I just had to share the WOD (workout of the day) that we did yesterday:

It was a partner WOD, which means we rolled dice to determine each group. I happened to be paired with the owner of the gym, and CrossFit machine, Coach Nikki. The workout was as follows (if you don’t understand the lingo, I’ve linked each term to an explanation):

There were 2 workouts, each consisting of 2 different exercises. Partner A started with Workout A and Partner B started with Workout B, then once a partner finished their workout, they would wait til the other partner had finished theirs, then they would alternate.

2 times 5 sets of:

Workout A

10 – Burpees (I can only do a couple regular pushups or about 10 knee pushups in a row, so I opted to do wall pushups in place of regular pushups)

10 – Kettlebell swings

Workout B

10 – Air Squats

10 – Toes To Bar (But, since I’m still working up to this, I did 10 Knees To Chest instead, which I still had trouble with, as I can’t yet bring my knees all the way to my chest)

So, when we were all said in done, everybody did 100 burpees, 100 kettlebell swings, 100 air squats, and 100 Toes to Bar (or in my case, knees to chest). Now, that’s what I call a WOD! I was so exhausted afterwards, but Nikki did me a favor and poured water over my head, so that woke me up a bit .

I’m really surprised that today I’m able to move, let alone walk, so my healing is becoming less of a problem at this point….so awesome!

I’ll keep updating my blog with more tales of CrossFit, because I’m totally hooked now. In fact, I’m going on vacation next week and will be gone 3 weeks, but Nikki emailed me a list of body weight workouts that I can do while I’m away from the gym, so I’m not going to miss a beat while I’m away.

I’ve finally made up my mind that I’m going to follow every online tutorial I can find, and read the books that I can find, until I can develop fully functioning software in C++. I’d really like to learn it well enough to build a game at some point, just to prove to myself that I can do it. It doesn’t even have to be a graphically awesome game or anything spectacular, just a fully functioning game that anyone can play.

I was never really great at programming in C++ to begin with, in fact I struggled with it quite a bit. I eventually changed my degree emphasis from software engineering to visual technologies, which I think I was even worse at. However, developing dynamic web applications in object oriented PHP has really made me a much better programmer, and I think I would make a pretty good C++ programmer now.

I took a class in Java development a few years ago, just for fun at the local community college, but have since forgotten it as well because I haven’t had any use for anything other than PHP in my career. I was going to attempt to re-learn Java for fun, but after reading so much negative comments about java programming, I’ve decided to focus on C++ for now since it seems to be a much more widely accepted language.

Anyway, here’s to hopefully learning how to develop applications in C++

At the beginning of January 2012, I started to have a little soreness behind my left knee, and I initially thought I had just strained it, but it kept getting worse over the next couple of weeks. It got to the point where I bought a knee brace to help me walk.

Around January 10th or so, I was lying down on the couch watching TV, when out of nowhere I felt a horrific pain behind my right shoulder blade, so bad that I jerked up and couldn’t catch my breath for a few seconds. I figured I had pulled a muscle and was just now experiencing the pain. I moved to the other side of the couch so I could lie down on my other side, and thought nothing of it. A couple of hours later, when I finally got up to go to bed, as soon as I stood up, I could barely breath. I could only take really short breaths, and could not take a deep breath. I was only able to catch my breath when I would lay down.

I wish I had gone to the hospital right then, but I wasn’t thinking clearly. Over the next 3 days, I had the same problem breathing when I was up and about, so I spent most of those days lying down so I could breath. About the fourth day, I was able to breath again but I was still a bit sore on the right side of my back, where I had experienced the pain.

While the breathing issues was happening, my knee kept feeling worse, and it was becoming very hard to extend my leg. About 3 days after I was able to breath properly again, I noticed my left leg was swollen to about double the size as normal I freaked out, and began searching online for my symptoms and voila, I found an article that explained both why my leg was swelling up AND where the pain in my back/problem breathing came from. I was a very lucky individual to have experienced a Pulmonary Embolism and lived to talk about it. The Pulmonary Embolism (or PE) was due to a blood clot in my leg, and part of the clot had broken free and traveled to my lung, which hit me like a brick.

