Thursday, July 30, 2009

Creative Puns

Take a healthy dose of Groan's Pills first...

1. The roundest knight at King Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference. He acquired his size from too much pi.

2. I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian.

3. She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.

4. A rubber band pistol was confiscated from algebra class because it was a weapon of math disruption.

5. No matter how much you push the envelope, it'll still be stationery.

6. A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was cited for littering.

7. A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.

8. Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie.

9. Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

10. A hole has been found in the nudist camp wall. The police are looking into it.

11. Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

12. Two hats were hanging on a hat rack in the hallway. One hat said to the other, You stay here; I'll go on a head.'

13. I wondered why the baseball kept getting bigger. Then it hit me.

14. A sign on the lawn at a drug rehab center said: 'Keep off the Grass.'

15. A small boy swallowed some coins and was taken to a hospital. When his grandmother telephoned to ask how he was, a nurse said, 'No change yet.'

16. A chicken crossing the road is poultry in motion.

17. The short fortune-teller who escaped from prison was a small medium at large.

18. The soldier who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.

19. A backward poet writes inverse.

20. In democracy it's your vote that counts. In feudalism it's your count that votes.

The Sole Of America

By Steve Tuttle of Newsweek. I read this while waiting to get my hair cut and found myself laughing out loud!

An update to our story from Aug. 11, 2008. I walked all over Crocs, and now the shoemaker is hurting. Sweet clown shoes, what have I done?

While other journalists were traipsing around the country last summer worshiping Barack Obama, I was tackling an issue far more important to our nation than presidential politics: the inexplicable popularity of Crocs. I wrote a call to arms asking my fellow Americans to end this horrific trend. The response was intense: thousands of comments, a handful of death threats, and several marriage proposals, some even from women.

Fast-forward about a year, and Crocs Inc. is losing money hand over clog. The stock is wallowing at around $3 from a high of $75.21 in the fall of 2007 (to be fair, few stocks haven't wallowed). The CEO resigned in the spring, and the most recent annual report raised talk in the press of a possible bankruptcy. I'll admit: my first thought when I saw all this was that the country had heard my plea. Who says the mainstream media are irrelevant?

But then I experienced an emotion unusual in my trade: a pang of regret. If Crocs Inc. goes bankrupt, good people are going to be out of work. Who am I to dis a bunch of hardworking folks who happen to make incredibly ugly and embarrassing-to-wear clown shoes? People buy them! Why shouldn't they make them? I wish I'd thought of it! Without Crocs, legions of sweaty feet will have to be stuffed into inferior $5 Croc knockoffs from Dollar General. Or even worse—and I never thought I'd say these words—they'll don even uglier shoes: these things called Vibram FiveFingers, which to me sound like a Vincent Price Sensurround movie or an illegal massage I almost had once in Vancouver. FiveFingers make Crocs look like a pair of Manolo Blahniks. They're constructed so that each toe has its own slot, and if you happen to see a pair, they will haunt your dreams. They are, however, "a good choice for vegans," according to the Web site.

Time magazine named FiveFingers one of the best inventions of 2007, which should have killed the shoes off back then, since whenever a newsmagazine calls something hot, that usually means the trend is pretty much over. But they survived that kiss of death and are finding their way into polite society.

I still hate Crocs, don't get me wrong, but the company has at least tried to branch out into other types of slightly less ugly footwear, like neon sandals and strange, fur-lined booties. Kicking them now just seems gratuitous. And so, though many of you are offering me thanks and possibly thinking of me as a candidate for high office, I'd like to issue a formal retraction of my stinging manifesto. I wish you Godspeed, ugly-shoe maker. In a world where people are now willing to wear gloves on their feet, your awful, sweat-slicked gnome clogs seem almost forgivable.

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Smashing Success

I was out by the pool this afternoon when Dena came by and told me that she'd just gotten home from being in a car accident. A 23-year old man turned into her path as she came home in the other direction. She generally felt fine but her car appears to be drivable but in the end, totaled since the air bags deployed and there was scattered damage to the bumpers, hood, dash and sunroof.

To be safe, she planned to go to Convenient Care for a quick exam even though she had only a very minor scrape to show for the incident.

I suppose it could've sufficed for me to express my thanks that she was okay. But after 11 years of marriage it just made sense to be there for her in the next hour or so. First of all a traumatic experience like that amps up the nervous system, and talking it out helps to settle down. Second, who knows what kind of internal damage there might have been, that might reveal itself while she was back on the road? And third, if she was in for a long stay in the waiting room, what fun would that be on her own? It's just one of those simple investments of love that sows manifold returns.

