Guys, Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. Forget the flowers and chocolate this year. Get your lady some nice jewelry instead. Something that is sure to say “Yes, she’s with this geek”.

Note: The following could be mistaken for a spam advertisement. I promise you I write this myself, willingly, as my own opinions on the matter. Any typos are genuine, not the result of some foreign-speaking hacker writing spam about the latest third-world leader dying and wanting to leave his fortune to you…yes, you! And All your base are not belong to us.

My job doesn’t require a lot of physical activity, unless you count walking to the bathroom, the printer, and the occasional meeting as physical labor. So, I have noticed in the last couple of years that I’ve put on good 15 pounds.

One of the perks of my employer is that they have a strong health and wellness program for their employees. For example, earlier this month, I attended a company-offered seminar over the fundamentals of getting into a fitness plan.

Along with all of the useful information the speaker provided, she also spoke highly of a web site called SparkPeople, a site I first heard about in November. SparkPeople is a free, on-line health and fitness tool containing a plethora of tools and resources from actual health and fitness specialists. When I registered for SparkPeople, I was able to define my weight and fitness goals right away, and set up a weekly personal fitness and nutritional program.

One of the great philosophies of SparkPeople is that they don’t try to shove some quick-and-easy diet scheme down your throat (literally or figuratively). They advocate adapting healthy lifestyles, such as exercising more days of the week and eating more healthy foods, rather than temporarily taking a pill that promises to “lose the weight for you.” Because, let’s face it: Once you’ve hit your target weight, if you haven’t changed your lifestyle, what’s to stop that weight from coming back in full force?

My biggest problem with working out was that I did it sporadically, without a set schedule. With SparkPeople, I was able to set up my own workout routine, pick my exercises, and measure my progress (because I love measurement tools).

Last night, I was feeling a cold coming on. I felt a little sweaty and I kept blowing my nose. But I convinced myself that, if I got enough sleep and kept popping the Vitamin C, I’d be fine.

This morning, I got up and was totally congested. After a few minutes of standing upright and blowing my nose, the congestion faded. I felt tired and run-down, but I convinced myself that it was just from waking up. I popped some cold medicine (the non-drowsy stuff) to take care of the symptoms and went into work.

Ninety minutes later, I decided to go home, rest and recover. I felt drowsy from the non-drowsy medicine; I was tired and run-down, and kept blowing my nose; and I could not focus on any work. Why didn’t I listen to my body when it told me to stay home and rest?? Why did I feel like I needed to come into work today?

I felt it was ironic that I had read this Scrum cartoon the night before…

It was a close game up until the last quarter, and I’m saddened that my team was not able to pull through.

Maybe next year…

I would be remiss if I did not do this…

“Go Cyclones! Beat the Hawks!”