Let me start by saying that I am so glad that 2009 is over. Though I don't have it nearly as bad as some people in the world, all the same it's a year I'd like to learn from and put behind me. Time for me to get out of my rut and make new, realistic goals for myself.

  • For one, it's time to get back to blogging some. But instead of promising that I'll blog 2-3/week, I'm gonna do my best to get 2-3 posts a month. Realistic!
  • As much as I want to get back to the weight I was at 21 years of age, the truth is that I'll never get back to that weight in 2010 (maybe ever!) I'll be very happy with 20 lbs of weight loss, and that's gonna be hard enough. I already workout, but I just need to be more consistent. I've also reached an age where I need to take more supplements (or in this take them period!)
  • When I was 17, I made a goal to give more hugs. That habit has stuck with me even to this day; however, I still think that in a lot of ways I've allowed myself to focus on more negative than I should. My new goal is to notice the good more than the bad. I'm not going to ignore the bad entirely; but I'm gonna try to make more lemonade out of the lemons all around me. It's easy to sit and be negative; but it takes character to notice the good despite the bad. I want character.
  • I will also find ways to spend more time with my family. This means that I have to start saying "no" to others. My schedule is so busy; as it is, I have no time to do the things I've committed to. This also means that I have schedule time with my family and take an active role in it. Like yesterday, It felti good to give up watching a NFL playoff game to play Band Hero with my wife and kids.
  • In addition to more family time, and I need more "me" time. For the longest time, I've needed update my Microsoft Certifications. I need personal scripture study and journaling back in my life. This means I'll have to scale back even further on my activities, and manage my time more wisely. And sometimes, it'll simply mean stepping away from my laptop.

Hopefully this list will be ever involving, and I will continue to see things I can do help me to be a better person for 2010 and beyond. For all of you reading this, I wish the same for you as well.

Happy New Year, y'all.

January 11, 2010 11:38 by RafaelV
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Just an FYI for those that are curious, you may have noticed that I've disabled the ability to add comments to any of my posts. The reason is quite simple ... I'm tired of getting spammed with useless statements that only serve to get others links back to their websites. The few comments have been authentic and well received are still there, all others I am in the process of deleting.

In fact, the whole experience has turned me off from blogging a bit, to the point that I've haven't been very diligent in keeping it up - I do apologize for that. I have lots of items that I will be sharing with you as soon as my time frees up more. Those of you that would still like to share your comments about my posts, I would encourage you to tweet me or e-mail me your thoughts and I will add them to the post manually.

I hope you understand. 

 

July 12, 2009 00:06 by RafaelV
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This is a music video of a song called A Song Around the World. What's cool is that it features musicians and vocalists from different locations in the world that perform together. Very uplifting!


 
May 8, 2009 22:25 by RafaelV
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This is one of my favorite sports personalities, Rich Eisen, running the 40 at the combine for the 5th straight year. Aside from him being slow, there's so much that makes this funny - especially the second half of the clip! Hilarious!!

March 7, 2009 00:57 by RafaelV
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I'm OK with most types of music genres. I'll even listen to some country every now and then, though I don't go looking for it. I usually listen to R&B on the radio or some clean hip hop; but the kind I really go for is Neo Soul, what I describe as an updated mix of R&B and Soul.

My two favorite artists right now are Mary J. Blige and Musiq Soulchild. I just found out today that Musiq Soulchild has a new album (OnMyRadio), that I'll be getting on iTunes soon. And it looks like his first single will be a song called "IfULeave" ... featuring none other than Mary J. Blige. Great song! 

He'll also be on tour in Atlanta February 25 at the Fox Theatre. We'll see if I'll have time to go peep it. 

January 24, 2009 22:30 by RafaelV
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Almost! But not quite. I'll remain an Adidas guy for now; but I absolutely love the "Chalk" commercial with Lebron James. It's just a nice, feel-good clip; and they did a great job taking advantage of Lebron's famous ritual of tossing chalk in the air before each game.

Every time I see it, I get just a little swell of emotion. I like commercials that are inspiring, featuring athletes that are even more inspiring. Great job, Nike.

December 8, 2008 16:40 by RafaelV
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In this post, we hear from Definition 6 (the home of my first web programming gig) on how blogs can work for your organization; and they use the Obama campaign as a prime example of how successful they can be. 

http://blog.definition6.com/blog/definition-6/0/0/the-power-of-blogs

I agree. Times are changing, and I believe that blogs will be around for a long time. You'd be amazed at the people you can reach by having a blog; I know this because I'm surprised every week when I get wonderful comments from people I don't know. The Internet is a powerful force, man.

December 1, 2008 23:46 by RafaelV
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When I do work for our client downtown, I hook up my laptop to a monitor so that I can have two screens. If you haven't tried yet, I encourage you to do so! The only thing that bothered me was the wallpaper on my monitor screen; it didn't match the resolution on my laptop, or it was ugly whenever nothing was on it. Fortunately, I was able to Google a way to resolve it; and I feel much better.

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows/dual-monitors-use-a-different-wallpaper-on-each-desktop/

September 18, 2008 16:29 by RafaelV
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Here's some pictures of my son Coleman playing in a freshman football game, taken by one of the parents. He plays Corner. If you click the Close link, you can see some of the other pictures - but who cares about the other kids? I'm just jokin'. :-) BTW - they won 42-7 at home; they're 1-1 for the season.

September 15, 2008 00:11 by RafaelV
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I'm trying lose 40 lbs, which is hard for a developer like myself that sits more than 10 hours a day. No, I don't have a new program especially for computer geeks; but I have been trying to come up with one that works for me. I personally believe that the important thing for me (or anyone for that matter) is that I find a way to make healthy eating and being active part of my lifestyle.

In regards to healthy eating, I've started counting my caloric intake using TheDailyPlate, which is now part of the LiveStrong website. So far, it's been very revealing - it has helped me to realize how much I'm eating; I'm doing much better now. Instead of consuming 3000+ calories per day, I am now able to stay within about 2250 calories (which should help me to lose 2 lbs. a week.)

As far as staying active, I've been going to the gym about 3-4 times a week, doing both cardio and weight training. According to Lifehack, there are five exercises that computer people should stay away from. The point of the post is that a person that sits all day at work on a computer have to be careful of the exercises he puts in his regimen. The main reason is posture. Since there are exercises on the list that I actually do, I will give it some thought; but in the end, I need to do what works for me. I just need to make sure that I stick with something.

July 12, 2008 23:53 by RafaelV
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Thanks for visiting "The Rafael Van Dyke Blog". This is where I'll be blogging about everything in my life, primarily about my career in programming using ASP.NET. I will also blog about my thoughts on my favorite sport ever ... basketball. And of course, I will also occasionally let you know what's happening in my family and otherwise. 

This is actually my second blog site; my first one was about creating better documents using Microsoft Office. However, I haven't posted anything on it since May 2007; apparently, there's only so much you can write about documents. So though I still have a passion for documents right, I'm afraid I'm going to have to retire this blog.

I'm confident that I'll have plenty of stuff to write about creating web applications using ASP.NET, my real passion and what has put food on my family's table for the past 10 years. Plus, I also get to blog about anything else that I want - so I should be able to do a better job of updating this blog site.

My second post will be available in the next few days, where I'll tabl about the 2008 NBA Finals and why it's so special to me. Until then, I'll see you around!

May 30, 2008 16:56 by RafaelV
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