I called my dad and told him I was on my way to the emergency room. Looking back, I should have called 911 instead of driving myself to the ER, but luckily I live about 5 minutes from the hospital. I checked myself in and was being emitted within 15 minutes or so. I wanted to make sure the doctors knew what they were talking about before explaining I had figured out what was wrong with me, so I explained to the ER doctor what my symptoms were and immediately, he said it sounds like I had a PE due to a blood clot in my leg. The condition is known as Deep Vein Thrombosis (or DVT). I was relieved to know that more than likely I was correct, so at least we knew what to look for. He explained to me they were going to perform an ultrasound on my leg and a CT (CAT) scan on my chest just to be sure. He also said that if I wasn’t in such good health otherwise, and due to the fact that I’m only 32, I probably wouldn’t be among the living.

An ultrasound was performed on my leg, during which they saw a large clot running the length of my leg was blocking one of my veins, which caused the other vein to have to work overtime to pump the same amount of blood, which is why my leg was swelling up. Next, I had a CT scan of my chest performed, and they discovered multiple clots in each of my lungs.

So, at least I was alive, but I then had to stay in the hospital for a week….borrrrrring! .

I was checked into a room by myself, and was given all kinds of meds, including a shot called Lovenox which had to be injected daily into the side of my stomach…fairly painful. The lovenox was used to speed up the process of another medication called Coumadin (generic form is called Warfarin). Every morning around 4am, a very lovely girl would come in and play vampire, and take multiple vials of blood from me for tests. Each day, I would get a report of what my current INR (International Normalization Ratio) number was. The goal was to get my INR between 2.0 and 3.0 and when I was emitted, it was 0.8 so it took a while to increase it.

I believe it was the 2nd or 3rd day I was in the hospital, I was taken in for surgery, to have a Vena Cava filter installed in my jugular. This was to help prevent additional clots from entering my lung. That procedure only took about a half hour or 45 minutes, and was painless. The only problem is, apparently the filter will only be effective for 6 months. I can have it removed or keep it in after 6 months, so I’ll probably just keep it in.

After a couple of days, the swelling in my left leg started going down. After 7 days, my INR was finally 2.2, which is on the low end but I was so stir crazy that I didn’t think to force the hospital to keep me until it was closer to 3.0.

I was doing fine, and feeling fine, once I was released, but on the fourth day out of the hospital, I looked down and noticed my left leg was swollen again….crud! My step-mom happens to be a hospice nurse and I asked her to look at my leg, and she said it’s definitely swollen and called a doctor friend of hers and he agreed I should go directly to the ER again. I happened to be at my dad’s that day and he was heading into town, so he took me to the hospital and once again, I was emitted.

Same story as the first week, all kinds of blood tests and meds, except this time they decided it best to remove a portion of the clot in my leg. I thought that was a good idea too. The only complication from that procedure was the blood thinner they used was really potent and caused me to have a ton of blood in my urine for 24 hours after the surgery. That was normal, however they did tests to make sure nothing else was causing it, which there wasn’t. I did have to see a urologist recently, as a follow up, to have another urine test done to make sure no blood was present, which there wasn’t.

After yet another week, I was released again, and I haven’t been back since . I have to watch what I eat, because certain foods tend to counteract the Coumadin (Warfarin) and can increase or decrease the effect, depending on how much you eat. The doctors said to make sure I eat the same amount of dark greens each day or completely stay off of them. This is because dark greens contain a large amount of Vitamin K, and Vitamin K is what can cause problems with Coumadin.

Since I was released from the hospital February 5th, 2012 I have gotten my blood tested twice per week, to make sure my INR was in the therapeutic range (2.0 – 3.0). It has remained good, so no worries yet.

If this happens to you, just be sure to pay attention to your vitamin k intake or you could bleed out or have another clot form. And for the record, I really hope this doesn’t happen to you…trust me.

Oh, another thing, is my condition (Deep Vein Thrombosis) happens to be a genetic problem. My grandmother (My dad’s mom) had blood clots, and my Factor V Leiden test came back positive, which indicates a genetic disposition for clots.

