Ups and Downs

Back in April I mentioned that they were looking at doing some internal promotions at work and that I was going to apply for one if I could. Well I did and this week I found out that I wasn't successful. I was and still am pretty disappointed that nothing came of it and the worst part is that from what I can gather, the position that I've been acting in for the last three years will remain vacant. So although I didn't get the job I wanted, no one else seems to have got it either, which means that I'll probably have to keep doing the work. I'm going to chat to my boss about it some more as if they don't want to be pay me to do the job and officially recognise me in that position, then they can give the responsibilities to someone else. I really don't think that there is any more that I could do in my current role to prove that I can do the job so if they aren't going to give it to me, I'm not going to beg and I'll probably start looking around and seeing what else is out there that I'd be interested in.
If I do end up stepping back from the current role then I'll have more time to spend on working on the YouTube endeavour as it will be easier to knock off early or do some four day weeks so I can get out camping more often.
Speaking of taking it easy, my wife finally agreed to go on another cruise. I started mentioning it a few weeks back and it obviously got her thinking about it. Today we actually made a booking and paid a deposit, we're going to cruise the South Pacific late next year. Yes it's a long time away but it will give us something to look forward to and allow us to save up and pay the cruise off over the next 12 months. I'm already feeling better about not getting the promotion at work just thinking about spending a week and a half on a boat with nothing to worry about except putting on sunscreen and which pool to relax in next.

Bomber
I'd better slim down before I fatten myself up again.

Happy Friday!

I've had a busy week and it has gone quickly. There has been a lot to do at work and I'm finding things that other people said that they'd done, not done at all or done really poorly. It's getting quite frustrating but I've been making to tidy things up and I've been trying to put processes in place that will make my life easier going forward for those too lazy to do the job properly. Anyway that's enough about work, I wasn't born to pay bills and die.
I've been chatting with a couple of mates and we're trying to organise a camping trip out to a nearby state forest. We can camp for free in any state forest but only a few of them have dedicated camp grounds. The others you kind of have to find a spot that works in amongst the trees, quite often they are large pine plantations so there aren't many good places but we're still going to give it a go and try and find an out of the way spot and have a primitive camp. I won't be filming any of it for YouTube but I may take some photos for Instagram. I might also take out my wife's camera which is pretty good and try and take some photos of the sky at night as we should be a long way from any light polution.
Speaking of Instagram, I need to take some more photos for that but I'm hoping to head out over the weekend and take some if the weather is nice. I've currently got 88 followers and I hope to keep slowly growing the following. I'm enjoying posting to Instagram, the audience is completely strangers who have found my posts as I still haven't promoted any of the social media accounts that I have. I like that it is organic, it will probably take longer to get a large following, but at least I know it will be from people who chose to follow because they liked what they saw.
I haven't been exercising and my diet hasn't changed, but to be honest I've been happier not really worrying about any of that. I feel more relaxed about this blog since I stopped writing everyday, it was becoming a chore and that was never meant to be the case.

Bomber
Bring on the weekend.

Solar Power

Last week my solar panels were installed. I ended up getting 5.27kW of panels paired to a 4kW inverter. Where I live I can only export a maximum of 5kW to the grid and as the kids are at school and my wife and I are at work most days, we don't have a huge amount of power usage during the day. I would end up making more power then I could export so the return on the investment would be there to have a larger system with a larger inverter, the next size up was 8kW.
I'm glad that I went the way I did, using tilt stands instead of just lying the panels flat on the roof. I'm already maxing out the inverter for an hour or so in the middle of each day where if the panels were flat, I wouldn't be generating as much power. Yes the tilt frames cost more, but I think it will be worth it in the long run and either way, what's done is done so there is no point worrying about it any longer.

On Tuesday I dropped my wife at work and then took the kids to the dentist, you can see in the graph when I came home and we turned the heater back on. This was the day before the solar system got installed. 
Our electricity provider had already configured us in advance so we were up and running the day the solar system was installed. 

On Thursday I was home with the kids all day and you can see where the solar system started producing power and we weren't using any from the grid. I'm pretty impressed the the electricity provider has all this information available on their website. It takes a couple of days for it to be available but to be able to see an hour by hour break down of your consumption and your generation is pretty cool. The graphs are showing the cost, so the export to the grid looks small as they don't pay very much. I managed to get up to 3kWh export for a bit on Thursday so the system works and I'm very happy with the results.
I'm looking forward to seeing the difference between summer and winter, I'm not sure if I'll get into credit with such a low feed in tariff but I'm hoping to at least be almost neutral for summer.

Bomber
One thing ticked off the unofficial list at last.

One Year Later

This could be a rather long post as it is made up of entries from the last 12 months of blogging. It's kind of a mini blog in itself or a TL;DR for the past year (although it is pretty long). At the end of each month's entry is a list of all the goals that I've set and my progress against each of them.
Reading through each months entry myself makes me remember things that I'd forgotten had happened. Life certainly moves very fast at times.

