NEGLECT

I have really neglected by blogging lately. Too much other stuff has gotten in the way. Hopefully I can carve out a few minutes each week to write some. Usually we take a vacation in the summer and I have something to write about during our adventure. We always have an adventure!

So just a few quick thoughts and then I will leave you to your day.

1) Office is under construction

2) Office has hired more people

3) Office is over budget.......of course who is to blame?

4) Yard is finally looking pretty good

5) Haven't spent nearly enough time in The Sanctuary

6) Patio isn't going to get rebuilt this summer

7) Air conditioning needs replaced

8) In February, I tore up the kitchen......still torn up

9) New additional Kitchen cabinets have been designed and contract signed

10) Need to build out the rest of the garage to handle the kitchen expansion

11) Every other weekend I seem to be running off to somewhere for work

12) Achilles is finally feeling better so I can run again

13) Way behind on my running schedule and goals

14) Signed up for Mud & Music Mayhem 6M obstacle run in NC on Aug 3.....first ever for me

15) I will be dead on August 4th

16) Signed up for first marathon in Disney in January

17) Am I crazy? Only need to run four times longer and farther than I am now

18) Starting back on diet for phase 2.....another 15 pounds

19) Haven't done any artwork in a long time

20) Have I mentioned I've been a bit preoccupied?

Enjoy your day my friends. Make time to rest and love your family.

ET This I Believe 

Eugene Thompson

A Whole Bunch of THINGYS!

I have really been dragging on any new postings recently.  Not a good thing! It just seems like things are so much busier right now.  Like what you may ask? I don't know....just THINGS!

For one THING it is the beginning of spring and so much yard work has yet to be done. I wish it would just stay frozen over the winter and pick right back up where I left off. Nope! Weeds grow everywhere, mulch beds need replaced. Plantings need to be added and of course all the over growth needs to be cut back or cut out.  Add this to all the other THINGS I am doing and I cannot keep up with the basic lawn mowing. Was out of town for two weeks and the front lawn was crazy.....what is worse that that? Well before I went out of town I didn't have time to mow the back lawn....Now that is a crazy jungle.  I think our small pup felt he was in a safari every time he ventured out in the back for a pee. Poor guy.

RESULT: This weekend (before another rainfall) I got the front lawn mowed and bagged, I worked on another mulch bed that needed mulch work. Yes a play on words.....lol. (Keep in mind I probably have about 13 mulch beds around the house...why 13....because lawn work in itself is unlucky). I trim a few bushes and transplanted a bush/tree...whatever you call that THING. Oh yeah, if you ask me what plants I have in my yard....I don't know.  It is a green tall thingy and the yellow flowers on a stick like branch and there are some growy purple stuff.....you get the idea! The most best piece (poor grammar is prevalent in today's writing) this weekend was a wack down of the back yard grass.  It needs a couple more mows before it is back in shape but at least my pup can go out there without being threatened by wildlife.

STILL TO DO: I always have the "still to do" lists.  They never end because I am never satisfied.  These lists may last for days, weeks and yes even years.  But at least I will add them today so we can all see my pathetic attempt to complete them this year.  I need to remove all the stone patio that I put down a few years ago.  The thought was a nice stone area to dine on in the evenings. The actual result... a constant weed battle that grew up between the cracks.  I am over it.  I will pull up the stone and use them as planter walls in the front yard and then add a concrete and stone (cannot describe because it is just a weird THING...that's what I do) in its place.  Maybe a fountain THING, I will have to see how adventurous I am. I also need to replace all the patio furniture....it has met its day.....do you know how expensive that stuff is?! Crazy. Oh yeah and don't forget the sunscreen trellis THING over the the wood patio that has been planned for maybe 5 years.....still not built.  I did get the posts buried in concrete at the edge of the deck.  Speaking of deck....It all needs replaced as it is beginning to deteriorate.  One area is torn up due to pup getting stuck under the deck last year just before a thunder storm.  I had to tear up a chunck of it to get him out.

So there is one THING. But now I am too tired to type about all the others.  I could mention, work...see my business blog....if I can keep up with that too, travel (vacation)...yes that is a thingy too.... a much needed thingy from all the other thingys, Finish the inside of the house....too long of a list to notate, the need for new interior furniture, the diet and health thingy.....doing good there! To date over the last 9 weeks I have lost over 30 pounds.....yeah! Now I have to work at the running part.  Another 8K  thingy in a few weeks. Am I missing something else?...probably so.  I guess I better stop writing  this blog thingy and get up and start working on some of these other thingys......just after one more cup of coffee.....My friends....enjoy your day....before you know it...it will have slipped away and you will have filled it up with a bunch of THINGYS!