Convenient Care got her in and out remarkably fast! The insurance company handled her well, and all's on track to normalcy.

Ancient Wisdom About Wisdom

"To know that you know, and to know that you don't know - that is real wisdom." - Confucius

And he probably coined the old corollary - "To say that you know when you know that you don't know - that's just stupid."

Standards

At the beginning of the 2004 season Coach K admitted to his staff that his instincts had escaped him as to the poor start the team had experienced.

"Coach," said former star Johnny Dawkins, "it's all about standards."

That kicked the coach back into high gear. The team had slowly been sliding in its expectations of itself. In short order, fueled by this self-awareness, they turned their season around.

This week I slid a bit on my usual diet. I read this week that for an estimated 37 percent of Americans, the pangs of thirst are so weak as to be mistaken for hunger. In one study no less than 100% study participants saw their midnight cravings diminish by drinking a glass of water at bedtime. In my case, I think I not only got away from curing pangs with a sip instead of a snack, but I also gorged a bit. Life's about the slow, steady march of patience... in this case, to let my food settle in to my stomach before swallowing another round of sandwiches, or whatever. Standards, given time, contribute to excellence.

Name That Loon

During our trivia fund-raiser on Saturday we got the question "In what state was Edgar Allan Poe born?" My teammates faces crinkled up in puzzlement. I didn't understand what was so hard about that.

"Wakefulness," I said with confidence. But evidently not confidently enough to sway them to write it down.

Competitor that I am, I offered another perfectly plausible answer of "Distress." Still my teammates had no appetite for success.

With the clock ticking, I shifted gears. "Solid!" I pleaded.

Meanwhile, oblivious to me, the team scribbled down "New Jersey" or some such thing.

The only "correct" answer announced was Massachusetts. I have my doubts!

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Credit Guard

"There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Anonymous

Future Man

"While others were obsessed and bewildered by the problems of the present, Reagan was focused on the future. This orientation gave Reagan an otherworldly quality that is often characteristic of great men." - Dinesh D'Souza

I love dreamers, those visionary people who see a better world and take steps to get there bit by bit.

Jimmy V Quotation

"A person does not become whole until he or she becomes a part of something bigger than himself or herself." - Jimmy Valvano

In other words, none of us is better off completely on our own. The internet gives us greater capability to live in isolation than ever before, but deep down we are social beings. I used interpret "part of something bigger" as a religious reference, but when we spend our time with other people, we are part of a group, and a group is bigger than an individual. I distinctly recall a time in college when I consciously realized how much happier I am being with people than alone. And we owe it to ourselves to find ways to get involved with others, whether its for some noble purpose or just to have a little fun together.

Tanks For The Memories

A test subject who invested 250 hours of practice could eventually remember long streams of digits, read to him at a rate of one per second, after which he had twenty seconds to pause before reading them back.

His longest string approached 82 numbers!

"There is apparently no limit to improvement in memory skill with practice." - Chase and Ericsson

Trivia Contest

This evening we went to the Knights of Columbus building and participated in a fund-raising trivia contest for the Arthritis Foundation. Our team consisted of...

Josh Barnett - Dena's Kiwanis pal, who invited us
Jenny Barnett - Josh's wife
Miles - Josh's friend of 8 years
Christa Sheppard - Kiwanis

There were six rounds of 9 questions apiece. For example, one round featured American history and asked to name the president involved in the crisis "13 Days in October."

There were several opportunities to win additional points by making extra donations. In the end I believe that we were in the top three in terms of number of questions correctly answered, even though we were squeezed out by those who made more donations.

Having volunteered in leadership roles for years, I deeply appreciated the work that the two young emcees had trying to control and yell over a raucous and alcohol-fueled crowd (my first time hearing the phrase "you bastard!" playfully hollered between tables at a fund-raiser). I'll bet they sleep like babies. And we had a great time getting to know our teammates better.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Kabluey

Dena and I went for a walk tonight... finding an excuse to stretch our legs after several straight days of running. We headed to Blockbuster to pick up a movie and stumbled upon the movie Kabluey.

I could describe it, but it's a better experience if read the preview on the box or online, and come into it expecting a cute movie with some visual gags. Dena and I really liked it on that basis! Definitely got our money's worth, and a few seriously hard laughs (we get a kick out of good physical comedy). And it's got a couple of gently played, serious subplots that add some heart to it all.

Thoughts For Positive Thinking & Living

My old next-door-neighbor and childhood chum Matt posted a top ten list that's right up Hidden Blog's alley...