One thing that the doctors said I should do is get more exercise, and don’t sit down for long periods of time. This means, because I’m a programmer and sit at my desk for at least 8 hours per day, that I have to get up at least once per hour and exercise to some degree.

I took my exercise to a whole new level, however. A buddy of mine, Mikey Patriquin, mentioned that he had joined his sister’s gym (she’s a trainer there), and maybe I should check it out, because I was thinking of joining a gym to get a little exercise. So, I decided to head down to the gym to check it out. It’s the Champion Athletic Club in Kingman, AZ and they are a CrossFit certified gym. I talked to Kris, one of the head trainers and a part owner of the gym, about signing up. He scheduled me for 2 weeks out to start their On Ramp program, which is a 3 time a week training session for 1 month with a trainer, to make sure you can handle their workout routines and lifts. I didn’t know what I was in for…it turns out CrossFit is the most elite and demanding workout regiment that a human being can put themselves thru! .

Just so you have an idea of what CrossFit is all about, here is a video of last years CrossFit Games, which is a yearly competition in which tons of CrossFitters from around the world compete and a single man and and a single woman each walk away with a check for $250,000 and the title of fittest on earth.

Anyway, to make an even longer story short, CrossFit has changed my life. In just a month, I have gone from being a total weakling to being able to perform feats of strength that I had no idea I was capable of. Every day, I thank myself for taking the initiative to give it a try. I will never stop crossfitting, it’s a way of life for me now!

As always, be sure to backup your files and database, just to be safe, before upgrading. I hope this helps somebody else, because I had to figure it out on my own.

One account one, go into your settings and add your cell number to the list of phones, and select a phone type. For mine, I selected Work. Next, logout and then login to your second google voice account. Now, go to the settings and add your cell number to the list of phones, and select a different phone type than you did for account one. For mine, I chose Home (you could choose Cell too, I believe and it should still work).

If everything worked, you should now be able to receive calls from both Google Voice numbers on the same cell phone (or landline, I suppose, but who uses those anymore lol).

I wanted to set this up because I signed up for a local Google Voice number where my mom lives, so she can call me all she wants from her local only landline and I would receive those calls on my cell phone across the country; I also want to have a local Google Voice number that I can give to people and receive those calls on my cell phone as well. I’m sure glad it’s possible, because it makes things so much easier.

If you have no idea what Google Voice is, or just want more information about it, you can find more information and sign up for your own free Google Voice number by going to http://www.google.com/voice

You can download the FREE Google Voice iPhone app by going to http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/google-voice/id318698524?mt=8. You can also download the FREE Google Voice app on the Android Market.

I’m excited about this, because it makes long distance shooting much more of a challenge, and seeing as how some of the maps are massive in scale, it will make for some pretty fun sniping moments. I’m ready to spread some lead, how about you guys?!? See you on the Battlefield!

Want to know more about the Battlefield 3 game? Check out the official website at http://www.battlefield.com/battlefield3

If you have loaded any models on your site, and then make changes to those models at a later time, you will need to clear the model cache for the particular model before Cake will be able to see the new database changes.

I just remembered that, as I’ve been yelling at the screen for the past hour, trying to figure out why a simple integer field would not save to the database…well, if I had my brain plugged in, I would have remembered I renamed the field in the database after I had already loaded the particular model on my site…duh!!!

Anyway, this tip always saves the day, whenever I can remember what the problem is . I hope it helps anyone else out there in the same boat.

For example, if page 1 of the form (or any page for that matter) contains fields for the Person model AND the Address model, and the “Person” fields come before the “Address” fields, when the form is submitted, all of the validation rules must pass on the Person model before the validation is run on the Address model. The problem with this, is the only validation errors that are shown will be the Person model errors, until those validation rules pass.

Fortunately, I found a very easy fix for this problem at
http://cobaia.net/2011/01/cakephp-one-form-with-multiple-model-validate-and-form-display-errors/
It wasn’t necessarily pertaining to the Wizard component, but it works just the same.

