Top 10 of Your Top 10 Top 10s

Posted on May 24, 2012 | Leave a comment

Great comic today over at The Joy of Tech about Top 10 lists. I find it particularly  funny because so many “How to Improve SEO” or “How to Drive Traffic to Your Blog” articles advise using top 10 lists (about nearly anything) to get people to read your blog. That nugget of wisdom is usually number 1 on their top 10 list of “Get Moar Blog Followers” posts.

I have a better idea. Write an interesting post. Leave the SEO wanging and other ‘tricks’ aside. I suppose if you are writing just to make some money (which is a wee bit sad) or for popularity (ditto) then you should be following those sorts of tips and tricks. Otherwise, just write some cool shit.

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Posted in asininity

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For the past few months, I have been fully and whole-heartedly off the wagon when it comes to my diet and exercise. I thought I would pick it back up right after the wedding I went to in Ireland, but I didn’t. I continued to be a grand ole slack-ass. Until recently.

I am back to using my Fitbit (yay, the cleaner found it!) and tracking all my movements, food and sleep. I’ve also started using the notes and journal functions of the Fitbit website, to try to understand more where I am slipping and where I am winning. Because I’m beginning to see that when you are struggling, it is just as important to celebrate the little wins as it is the big ones.

I’ve also gone back to weighing myself. I find that I have a “just don’t look” policy when it comes to things I don’t want to deal with… when I know I haven’t been eating right and exercising, I stop weighing myself, and when I know it is near the end of the month and I shouldn’t spend any more money… I stop looking at my bank balance. What a brat.

Things aren’t as bad as I had thought (with the scale, the bank account is an entirely different issue!) but I do feel the need to lament a little how much further along I would have been had I not given up for a couple of months there.

Ages ago, Fitbit (bless it’s little wee electrical heart) told me that I would be my “ideal weight” mid-October. Then it got all excited and said it would be late September. NOT SO OPTIMISTIC NOW, ARE YOU? Poor Fitbit.

When I weighed in on Monday, it told me that I could be my ideal weight in mid-January. Yesterday it was like “holy shit, lookit you all on track” and pulled it back to the beginning of January. Today it is telling me I could still hit my goal weight in 2012. So I am completely in love with it again.

I would like to try to hit my goal weight this year. I think that would be cool. I just have to figure out how to stay consistent with what I am doing….

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Posted on May 24, 2012

Strategerising and Sticky Stuff

Posted on May 10, 2012 | Leave a comment

So apparently Velcro has gone through a massive rebranding. Who knew?

Although there is velcro in my life… that’s how I think of it. Little “v” velcro, not capital “V” Velcro as in “a brand”. I thought it had gone the way of Thermos, Teflon and all the other once-brand-names that ended up becoming just another product name to be pilfered by a bunch of other brands.

When I think of velcro, I think of shoes. Or this:

she looks like she’s having a great time

But it isn’t the rebranding (6 months for that logo? Really?) or the new website that caught my attention. It was two lines from the article over at Co. Create from  Velcro Group vice president of global marketing Jurjen Jacobs:

 “Instead of us trying to invent all kinds of new things you can do with Velcro, there are millions of people using our products every day, and most of them will be very proud to share their results with other people. I think that’s a huge strength of our brand and where our future marketing strategy will come from.”

Jacobs is doing marketing right. Instead of telling your brand advocates what they should be doing with your stuff, let your brand advocates tell you. Let THEM do the work! Let them shill your goods to other people… and hopefully turn those people into brand advocates in the meantime.

Although it is kinda ridiculous that it took 6 months (and probs oodles of money) to get a new logo, props to the velcro kids for doing their marketing strategy right.

I am curious now how Velcro is listening to their customers, evaluating what is being discussed and how they are going to act on that. At least there is going to be one clear measure of success on this one… when people start thinking about velcro as Velcro again.

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Posted in workskipops

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Will you spend more money for better terry cloth?