1. Decide to focus on what you do have.
2. Decide to become Curious and not Judgmental. For He who is without sin, let Him cast the first stone.
3. Ask yourself more often "What else could this mean?"
4. Never Assume. Ask.
5. Develop the HABIT of giving Compliments.
6. Decide for your goal each day to be more, try more, do more, love more, contribute more.
7. Realize that you will screw up again, and Do NOT make it into a catastrophic event, but see it as it is...You'll be able to bounce back quicker than you think possible.
8. The only way to fail is to quit. You are not a quitter.
9. Create Certainty within yourself, believe in yourself, and believe in your positive future.
10. Make time for yourself. Take a walk. Ride a bike. Read a book. Call an old friend. Replenish your YOU tank.

These steps are quite simple, meaning easily written and easily read, but to accomplish them...ONLY YOU can make that effort. Some may look at them as challenging. I encourage you to try your best, and see what kind of results you get. It just might change your life.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

The Ultimate Experience

Wow.

My ultimate Frisbee team has been a tremendous exercise in patience. Ultimate is basically football with a disc - your 5-person team controls the ball, throwing it to each other to get into the end zone for a score (1 point apiece). There are no "downs" like in football, you can throw as many passes as you want, but the key is that there's no running once you've caught the disc. So there's lots of sprinting downfield to get ahead. And if your toss hits the ground, the other team goes on offense.

My squad consists of 15 twentysomething pairs of legs and my old bones. Most of us had barely played the game before. When you only have 5 on the field at a time, that means chemistry grows slowly. But recently we'd come closer to winning and even won last week.

This week though our prospects of victory were dim against a team featuring the league captain. And true enough, we fell behind 7-2 in the second half, dropping something like a dozen deep passes in the process.

But seizing the motto "Fresh Legs" against this team that was considerably older and decorated with knee braces, we went on a dramatic run that ended with a tying score with only minutes remaining on the running clock. Facing a "next score wins" scenario, we gutted it out down to the goal line. And when I found my way behind the defense into the corner of the end zone, we had the greatest upset I've been part of this century.

The Pit



Here's another chapter from the good old days at Walker Hall (RIP 2008) in college. We lived on a floor that was half underground and off the beaten path. It became a tight-knit community of mostly freshman, plus me the senior. Like I've said before, I loved dorm life!

We hung a sign at the security door that led to our hallway - The Pit - which you can see proudly on display before.

It'd be hard to pinpoint a better season of my life than the times we spent goofing around and (kind of) growing up.

Jake!

I just got in touch with my old college roommate Jake!

You've got to understand that I had the best fortune in my roommates, for all the potential peril that can happen. But Jake... was my first. :) Together, he and I hung together and kept our grades up during that transitional first year away from home. We studied hard but played hard too... we both learned to play tennis together (and one time during a tornado watch). Jake tried several majors and served as president of the student club at the Catholic Newman Center. And we just had a lot of fun - senseless, silly fun that kicked off my ongoing love of dorm living (and nowadays, condo living). Together we watched the Super Bowl, played Tecmo Bowl, and invented a game of tennis ball basketball that was more like Bozo buckets. I could go on for pages.

Now he's got his doctorate in psychology and working at the University of Missouri in Kansas City. When you're out of touch with someone like that for so many years, it's like finding buried treasure.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Must've Been God's Motto

"It is through creating, not possessing, that life is revealed." - Vide D. Scudder

Friday, July 17, 2009

You Talking To Me?

"Sayings remain meaningless until they are embodied in habits." - Kahlil Gibran

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Missing Truth?

"All beings are the truth, just as they are." - Robert Aitken

Someone once said that one of the great drawbacks of humans, and Americans in particular, is the addiction to being right.

Someone else described the difference between "absolute truth" (it's true no matter what I say) and "relative truth" (it's true as long as I say it).

What is right? What is truth? To me that's a rephrasing of "What's your opinion?" Fun to talk about, harsh to advocate.

Saturday, July 11, 2009

9 Critical Skills of Voice Over Acting

http://podcasts.voices.com/voiceoverexperts/2009/07/voice_over_experts_episode_92.html

It was interesting to hear tips from voice over expert Pat Fraley... the man of 4,000 voices. He listed these critical skills:

Acting
Reading and Voice
Relaxation
Character and Accents
Energy
Microphone Technique
Business
Sense of Scene
Text Analysis

Friday, July 10, 2009

Dreams - The Fuel of Great Living

"The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up." - Paul Valery

Hapless Job Seeker, Part 3

"Please don't regard my 14 positions as job-hopping. I never once quit a job."

