Are we sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin.

Ten years ago I weighed very little. My Mum once told be that I was “a little bit weedy”. Love you too Mum.

At 16 I was around the six-foot mark and maybe weighed about 55kg wet through (that’s just over 8.5 stone for those  still living in the previous Century). I used to walk roughly five miles a day on average, I walked the dog everyday after school and I rode my bike at the weekends. This basically meant that I ate whatever I felt like and never seemed to gain any weight. I also had a nightmare trying to find trousers which fit properly, I had a hard time getting trousers with a 30-inch waist to stay up, which isn’t supposed to be possible when you’re six-feet tall if the availability of suitable jeans was anything to go by.

Then, in the 18-months before I left to go to University I got a part time job, in a Little Chef. This had a number of disadvantages, not least of which that I became less active; I had more money to go out and drink beer, and I got a free meal when I was working – which usually consisted of a cooked breakfast or a burger, with chips, cheese and very little salad. Needless to say finding jeans started to become less of an issue. At one point I put on over 10kg in two months.

At 18 I left home to go to University, this didn’t help matters. Why would I want to go and do exercise when I could go to the pub and watch the football? Drinks flowed and late night visits to the local take-away became the norm. About halfway through Uni I peaked somewhere around the 90kg mark. I was wearing the same size trousers as my Dad – who was a little too happy to highlight the fact that he’d never had the same size waist as his father.

Almost eight years after starting, I’m still at University and I spend most of my day sat behind a desk reading and tapping away at my keyboard punctuated by regular coffee breaks, which usually involve cake, or at least biscuits. However, for a 12 month period I was walking 45 minutes to and from the office every day, and I lost a not insignificant amount of weight very quickly.

Then I joined the university Hiking Club.

My jeans started to get loose and my shirts were hanging off me.

But then I moved house and am no longer living within sensible walking distance. I bought a bike, but that was a lot more like hard work compared to walking, and when the wet weather started to move in and the days got shorter, the bike stayed in the garage.

My weight started to head skywards again.

I had to do something, so I bought a high-tech scale. The first time I used it was a bit of a wake-up call.

I weighed 88.6kg, of which 30.4% was fat, 33.2% muscle, and my visceral fat level was on the borderline between normal and high.

I started to eat a bit better. No more pizza and chips for lunch; I’d have soup instead. My weight started to fall, slowly; a little to slowly for my liking. I bought a cross-trainer. It was a gamble, would I use it? I hate going to the gym; I just can’t stand the atmosphere. If I paid for a gym membership it’d just sit there being neglected? Would the cross-trainer, or would the fact that it was there, in the house, in my face, mean that I used it?

Well, I’ve been using it about four times a week, so I think it’s safe to say that the later is the case.

I started out doing about 15 minutes a day and after 10 weeks I’m quite happily doing 45 minutes a day on the highest setting. I’d say that I’m in the best shape I’ve been in for 10 years, but that wouldn’t really be saying much.

What about my weight? Well, the figures from this morning, 90-days after the first set, read:

Weight: 83.5kg. Fat: 30.4%. Muscle: 37.0%. And my visceral fat had dropped significantly.

I’m by no means lean and I have a long way to go before I’d call myself fit, but I have noticed a huge improvement in my general fitness and people I haven’t seen for a while keep telling me that I “look well” – which I’ve managed to translate to “less fat” – so I guess I’m actually pretty happy with my investment. Even if I am having to buy a whole new wardrobe. Again.

Still, the one thing that I’ve not heard anybody talk about is wether the single most annoying design flaw with the iPhone has been addressed in the iPad.

“What flaw?” I hear you all cry.

I’ll tell you: It’s the inability to stop it changing from portrait to landscape view when you’re lying on your side in bed.

I can flick a switch to easily turn off the ringer when I’m in a meeting, but there is no way to stop the Mail app from shifting to landscape view  and making me do a silly hand-dance trying to find just-the-perfect-angle where I can still read in portrait and not give myself a stiff neck.

It’s really not too much to ask for, is it?

The fact is, my DSLR is too bulky to carry when I’m hiking. It’s too bulky to take to work or carry around on a daily basis. I bought a point-and-shoot for that purpose, and I hardly ever remember that it’s in my bag. I recently considered selling up and replacing all my gear with a Panasonic GF1. Maybe that was the answer? But what if I don’t use that?

I’ve taken so few photos in the last few months that I’m actually considering selling my camera and lenses. I’ve just had no enthusiasm or even a desire to pick up the camera.

And then, lying in bed last night, I read something that really struck a chord with me:

“Could it be that we take pictures only during the happy cycles of our lives?”

The quote is from a book I’m reading about a middle aged guy who after going through a divorce decides to put his life on hold, learn to ride a motor bike, and bugger off around Europe for six months. Your typical mid-life crisis. (It’s a good read by the way.)

