the job I've done the past six years). It sounds great and had a really good post schedule set up already. Lots of time to get these episodes done. The money was right and I look forward to working with my previous boss Robyn.

It starts Nov 22nd for two days then Thanksgiving time off, then I start the following Monday and it runs through July. It's eight months of work. I can't say much about the show other then it's an MTV show which means I'll be working in Santa Monica at their offices. It's 12 half hour episodes and it's a docu/reality show. I'll have four editors and 3 assistant editors. I'm really looking forward to this job. Should be a great experience.

Now I can enjoy this next month off and not have to stress about finding a job.. whoo hooo.

My New Podcast - Epic Geek Out

Today while taking to my friend Jen I mentioned how I've always wanted to do another podcast, one who's topic wasn't restricted like it is with Knights of the Guild. To my surprise she asked if she could be my co-host. She and I co-hosted our very first podcasts a few years back for the Treks in Sci Fi forums RPG game called The Ready Room and we had a great time. I was surprised that she asked as she just had a new baby and is extremely busy. But when she asked I of course said yes and suddenly we were planning our next podcast. I mean I wanted to do one but didn't have any plans on starting one so quickly.

A few hours later:

• we an idea of what kind of podcast - 30 minute roundtable discussion about 1 geeky topic per episode. There are alot of geeky podcasts out there talking about all kinds of geeky things. I wanted it to be different so I came up with the idea of having two permanent host (Jen and I) and then having 2 to 3 other hosts that will revolve from podcast to podcast depending on the topic of discussion.
• Jen and I worked on a name and finally settled on - Epic Geek Out or EGO for short.
• Getting a URL is always fun, but we wound up with http://TheEGOshow.com
• I knew I wanted to use podbean as that is what I use for my Knights of the Guild podcast and for the most part it's a fairly good and reliable system. So our podbean website is http://EpicGeekOut.podbean.com, 
• We then had to set up a Gmail and had to go with EpicGeekMail@gmail.com as the other ones were already taken.. but we're very happy with that one.
• Last we set up a Twitter account  and since Epic Geek Out was taking we went with @EpicGeekOutShow. 

Jen is currently working on a Logo for our show, our buddy Rick Moyer is working on some music and I'm working on our topics of discussions and the podcast will be formatted and who are guests will be for our first few episodes.

It's pretty amazing how something that I was just thinking about turns into something real in a matter of a few hours. I guess that's what happens when you get two very excited people ready to make some magic.

More details to come.. hope to have our first episode out next month.

A Healthier Me - Day 57

Well it's the start of another week. I ate really poorly during the weekend as I had a good friend staying with me. But we did go hiking on Sunday.. but I wasn't looking forward to my weight in this morning.

Monday weight in: 209

Today's Workout

30 minutes of cardio on the elliptical
3 sets of ten on the chest fly for my chest (75 lbs)
3 sets of ten on the curl arm for my biceps (45 lbs)
3 sets of ten on the free weight (110 lbs)
3 sets of ten working on my back (75 lbs)

So I was extremely happy with my weight.. my lowest so far was 208.5 so I'm only .5 lbs above it and by my next weight in I will have hopefully lost a few more pounds. All in all is was a good workout, continue to listen to podcasts, this time The Anomaly podcast.

Still have 9 lbs to lose before the end of the year.. that was my first goal.. to get below 200 by years end and I'm well on my way.

National Coming Out Day

National Coming Out Day (NCOD) is an internationally observed civil awareness day for coming out and discussion about gay, lesbian, bisexual, asexual and transgender (LGBT) issues. It is observed by members of the LGBT communities and their supporters (often referred to as "allies") on October 11 every year, or October 12 in the United Kingdom.

With 11 teen suicides in the past few months due to gay bullying and sexuality confusion, with all the hate that is being spewed by this new Tea Party group and all this anti-gay marriage crap it's more important then ever to come together as a community and show our support for all those still in the closet to afraid to open that door.

I was one of those people, as it took many, many years for me to open that door. I knew I was gay from the age of 12 but didn't accept it until I was 27. I lived through some very lonely and confusing years before I realized that this is who I am and I'm not ashamed of it. You can read more about my coming out HERE

More Time with My Padawan

Got up at 8am this morning, Troy got up about 10 minutes later. I made us breakfast and once again we chatted. After breakfast we went out to Vasquez Rocks as it was still early and fairly cool. Since he didn't plan to stay the night we didn't have the right shoes and after a few attempts to go up a steep incline and him almost falling down the hillside we opted for the other side and less steep rock. We had a great time hiking around Vasquez. After Vasquez we headed back to my place and started to play some Wii.. for the next few hours we played various Wii Resort Games and had a blast. Harry got up and I made some spaghetti and garlic bread for lunch. We ate and then I wanted to interview Troy for a "fan" interview for my Knights of the Guild podcast. After we recorded we just hung out in my office and chatted. 3pm came around and Harry and I had to leave for a friends daughter's birthday and Troy had to head back home as he was attending a pumpkin carving party this evening.

So we said our good byes and what was suppose to be a few hours visit on Saturday turned into a really fun and memorable weekend. We made plans to hang out again soon and I look forward to it.