"They stopped paying me."

"In my next life, I will be a professional backup dancer or a rabbi."

"I am attacking my resume for you to review."

"I realize that my resume is no longer exemplary thanks to my family destroying the computer file."

"Here are my qualifications for you to overlook."

"Thank you for your consideration. Hope to here from you shorty!"

Pool Closing

Yikes! I had to post the following notice today. Years from now we'll look back at this and laugh...

"During an annual inspection on Friday, the Illinois Department of Public Health determined that a series of violations justified immediate closure of the pool. The inspection was announced to Nancy on Wednesday, while she was out of town on vacation, and details are still unclear. We will be discussing this at the Board meeting on Tuesday, July 14, so as to move toward the re-opening of the pool as quickly as practical, and overcome this highly unfortunate timing."

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Hapless Job Seeker, Part 2

"I enjoy working closely with customers, and my pleasant demeanor helps them feel comfortable and relaxed - not afraid."

"I realize that my total lack of appropriate experience may concern those considering me for employment." But "I have integrity, so I will not steal office supplies and take them home."

Monday, July 6, 2009

Highest Purpose

"The highest purpose is to have no purpose at all. This puts one in accord with nature, in her manner of operation." - John Cage

What an interesting comment, in the age of purpose-driven lives! It encourages us to live in the moment, going with the flow, to just fully experience the world around us.

Hapless Job Seeker, Part 1

From Readers' Digest:

This is a string of actual blunders made by job seekers.

Dear Sir or Madam:

"I am sure you have looked through several resumes with the same information about work experience, education, and references. I am not going to give you any of that stuff."

"I would love to interview for the position of (insert job title here). If you grant me an interview for (insert job title here), I feel confident you'll see why I'm the right person for the job."

"My mother delivered me without anesthesia, so I have an IQ of 146 and can therefore learn anything."

Backwards Living

"Often people attempt to live their livs backwards: they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want, so they will be happier.

The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are, then, do what you need to do, in order to have what you want."

- Margaret Young

Voice Over Notes

I think I'll use this post to update occasionally with questions that I'll want answered prior to my class in November.

1. What does "ISDN capable" mean? At least one job posting preferred that.

Sunday, July 5, 2009

Aversion To Conversion

A priest, a minister and a rabbi want to see who's best at his job. So they each go into the woods, find a bear, and attempt to convert it. Later they get together. The priest begins: "When I found the bear, I read to him from the Catechism and sprinkled him with holy water. Next week is his First Communion."

"I found a bear by the stream," says the minister, "and preached God's holy word. The bear was so mesmerized that he let me baptize him."

They both look down at the rabbi, who is lying on a gurney in a body cast. "Looking back,'" he says, "maybe I shouldn't have started with the circumcision."

Respect

"When I hear the word 'respect,' I think of treating everyone the same." - Mike Krzyzewski

Naturally, that doesn't mean that everyone is given the exact same result. Krzyzewski goes on to point out how each individual needs a different approach in order to match up with his unique psychology and physiology. But in matters of opportunity and basic appreciation of the skills that he or she has, everyone can be given the same dosage.

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Microphone Test

I bought a microphone as part of my voice acting experiment. And since Blogger doesn't have means of direct upload of audio, the next best thing is a direct link.

Link to Microphone Test

Pressure

"If I want into the locker room and said, 'Okay, here is what we need to do. We need to win six games and become National Champions," that would put an undue amount of pressure on the team. Instead, I tell them to focus on one game at a time and to segment the NCAAs in three two-game tournaments... Each of those segments becomes a four team tournament that we have to win in order to advance, and that is much less intimidating." - Mike Krzyzewski

Multi-tasking adds spice to life, but it can be a short leap to being overwhelmed. The difference is focus. This afternoon I made up my mind to catch up on some blogging from several books accumulating on the shelf. Along the way it occasionally occurs to me to shake up the routine and pay a bill, organize some scattered paperwork or grab a snack. But the focus is on the task at hand. More commonly the potential distractions pile on at work... this request for an answer, the person who pops in for a quick question. It takes a real discipline to realize that quality comes from concentration, and not from putting out fires that are less than smoldering. I tend to think that allowing myself to be distracted by littler things is a self-destructive tendency, a means of settling for less than the best life has to offer. We are meant for more than that!

