Finally...

[Murgatroy]

Christmas Vacation is finally over.

I dropped my heathen off at school this morning.

You would think, with this being her first year of school, that Christmas Vacation, or Winter Break if you prefer, would have seemed normal, what after five years of her being home every day; however, it threw the cycle of things off pretty severely.

Now, I don't want to come off as seeming like a self centered person. I am not, anyone that knows me knows that my daughter is my number one priority and my pride and joy. Anyone that is not a parent I don't think could understand, but parents should get it. She has changed my life so drastically that those that knew me before don't believe that I am the same person.

That is a great thing. In many ways.

Since she started school my wife went back to work. That has been a great blessing. Having a full time stay at home parent is valuable, but it is hard to live on one income, regardless of what my tax bracket may say. I have settled into a nice daily routine. I had to find something to fill several hours of my morning since I take care of the morning preparations. I don't go into work until 11am, however, I start my day at 6am. I wake my heathen, get her dressed, feed her, make her lunch (even though she wants to be a lunch buyer!!!) I drop her off at school at 7am, and then head to the gym.

This has been a major improvement in my life. I am not out of shape, exactly. I have a few extra pounds on me, but that is bound to happen when you finally work your way to a desk job. After several years of working a physically demanding night shift job, a few years ago I was promoted from a supervisory position to a management position. Now, instead of being a hands on doing guy, I sit at a desk and watch numbers. I enjoy it, but at times I am bored out of my skull, because I would find it easier to just do it myself, than create a protocol of how someone else should do it.

So the inactivity and stress has put around thirty pounds on me.

Now I have gotten into the routine of spending a couple hours a morning at the gym, working the weight off and getting back into some semblance of shape. Through exercise and a slapped together diet I have lost over twenty pounds over the last few months. I have been taking vitamins, stopped eating out and honestly I feel great.

Christmas Vacation was two weeks of inactivity. I slept in, ate what I wanted and just lounged around the house most days until it was time to go to work. I even found this slothfulness creeping into my work attitude. To combat the inactivity of my preafternoon work, I have taken to helping other departments in what ways I can. Last week I don't think I did a thing other than sit in front of my computer and tinker.

So this morning I dropped my daughter off and took my happy little a** to the gym. I feel great and I am gonna carry that attitude to work with me.