Coast Guard Sailboat in Charleston Harbor 

entourage of boats that were part of our party today. We took out about 50 kids for Happy days and Special times 

smaller boat zooming past us 

River shot in front of the boat 

control tower that raises the bridge for boats to go under it 

draw bridge on river we were on today 

captain of the boat I was on today 

Kristina Lynn "Princess" Moffitt during the boat ride today. She looks like a gangsta... 

Justin Matthew Moffitt on boat ride today sponsored by SSCA and Happy Days and Special Times 

Motorola Razr phone and Motorola Phone Tools issues

The other day I tried to use my cell phone to make phone calls. I was able to receive phone calls but not able to send them. The first thought that ran through my mind was, did I pay the bill or did they cut me off even if I did pay the bill? Stranger things have happened in the past. So, anyway, I call my friends over at Suncom Customer support later in the morning and I found out that two things needed to happen. The first thing that happened is that the Suncom System had been upgraded between 12 midnight and 6 am. In order for my phone to work properly I needed to turn my phone off for a few moments and then power it up again. The other thing that I needed to do was to go by Suncom retail outlet and have them swap out my version 2.5 SIM card for version 3.0. Apparently that version of SIM card has the updated software needed to interface my telephone with their towers. Ok, fair enough. So, off I go to the land of Suncom to sit in line (on the floor) waiting for someone to chat with me about this. I signed the list and sat down to wait with the other 25 people that were there for other issues. One of the sales reps happened to hear my conversation with another customer about my just being there to swap out sim cards so he tosses one on the counter for me to complete the transaction on my own. I managed to get the SIM card swapped out and connected to the service. Thus far, no problems sending and receiving phone calls with my Motorola VC3 Razr phone.
That event happened approximately 10 days ago and just today I decided to try and download some images that I have taken and stored on my phone. One of the features that I love about the Motorola Razr is that it has a very nice digital camera with a 4x digital zoom. I have taken quite a few photos with this phone since it is easier to do that then always have to lug around my other digital camera which is much bigger.
I installed the Motorola Phone Tools to my laptop computer the other day after I wiped the hard drive after testing Microsoft Vista. At that time I had not tried to configure the telephone with the software and just figured I would do that later. I knew that I already had the Motorola Phone Tools configured and functional on my main system. Today when I tried to run the Phone Tools software I was advised of an update so I allowed Live Update run and updated the software. To my surprise when I connected the phone to the laptop USB port the Motorola Razr was not recognized. Two hours later I finally gave up and figured that it would be more fun to download and blog pictures off the main system vs fighting with software on the laptop.
When I came over to the main system I was surprised to see that the already configured Motorola Phone Tools with the profile for the Motorola Razr no longer worked. I tried upgrading the software on the main system as well and that did not work. I uninstalled all of the Motorola Phone Tools and then just reinstalled the original software hoping to make that work. Guess what folks? No cigar.... No connection between the computer and the Motorola Razr phone either. All I can figure is that before I swapped out the SIM cards the interface between the software and hardware worked and after I upgraded the SIM card the interface does not work any longer. That means that interoperability between the hardware and the SIM card and software went out the window at some point. How special is that folks?
It just occurs to me that maybe one way around this will be to e-mail the pictures to myself from the phone to my suncom MMS e-mail address. Once that happens I can download those to my hard drive. Wait, no, that wont work either. The MMS e-mail address is what is used for someone from a PC to e-mail a picture TO my telephone. Sigh.... This can be sort of confusing at times aye? Back to square one. I have pictures that I need to download off of the phone. I wonder if I can take the SIM card out of the phone and plug it into a SD card reader and download the pictures that way. I think that is what the SIM card is , is a SD card with code on it. I will try that and get back to you if that worked.

Stick a fork in me I am done with Vista Beta on the laptop

As of July 14th my thoughts about Vista could be summarized by saying " Stick a fork in me, I am done". I decided that I wanted a fully functional laptop back under my control and having Vista installed at this point was not going to allow that to happen. For whatever reasons Microsoft has decided to over complicate the user interface to the point of frustration. Just because I uninstalled it on the laptop does not mean that there is no hope for the OS. I just decided that I need to install this under VMWARE or on a spare PC.
Originally I had intended to install Vista under Vmware and when I did not do this a friend of mine asked me what my thought process was making this decision. I guess that my first thought was " what the heck, go for it" because the laptop is considered a secondary computing device next to our main home pc and I feel as if I am a disaster recovery expert (has been drip under pressure) and I knew I had two critical pieces in place in case a disaster did happen. The first thing I had was a good , current backup of all my data. The second most important tool at my disposal was the Toshiba recovery cd which would allow me to recover the laptop back to factory specifications with all the drivers needed. So, with those thought drifting through the fog banks of my mind I went forward to where no man (in this houshold) has gone before and installed Vista. The following list are points of interest as I look back on my Vista BETA install experience.

A. the install (upgrade) took almost four hours

B. Wireless does not support wireless security (wep)

C. Networking configuration options are a nightmare

D. The user interface is just different enough to make you stumble around looking for the usual things we are used to in XP

E. I could not find Start RUN anywhere

F. Since I could not find START RUN I could not run MSCONFIG to edit the start up applications and get rid of the ones I did not want starting at boot

G. Vista BETA does not provide you with Anti Virus software even though CA does provide Ez Anti Virus for free for one year to Vista Beta users.

