I just checked the site stats…
Over 11,000 visitors! Wow! Thank you!
Writing for this blog has been both fun and challenging. Many are the nights when I sit down and think, “I’ve got to write a post!…What am I going to write about?” and just dive in.
By the time I am finished, I am usually laughing, rejoicing, exclaiming, etc. out loud.
I hope you are enjoying it too! Thank you for reading.
I am really becoming a true Mid-Westerner…
It seems that all I want to do is talk about the weather!
But, here in Kansas City, we have the best weather in the country.
Take today for instance…
When I drove to work at 6:30 A.M., it was in the low 20’s. But the sky was clear and the sun was rising. The forecast said that we would get above freezing.
At lunch, the sun was completely gone, the temperature had dropped to I don’t know what, and we were engulfed in something I have never even heard of before…
Freezing fog! I’m not kidding!
There was white stuff on my car but it was not snow. It was like big granules of powdered sugar.
Then, in the afternoon, the sun came back and we actually DID get above freezing for the first time in weeks.
You talk about adventure! It is like, “What is God going to whip up the next time I walk out the door?”
It was 29º at lunch time.
“That’s pretty warm these days. I’m going to take a walk. ”
I came back with this…
A four foot long icicle!
On my way back home from the IHOP Prayer Room, my eye caught a glimpse of a very small waterfall that we had stopped at during the summer months.
Back then, the stream of water was so small that you can easily catch it in one hand. After a hard rain, you might be able to capture it with two hands.
However, we haven’t really had that much rain in the past few weeks. It has been too cold! We have had lots and lots of snow!
This is what that itty, bitty water fall looks like today (click on it to get a better look)…
The “ice fall” is about two feet wide and about one foot thick! And looks like the water is still flowing despite being frozen.
I have tried repeatedly to figure out how this happens but I just can’t seem to get my mind around the mechanics of how this actually happens.
I wish I could have looked at it longer but I had to hurry back to my car since it was halfway in the road. With the snow this deep, there is no “pulling off to the side of the road”…unless you want to get stuck.
I thought I would catch you up on few open items today…
Update #1: No Shave November was such a smashing success that Cakes decided to extend it all the way to Christmas Day! She wanted all of her siblings to see her “winter coat”. It was hilarious to see both her mother’s and her brother’s skin crawl while looking at her legs. She shaved, wrapped them in wrapping paper and gave them to her mother as a present on Christmas Day!
Update #2: The Matthew McConaughey hair goo is working! My hair is growing back! And I have figured out a way to stretch a months supply for nearly six months so it won’t cost me a small fortune! By the time I’m 51, I will look like I’m…42!
Update #3: It isn’t looking all that good for me in my big bet with my wife. When she lost 10 pounds in the first two months, I thought I would have to have braces on by the summer. However, she hit a wall and then the holidays came and she lost all of her momentum. I was beginning to think that I would be able to make it to the grave before I had to go to the orthodontist!
Fortunately for her, we ran into a friend at our Halloween celebration at Chipotle who had lost a boat load of weight. Now, Bunch is starting the same radical diet on Thursday! Yikes! A 5o year old man with braces?..
With all of my hair back on my head, I’ll look… 14!
Nearly thirty years ago, I bought a tape series by Zig Ziglar on setting goals. It changed my life.
One of his best insights is that we shouldn’t just have one or two goals. We should have goals in every area of life.
For instance, if my only goal is to climb the corporate ladder to make $250,ooo/year, will I really consider myself a success if I accomplish it but lose my wife and kids in the process? What if I accomplish it and lose my health in the process? Would I call consider either of those scenarios “success”?
Probably not.
What if i don’t achieve it? If that is my only goal in life, then that would pretty much make me a failure.
Therefore, it is better to set a goal (or goals) in every area of life.
Zig breaks down them down as follows: Spiritual, Physical, Financial, Social, Career, Mental and Family. In my life, I break the last one into smaller categories of Marriage, Children, and family.
Where do you want to be in one year? in five years? in ten years? What about when you die? A good exercise for that is to write your own dream obituary.
Anyway, I am in the middle of achieving my first quarterly spiritual goal of the year and am really tired, so…
I hope this helps someone…
As you probably know, it has been snowing quite a bit here in Kansas City. When I went out to the car this morning, I learned that another several inches fell last night.
Needless to say, driving in this weather is a challenge. It is not uncommon to see cars completely off the side of the freeway, often facing the wrong direction. I have wondered “How can that happen?”
Until today…
I was driving to work this morning in the number two lane (#1 is the fast lane). Because of the conditions, I was going between 50-60 MPH and was a safe distance behind the car in front of me.
We came up on four cars in the number three lane that were driving about 40 MPH.
The last car in that line was an SUV driving about 10 feet behind the third car in the line! Unbelievable!
