So after posting my horrific first run experience, my friend pointed me to the following website: http://www.c25k.com/ It’s called ‘Couch to 5K in 9 Weeks.’ The idea is over nine weeks any old couch potato can train to run a 5K. Now I have no desire to run a 5K, but the program sounds interesting to me, especially since after that first attempt I realized how horrifically out of shape I really am.
On the site there are 9 weeks of free podcasts to download that basically tell you what to do, ie when to walk and when to run. It’s all set to music too, so that’s even better. I downloaded all the podcasts and have decided to give this program a try. I’ll update everyone on my progress here and how effective it is.
The website also pointed me to another site called Calorie King (http://www.calorieking.com). I had been using MyFoodDiary.com for awhile which I really like. Two summers ago using it and regular exercise I lost a good deal of weight. However lately I find myself only using it to record my weight and not being bothered to input my food, which is bothersome as you have to search for the foods and then scroll through lists looking for what you wanted it to find for you.
The Calorie King website lets you download software (a free 7 day trial) and works almost the same way as MyFoodDiary does, but so much quicker because it’s on your PC. Plus the food part is so more efficient when it comes to searching and finding, and you can download updates to the food database. I like the overall graphical presentation of what you’ve eaten better as well (how much fat, carbs, calories, etc). I’m going to switch over to this and use it as well.
By the end of this summer I plan to finally be done with my dissertation and a fit lean mean machine lol.