Close Non-Relationships

"[Reagan] was gregarious and liked people, yet he allowed virtually no one to get close to him." - Dinesh D'Souza

I suppose that could be characterized as a weakness or a strength. Close relationships come with cost, so those who see that as too much and are comfortable with the absence of deepest intimacy may choose to live in that type of friendly isolation.

Meaning In Life

"The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning.

The most important thing in life is to learn how to love, and to let it come in." - Morrie Schwartz

Beethoven's Filth

A man is walking in a graveyard when he hears the Third Symphony played backward. When it's over, the Second Symphony starts playing, also backward, and then the First. "What's going on?" he asks a cemetery worker.

"It's Beethoven," says the worker. "He's decomposing."

Do Good, Feel Good... Be Well

From Reader's Digest:

Despite the stress involved, men and women who put in the most time taking care of a spouse cut their own risk of dying by 36 percent over a seven-year period, researchers found at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.

Taking The Road Less Sniveled

"In moments of doubt, I tell my players to listen to that voice inside their head and to be sure that the voice is always positive. It's the one that says things like, 'I'm good' and 'I can do this.' Tune out the voice that says things like, 'Oh no' and 'I'm really in trouble, here.' If you make a habit of this, that negative voice will eventually disappear entirely." - Mike Krzyzewski

They say that love casts out all fear. Confidence does a pretty good job too. We all have resources enough to overcome any circumstance.

Mozart The Late Bloomer

"Mozart's first work regarded to day as a masterpiece, with its status confirmed by the number of recordings available, is his Piano Concerto No. 9, composed when he was twenty-one. That's certainly an early age, but we must remember that by then Wolfgang had been through eighteen years of extremely hard, expert training." - Geoff Colvin

It's easy to confuse experience as giftedness. Don't! Genius for most is the fruit of hard work.

Poise

"I tell my players that you never want to show your opponent a weakness through you words, facial expressions, or body language. No matter what they are saying to you, no matter what the crowd is chanting, if you can show poise, you can demonstrate to your opponent that they cannot rattle you. Just keep your mind on what you're doing and maintain that inner balance. Act like you have been there before and that you expect to do well." - Mike Krzyzewski

When said by a basketball coach, poise sounds like keeping a tough face in the heat of battle. I think it can also be applied, though, in our daily smaller skirmishes. If you're like me you have expectations that things will go a certain way. When something pops up unexpectedly, it's not unlike me to give a surprised and meek-sounding "Ohhhh!" Poise can be receiving unexpected news with a calm face instead of a wide-eyed one.

Poise to me isn't about being "man-tough" and refusing to share emotions. Poise and toughness can be reflected as much by a smile as in grimness. Perhaps even more so. The person of a mindset that all will be well is rugged against the worst of times, and their calm in those times reveals a fundamental strength that few ever achieve.

The Power Of A Giggle

From Reader's Digest:

Researchers prescribed a daily "dose" of humor - 30 minutes of a favorite sitcom or video - to diabetes patients, along with standard medication. Blood tests taken before an after the study showed that patients who tickled their funny bones lowered their heart risk substantially: They had about a 26 percent increase in HDL "good" cholesterol), compared with a bump of just 3 percent among patients in the control group.

Low HDL is the one item that pops up consistently in my own blood tests. Guess I'd better start watching more Seinfeld!

Call Me Dave

"I sensed that what Dave was getting at was a bachelor's aversion to the endless responsibilities of raising a child, and I decided to feed his anxiety by playing into it. 'Well, Dave," I responded, 'hanging out with Sam or any two-year-old is basically one big suicide watch. Their mission is to find one new way after another of offing themselves - piss in an electric socked, lick a pit bull's nose, chase an ice cream truck into traffic - and your job as a parent is to step in before it happens." - Michael J. Fox

The Fuel Of Common Passion

"In putting together a team, it is important that the leader not be the sole passion-provider for that team. you have to find others who feel the dame way as you do. This is one reason I surround myself with assistant coaches who are equally motivated. During videotape sessions and scouting reports that often last all night, my assistants and I continually find strength and inspiration in each other's drive toward our common goal." - Mike Krzyzewski

Years ago the book "Purpose-Driven Life" was a top-seller. What sense that makes... to find our calling and immerse ourselves in it. And it wouldn't surprise me if often times the real substance of our passion is the people who come along with it, like Krzyzewski and his assistants. Doing something together, it'd seem, trumps most things that are done alone.

The Worst Kind Of Calories

From Reader's Digest:

If you're trying to drop a few pounds, here's the most important dietary change to make: Put down that sugar-sweetened beverage.