I was about to start passing by the line of cars when he suddenly pulled out in front of me! The distance couldn’t have been more than 10 feet!
I tried to coast but he was going much slower. It was either hit the brake or hit him…
I hit my brake.
Instantly the rear of my car started skidding to the right. I responded by turning the steering wheel to the right into the slide. My rear end then whipped around in a counter clockwise direction and I couldn’t stop it. It was like being on a bad Merry-Go-Round!
After completing the second 360º spin, I was approaching the wall on the right side of the freeway. I prepared for impact…
The nose of my car hit the wall and my car started spinning in the other direction.
I prepared for impact again…
My rear bumper hit the wall. I bounced off of the wall and came to a stop on the side of the freeway facing the oncoming traffic. Fortunately, there were no cars immediately behind me.
The amazing thing was that in both locations where I hit the wall, I hit a pile of fresh snow! Nothing happened to me or my car! Not a scratch!
I turned my headlights off so I wouldn’t blind the oncoming traffic, started my car, turned around and drove to work!
When I told a friend at work the story, he said that wasn’t the snow that I hit…
For He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways. They shall bear you up in their hands, lest you dash your foot against a stone. Psalm 91:11-12
I believe that and thank Him for it!
Chivalry is not dead!
At least not here at the castle.
It is snowing right now. I know, what a surprise!
It has been snowing since noon and it is snowing hard.
She gets off from work from Costco at 8:00. As I pictured her walking out to her car and seeing it covered in snow, I decided to drive our Super Crew to Costco and brush all of the snow off of the car for her.
I was going to back up and just watch her as she realized that her car was the only one in the parking lot that wasn’t completely covered. But, after finishing the job, I realized that it was pretty cold. so…
I decided to pick her up at the door and drive her to her car…
While I waited, I got a third good idea…
She should drive the truck home since it is the easiest car to drive in the snow and I should drive her car home.
It’s no wonder this woman REALLY likes me!
For a goal to be good, it has to be meaningful.
Take for instance my goal of trying to get and stay in shape. Do I really want to do that or is that just something that I am “supposed” to do?
I really want to do it…
Two years ago I began exercising and lost 20 pounds. However, last year I ran into problems.
Since I had started lifting weights the year before, last January I decided to just continue my program of lifting twice per week and running 3 times per week.
By March, my strength had grown to the point that I realized that if I wanted to continue growing, I had to commit to pumping some serious iron. About the same time, my 3-4 mile run had begun to seem like drudgery.
Yet, I couldn’t quit. I don’t want to get tired and fat. And while I am not afraid of getting older, I’m don’t have my eyes on a certain “walker” or a cane!
I had to get more specific about my goal. What do I mean by being “in shape”?
I’m not going to compete in the Senior Olympics. I was never a great athlete when I was young so now that I am older, forget about it!
While I did some pretty serious bodybuilding when I was 18, I realized that I didn’t really want to be “muscular”.
So What kind of shape do I want to be in?
I want to be functionally fit. I want to live with vigor and energy. I want to be strong enough to make my son work when he wrestles me. I want to be strong enough make my wife feel feminine.
And I didn’t want to spend hours doing it. I wanted it to be fun…at least a little bit!
I ended up designing a plan that I am still trying to implement. I had to break it into smaller, bite size time blocks that would make it easier to actually DO the exercises.
I started some of it right away. I added other parts as the year went on.
The amazing thing was that after that big mid-year change to my plan, I set my sights on trying to perform a certain amount of repetitions of one of my exercises. I fell 3 short of my mid-year, unwritten goal…
Except that I had written it down…
When I opened that Excel file on my computer, I saw that I had written down the same exact target as a goal at the beginning of the year! I was lifting weights at the time. I have no idea how I originally planned on getting there. I certainly didn’t plan the impasse that I have just written about.
Anyway, it highlights two points…
For a goal to have power, it must be personal. It must be meaningful. It must be something that you really want to accomplish.
Two, a goal without a practical plan on how to make it happen is just an empty dream. Write down how you plan to get there. You can change it if you need to.
I generally use this time of year to set goals. This year is no exception.
On New Year’s Day, I turned on my computer and looked for the file that contained my 2009 goals. It took me a few minutes to find it.
It turns out that last year, for the first time, I wrote my goals in an Excel spreadsheet rather than a word processing document. I didn’t remember that…
because I have not looked at them since the day I wrote them!
You might say, “What is the point of writing them down if your never going to look at them?”
That is a really good question.
I agree with you…
to a point…
and then I don’t.
Once I found them, I was really struck by how close I came to meeting many of them. I don’t know what it is but something changes when you write your goal down. It is as if putting the pen to paper, or in my case fingers to the keyboard, creates a sense of ownership. Once you write it, or type it, you own it.
But, it really helps if it is a good goal.
