Photo credit to yachtfan on flickr

Well, I did it. I joined a gym again. I know that the only reason I stuck with the gym as long as I did last time was because I was working out with friends. I hope that this time my focus will be on my goals and to become a thinner healthier Cliff. I’m ashamed to say that my current weight is 307. Not the heaviest I’ve been in my life, but definitely not near my goal weight of 200lbs. I know that for my health and self esteem this is what has to be done. Wish me luck as I embark on what will hopefully be a life changing journey.

Where does the time go?  I mean really, there has to be a spent time basket some where that is running over with time that has passed.  Some of it I’d like back to experience all over again, others I’m glad is gone.  I guess that’s life.  We move through our days with experiences, some good, some bad.  We have to learn from the bad and enjoy the good.

What’s going on in my life lately.  Well truthfully a lot.

I just celebrated my 29th birthday, surprising to me this birthday kind of hit me hard.   Not just because of the fact that I can no longer tryout for American Idol but that the end of my twenties is drawing near.  Another decade of my life to write off.

My birthday was wonderful this year, I got to have lunch with great friends, then dinner with great friends.  Unfortunately my birthday this year had one nasty sour note that I’m still dealing with.  While I was talking to a dear friend on the phone that was calling to wish me a Happy Birthday I started getting banking alerts that I had an International Charge on my credit card.  This wasn’t extremely surprising I had seen this once before when I had ordered something online.  The problem was that as I started researching I came to realize that the charges were not my charges.  In total $1,140.00 was charged to my account.  Luckily I have a pretty decent bank, they’ve been able to stop all the charges and even temporarily credit my account while the fraud claim is processed.  So after all is said and done, no money has been lost, just have to jump over a couple administrative hurdles then all will be back to normal.

I’ve started preliminary planning for my trip to China.  I’m very excited to get to visit my brother William in June of this year.  Together we will visit the World Expo 2010 in Shanghai.  The light research I’ve done so far on the Expo makes me look forward to the experience even more.  From what I can see so far we will be able to experience the attendance of over 200 countries in one location, this will surely be sensory overload but should be a blast.  Above all I will get to see and spend time with my brother.  My brother William has lived in China for almost three years now.  I’ll be the first to admit that my brother and my relationship growing up was not the best.  Not that we didn’t get along, we were just not close.  Since my brother moved to China I feel that we’ve really been able to develop our relationship and kind of discover and mold our relationship in to a great friendship.

These things are just a few things that are going on right now.  I’m happy with my life and so happy that I have the friends that I have to experience life with.

Until the next update…TTFN

Wilson Machine Works

Originally uploaded by dizfunkshinal

Went on quite a long walk today, it was a gorgeous day. Not exactly sure how long or far I walked but I definitely made up for it by eating a giant walnut brownie when I got home. I should never let that happen again, the walk that is…the brownie was heavenly.

Hello,

My name is Cliff Cooper.

Ya, it’s still kind of weird for me, it doesn’t really roll off the tongue as easily as I’d like it to.  I’ve had a nickname since birth, Rusty.  In effect I’ve always had a total of four names. Clifford “Rusty” Russell Cooper.  I’ve always enjoyed the short form of my real first name, Cliff.  A couple weeks ago I began the transformation to using my real name.  It’s a tough transition, for people I’ve known for years it’s quite difficult to learn a new monomer.  It’s difficult for me as well, answering the phone I have to dedicate some extra thought process when I say my name.  For the past 28 years I have used one name to introduce myself, now that’s changing, what have I done…?  I also have a guilty feeling for some reason that I’ve dishonored my parents some how.  Rusty is the name that they gave me, is it not good enough for me? I told my mom that I’m changing to using Cliff as my primary name and didn’t get a poor response, I still, however, have a little feeling of guilt about it.  Over time Rusty will fade away in to the past but it’s definitely a tough transition period.

Rudy, my high school friend left Seattle this morning after spending some of the best days of my Seattle life so far.  Rudy and I had an absolute blast touring all over the city and great Pacific Northwest.  Take a look here for some of the pictures.  We had a loosely set itinerary but what I love is the true run down of what we actually did in comparison.  Hit the link/picture below to see the comparison, the tabs are at the bottom to compare.

We had a great time, I truly hope that Rudy will return soon, but ultimately would love to have him move to Seattle to share this wonderful city with me.

Hey guess what!

Today is rustycooper.com, dizfunkshinal.com, & morningbyte.com’s 4th birthday!

My little corner of the web is a big 4 years old today!

Thanks for being part of it!

Howdy!

I’m coming to you live from my fresh new Blog Tool!

I was in the process of moving my site to a new host.  Well in the process my old posts wouldn’t transfer to the same blog, so I scrapped it.  I imported all my posts to this new system called Word Press.  I’ve heard good things about it and so far I’m very happy with it!  I will probably be toying with the look so give me feedback!  Tell me what ya like or what ya miss!

Take care!

TTFN

I’d like to buy a bicycle, I could just go cheap and find one at like Wal-mart or Costco. What would be the advantages of paying thousands of dollars for a bike? I think I’ll probably start off with something cheap and then, if I see that I use it enough venture in to paying more money for one.
I’d also like a motorcycle, something like a Harley Fat Boy, I feel that’s appropriate. I may postpone that purchase till my living situation changes. I have a feeling my landlady might now appreciate it, and I respect that.
I want a tattoo, I’ve wanted one for years, I’ve just never been able to decide exactly what I want. I want something that is unique and meaningful to me.
So clearly after putting this down on “paper” I seem incredibly materialistic and feel like I should just be happy with what life has given me and carry on. Enter the conundrum of my daily life and the decisions that constantly play Pong in my head.