Thanksgiving pictorial

Some of the Family at the Candy Kitchen

Amber sporting her sweet turkey hat

Isaac displaying his genetic sense of fashion.

Eli loving life after dinner. He tends to find the most joy out of simply running around. It's pretty great to watch.

Kyle and Sam displaying their mastery of ASL. This is "cold." They were however, not cold at the family reunion as they dominated food.

Hydrating on the trip back to Kentucky. Not a good trip.

Think so?

"Where the roots of faith are strong, the winds of laughter do no harm."

Insulation

Ever notice how angry and excitable people can be? Or how so many people say things in some company that they would rarely or never say to or about the person/people about which they speak? This is especially noticeable with many people around election time, but that situation is more of an outlier to relative to the sensation being described here. The general symptoms include things such as railing against the problems of "other people" with no regard for how they themselves might be part of the problem, screaming at people in the car because traffic is stopped, etc.

A theory on one potential cause: many Americans live in a constant state of background noise with very little real interaction. Wake up in the morning at your own home, get in your car with your coffee, go to work and never really interact with another person or face or own humanity.
We are all too busy to get out of our protective forts or home, automobile and building that we miss so much. Please don't miss what's going on all around you.

Go for a walk. Go to the park. Turn off your cell phone for a while, and realize your body is a soft, breakable shell.

Watch it. Laugh.

My wife used to get mad when I talked about Politics with friends. Now I can't get her to stop watching the conventions. She's a dang Campaign Nazi. The video above helps keep us laughing through the posturing.

There are plenty of dumb people at FOX News...

But this man could be the dumbest. Tonight while flipping through the channels, Geraldo could be seen exclaiming in a loud voice about the craziness of Hurricane Gustav. The worst was some footage from a bridge with the camera trained on a man (who looked calm and under control) in the water with a life jacket working on a light pole. Geraldo was screaming "Oh my God, there's a man in the water! I'm gonna tell the police."

Walk two steps to also calm police officer.

"There's a man in the water. He's stranded (repeats approximately 8 times)!!!!"

Police: "Huh?"

Moron (aka Geraldo): "There's a MAN in the WAAAATER!!!"

Police: "mumble mumble" (totally nonplussed)

Camera zooms out and shows Man in lifejacket begins swimming toward the boat (about 30 feet away) by himself, still calm and under control.

Geraldo: "The man is swimming !!!! (failed attempt at pregnant pause)

Man arrives at boat safely

Geraldo: "He got a lifeline.....Oh my God."

Three words: Don't watch Geraldo.

Response to being Meme'd??

I still don't know what the crap meme is, but Michelle did it to me, but since I don't have 7 blog friends (left unmeme'd), I will stop the chain here and break one of the rules listed below.

1. Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

hence, I will follow rules 1 and 2 and conveniently ignore rules 3&4.

Here goes:

1. I love almost anything buffalo flavored. I just ran into buffalo flavored pretzels via a co-worker and they are one of the greatest creations of man.

2. I often have strange dreams. For instance, last week I dreamed that my dad wanted me to pay for repairs to my first truck (which was stolen while in use by dad's company on a lighted golf course). For some reason in my dream, I didn't even question whether it was reasonable that I be paying for the maintenance. For that matter, he had a company mechanic who worked on it back then anyway, so there's no reason I should have to pay.....I know. It's weird. Another notable dream that comes to mind is my gunfight with the Cosby's. It's ok that I'm more awesome than you. Don't be upset.

3. I am one competitive guy. It's nothing compared to what it used to be. Now I really just enjoy sticking it to somebody when they think they're big stuff. Like dude at the gym rocking his 7:45 minute miles and acting like everybody's in his way because he's the reincarnated Steve Prefontaine. That guy? ya him. I especially enjoying running him down, sitting on his shoulder for about 15 seconds just so he knows I'm there, and then slowly increasing my pace until he breaks off and complains of some injury ailing him or how dry it is in here, etc. That warms the cockles of my heart. I also enjoy doing that in races....especially to skinny people.

4. I like to run in the snow and ice. It makes me feel like winter is not going to win. This has been a source of relational strife.

5. No matter how hard I try, I can't like UK more than UF even though I have 2 degrees from the former and none from the latter.