H. Windows Defender is not supported in Vista

I. Internet Explorer 7 SUCKS.... The application refused to shut down properly when it was running in "protected" mode.

J. Even though the upgrade recognized my Administrator status on XP Professional it does not give you FULL administrative rights to Vista Beta. Several times I was greeted with a nag screen that said something to the affect that "you are not a system adminstrator and therefore dont have the ability to do this function at this time. Please notify your system administrator"

K. Several of my applications just did not work after the upgrade which required my reinstalling them.

To see all the gory details on the install process and my thoughts AFTER the install go to http://jcmoffitt.googlepages.com and view my technology pages and read the Vista Beta review.
Thanks

Vista Beta 2 installation

Vista Beta 2 Software Review

Starting over every day

July 1 through July 7th

Calories consumed

Sat 2289
Sun 1748
Mon 1927
Tue 2189
Wed 1821
Thur 1710
Fri 1518

Exercise

Sat 1561
Sun 1057
Mon 487
Tue 1870
Wed 1057
Sat 2610

This week was particularly hard because I have been working security at night several nights per week in a grocery store. I would find myself getting the munchies more time than not and I had to contend with fighting the flesh and NOT purchasing those things that my flesh desires such as candy bars or fudge brownies or whatever you want to fill the blank in. Every time I would crave something I would pick up the package and read the calories. When I saw that it had enough calories to replace one of my regular meals I decided NOT to purchase it. Now, my friends, that was JESUS in ME and NOT ME. hahahahahahaha I remember a time I would have just given in and said " well, I can justify this because I am working out and getting exercise four times per week". I am finally making some good choices. As I like to say " Starting over every day".

This week has also been a particularly stressful week because now that I do not have a regular day job and my night security job has really screwed up my sleep habits not to mention being stressed out over trying to find a REAL job that pays what the budget needs for me to make so I can pay the bills. I have tried my best NOT to be stressed out but it is just not working. During these times of high stress I normally would be just saying "Oh to heck with this calorie counting" and exercise, it is time for me to self medicate and make myself FEEL GOOD." Once again, I have to say " this has to be Jesus in Me" working out the details and helping me to start over every day. I am still not losing any weight to speak of. My personal trainer is telling me that because I am hitting the weights that I will actually gain some weight and that eventually the muscle mass that I am building that is heavier than fat will start to burn off the fat calories and the weight will gradually start to come off. So, with that in mind I am starting over every day and learning how to make the right decisions. Therefore I can not focus on the numbers on the scales right now and I need physiology to take its natural course and just keep doing what I am doing and realize that in time the weight will come off. For now, my reward will be feeling great and having much more energy and the ability to deal with stress better.

Four days and counting

Tick Tock, Tick Tock... The clock is counting down and within four days I will be officially off of the propellerhead island. Well, what I mean to say is that my contract with the company I am at will be over and they are going to ship me out into the pond on a canoe with half a paddle. I have learned that is very wise for me to be sure and NOT name my employer(s) just in case they might be reading my blog. I have heard that employers do read blogs and they use the Internet to research future candidates for employment. Therefore it is very important that I keep all of my significant others as anonymous as possible. Every since May I have been looking high and low for a new place for my propeller to spin but thus far everything that I have found has seemed to vaporize into thin air. I guess that I have not stumbled upon the right opportunity. Contracting my skills out to the highest bidder sort of feels like sales. I am selling myself and my skills to the highest bidder. The only way that I can hear the YES I am waiting for is for me to hear all of the NO's that I should listen to. There are always more NO's than there are yes's. Of course, if I had STAR quality then maybe I would not hear as many no's. Star quality means that I have everything that employers are looking for. Those qualities include a four year degree in computer science and every vendor certification from every vendor that I would ever need to support. On top of those shingles I would also need to top that off with the type of personality that would allow me to SHINE above the rest of the crowd and make me popular with both the boss and my peers. The ability to shine above the rest also means that you have to thrive in the political arena and you have to be a good YES man or woman to your superiors. Last but not least it is not always what you know but who you know. Once upon a time employers rewarded people upon their merit. I want employers to hire me because I am a hard worker that has proven myself time and time again and not because of my popularity measurements. On the current island that I am on you must have a four year degree to even get into the starting gate and be considered for a mid level position. Without that degree I am the grand winner of a canoe and half a paddle. LOL...

I am already working security at night to supliment our income. I am so thankful that Katy does have her degree and is well on the way to establishing herself in her chosen career path as a teacher.
Hopefully I wont have to wear the gorilla suit for too long before some recruiter lands me a decent paying job. Until then I will do what I can to keep my sanity and keep the bucks trickling into our magically shrinking budget.

