Wandering Around

I am traveling for work, as a matter of fact I am writing this from my hotel room.  It has been a while since I have traveled this trip has been a great learning experience. The conference I have been attending is great and I have met a lot of great people.

I have learned that I am not a real big fan of trying to do real work on my netbook. I like it for small things, but if you have to do a lot of work, it really is just too small.

I have learned to always travel with an umbrella, it has been raining for 2 days here and no end until tomorrow sometime (maybe). Today I walked about 15 blocks in the rain and was pretty much soaked by the time I got to the conference.

I learned not to give up watching TV for Lent if you are going out of town and will be sending your nights in a hotel room. You can only read the Guest Dervices Directory so many times before it is really sad.

So as you can see I have learned a lot, which brings me one of my favorite quotes of all times. I heard this a long time ago and it has stuck with me.

Not all those who wander are lost
J.R.R. Tolkien

What Should I Be Doing?

I am sure that I am not unlike a lot of others when I say there are times when I wonder if I am doing the right thing. Now I don't mean am I doing the proper thing or not being "evil" kind of right but am I doing what I should be doing with my life. I have not been watching TV for the last few weeks and as you would guess I have some free time that used to be taken up by the mind numbing box in the corner of the room. So I have had plenty of time to think about what I am doing and if I should be doing it.

There are plenty of test you take in school that tell you what kind of job you should have or what kind of skills you should be using, but what about the rest of your life? Is there a test for that?

What is it that keeps us from doing in life what we want? One study says it is fear that stops us or that we are boxed in by the thoughts, feelings, hopes of our family, spouses and friends.  So without even realizing it we let those around us decide for us what we are doing, why do we do that? Unless we are completely honest with those around us (and I don't believe we really are with most of them) they will not know what we really should be doing.

What would you do if did not have to worry about what others thought or what you were afraid of? Who could you be if everyone around you cheered you on to success?

Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today. 
James Dean

Having it All like Jesse James

I think we have all wondered what it would be like to have it all. To not have to worry about money, house payment, food, will your children have what they need and life in general would be great. Or would it? Lately you can’t pick up the newspaper without reading something about Jesse James or Tiger Woods and how they have pretty much screwed up their lives. What really bothers me is that most people look at them and think they had it all, they reach the top, and they should be looked up to.

Well, apparently not! Why in the world would anyone lookup to someone who can’t honest with the one person on earth they should be (their spouse in case you did not know who I was talking about).  Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t care if Jesse is a Nazi or if Tiger has some kind of illness that makes him unable to be faithful, they are just guys. Just like you and I only they found a way to make some money.  There is nothing special about them in any way that would make me think I should be like them or better yet that my children should be like them.

We need to change the way we think about "having it all" because if that is what having it all means, I say no thanks. 

That's the key to having it all: stop expecting it to look like what you thought it was going to look like. 

Cindy Chupack

Spring Is In The Air

Well, here we are once again at the beginning of spring. A time when we look to get out of our cabins and break free of the cabin fever that has infected us for the last couple months. I, for one, am not looking forward to all of the yard work that will need to be done (maybe it would be nice to have a couple more weeks of snow).

Spring is also the time of spring break. When young people get together and party like they have been locked up for a decade. The amount of booze consumed this time of year is incredible.

• The average man drinks 18 drinks a day
• The average women drinks 10 (come on girls you need to work harder)
• 50% of men and 40% of women say they drink until they passout or get sick. 

Wow, that is a lot of drinking, but what does drinking lead to? Well, children of course. Studies show that almost 50% of men who have more that 5 drinks (4 for women) report that they had unplanned sex and 52% said they had unprotected sex (does that mean the door was not locked?). Which means that not only could they end up with a kid, but they could have the gift that keeps on giving Herpes. 

So if those numbers have scared you into not wanting to go party like you have no tomorrow, you could always come to my house and do yard work.

Spring is nature's way of saying, "Let's party!"
Robin Williams

Any Fool

I have recently come to realized that I am a cynic. I have joked about it for years, but I am a cynic. I don't know how I got here. If I look back over my travels I don't see any real signs that indicated if I turned here I would end up where I am today.