26 August 2018
Back on the 26th of August 2018, I came up with the idea for this post. I actually started writing this post on that day. I didn't publish the post with this idea in it until the 28th of August because that's just how I roll. At this time (August 2018) I often write three or four posts over the weekend and schedule them to be published so that there is one post at 19:30 each day. I do go back and check them prior to being published and I sometimes change the order of the posts as I come up with new ideas or something might happen on a particular day and it makes more sense to publish that then what I had already scheduled for the day.
I've been a little bit in the wars this month. I busted my knee somehow, the doctor never gave me a firm diagnoses but I had an ultrasound and they couldn't find anything so it was likely just some tendinitis. I also started feeling really dizzy, so I was back at the doctors and they did a round of blood tests. I'm currently waiting for the results of them but it is most likely due to me losing weight and not eating as much crap. That has caused my blood pressure to drop.
I'm doubting that I'll be able to get even 20 videos out in a year as it seems quite daunting but I'm still keen to give it a go. I've spoken to my wife about heading out camping mid-week and she seems ok with it at this stage. I've also spoken with my boss at work and he's ok with me taking time out every few weeks too.
There has been a number of goals set this month as it is the first month of the blog

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 70,000 steps each week - currently at about 65,000 steps on average.
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 0 subscribers
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 108.5kg 
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Not looking so good
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
    

19 September 2018
Dizziness, a cold and weight gained, that's how to summarise the last month. The blood tests didn't shed any light as to what may be wrong, I've still got a few more days of tablets left and if I'm still dizzy after I finish all the tablets then I have to go back to the doctors.
This month I went camping solo for the first time. I also shot the introduction videos for YouTube and Patreon. I came up with some t-shirt designs.
I've managed to cross off one goal this month. I'm guessing that crossing them off will become harder and harder as time goes on.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 70,000 steps each week - currently just under 65,000 steps on average, so down from last month (no surprises there)
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 108kg that's only 0.5kg from this time last month as I put on 1kg last week.
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned yet.
 

 

19 October 2018
Still got some dizziness, it started off not so bad but sometimes it gets pretty bad. I'm thinking that I may have to go back to the doctor. This month I went and visited my Sister as she was graduating from University with a bachelor of medicine. I didn't really do that well with my diet or exercise in the last month, hopefully I'm getting back on the right track now. I didn't achieve any goals in the last month but I did set one new goal.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 70,000 steps each week - roughly 60,500
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 3 subscribers but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 107.5kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
 

 

19 November 2018
This month I started off by setting myself a mini goal of having to lose 1kg a week or I'd have to join a gym. I'm not adding that to the list of goals as it ties in with the general goal of losing weight. 1kg a week isn't enough to hit my goal of 90kg by Christmas but I think there is no way I could reach that goal now. I still want to get down to 90kg though. What I did add was a goal of burning on average 4.6K calories each day. That can be achieved by walking or other forms of exercise... then the vertigo returned with a vengeance and I ended up giving myself a week off from everything. I also discovered that maybe my metabolism had changed and that was why I'd stopped losing weight.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 70,000 steps each week - this month I averaged just over 61,000 steps
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 4 subscribers and I still haven't launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently xxxkg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 4,004

19 December 2018

This month I purchased some dumbbells to use in the garage. I also had a couple of slack weeks and stopped writing the food diary as it wasn't helping and was just taking up too much time to actually do properly. I didn't complete any goals this month and it's safe to say that I'll fail the 90kg by Christmas goal. Knowing what I do now, I think that the goal was probably unachievable just by doing what I had planned to do which was to exercise a little more and reduce the amount of junk I eat. I think that if I wanted to lose that much weight I'd have to make major changes to all meals and maybe even go on a shake diet. 
This month I also missed my first daily blog. I thought that I had one scheduled and ready to go but for some reason I hadn't done that so I just completely missed a day. Towards the end of the month I also gave up on walking and using weights. Work was just getting to me too much and I just wanted to put my feet up when I got home.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 70,000 steps each week - just less than 50,000 on average
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 4 subscribers and I still haven't launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 108kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 3,744
 

 

19 January 2019

I needed a break. This month I was really feeling ready for a break and even when I got one, it didn't seem long enough. I didn't achieve anywhere near as many goals as I'd set for myself for the year and I had no real plans to actually meet any of them in the near future. My wife and I also started talking about possibly extending the house or maybe moving to somewhere a little bigger.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 70,000 steps each week is now 10,000 steps daily average - 5,168
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 111kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 3,267
 

19 February 2019
What a month this has been. Nothing to do with motocamping or losing weight, in fact I put on weight and only went camping in the car with the kids during school holidays. What has happened this month is that we decided that we would like to sell our house and upsize to a new one out at Googong. Little did I know that it would all happen in just a couple of weeks and we are now just waiting for settlement to occur around mid March. In fact the next monthly update should be the day before settlement. This blog was always meant to be about me being better and I'm not sure if moving house really counts but I guess that getting a nicer house and having a better standard of living is good all round.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 10,000 steps daily average -7,947
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently110kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 3,780
 

 