6. I would kind of like to become a geologist and study volcanoes and seafloor plate spreading.

7. I love hurricanes (when they don't hit, but just make the weather crazy near the coast).

Discovered by Amber

"If we can keep our minds open to the blessings, humor, and education in whatever happens to us -- if we can set that little invisible radar dish on top of our heads to constantly search for blessings instead of disasters -- our lives will be enriched by the experiences we endure and fertilize our lives" -Unkown.

Bike There?

With all the love that Google has been given on this blog, it only seems fair to ask for something in return other than quality features for free (which are of course paid for by advertising contingent upon site visits, thus the whole former part irons out itself.)

Google Map has many unique and helpful features, not the least of which being the ability to quickly and easily change routes using a drag and drop technique. It has come to the mind of some civic minded folk that a new feature is necessary. Bike there. These individuals have found it reasonable to petition google to add this feature over time to its mapping software. They also request two methods: direct route, and safe route. The author for one thinks you should go check it out and sign the petition.

Who knew one could petition private companies in this manner? Oh well, here's hoping it's successful so more people can enjoy bike rides without the fear of being crushed by large hunks of metal. With that in mind, people can start showing up places looking like our friend below.

Some Photos from the last little while.

The long absent author is attempting to get back into the blogosphere, and this is a break-in post: Hope you enjoy. Some photos from a little hike this weekend. Enjoy.

Baseball's Back

The boys of Summer Return. For those of you who don't even care about baseball, I offer this entertaining piece of wonderfulness.



Aaaahhh, Spring....

Ben Stein: interesting guy

Take a quick look at this video.

General TravestShammockery

Seen over the weekend. This one might trouble me even more than the "Anybody but -fill in the politician-" sticker. Hope? Hope? From Politicians. Are you serious?

Don't Get me wrong. I like Barack. As a politician, I guess he's ok. I'll probably vote for him in the primary here, but mainly because I find him less obfuscating than one Hillary Rodham Clinton. And by less, I mean by just a very, very, barely intelligible margin. He is after all, a politician.

These people act like Barack Obama isn't a politician. He's been doing it for a while people. He's not different from these other people. He's a greedy power hungry, politician.

I know what you want to ask. It's ok. Go ahead. "Sam if all politicians are ethical degenerates in your book, what if somebody with actual character tries to change?" The short answer: it gets sucked out of them by the reality of our system. Our system is better than despot-led and starved countries in other parts of the world, but the reality is most all politicians are owned. Barack is no different. Change is not simply avoidable. It's nearly impossible. And Barack doesn't really care about change. He just wants to be president, so he can decide what does not change.

Hope in Politicians: Priceless.

Fun Time

The Gecko for Isaac

Because I can.

Further up and Further in, Part 2

Referencing an older post, a better picture has been found. Of late, the realization of life as a journey of transformation has become much more acute. Life as a journey to death which yields more life. It's a confusing idea that I'm just beginning to wrap my head around. Henri Nouwen does a much better job of describing it in his book, Life of the Beloved. He describes the process of death as one which should open us up even more to God and to loving other people. This is a difficult concept for me to grasp, though I think I'm getting better at it. Applying the idea to other areas, it's intriguing to see what "dying to oneself" looks like in myriad situations. Through some personal unscientific study by someone who knows very little about it, it's reasonable to say death yields life.

Good Stories

One of the better ones I've read/heard in a while is "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell. You can read it through the link or go to the Classic Tales Podcast if you'd like to hear it for free. If you're an iTunes user, it's easily searchable at the iTunes store.

Ya, I'm engaged...what's it to you?

Amber has hindsight bias. She now thinks she knew it was coming. She didn't. I tricked her into marrying me, and now it's too late. If you want the story...man I'm tired of telling it but here 'goes.

We went out to eat at Gaetano's. If you don't know what it is, it's in Dunedin, FL and you should go. Great food, good time. Nice atmosphere. As we were leaving dinner, Amber had to use the restroom, so I went out to the car and put the ring in my pocket. I snuck it out while she was in the shower after our bike ride.

We stopped in dunedin and looked out over the water and talked about stars and tampa area geography. Next on the plan was going to the Botanical Gardens for the Holiday Lights. We walked around some of the other areas, and then went into the wedding garden. I asked Amber if she wanted to stand under the gazebo and practice. She said no, that's dumb. I was able to convince her. Then I tricked her into marrying me.

One of the highlights of the evening was a couple walking past charging us to make it last 40 years like they had. It's encouraging stuff.

We wound out the evening hanging out at the beach, letting some people (who were awake) know of the night's festivities.

2 people looking HOTT!

It's gonna be a fun life together.