On a more positive and uplifting note my life changes have been slowly but surely taking hold. As I say in my accountability log on one of the forums I am starting over. My girth did not happen over night and I know that it wont go away over night. So, every day, I start over and make the right choices with what I stick in my mouth. I have been starting over since the last week of May and even though I have not lost a LOT of weight I have taken off a few pounds here and there. I am averaging around 2000 calories a day and I am working out and getting exercise four days a week. Every other day I go to the recreation center in Duck Ditch USA and I get on the elliptical trainer and quack my way through 30 minutes of fun filled excitement. Then I go downstairs and do light reps with the nautilus machines. Even though I am not seeing a lot of pounds melting off of the body I am feeling much much better. I have more energy, sleep better at night and can handle stress better during the day.
Slowly but surely I am learning how to eat less and better food. I am also living healthier by exercising my heart and hopefully making it stronger every day. A healthy heart is always a very good thing.

While I have been making healthy decisions about what I am going to put in my mouth my friend Chuck across the street has been taking on birds of a different feather. Speaking of birds my friend Paul Bunyon and his entire featherless clan has lifted off in starship one and blasted off to Yankee land. Paul Bunyon was very wise by leaving Chuck in charge of the feathered fowl across the street in the chicken coop because had he not it would have been a short lived chapter for one very worn out rooster. Chuck shared with me that one of Paul Bunyon's older sons has been complaining about the mighty rooster with a BAD ATTITUDE. Chuck told me that he figured that the featherless sibling was stretching the severity of the mighty roosters attitude. Chuck told me that he found out first hand how much truth there is with regards to the little bird with a bad attitude. Chuck had no sooner stepped into the chicken coop than when out of no where the big bad rooster fluffed up his feathers and charged at him for all he was worth. Having been forewarned about the nasty attitude Chuck was smart enough to bring along an equalizer. This equalizer enabled Chuck to enhance and reduce the attitude and altitude of the flying feathers on two legs. Chuck told me that he was able to teach this bird several aerobic positions and aeronautical maneuvers. Chuck also told me that the bird, no matter what position he found himself would shake his head, clear his bird brain and charge again and again. Luckily enough both the bird and Chuck are still alive and they are both sore because of the experience. The hens have been tended to each day , eggs gathered and feed spread. The rooster has decided to give Chuck a free pass to the chicken coop and has decided to watch him from behind the coop as Chuck goes about his duties. I told Chuck to keep his eyes open because the rooster is surely plotting on him and will find away to even the odds when he recruits some other feathered friends from up the street to gang up on him.

Happy Fathers Day DADS

I have two weeks before my contract is over and then I will be continuing the job search.  This is not something new under the sun.  I have been doing this on and off for 16 years and I must admit that I am sick of it.  Once upon a time companies had internal IT staff that took care of their network and the only time they brought in contractors or consultants was for large short term projects that was beyond their ability to handle.  For whatever reasons corporate America has decided that it is cheaper to have contractors doing more of the work than full time IT staff.  One of the money savings for employers is that they do not have to pay benefits for contractors so I guess I understand WHY they do it.  Understanding the reasons why does not make my life any easier.  

I am currently entertaining two options after this contract ends.  One is a full time position with a credit union here locally and the other is a 9 month to one year contract with the SC DMV which could turn into a permanent position at the end of the contract depending on how well the contractors do with providing support to the DMV offices in the state.  I am hopeful that I can land the full time salaried position vs the contract position but I will be happy if I can land one of them.  If I can not land either of them for whatever reasons then I will be forced to continue looking and find whatever job I can to supplement Katy’s income.  

If I wind up not being able to find a job or contract in the IT industry AGAIN I have decided that I will take the necessary steps to get OUT of the IT industry once and for all by going back to school and training to do something within the Healthcare industry like X-ray tech or whatever.  I am sure that Trident Technical College has several programs that I could get involved in.  I would have to get another student loan to do it but that is fine with me if it gives me the ability to find something stable for my future.  

If you are reading this and you are wondering if there is any value in a college degree please let me use my life experience and tell you that there IS GREAT VALUE in having a college degree.  There are so many more doors open to you because of the advanced education.  That does not mean that you should just go get a degree in basket weaving.  What it means is that you should target those industries where there is always going to be a need and those companies within that industry will have a track record for providing a stable working environment that will not just go away because the economy is having a problem.  Government, healthcare, law enforcement is three industries that will never go anywhere and will always be looking for a few good men and women that can provide them with a good workforce.   Information Technology for some reason does not provide the stability that the last three do.  If you do not have even a high school diploma let me tell you that you are going to be in a LOT of trouble if you hope to find a decent job of any kind.  Almost ALL of the jobs that I have ever pursued required that you have a MINIMUM of a high school education.  So, if you dropped out of high school to pursue your dream be sure to go get your GED certificate.  Without it you will be in deep trouble.  

Katy is halfway through her PACE class that is two weeks long and that started after summer vacation started for the kids here in the low country.  Katy will be so happy when this next week is over and she too can have a break of sorts.  Katy has been working very hard studying and studying and studying.  I think that she feels as if her brain is going to explode with all the stuff they are cramming into her head.  Go Katy Go!!!!  You can do it!!