Spare Time?

So tell me....Do any of you actually have any spare time? Me neither.  I just squeeze something in if I want to do it bad enough.  Work keeps me busy enough at the office, but a great design staff allows me to take some time for myself every now and then.  But what do I do with that time? What do you do with your time? When you actually find that there are a few moments available what do you do with it?

Usually there are periods of time or lengths that become available.  Like 5 min.....15 min.....an hour.....an afternoon or morning.....the ever so infrequent DAY......maybe possibly but the unlikely  weekend. Forget about the full week vacation....and no longer does the month long get-a-way happen ever since college. (Maybe once I get all the office running independently I can take some sabbaticals to far away distant lands.....we will see.)

Well I do not plan on going through the entire "things I do" because it will make me feel like I need to DO all those things......and I don't want to right now! Primarily, at nearly 46 years of life, I like to find time to rest.  Rest and recovery (sounds like a computer necessity....a reboot). If I have a few minutes I actually like to keep up with the news, sports, yes facebook or even this silly blog. I can even burn through an hour reading up on stuff on the Internet. If we get to an hour time frame, there isn't really much I can PLAN for....it just becomes spontaneous. Yes, I should come up with a few tasks that need to be done around the house or office, even a few chores but alas that doesn't help in the recovery category.

When it comes to a morning or afternoon time slot, I often try to mix in the TASK along with some down time. There is much to do regarding the yard work.  It seems it always needs mowing or trimming or something.  Nice part about that is we are getting close to winter so that will come to a close soon. Maybe the home repairs lists will kick in at that point? It would be nice to finish the base cove, a new coat of paint, remodel the stairs, redo the main bathroom.....ahhhh and yes the new kitchen floor which includes the walls, demo, lighting, wood flooring, tile flooring....and more.......stop already! Maybe I will just take some time to watch TV......a total waste of time. But I can unwind.  Better yet, I will do a little city building in SIM CITY! (I know, a complete departure from what I do all day long at work! Plan for commerical, industrial and residential areas, make sure there are proper traffic flows both private and public transportation. Incorporate parks and recreational areas for ....get this.... DOWNTIME....I think I will go live in one of my sim cities. Make sure there is enough police, fire and medical facilities and plenty of options for education.  Don't get the city bogged down in traffic or don't let the air and water pollution overcome the occupants. And do all this under budget!)

Okay, if I had a weekend.....it never really consists of just down time.  I always have to DO SOMETHING.  We did get away to the camping site over labor day and that was a complete departure....mostly because it rained the entire time. I usually have to accomplish a bit of everything during a weekend....maybe a bit more relaxing time for a holiday weekend....a real holiday weekend not like Columbus Day.

What about a week long? Well that happen very infrequently.  I haven't taken a vacation in a while. Keeping an eye on the business prevents that mostly.....having no money prevents that the rest of the time. But again if it does occur....I have the tether of the laptop and blackberry that keeps it all at my finger tips......I need a few of these soon.....maybe half weeks?

If I had a month to DO SOMETHING it would have to be an agenda item....you know one of my bucket list items. I have a few that I would really enjoy doing and it would probably be much like a TASK than a VACATION......something to all planned out and coordinated and organized and budgeted and and and.....yep....WORK. I have a massive Bucket List already containing 50 or more items.  I may share that with you all soon........until then......I a going to play SIM CITY!

Get some rest my friends.....or go do something!

The Pleasure Zone

Have you ever ventured in to the "PLEASURE ZONE"? Has your journey of life allowed to you finally reach this euphoric land. No this is some XXX rated blog post....get your minds out of the gutter.  I am talking about the awesome feeling you receive once you have completed an amazing task.  Like running a marathon for the first time....each time as well, I guess.  Our working on something so diligently that you it seems you will never see its completion...but then you finally reach that destination. That light at the end of the tunnel has finally arrived and no it wasn't the head light of an oncoming train....just the glow of achieving the gold.

Sometimes I feel this way when I am doing the tasks around the house.  It is pretty commonly known that our house is an experiment in progress.  A never ending series of goals, lists, to-dos and chores that seem like they never end. This glorious awakening occurs when even just one of those items are accomplished.  Yep....you toiled and fussed and smashed your fingers with the hammer...not once but a few times, like you didn't learn the first time you hit your thumb! Your back now aches, your clothes are drenched with sweat....but it is finally done!  And now you can look back and see it's splendor and relish in its completeness.

Ok, this might sound a bit hokey (no disrespect to any of the VT fans) but truly this is a joy.  You can only understand this if you have gone thru it.....no, not pay someone to do the work.....that doesn't count.  You have to actually DO THE WORK. It is okay for some help from family or friends, but the bulk of the sweat has to be your own....sweat equity so to speak.