The sentiment really struck me. The author had not been taking photos on his travels, and it wasn’t until he met a couple who asked to see his photos that he realises this. He notes that he took lots of photos at university and when he was with his ex-wife, but not any more. He questions if “a photograph is only worth something when you have someone to share the memory with?”

I take photos when I travel because I can. It’s can’t be about the process and the end result because I wouldn’t be writing this if that was enough. But what about the memories? As I look back at the photos I’ve taken it’s clear to me that they could have been taken by anybody. There’s very little evidence that I was ever there. I take photos of my friends when I go hiking, but I’m questioning why now, is that about the memories, or is it just because they are there? It’s not conscious, and it’s not a slur on my friends; it’s about the reasons that I take photographs. Somewhere along the way I got lost in the mechanics of taking the photograph, and forgot about the reasons for taking them.

Something is clear to me now: I want the memories, and I’m going to make a conscious effort to make, and record them. If I have to go back to basics, ditch the SLR, in order to find them? So be it.

Data Roboto:

The entry level Drobo is a 4-bay USB2.0 and Firewire800 enclosure for SATA hard drives. It uses a proprietary technology known as “BeyondRAID” to provide redundancy for your data; should one disk fail, your data will (in theory) be intact, and you can simply replace the failed drive with a new one. Should you run low on space you can simply insert a new drive, even while the unit is on; if there are no free bays, you can replace one of the existing drives with a larger one. Simples.

The manufacturer offers various other solutions including network attached options with 8-bays, and a 5-bay version offering protection from two simultaneous drive failures.

The unit has a reasonably large light next to each drive bay which indicates the current state of each drive. Green is good. Red is bad. Somewhere in between means that you need to think about replacing the drive soon. There is also a row of 10 small LEDs along the bottom of the device, these indicate how much of the installed capacity you are using, one LED = 10%.

Thoughts?

I’ve had the unit for less than a week, but so far I’m impressed by it’s solid build quality, excellent design, and blistering speed. It’s biggest flaw is that it’s not network-attached, but I knew this going in. There is an optional module called the DroboShare, which you plug the Drobo into and it essentially turns it into a NAS, but I didn’t think that the cost was justified. I have experimented with plugging the unit into my Apple Time Capsule’s USB port, which not only allowed me to access the device over the wireless network, but also over the Internet via MobileMe. Handy, but there does see to be a significant performance hit, even when connected directly to the Time Capsule via Gb Ethernet.

I’m a very happy customer so far, I’ll keep you posted with any new thoughts and developments.

Why don’t you buy from a Drobo from Amazon.co.uk?

Give it a watch.

Kuroshio Sea – 2nd largest aquarium tank in the world – (song is Please don’t go by Barcelona) from Jon Rawlinson on Vimeo.

Here’s Day 3:

It’s been about 8 months since I last posted, and stuff has happened to me, interesting stuff as well as the mundane. I’ve been using Twitter a lot though, and I say most of what I want to say there. I’ve been posting photos to Flickr, but I’ve not even been doing that on a regular basis since I finished the 365days project.

Anyway here’s a brief summary of the last few months or so…

December 2008

• Went to see Coldplay at the NIA in Birmingham.

• Got Merry at the LSUHC Christmas Meal.

• Moved house

• Christmas at my parents house
• Walking in the Elan Valley with the family, including my sister’s boyfriend’s family, and their dogs

January 2009

• Brief moments of photographical inspiration

• Walking in the Peak District, with the Nottingham Flickr Group.

• More MacBook Pro woes.

February 2009

• Got snowed on a bit

• Had 2 minor operations.
• Got Stuff done.

• Went to the Zoo with my girlfriend (yeah, I might have skipped that bit in November…)

• Hiking in the Brecon Beacons with the Hiking Club.

March 2009

• Hiking in the Lake District (LSUHC again)

• Went climbing (indoors)
• Trip to Preston for my Birthday.

April 2009

• Went home for Easter with my girlfriend. Including trips to Cardiff, the Elan Valley (pic 1 below) and Aberystwyth (pic 2 below).

• Attended / help to host CSER2009.
• Became single again.

May 2009

• Hiking in the Lake District

• British Touring Cars at Donnington Park.

• Took my dad to see Counting Crows at the NIA for his birthday.
• Went Hiking / Bod wadding in the Peak District with John. Got stuck up to my knees in the peat.

• Saw Counting Crows again in Nottingham.

June 2009

• Moved house again.
• Went to London for a long-weekend to see Heather standing on a plinth in Trafalgar Square, dressed as a giant pigeon (Heather, not me!).

I’m finding so many good photos recently that I just need to spend a bit more time working on.

This was taken back in October in the Peak District. I’m hoping to spend a little more time with Aperture over Christmas, going through some of my photos from the past 12 months. Keep ‘em peeled.