Day 273

Back when this year started, on Day -8, for the first time in a long time, I made a few New Year's resolutions. To the shock of everyone - well, mainly me since I'm the only one who would care - I've actually followed through on them.

The two resolutions that I thought would be the hardest to maintain are the ones that are now coming through.

When the year began, I told myself I would quit smoking by the time I was 30. I have 28 days left in my 20s as I write this and I haven't had a cigarette in almost three months (it'll be three months in about a week and a half). Sure, a trip to the hospital was instrumental in helping me quit, but you take what you can get, right?

The other resolution was to start going to the gym. While I was in North Adams, I had signed up for a $10 per month gym membership that I ended up never using. And after moving to Palatine, Stacey had been bugging me for months to start going to the gym with her, but because of my health issues, I always begged off. Now, post-hospital stay, those health issues are less of a deterrent. I started going to the small gym area within our housing community and then, less than a month ago, Stacey and I got a membership to the YMCA. Do I go as often as I should? No, probably not, but I'm still going four or five times every week, which is four or five times more than I ever imagined I would.

Today, we have appointments for the Y's new Active Trax program, a computerized system that sets a workout regiment for the user. We have to take a strength test (on which I'm sure I'll be told "wow, you're a weakling") first and then they set us up on the program. I'm looking forward to this, as it should help us both set complete workouts whenever we go.

So now that I've achieved the two biggest goals that I've had, I have new ones. The first is to continue with the fitness training and lose about 20 pounds, healthily this time, so I can be a cool 185. This time, it would be nice to be at that weight with some muscle mass. Second, I need to continue taking care of myself, which means regularly checking my blood sugar levels, going to doctors, etc. I was bad about that for so long that it takes some getting used to, but I'm working on it now. The better I take care of myself, the longer you all have to put up with me, which makes it all worthwhile. Finally, the third and final goal is to start writing more. It doesn't matter where or how, which means yes, Fran, I'll update the blog more often.

The only question I have now is, if I set resolutions in October, do I have to make new ones once January 1 rolls around?

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