So to change I guess I first have to determine how I got here in the first place. Is it the TV I watch? There does seem to a lot of shows that are very cynical in nature like the Cobert Report or The Daily Show, maybe that is where I caught it from. It could be in the newspaper I read, the letters to the editor are usually very full of emotions that can be considered cynical. As I am writing this I am listening to "Things that make you go hummmm..." That is not going help.  It must be coming from somewhere, I wonder if there is a 12 step program for people who are trying to break the habit?

Well, I am going to try and work at being positive about life, family, friends and work. I am sure that if I just give it some attention then I will be able to do it.......yea right that will work.


Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain...and most fools do.
Dale Carnegie

Aretha Had It Right

I think Aretha Franklin may have had it right, it is all about respect. Why is it we sometimes find it hard to respect others? Is there something in our nature that just does not allow us to notice others around us. Have we grown so unaware of what is going on around us that we just don't have the ability to show simple honest respect?

Now I would love to tell you that I always show respect for people around me. I can tell you that I try, sometimes harder than others, but I try. We as a whole, it appears, has found that it does not matter if you give anyone some respect. We ignore people who are waiting on us in restaurants, or checking us out at the store. That is until one of them makes a mistake and then they be come the center of our attention. I try and always greet the people who are there to help me and make my life easier. You would be surprised how many time someone will brighten up just by asking them a simple "How are you today?" when it is normally their job to ask you.

But I am not just talking about respect to those people around you for just a short time during the day, how about the people you are around all day. You know the people you work with. We need to remember that they deserve to be treated the same way we want to be treated. So unless you want to be talked down to, or ridiculed in public, maybe we should not do that to others.  I know what it feels like and I can tell you that it is not one of my favorite feelings, so I am going to try and treat people with respect, how about it care to join me?

Men are respectable only as they respect
Ralph Waldo Emerson


All I am askin' is for a little respect....
Aretha Franklin

Working for a Thanks

I had an interesting moment today, you know one of those moments that stick with you all the day though. I was doing something for someone and their friends. Now I did not start out thinking that I wanted to be thanked for what I was doing but I came to think that it would be nice to be thanked. Well, after saying something like, look what I did for you, the response I got was "I did not ask you to do it". Wow, there it was right in my face, here I was doing something for someone else and instead of getting thanked I got slapped.

I did not know what to say at first. It would seem that I had to rethink my motives as to why I was doing what I was doing specially in the light that it was not asked for and now apparently not appreciated.  So instead of getting angry and saying things that would cause a fight, I simply finished what I was doing and then left the room to think.

Ok, what was my real motive? Was I working for a thanks or did I have a higher purpose in mind? I still am not sure, but I think I will have to think twice next time to find out what I want out of my actions. I would love to say that I would only want to do it for the pure motive of just trying to help someone. But is it wrong to want at least some kind of appreciation? There has been plenty of things I have done for others behind the scenes where they do not know it was me and I am ok about not being thanked, why is it sometimes we feel the need to be thanked?

Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul.
Henry Ward Beecher

I Love A Good Deadline

What are deadlines and why do we have them? That question comes to mind every now and then since my life seems to be made up of deadlines. If you look up the word deadline you get "DeadLine: The point in time at which something must be completed". That seems right at least that is how we look at deadlines today. Of course I found that is also means the line that if a prisoner crossed they would be killed. Maybe that is where the stress comes from with deadlines, the fear that if we don's finish in time it will kill us. I wish I had not found that part of the definition, now deadlines will bother me even more.

A good friend of mine gave me a plaque for my desk that reads - Deadlines - the Ultimate Incentive. Is that really the case? Why do we put deadlines on ourselves? More importantly why do we let others put deadlines on us? It is bad enough that I have to put up with my own deadlines, now I allow others to give me their left over deadlines that they are not using.  I am very bad at putting deadlines on myself. Just about everything I am going to do I have some kind of self imposed idea of when I should be finished. It does not matter if it is doing the laundry (yes I do the laundry sometimes) or doing something at the church I put my self under stress by coming up with some kind of crazy deadline. Well, I think I should stop doing that but then again...I do love a good deadline.

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
         Douglas Adams - 1952-2001