19 March 2019
Today we moved into our new house. That wasn't even on the horizon when I started this blog. If you had told me when I started writing this blog that we'd have purchased a brand new, never lived in house by today, I would have laughed and said that it wasn't even possible. In this last month we took the family to the Gold Coast for a holiday in a luxury house right on one of the canals. Today also marks when I have given myself to, to get my exercise routine back in order. Next month will hopefully show the fruits of my labour. I also added a new goal this month and that was to post a new Instagram post every week.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 10,000 steps daily average - 8,860 this month
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 112kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September 2018
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 3,901 this month
15. Post a new Instagram photo each week - starting this month
 

 

19 April 2019
It's still been a bit of a blur but things seem to be getting back on track. The weather is cooling down and daylight savings has ended but I'm exercising and losing a little weight again. Things are settling down at home so my weekends will become a little more available to motorcycling pursuits. I just need to take advantage of nice weather whenever I can. This month is the first time I've averaged over 10,000 steps each day and averaged over 4.6K calories each day.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 10,000 steps daily average - 11,572 this month
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 109kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September 2018
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 4.63K this month
15. Post a new Instagram photo each week - I posted once in the last month and that was last weekend.
 

 

19 May 2019
I haven't changed my step goal yet but it is probably getting close to the time where I should increase it. This month I didn't quite meet my targets which somewhat surprises me as I did last month and I feel that this month I've tried harder.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Built but no videos as yet 
3. 10,000 steps daily average - 9,500 this month
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 110kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September 2018
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - Not sure how to judge this?
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 4.04K this month
15. Post a new Instagram photo each week - I haven't posted at all in the last month, bad Bomber.

19 June 2019
A mixed bag this month. The colder weather and some trips away with work have impacted my step targets but I'm persisting and the weight is very very slowly coming back down.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - Took some footage this month but no motocamping trips
3. 10,000 steps daily average -  9,255 this month
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife) but I haven't really launched the channel yet.
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 109kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September 2018
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - I'm starting to really feel like I'm becoming a better Dad, I just need to work harder on being a better Husband.
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned but I need to get onto this, I think I've found the right course.
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 4.1K this month
15. Post a new Instagram photo each week - I took a bunch of photos this month and will release a new photo each week until I run out, hopefully I'll take some more before that happens.

19 July 2019
Well it's been one year since I started this blog. I blogged nearly every day up until the last couple of weeks. All up I've published 344 posts in 365 days, that's a pretty fair effort. I just seemed to run out of things to write about which was part of why I stopped writing every day and life had settled down for me. I've been really busy at work and I've been happy watching TV with my wife instead of spending time on the computer.

1. Start Blog - Completed 19 July 2018 
2. Start YouTube Channel - This never really happened
3. 10,000 steps daily average -  8,286 average this month
4. 10,000 subscribers within the first year - 1 subscriber (my wife)
5. Earn $1000 in one month by second year - $0 biggest month
6. Earn $5000 per month by the fifth year - $0 avg per month
7. Meet YouTubers who have inspired me - 0 met
   
8. Weigh less than 90kg by Christmas - currently 109kg
9. Shoot intro videos by end of August - Completed 14 September 2018
10. Publish 20 videos in a year - 0 videos published
11. Be a better Husband and Dad - I think I've become a better Dad
12. Motocamp to Bourke - Nothing planned
13. Adventure Motorcycle Training by Oct 2019 - Nothing planned
14. Burn an average of 4.6K calories each day - 3.2K this month
15. Post a new Instagram photo each week - I haven't taken any more photos from what I had previously.

Bomber

I'll still be writing regularly, just not daily unless there is a lot happening; And thank-you for reading all the way to the end of this post :)

Weighing In

I'm still here, I just haven't really had anything much to say recently. I guess it's what's called writers block or something like that. To be honest, it's kind of been nice not worrying about if I have something to post or not. I have been a little tired and I was a little sick during the week but I think things have just been very much the same for the last week or so I didn't see the point in trying to invent something to write about.
Diet hasn't changed, I haven't really tried that hard. I don't think I got out for one walk this week, we had people coming around to give quotes on doing up the study a couple of afternoons and it was raining another afternoon. I guess I just wanted to take a break from it all.
I've gained a couple of new Instagram followers but still haven't taken any new photos. I probably had time this weekend but I spent it on the couch instead.

Weight: 108.8kg
Steps for the week: 51,034
Average daily calorie burn: 3,607

Bomber
Time to start again.

Struggling

I'm really struggling for content at the moment. Nothing is really happening at the moment besides waking up, going to work, coming home, going for a walk, having dinner and then going to bed. There hasn't been any real news or anything that I've done or thought about or goals that I've set myself. I don't want to just write meaningless posts just for the sake or writing something.
I guess one thing that has happened that I was expecting was that once I started posting to Instagram regularly was that I may pick up more followers. Since I posted only a couple of times and seem to attract new follows every week or so, I imagined that I would get more followers pretty easily. I was actually talking to my wife about it and saying how I had 75 followers, then next time I checked I had 74. I don't think that I've actually got any new followers at all since I posted each Monday for the last four weeks. I've had quite a few likes on my posts, not all of them from followers so I guess I'm getting out there a little. I'm going to persist with it for as long as I can, who knows, maybe I can get a following or maybe people just won't be interested in what I'm doing.

Bomber
Sometimes I have verbal diarrhoea, other times not so much.