I know it’s been a long time since I updated this thing. Maybe I need to try to make this a discipline to update more regularly.

Anyway, the reason for this post …

We’re moving to New Jersey!

Wendy has accepted a call to be the new Regional Presbyter for the Presbyteries of Monmouth and New Brunswick, in central New Jersey. The formal vote making it all “final and official” will be July 20th. We plan on moving out some time around Labor Day weekend.

This will be very exciting. We’re going to be sad to leave all of our Texas friends, but it will be nice to be back in the north east again, which is, after all, “home” for both of us.

Now we just need to sell our house. Anyone interested?

This is just a test post, trying out the WordPress app for my iPad. Seems to work pretty well.

This is just a test post from my new Google Nexus One phone.

I can’t resist:

This isn’t the Droid you’re looking for.

A recent Princeton University study (HT: Slashdot) would seem to debunk the recent ad campaigns by the corn industry that HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) is just the same thing as sugar, only repackaged. This study showed that rats, given the same amount of calories, became significantly more obese when those calories came from HFCS rather than from sucrose (table sugar).

I can’t remember where I saw it now, but I remember watching a documentary piece which attempted to show just the opposite – that HFCS is virtually identical to sucrose. They did this by showing that the levels of fructose and glucose in the two substances are virtually the same, and that, therefore, they must act the same in our bodies. However, almost in the same breath, they added that HFCS behaved differently in the consistency of the product produced, making more appealing to food manufacturers. I remember thinking at the time that they can’t have it both ways — either it’s the same as sugar, or it’s not.

This study seems to make it clear: it’s not. Wendy and I are making a concerted effort to avoid HFCS whenever possible, but that’ surprisingly difficult.

Well, it’s official. As of this morning, Wendy and I are now both on the “South Beach” diet. It felt like we were buying out Kroger’s entire produce section last night. I wish we had a more convenient, better stocked produce section near by. That, or I think we need a second refrigerator to store all this stuff! I cooked the first item this morning — something called a “Cheesy Frittata.”

We were on this diet once before, and did pretty well on it. Unfortunately, we “fell off the wagon” when I fell off my bike. So now we’re trying again. One of the biggest challenges from last time, other than produce storage, was the rather time consuming chore of putting togerher a meal plan for the week, and then figuring out what groceries we’d need. This time, we’re turing to technology to help. Wendy’s got a piece of software called “Mac Gourmet” that we’re going to try. She’s going through the painstaking process of entering the South Beach recipes. Once that’s done, it will be much easier to create weekly menus and shopping lists.

Wish us luck!

That last video I posted got me thinking — I think I need to “up the ante” when it comes to my geek factor. Sure, I program computers. I play World of Warcraft. At one time, I even had an official chess ranking (though not a very high one). I also do some geocaching, play around with FourSquare and Twitter, and I’m active in community theater. But I also ride a motorcycle, which I think would count against me.

Well, there’s one geek “badge of honor” that I DON’T have — I don’t play Dungeons and Dragons. What makes it even worse is that, while I don’t play, my daughter DOES! This unnatural state of affairs should not be! So I’m looking for people in the Baytown/Houston area who might like to take me under their wing (or scale, as the case may be). Or, failing that, perhaps find other like-minded geeks who want to learn together.

So, who’s up for it?