Did I tell you that we switched from MaBell over to Vonage for home telephone service?  I just paid my first bill with them.  We paid 19.11 vs the 35.00 + that we paid with MaBell.  Wooohooooo, I LOVE that.   The talk quality is just as clear as MaBell and you can manage your account details and see the call information online.  You have to have a broadband connection to the Internet or it won’t work.  So, if you have DSL or a CABLE modem and have an always on connection to the Internet and you want to reduce your budget you can switch to Vonage.  If you are interested in all the features go to www.vonage.com and read up on it.  If you think about joining tell me and I will send you a referral link so that we both can get a free month of service.  It took me all of 10 minutes to hook up the Vonage switch in my existing network setup.   The only problem that we discovered after it was all hooked up is that we lost the ability to print to the network printer that is shared off of the main gateway pc in our home.  We have two computers and two laptops hooked up to our internal network.   I wrote Vonage tech support and they told me to give them an exact diagram of how the network was setup.  So, I was armed with my first cup of coffee this morning and a lamp and I discovered what the problem was.  My main Gateway system was the only pc on my network plugged into one of the switch ports on the Vonage switch.  All the other computers either connected wirelessly to the existing wireless router or the switch ports on the wireless router.  Once I unplugged the gateway from the Vonage switch and plugged it back into my Motorola switch/firewall/router/wireless device all the computers on the workgroup were able to see it again.  We can also print to the network printer anywhere in the house again.  Wooohoooo  If I had one of those EASY Buttons from Staples I would push it and it would say THAT WAS EASY.  LOL….

I have been working really hard at counting calories and going to the gym since the first of this month.   I have a fifteen pound window that I seem to be bouncing around in.  The other day I got on the scales and I had gained to pounds back that I had recently lost.  That was AFTER reducing my calorie intake and exercising four times per week.  I just could not believe that I had gained two pounds back after all of that.  LOL…  One of the things I have to realize is that I did not get where I am physically over night and I won’t lose all the weight over night either.  The other thing I have to realize is that as I use the weight machines at the gym that I am going to start to gain back some muscle cells that I have lost and I am going to be convert fat to muscle which will mean that I will gain back a few pounds.  The important thing is that I eat less, exercise more and drink water and lots of it.  I am supposed to drink 8 eight ounce glasses of water and I am falling way short on that folks.  I love sweet tea but that is not pure water.  If you drink a lot of water it will help you shed those pounds.  

Well, it is time to stop writing here and get ready for church.  I hope you have a blessed day and a good week coming up.  God bless

changing lifestyles to be healthy

Yesterday was a busy day, took Katy to Columbia SC so she could take her test she has been studying for. We came back home around 2 pm and I took the kids to the bowling alley for about 90 minutes and bowled three games. I had 2173 calories yesterday.

Today after church Katy went to the store to get hamburger fixings so I went home and put on my work out garb and went to the gym for an hour. I spent 25 minutes on the elliptical trainer at level 3 which is up from level 2 and ran 1.86 miles. I then walked around the track once to cool off and then went downstairs to the nautilus machines and worked on the weight machines for 35 minutes.

I am worn slap out but I feel good about my choices. I am at 1129 calories for today as of 3 pm so I am hoping to keep it under 2000 calories today.

I also had the opportunity to talk to one of the personal trainers while I was at the gym. This turned out to be a very good conversation. Sylvia told me to quit focusing so much on my weight. She told me that I needed to focus more on becoming healthy. She said that if I always focused on the FAT and how that made me feel that it would cause me to do things to make me FEEL better like eat more food. She told me that my focus or mind set should be to start eating the right things and less food and doing things like aerobics and weight training to cause my body to be healthy. She said that if I will do that then the weight will begin to come off slowly and surely. Sylvia told me that I need to set goals no matter how small they are. She said the goal should be obtainable. I told her that my goal for now is to show up at the gym every other day and to get on the elliptical trainer for a minimum of 20 to 30 minutes. I told her that the weight training afterwards was just an added bonus. Sylvia told me that I should write that down and then stick with it. She told me that every time I meet a goal such as making it to the gym and losing weight that I should record it so I can go back and look at it. On Calorie-count.com I am keeping a log of calories, weight lost and exercise so I can print that out.

Spring Valley High School Columbia SC

I am sitting in my car outside of a UPS store connected to Wifi (paid) waiting for Katy go finish her exam. We woke up bright and early at 5 am and hit the road at 5:20 am putting us in Columbia SC around 7:20 am. Katy was supposed to be at the school around 7:30 am to check in so that she could take the test around 8 am. Well, little did we know there would be several HUNDRED other souls there doing the same thing. Can you say parking NIGHTMARE. No, I am not talking about having a hard time finding a parking spot I am talking about those of us that were trying to drop our spouse off and just leave so they could take the test. Basically it worked like this. Drive in the first drive way go to dead end where there was other folks blocked in backing out and turning around to leave. I follow them and go to the next entrance and let Katy out of the car. I turn left to go down the driveway in front of the school to find that while it is a one way drive there are people doing the same thing. They are running into a grid lock at the gate that is closed and locked and they are turning around and trying to come out the same way they came in except for the fact that I and about 20 other folks were trying to leave the same way they were coming. We are all sitting in our cars shaking our heads wondering why we are running around like geese with our heads lobbed off. Security shows up and we all think "goodie, this person will make sense of this nightmare and help us". Think again, security was clueless and wondered how we even got onto the property in the first place. So much for being aware of your surroundings. LOL... Well, anyway , I dont fault the security officer he was only doing whatever it is he was supposed to be doing. I asked him if there was any way he would entertain the option of directing traffic and get it flowing in one direction or the other. He tried to open the gate down at the end which was the direction folks were supposed to leave and he did not have the keys. He called his supervisor who did not know where the keys were either. Imagine my surprise when I found that out. LOL... Approximately 35 minutes later enough cars filter out to where I can turn my car around and follow the secruity vehicle the wrong way down a one way driveway to the front gate where he kept people from entering in and eventually let me out. I was so thankful to be free of that clusterfuge.