Calories from solid foods and liquids both add up, of course. But in a recent multicenter study, the only menu change that had a significant payoff for dieters was cutting back on sugary beverages.

Deep Reserves

Many know about the paralyzing accident that actor Christopher Reeve suffered years ago, and ultimately led to his death.

"Chris focused not on the 'What happened?' but on the 'What now?' 'Before a catastrophe, we can't imagine coping with the burdens that might confront us in a dire moment. Then when that moment arrives, we suddenly find that we have resources inside us that we know nothing about,' he said." - Michael J. Fox

Voices For All

Heartland Community College offered an interesting class with introduction to voice acting. The fellow who traveled from Miami to give the class (and a host of other identical classes along the way) is one of the three national voices for Verizon. There's never been a better time to break into voice acting. Voice over work is all around us. Not only are they in T.V. and radio, but also in answering machines, grocery stores, video games and a host of other places. The Internet supplies a ton of jobs, and the spread of audiobooks demands talent too. I quickly found jobs that pay $200 for 30 seconds of voice. How to get the jobs? You submit a demo of your voice to the prospective employer. And the work can be done from home, with a simple microphone set-up that I bought at a local music store. A good demo, considering any sound effects and the studio time of an engineer, runs $1,500 (a big investment, but much less than starting up your own Burger King store!). The intro class mentioned a master class, and it sounds like a good deal. In addition to a full day and a half of instruction in a classroom setting (max class size of 14 enables more individualized attention), you get a 2 hour session of 1-on-1 time with the instructor during which time they cut two demos for you. They also provide your own web site. The class is the first week of November, up near where Mom lives. The instructor is Eric Hunt, a member of Voices For All who creates the training (and has a favorable B+ rating by the Better Business Bureau - felt I'd better check). His co-worker Casey Rose (1-518-618-1297) helped make arrangements for me.

Choosing Wisely

"Bill Gates has said that if you took the twenty smartest people out of the Microsoft it would be an insignificant company, and if you ask around the company what its core competency is, they don't say anything about software. They say it's hiring. They know what the scarce resource is." - Geoff Colvin

In business, hiring decisions are far-reaching. And in personal life, what could be as important as choosing good friends? The kind who endure our faults, who strive to improve, who always find ways to be happy, who resist complaint, and who make us better through their example. Friends who get their fun out of commiserating will run a person into the ground, as surely as a river will cut stone. We have the choice to take the high ground by the friends we choose.

Passion

"Because you love what you are pursuing, things like rejection and setbacks will not hinder you in your pursuit. You believe that nothing can stop you!" - Mike Krzyzewski

It's pretty trifling, but earlier this spring I found myself in last place in my fantasy baseball league. With 11 teams above me I would have given up right about then, if I didn't love the game as much as I do. Every day, while those above me were probably losing focus, I waded through free agent players available to be plucked and inserted into my lineup once they got hot. And now just this week I climbed into first place. Now if only I can find something in real life to inspire that same kind of passion!

Friday, July 3, 2009

Getting High On Service

They say that our natural instinct to "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" is an actual piece of hard coding that probably halped our species survive. This "mensch impulse" is reinforced by a surege of feel-good chemicaals (srotonin, oxytocin, and dopamine) that the brain produces when we make ourselves available for someone else. In other words, they give us the wrm fuzzies and boost immunity to stave of illness.

Young King Cole

Cole Hamels was the top pitcher on the World Series winning Philadelphia Phillies in 2008.

Back in high school, as an oft-watched pitching phenom with dreams of becoming a pro athlete, his arm bone suddenly snapped clean through while throwing a pitch.

It took months of healing and therapy, but he returned to the mound sharper than ever.

Past setbacks are your greatest proof of strength. Hold onto them. Celebrate them. They remind you that you can overcome.

Thursday, July 2, 2009

Passing Away

"The world is fleeting; all things pass away. Or is it that we pass and they stay?" - Lucian

When I sit to rest on a rock in the park, between the two of us I'm the shadow. How many generations has the rock seen? A hundred? A thousand? Meanwhile I pause, a unique but temporary accessory, an instant's glint within an eternal sunshine.

Picking Pockets

"You owe it to everyone (including yourself) to find pockets of tranquility in your busy world." - Georges Bernanos

In almost every scene of life, even in confrontation, we can allow ourselves to detach from it as if we were watching a show on television. In that moment, we can relax as if mentally stretched out on a sofa, enjoying the chance to gaze with interest and see how things unfold, or to give a quick thanks for something even as simple as being alive.