Posted on April 15, 2012 | Leave a comment

I don’t need terry cloth. But if I did, I’d spend the money to get the best damn terry cloth available.

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Goal Tracking. Weeks 13, 14 and 15.

Posted on April 10, 2012 | Leave a comment

THREE WEEKS WITHOUT POSTING? BAD JODI.

Week 13: Success. On track for 12/52 weeks so far.
Week 14: FAIL! On track for 12/52 weeks so far.
Week 15: FAIL! On track for 12/52 weeks so far.

I wasn’t really surprised about weeks 14 and 15, to be honest. I’ve been on holidays for the last couple of weeks and have been eating (and drinking) a LOT. And although I’ve been walking a lot on my holidays, it hasn’t been enough to make up for the amount of pub grub and ales I’ve inhaled.

Like I said before: You can’t outrun your fork. Back to better eating then!

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De-Ragifying with the Zoms

Posted on March 26, 2012 | Leave a comment

A strange thing happened to me today.

Started out as a fairly regular Monday. You know. Pretty shit. Had to get up early. Had to get on a stinky, crowded train. Decided that rather than walk to work (Waterloo to London Bridge) I would take more of a stinky train to get in early.

Got in early. No bananas. Work work work worky work. Gym at lunch – ran 5km. Fairly standard.

Work work work worky work. (There may have been a meeting or two in that worky work there somewhere).

Commute home, stinky train. Pick up groceries. Eat some dinner, eff about online. Talk to my moms (which is always a highlight) but then RAGE RAGE RAGE (my poor, patient moms) about a particularly INFURIATING work thing that is going on.

I was very ragey again today. There is a thing (the same “thing” as always) at work and a thing in my personal life that is filling me full of rageohol.

Now, if you know me, you know how I deal with rageohol: Usually I dilute it with alcohol. Seems like the right thing to do.

But today… today I got changed into my running shit after my call with my moms. I fired up my Runkeeper and Zombies, Run! apps. And I went for a motherfucking run.

Now… here’s the strange thing that happened (I mean – over and above the fact that I went for a run instead of a pint): I liked it.

There was a point where I was actually enjoying the exercise. Double-you Tee Eff, man? ENJOYING THE RUNNING.

I’m sat here now in minor amounts of pain. My feet are a wee bit torn apart (I did run nearly 15km today in total – and this after running 10km yesterday… WHO EVEN AM I?) and I’m pretty sure my thighs are going to be non-functioning tomorrow (there is already a pretty deep ache)… but I feel good.

And not just self-righteous good (a by-product of any exercise if you are me), but good-good. My rage has subsided. I am feeling fairly at piece with the universe.

I hope this is a feeling I can remember (not the feet/thighs part – the other part) because I would like to feel this way more often.

This was my run, by the way. Check out those changes in elevation. That first hill is where the zoms nearly got me. I thought I was going to vomit (zom vom) when I got to the top… I’m not nearly in shape enough to fucking sprint up a hill that far into a run.

http://runkeeper.com/user/jodiwankenobi/activity/77826178

Who knew that trying to escape a murderous pack of zombies would motivate me enough to run and run and run. Bless you, zombies.

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Goal Tracking. Week 12.

Posted on March 26, 2012 | Leave a comment

This week: Success. On track for 11/52 weeks so far.

HOWEVER. I am not on track for keeping up with the goal tracking. How am I already a week behind? SAD TIMES.

I’m not sure what has been happening in my brain for the last few weeks, but I’ve been highly resistant to getting shit done. It’s like weaponised procrastination.

Not just the blog – I haven’t been tracking my exercise or food properly. I haven’t been doing my laundry (just caught up this week). The list could go on and on.

I’m not sure if it is still a push-back from the uber-restraint that was February, or if it turns out that I’m just that fucking lazy. I’d like to blame the former, but I’m fairly sure that it is the latter.

Anyway: Tomorrow’s goal tracking is NOT going to be pretty. At all. But I’m okay with that. Hopefully it will motivate me to get back on track.

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Posted in fatties

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