One of the things that amused me was that security did not know how the gate got opened to begin with. The other thing that was amusing is that there is a huge parking lot that was empty next to the school that everyone was supposed to use this morning. My question is this. Why was security not notified of this and who opened the wrong gate? Why wasnt there someone there this morning around 6:30 am to guide folks from out of town to the correct parking lot? Well, I have to run, wifey just called and said she is done with the test. Yeah!! Go Katy!!

Starting over

I am starting over. Today I did the impossible and I joined the Goose Creek Recreation Center. If you live in Goose Creek it costs 25.00 to join. Adults are 25.00 and children 16 and under are less. No, it is not World Fitness however it does provide us a place to go and get some much needed exercise. I went back tonight with my shorts and tennis shoes on and got on the elliptical trainer for 20 minutes. I burned 247 calories and ran 1.25 miles. I am starting over. Every day I will be starting over.Every day I will determine to count my calories, drink more water, less sugary crap and exercise more. Every day that I have to live I can start over and take small baby steps to reach my goal. My first goal is to lose 20 lbs and leave it off. Over the last several years I have managed to take off 13 to 14 lbs but I have not been consistent with making the life changes permanent. Some folks force themselves into drastic weight loss diets. The problem with weight loss diets is that the changes are radically different and if you fall off the wagon the weight comes right back on. I need to practice using the knowledge that I already have. I need to eat less bread, sugars, carbs etc. I need to eat more veggies and drink more water and eat less sugary junk. I also need to realize that this weight did not get here over night and it wont come off over night. I have to take it one day at a time, one meal at a time and one exercise session at a time. Instead of eating the elephant all at one sitting I amgoing to eat him one tiny bite at a time. The elephant represents the weight that I am carrying around.

Now that I have spoken about my starting over with my weight loss I am going to speak about something that very few folks are brave enough to talk about in public. I am going to talk about rebuilding my/our credit rating. Most folks would not dare to admit that they have credit problems and or huge debt that they can not handle or an outrageous debt to income ratio. Approximately 1 year ago Katy and I decided to start over. Before that time I was so depressed about my weight problem and our credit woes that my attitude was to just ignore the problem and hope it would auto magically go away. Guess what folks, weight problems and bad credit do not go away, they linger on for a life time if you let them. Not only do they linger on but they can potentially cause you a lot of grief, pain, anguish, stress and sleepless nights. I am glad that we have started over with rebuilding our credit. The firstthing that we had to do was to realize that while things looked dismal the situation was not impossible. Do you remember that elephant? This is an elephant of a different color but an elephant nonetheless. So, we realized that the only way that our credit was going to get better was to do several things. The first thing was to get beyond the mental anguish and depression that it causes. My thought process went like this. Go ahead and put it on my credit, it is so screwed up it does not even matter. The sad fact of the matter is every single thing on your credit report does matter and in a big way. Lets face it folks,we live in a society that says if you do not have good credit then there are certain things that you just wont be able to do. If you have bad credit it will be difficult to lease a house much less buy one. If you have 10,000 bucks lying around in a mutual fund or IRA that you can cash in then it does not matter what your credit is except for a small little thing called an interest rate.There are tons of investors and mortgage companies that will give you an 80 or 90 percent loan but you have to come up with a huge down payment and closing costs AND you have to pay an enormous interest rate or balloon payment at the end. Is that fair?No, not really but it is reality and the sooner that we realize it the better off we will be.

Debt is not limited to nationality, religion or creed. Debt is a problem that most of us have. Debt in and of itself is not bad but how we handle it or dont handle it is what makes it bad. One year ago or maybe longer a friend of mine helped me past some mental road blocks that were hindering me from getting back on the long road to being more successful with regards to credit.

I had to quit viewing the credit problems like it was some sort of uncontrollable monster. I had a fear of this monster and I thought it was about to eat me alive. The only way I knew how to control this monster was to just lock it up and throw away the key and hide from it. Another defense mechanism that I used was to deny the monster was even there. Somehow the monster always managed to announce its presence through the US Mail and my answering machine. Nevertheless I was afraid of the monster and I chose to ignore it. I had to realize that this monster was really just a series of stupid mistakes I had madeand circumstances that I had very little control of. Neither one of these things negate the other, they just exist and cause bad credit. Not too long ago a mortgage brokersensed my despair over my credit and wrote something to me in her response. She told me that just because I have bad credit or a low FICO score does not mean we are bad people. So, with that in mind when I was afraid of the credit/debt monster I allowedit to give me low self esteem. I viewed myself as ugly and unlovable because of it. That also goes hand in hand with the weight problem. I am over weight, I feel bad, I must look bad therefore I am probably bad. There it is again, deriving my value orlack thereof because of my weight problem or credit problems.

