Design Challenges

2 Miles: Bright and Early

I'm still amazed how many people are up and jogging early in the morning. When I was growing up I remember walking to the bus and the only other people I saw where classmates walking to the same bus. This goes to show how concern or educated people have gotten over the years.

As I was doing my two+ (sometimes three or four) miles this morning I noticed how many others get up and either walk or jog. I also noticed that many of these people are the same people. A lot of them do it because they have to walk their dogs, others do it for the same reason I'm doing it, to improve or maintain healthy.

The purpose of this two mile a day work challenge is to get people motivated to become active and get up the couch. I'm thankful to my colleague for organizing this ass-off challenge.

The bottom line is that it doesn't much matter what type of exercise you are doing, whether it is walking, jogging, running, or a combination thereof, the important thing is to commit to being active and stick with it.

Labels: 2-mile, biggest loser, Jacksonville

2-Miles: Coquina

Up in the northeast, where I grew up, most houses are built with either wood or aluminum siding. Vinyl siding is a plastic exterior cladding for a house. Vinyl siding was introduced to the exterior cladding market in the late 1950s. At that time, blending of colors was done manually. Because of all the manual labor involved, the process made it difficult to produce and install a consistent, quality product. In 1970s, a transformation of the product began, with the industry engineering formulation changes. Because of these changes a lot of houses in the northeast where upgraded to the product.

In Florida, however, we have seen three distinct materials in used. Stucco, vinyl, and Coquina. The first I was familiar with, the latter however was new to me. Coquina is an incompletely consolidated sedimentary rock. Coquina is mainly composed of mineral calcite, often including some phosphate, in the form of seashells or coral. It has been used in building stone in Florida for over 400 years, coquina forms the walls of the Castillo de San Marcos in Saint Augustine, this country's oldest city. The stone makes a very good material for forts, particularly those built during the period of heavy cannon use. Because of coquina's softness, cannon balls would sink into, rather than shatter or puncture, the walls of the Castillo de San Marcos.

In my current community of Saw Mill Lakes where I perform most commonly my two miles I have noticed that about every fifth house is sided with Coquina. At first I was not fun of the material. Although it gives a very beachy atmosphere, it texture is very shelly, and looks very rough. When we were looking to buying a house we decided that this material just wasn't for us mainly because all the houses we saw that had coquina had a pink tone to them. Later we found out that coquina can be painted. Ever since I have noticed many shades of coquina in our community. We ended up buying a house in a different community, The Players Club at Sawgrass, but it is made of stucco siding. This is not because of our original dislike of coquina, but because we found the right house for us, just a coincidence that it did not have coquina. We actually grew fond of coquina over time.

The bottom line is that you can't a judge something until you have all the facts. We originally dislike Coquina because of the tones we had noticed, turns out that it can be painted just like any other material to any color that suits your taste. It is very durable and long lasting. To replace coquina for another material in a house is quite costly, but this is true for all materials. If you find the right house, don't worry about the exterior, remember you expend 99% of the time indoors.

Labels: 2-mile, biggest loser, Connecticut, Florida, Jacksonville, jax

2-Miles: Earth Day

With Biggest Loser season 7 now winding down to the end, it seems like Tara can't loose a challenge and will take this thing to the end. With that said, I think people have now become very health conscious and the whole world is hype up on losing weight.

This past Wednesday my colleagues decided to start a 2 mile challenge. That is, the folks who decided to join have to walk 2 miles a day, seven days a week. These two miles were imposed to motivate folks to step out of their daily life and comfort zone. With summer coming it seemed like a good idea. I typically run 3 miles four days a week and this seemed like the perfect thing to get me out of the house every day instead. My wife has decided to join me and we use the time to wind out the day and stroll down the neighborhood and beach.

I started thinking that there are so many different things that we observed on our daily life and as such, I decided to document in this blog the things I come out at me as different during my two miles.

As a celebration today being Earth Day, I started noticing while walking on the beach, that sometimes we disrespect our planet and our fellow cohabitants by polluting and trashing our share space on this Earth. We started our walk this evening a few minutes past 6 and as the sun started to set and the beach started to become more desolate, I notice the garbage people leave behind. The photo here depicts a bottle cap left behind from a sprite bottle. The bottle was gone, but the cap remained. So the people having this drink decided that they would pick up the bottle and leave a cap behind. Something this small could easily be picked up and swallow by one of the many dogs that are walked thereby leading to indigestion, or worse, death.

The bottom line is that there are so many things that we can do to change ourselves and our environment. It is the little things and details that set us apart. Do your part and start picking up after yourself. That 10 seconds it takes to pick a bottle cap can save our planet and a life.

Labels: 2-mile, biggest loser, Design, exercise, Florida, Jacksonville, photo resizing, photoshop

Biggest Loser: Bill and Jim Take It

What have you done today to make yourself feel proud? This is the question the Biggest Looser Theme song asks of every viewer.

I have been watching the show since the first season and each and every single time I am amazed how well this now athletes perform. I'm not one for reality TV, but this show is more than real to me. I have struggle with the teetering of the scale my entire life.

This show is truly inspiring and should become the number one watched show in America as we, as a nation, are suffering the highest rate of obesity in the world.

This season I been rooting for Bill and Jim since day one. I thought they had the most integrity and of course, as twins, had each other to push each other to loose the most weight.

The proof is on today's finale where Bill took the prize money of 250 thousand dollars and Jim taking home the 100 thousand dollar at home prize.

This season most were rooting for a girl to win and it appeared to be heading that way until the bitter end where Bill took Julie out by a close 5% of body weight.

Here are their numbers:
Bill - 49.1%
Julie - 44.5%
Hollie - 41.18%
Isabeau - 37.92%

The bottom line is that if you set your mind to anything, you can accomplish it. Whether is loosing weight, changing careers, or becoming a millionaire, we all have the power to do it. With a little dedication and motivation we can achieve all of our goals and dreams.

Labels: biggest loser, reality show, TV