All you need to do, is inside the process methods for each step, before the $this->Model->validates() checks, add this little snippet of code (change the word Model to the name of your particular controller’s model — In my case, my form is processed inside a controller called “Applications” and it has a model called “Application” which I use to store basic information about the submitted form…I then house various other pieces of data from the form inside associated tables (models)):

If you need to see this in context, here is the entire process method for one of my form pages:

Of course, I’ve simplified my process method quite a bit, but it would be a functional method if your controller’s model was called Application and your form had fields from both a Person model and Address model.

The line that sets the errors variable is optional. I like to display all of the errors at the top of the page, as well as below the invalid field.

I hope that helps others who are having the same issue as I did!

However, there are a couple of features missing, that are apparently only available on the new iPhone 4S, that I wish Apple had enabled on other iOS 5 devices.

The first missing feature is Voice Control, which is powered by the Siri technology that Apple purchased. I’ve seen the demos online and I would love to have that functionality on my 3GS, but no luck…that is a selling point for the new 4S .

The next missing feature is Geofence Reminders (lets you setup a reminder that will be displayed once you’re within range of a particular location…way cool!)…which is something that could probably easily be enabled on non 4S devices, but those of us that aren’t using the 4S are out of luck.

I’m not bitter about the features not being enabled on my devices, because I understand business, but it would sure be cool to have them without upgrading.

With that being said, anyone using an iOS compatible device can now enjoy 200+ new features, FOR FREE! That’s pretty cool in my book. Yes, I will probably never use most of the new features, but some of them are very handy.

One of the very handy features, is the wireless syncing over Wi-Fi. I don’t know about you, but I rarely sync my devices, and when I do it usually takes a while. Well, now all I have to do is plug my device in to charge, and as long as I’m connected to my wireless network, all my data is automatically synced…without me having to do a thing other than charge my device!

I won’t go into any other features at this time, because there are tons of posts out there detailing every last one of them, but these couple of things were on my mind.

If you haven’t yet downloaded iOS 5′ I’d certainly recommend trying it out. Just remember to backup your data first

Also, it drove me nuts how the states list would disappear if the page was refreshed. I learned how to handle that as well, using jQuery cookies.

By the way, here’s the versions of cakephp, jquery and plugins I am using:

CakePHP version 1.3.7
jQuery version 1.5 (I just used the minified version, not that is should matter)
jQuery cookie plugin version 1.0

Not that it matters at all, but for those who may have problems and are wondering what database I’m running, it’s MySQL version 5.1.41 (at least that’s the client I’m running…the server number may or may not be different). I am testing this using XAMPP 1.7.3 for Windows in Windows 7.

Here’s the steps:

***********************
STEP 1
***********************
Add the following to your view file (whatever file contains the form that houses country and state select fields):

***********************
STEP 2
***********************
Create a model file for country and one for state:

— /app/models/country.php —

— /app/models/state.php —

***********************
STEP 3
***********************
Add the following action to your controller.php file (whichever controller file you are using to control the form)

***********************
STEP 4
***********************
Create a view file for the action you just created, inside /app/views/NameOfYourControllerGoesHere/get_states.ctp

then, add the following to that file:

***********************
STEP 5
***********************
Download the jQuery cookie plugin from

http://plugins.jquery.com/files/jquery.cookie.js.txt

copy the contents of jquery.cookie.js.txt into /app/webroot/js/jquery.cookie.js

***********************
STEP 6
***********************
If you don’t already have jQuery installed, you can download the latest version by going to www.jquery.com and click the download button (I’m using version 1.5, but I would imagine this code will still work with future versions)

Once you have both jQuery and jQuery cookie plugin installed, add this to the view file containing your form:

***********************
STEP 7
***********************
Add the following to either your layout file or to the view file that contains your form:

Obviosuly, you need to have countries and states inserted into the appropriate tables in your database for this to work. Here’s the structure I used for my tables:

— For countries Table —
id int(11) auto_increment primary_key,
name varchar(50)

— For states Table —
id int(11) auto_increment primary_key,
country_id int(11),
name varchar(50)

———————————————————–
If I missed something, please send me a comment and I’ll be happy to fix it. If you have any problems, let me know and I’ll try to help the best I can.

Thanks for reading