My friend helped me to see that the monster really was not a problem but it was a problem that could be solved. The monster is no longer a monster but a puzzle to be solved. This monster isa challenge instead of an insurmountable obstacle. The next thing that I had to do was to take ownership of the problem and posses it. I could no longer ignore it and I had to realize that it would never just magically go away on its own. Once I did that I was able to view the challenge as a series of problems that needed to be solved. The first problem that I had to undertake was to make sure that I did not repeat further mistakes that caused the problems to occur. One of the best ways to keep from making the same mistakes is to educate yourself about debt. My friend gave me a series of books by Suze Orman and they are excellent. Not every single thing that she says applies to my situation however the basics do apply. I do not care who you chose to get that education but for your sake the sake of your credit find someone that you can trust and start learning.

Here is a basic fact that we had to grasp. If you do not have the cash to buy it then you do not need it, period. That especially applies to those of us that have a credit card. For those of us that use debit cards and cash this is how that works. You live by a budget and if what you want will cause something in your budget to get bumped out of place you CAN NOT get it, period. Years ago we started using a budget out of sheer necessity so that we could allocate the necessary funds to pay for necessary living expenses such as rent (mortgage payment), car payment(s), light bill, gasoline for the cars, water bill, telephone bill, cell phone bill , cable bill etc. Please note that of those bills listed there are some needs and wants. It is so easy to blur the lines between a need and a want. Your rent or mortgage payment is a NEED because if you dont pay those items you will find yourself swatting at mosquitoes late at night under a tree somewhere in a public park. If you dont pay your phone bills you will still have a place to live but you wont be able to make a phone call. I guess some folks would argue that having a phone is a need. The bottom line is this. You have to determine where the fuzzy line is between a want and a need and draw it in the sand.

What I did not realize was that we used our budget to pay for necessities but we did not use it to manage the rest of our income. Like most married couples we were living from pay check to pay check with little to nothing left over. The main living expenses were paid and we had a place to live and a car to drive to our jobs but we still had outstanding debt that was piling on theinterest and penalties. God forbid an emergency would happen that would be out of the ordinary such as a unexpected car bill or medical emergency with the kids. We needed to learn how to PLAN for emergencies and to PLAN for paying off that debt. We hadto take the credit report in hand and identify those things that were not ours and dispute it with the credit reporting agencies. Remember the monster I spoke of? Credit reporting agencies do not care what is on your credit report, they are paid to putwhatever is reported on there. It is our job to dispute it and prove that what is there is either valid or not. It took us approximately 45 days but I managed to prove that several of the things that were listed on my credit report did not belong to me.The credit reporting agency took those things off.

I have only scratched the surface on these two subjects. All of us are subject matter experts either on the cause or the effect. My desire here is not to relish in the negatives or my failures. My desire is to communicate to you that there is HOPE. There is hope to start over. One day at a time, one bite at a time. Reach out to your circle of friends and family and God and ask for help. Break out of the darkness and despair and drag that thing into the light. You can do it...

It's time to toss out your antivirus software by TechRepublic's George Ou -- Running antivirus on a personal computer is like having the bomb squad inspect a suspicious package inside the house right next to you. No matter how careful or how good that bomb squad is, one of these days they'll make a mistake and explode in your house. As a matter of fact, the bad guys are deliberately rigging the bombs in a way that will blow up the house if someone tries to scan it and this is exactly what's happening with malformed ARJ or ZIP packages.

James Moffitt
http://www.lightourworld.com
http://moffittjc.blogharbor.com/blog
jcmoffitt@gmail.com

Google Talk & Google Pages

Do you use Google Talk? Have you signed up for Google Pages? Maybe you are one of the folks on the "We Hate Google bandwagon"? Well, anyway, if you are not on that bandwagon and you do use Google Talk go to the following URL and visit my document on how to update Gtalk and change your fonts and use custom themes. One of the negative aspects of Gtalk was the inability to change font size and color. Thanks to Gtalk and the help of third party programmers we can now enjoy some of the bells and whistles that we have grown accustomed to with our other IM programs from AOL and Yahoo.
The nice thing about Gtalk is that it is not bloatware and does not force you to view video advertising when it starts up.

http://jcmoffitt.googlepages.com/gtalk

End user moment....

This is too funny.  Gizmo read my blog a few moments ago and she is about fit to be tied because she forgot her user logon and password to make a comment.  Seems as if someone I know is having an END USER moment.  LOL….  Poor gizmo….

16 Years of Marriage

It is hard to believe that on May 13, 2006 we have been married for over 16 years.  My, oh my how the time has just flown.  Someone once said that the older you get the faster time moves.  This soul must have been an ancient old soul because it seems that the older I get the FASTER time does move.  