We finished pulling out all the weeds in our stone patio this weekend.  I believe that there was far more grass/weeds than stones.....but that wasn't the point.  our backs were aching, hands sore, legs stiff to the point of making it difficult to walk on Monday morning (cannot bend down and pick up another thing....if I drop something....it is going to stay down there) and dirt still gathered underneath the edge of our finger nails.......Yes I cleaned then...12 times.  And what I couldn't clean I trim back.....no more finger nail to trim.  But here is the JOYOUS, GLORIOUS REWARD! we look back and see the clean patio (only a few strays of grass blades here and there) and get to say..."Look at that! We have a patio".  So very cool!

A smile, one last gander at our prize and inside we go to take a hot shower and a few ibuprofen....4 to be exact. And the comment we make to each other....." I think we shouldn't let the grass grow over the rocks again"......DUH!

Have a rewarding day my friends!

Yard Work

There was a time many years ago......okay maybe not that many years ago, but some time has passed.....when the yard work was a different animal for our household. We bought our house because it was on a corner lot with lots of side yard for the kids to play and a pretty good size backyard (for our neighborhood anyway). I never really cared too much what the yard looked like as long as the grass was cut for the Nazi Association people! I know that isn't nice to say, but they are pretty ridiculous sometimes......come on, give me a break...grass in the cracks of my drive way!!??? Sometimes that was the only place grass would actually grow!

The kids used the sideyard for so many years as a football field.  Most of the time we never needed to mow except for up against the house because they trampled it all down.  After a rain the yard became MudBowl! One giant brown pit in the yard! We had the ugliest yard in the neighborhood but who cared....the kids had a blast.  There was a time when I had the Courthouse Rec League field equipment that we painted football lines on the yard.....yep....and the kids loved it.....neighbors....not so much.

The planting of our yard was never a pressing desire.  I didn't care for a bunch of flowers...mainly just shrubs and green plants. We didn't have any money for new plants anyway.  It just was too much non-initial expenses for our budget. When we first moved in the house we had these two MASSIVE pompous grass bushes on both sides of the driveway entrance near the street.  You couldn't hardly see to back out.  The kids often took the "spears" off of the plant, got on their bikes and used them as lances and they rode towards each other at break neck seed.  After many hours of chopping, whacking, weeding and pounding those big bushes were totally removed.  A stump remained for a long time after until we finally regained some strength to chop that out with a pick ax!

Other bushes around the house were pulled out and replanted in different places but never really any major plantings or mulch beds were created.  We did add a elongated mulch bed reaching from the corner of the house out to the tree in the middle of the front yard after we exhausted of trying to keep people walking RIGHT NEXT TO OUR HOUSE on the way to the mail box!  Kids I can understand....but ADULTS....come on.  I will admit we tied our KILLER DOG up to the tree many times to have him back and growl at everyone as they tried to navigate our front yard. (I got to tell you that after the mulch was added there was some who had to go out of their way to go around the mulch bed....no not out in the street....but actually right up against our house!.......They could have touched the window they were so close........GET REAL PEOPLE!)

Anyway, the back lawn always grew twice (maybe three times) as tall as the front.....Front was mowed because of the Association Police, the back grew with the added "dog fertilizer"...never was a important to mow...but did get quite high from time to time. The boys always did the yardwork for me. The mowed and weed-eated.  As long as it was cut, I was happy.  There were times when I tried to tell them about the details, but it really never sank in.  If I was ever out there mowing....everyone knew I must be MAD or something.....I never mowed.

All that has changed over the last several years.  Since the kids are all older, no more football practice evenings, no more football Saturdays, no more baseball days, soccer days, softball days, basketball days.....and on and on and on....they have grown up and moved on to school, mission field and marriage.  I now take care of the lawn. Yes, now I COACH the flowers.  I love the backyard.  I have pots, plants, vines, mulch beds, stone works.....and more. The backyard is my peace.

These last two weekends, I have worked to get the mulch beds in order for the season.  Re-planting some of the annuals, trimming up the dead or the over grown, digging up and transplanting, weeding, trimming and mowing all of the yard.  It is hardwork and I don't have the same stamina anymore but I like the results.  It is some what satisfying. I cut the lawn at different angle, spray for weeds, edge the mulch beds, trim the bushes and tree limbs. Finally after all these years, I can finally have a yard that the everyone, including the kids (when they come home) can finally be proud of.

Now....to take care of the neighbors giant bulldog who keeps POOPING on my lawn! PEOPLE, COME ON ALREADY!  Have a great Summer my friends! MOW HAPPY!