In the month of May we have two birthdays.  Justin recently turned 11 and Kristina recently turned 14.  There are times that I wonder if the children will ever make it to their next birthday OR if I will live through the experience myself.  It seems that the older Kristina gets the more she wants to spread her wings.  I am thinking back to my childhood and I am wondering if I ever had a sleep over.  I am thinking that perhaps when my parents were stationed in Leesville Louisiana and my dad was a drill instructor on the army base at Ft Polk that my friend Jack and I must have done that.  Having a sleep over at someone else’s house is apparently a very HOT item for a pre teen.  When I think about it I am thinking, “How exciting can it be to listen to some stranger snore in your bedroom”?  I would imagine that sleeping has nothing to do with it.  The fact that your friend has been allowed to come spend the night or you have been given permission to spend the night at your friends house has some magical quality that only a child can appreciate.  Katy told me that my princess (Kristina) planned a slumber party in honor of my trip to Denver.  Apparently 9 girls descended upon Katy while I was gone.  Katy told me that she was afraid to go to sleep.  Is there something wrong with that picture folks?  Can you imagine how dangerous it could be to have 9 adolescents living with you under the same roof for an extended period of time?  Katy told me that one of the fun things that the girls found to do was to see how many times they could light our candles.   I looked at Katy and said, you mean to tell me that while I was gone 9 girls were in the living room playing with fire?  Do we even have a fire extinguisher?

I almost forgot about the high light of the slumber party.  The girls LOVE the telephone and were up all hours of the night using our home phone to talk to all of their friends at an UNGODLY hour.  Just how much does a teenager have to say to another teenager anyway?  I am sitting here just imagining what the NSA lackie must have been doing as they were trying to keep up with the yickety yack that was going non stop at our house on the phone lines that night.  I would imagine that they had to change the tapes on the main frames at least once to keep up with it all.  I wonder how many times this pour soul went to sleep while trying to make sense out of what was being said.  LOL…  

I guess no one ever said that raising children and holding together a relationship was ever going to be easy.  It never has and it never will.  Being married and a parent are challenges that require stamina and courage.  Do I hear an amen??  LOL… Every Saturday morning I go to breakfast with my friend Chuck and some of the other men from church.   I told Chuck that I am a very lucky and blessed man to be married to such a wonderful lady as my gizmo.  Gizmo (aka Katy or Georgia Kathryn Moffitt) stole my heart 16 years ago and refuses to give it back to me.  Katy and I both attended First Baptist Church in Houston Texas back in 1989 and 1990.  We were both part of the singles group at that church and we spent some time together after church eating out with the other singles and attending singles events.  At that time in my life I had no desire to find a mate as I had been working out the kinks from a previous marriage that did not work out.  I will never forget one of my friends at church who I considered one of my spiritual sisters coming up to me and telling me that I was very difficult to be around sometimes because of the issues I was having to work through.  I know that this is probably hard for most of you to imagine this but one of my friends at church was telling me what a jerk I could be.  I just could not believe that she was saying that to innocent me.

Katy and I met at a Mash party where the singles would dress up as one of the MASH characters from the TV show and participate in whatever type of events that they were having at church that night.  On the particular night that Katy and I met I was playing volleyball out on the basketball court and keeping a watchful eye on my son Jeremy who was still 3 years old.  Katy just happened to be on the sidelines near Jeremy and was helping keep an eye on him while I played volleyball.  I managed to wander off the court and check out this single female that was getting a little too close to my son.   Over the span of 6 months to a year Katy and I managed to keep running into each other when we would all go out to eat after church.  I did not know this until later but Katy and her friend Peggy kept reserving a seat for me next to Katy when we would go out to eat with the singles.  Can you imagine that they were plotting on me??  I tell ya, it is just not safe for a guy to go stuff his face anymore.  Hahahahahaha  Anyway, one thing led to another and the next thing I know I am head over heals in love with gizmo.  Really, I just wanted to be friends.  As I had mentioned earlier in this diatribe I had as much use for women at this point in my life as I did for a pile of dog doo doo.  I was still pretty messed up from another relationship therefore the last thing I wanted to do was to get involved with someone else any time soon.  I remember the day that I took Katy aside after Sunday night service and told her that while I liked her very much that I just wanted to be friends and that I thought that things were progressing a little bit too fast for my liking.  Katy was just crushed and cried and cried as if I had broken her heart.  Poor dear…  Why did she and does she love me so??  LOL…  Anyway, the friend’s thing continued for quite some time.  I had Jeremy every two weeks and one weekend on a Friday night I remember that Katy called the house I was staying at and invited Jeremy and I to  go to Galveston.  Katy used Jeremy to get back into my life.  Can you imagine that.  Poor Jeremy at a tender young age of 3 was being manipulated by this man hungry single from First Baptist Church.  LOL…  Well, we went to Galveston that evening and rode the ferry across.  Before you know it Jeremy is in the back of my 1973 two door Mercury Montego and Katy and I were on the beach talking into the wee hours of the morning.  I guess that you could say that the fires of friendship were rekindled into something a tad bit more serious.  

Katy and I both have an understanding.  We agreed to the fact that we are married with a coffin clause.  Some folks get married and have a prenuptial agreement to sign.  Katy and I just had a one line coffin clause that basically says that you can get out of the relationship IF you are dead and they are putting your carcass into a pine box and banging nails into it.  You could say that we made a very solemn commitment to one another to make this relationship work for better or for worse.  We also understood that she was not marrying me because of my money nor was I marrying her for her cooking skills.  As a matter of fact Katy and I both had more people telling us how our marriage would fail vs. saying that it would be a success.  Imagine our shock at listening to our Christian friends tell us that there was no way that our marriage could ever last because of things in our past.  Looking back over the last 16 years I have to say that I never fully realized what kind of a true gem that God had placed into my life.  When you first get married there is a certain physical attraction that gets the flames started and then the children come and the careers take over and the next thing you know the raging flames of romance start to die out and then you are in the midst of the commitment that you have made to your spouse.  On September 11th 1990 our first child, Jessica Ann was born and she was 3.5 months premature.  We spent the first three months of Jessica’s life watching her fight for life but with much prayer and great medical treatments she was free to come home to be with her parents.  

One of the things that I treasure the most about our relationship as husband and wife is that we are totally sold out to one another and our family.  I can honestly say that we have been through a LOT of things that most women and marriages would have NEVER  held up to.  I honestly believe that if things had gotten so bad that we would have wound up on the street that Katy and the kids would have been right there beside me.  No, we never wound up in the street however things did get pretty rough for us financially on more than one occasion.  We have weathered the storms of financial disaster, medical emergencies with our children and many other storms that we have faced together.  Thanks to our undying commitment to one another and our individual and joint commitment to our faith in Jesus Christ we have managed to stay together despite the odds.  

As of 2006 Katy cooks better and I have managed to increase my salary somewhat.  One of the things that money can not purchase and that is worth more than all the gold in the world is the peace that passes all understanding.  When you walk into our home you will find that it is a very peaceful place.  Does that mean that Katy and I sweep everything under the rug and we live in denial or think that either of us is without fault?  Of course not, we are married and we do have our moments when we disagree on things.  As a matter of fact we have agreed that we need to have at least one fight every other year just so that we can remember how to do it.  We also agreed that kissing and making up at the end is also just as fun today as it was way back when.  LOL….

Thank you for 16 years of wonderful marriage my gizmo.  I am looking forward to another 16 years with you and I can not wait to see how much our love for one another is going to grow and mature.  Thank you for putting up with me during my moments of selfishness and immaturity.  Thank you for being there for me despite my not deserving it.  Thank you for the Jesus in you that I have seen over the last 16 years as you have shown me how to be a selfless servant to your family.   Thank you for the quiet courage and strength that you have given to our marriage and to each of our situations that we have walked through.  Thank you for being my bride and the mother of my wonderful children.  Thank you for accepting my son Jeremy as your own and loving him no less than your own children.  Thank you so much for your never ending love.  
I wuv you vewy vewy mooch gizmo, don’t ever forget it.  Hugs

Denver Colorado Slide show

My visit in Denver Colorado this weekend

This weekend I spent with my friend James Carberry and his family in Denver Colorado. I used to work for James back in 1992 when he owned and operated Practice Management Industries. James and I developed a close friendship every since then and have stayed in contact even though we live far away. The Internet and the ability to exchange e-mail and IM messages makes it easy for us to do this. James and I spent the weekend driving around the foot hills of the Rocky Mountains and we also went up into the Rocky Mountains so I could see some pretty spectacular sights. In the pictures you will see some pretty magnificant views.
During one of our photo op moments I managed to get buried up to my britches in snow. I was going up an enbankment of snow to go stand by a couple of trees when my right leg just disappeared. So, there I am stuck like chuck with no way to get out. I am pulling on my leg to get it out and it would not come out. James told me that I had a moment when the look of panic appeared. LOL... I finally pulled my leg out and left my shoe down in the hole. LOL... My friend James dug my shoe out as I sat down on my rear end and just slid back down the hill to the road. Luckily for me there were only a few folks that were on a pull out down the road that noticed our antics. I just had to sit there and laugh and laugh. It really was sort of scary and embarrasing but I decided tha it was pretty funny. Thanks to James digging my shoe out I was able to brush myself off and get my wits about me fairly quickly.
James and his family were very gracious hosts and it was so good to see the family and spend some time with them. James is married to his wife Liese and there four children are Gracie, Joel, Hannah and ..... the baby. Sorry, the name just escapes me... Anyway, they are a beautiful group of folks and they live in a very nice place up near the Rocky Mountains.
One of the things that I was amazed about was the apparent lack of oxygen. All in all we did not do anything very physically demanding but I found myself huffing and puffing even with the simplest of activities such as getting in and out of the rental car to take hundreds of pictures. I was very suprised at how thin the air is and how little humidity that they have there in Denver. The static electricity was so bad I found myself noticing that the hair on my arms were standing straight up and I kept getting shocked when I would touch the rental car.
I took hundreds of pictures and also took several videos with my Concorde Digital camera which I am going to figure out how to share as well. Enjoy!!

James Carberry next to rental car as we were driving up the foot hills of the rockies 

Joel Carberry's pet gerbil.  

green mountain 

Me and James at the Buffalo Bill gift shop 

The coors plant in the Mesa Plains valley. If you look to the right of the picture you see the clear mountain spring water that runs from the mountains into the brewery 

Kissing the buffalo 

my friend James Carberry in Denver Colorado 

me and James with his newest baby girl 

James Carberry, Liese and family 

my friend James Carberry checking email in my hotel room in Denver Colorado 

Dad and Kristina 

Katy and Kristina 

My princess... 

Kristina Lynn Moffitt in her band uniform.  

Carberry family in Littleton Colorado. I will be visiting with them this coming up weekend.  

picture of house at waterfront park