A Few More Favorites

I came up with a few more favorites from the year that was.

New Discovery: MKT Trail

I've lived in Columbia since 1996 and had never been on the trail until this summer. We took the kids a couple times and had a blast

Photo: This one

Janelle got a new camera this fall, and she's taken a ton of great pictures. This shot of me and the kiddos is on the aforementioned MKT trail in Columbia. I think it looks like we're walking in The Shire from Middle Earth.

Month: September

We often complain about how we go directly from summer to winter around here sometimes. This autumn was an incredible exception. I think we cooked, ate, and played outside more this past September than the entire last couple years. I can't wait until spring when we can do it again.

New Foods: Lobster and Sushi (not necessarily together)

I was fortunate to have my first real lobster dinner at a business conference in New Orleans this spring. Yum.The sushi introduction was a bit less exciting (refrigerated section of Hy-Vee), but also tasty. I'm a fan of both.

Poppy Love Song: Come On Get Higher, Matt Nathanson

Nothing particularly deep or special about this one, but I simply cannot turn the radio dial when it's on. A great sing-along song.

Kid-Friendly Movies: Prince Caspian

I'm loving our kids ages (8 & 5), as it means we've entered into true "Family Movie" territory. We're watching movies and TV shows together that we all enjoy. Don't get me wrong, I'm as big a Blue's Clues and Ruff Ruffman fan as anyone my age, but it's been fun to start watching Big Kid stuff, too.

Prince Caspian is a much better movie experience than Lion/Witch/Wardrobe, mainly because it's a better story for the screen. The battles are done well, even without much (if any) blood. And Blake even survived the "romantic" part at the end. Good show.

TV Show: Star Wars, The Clone Wars

First of all, this is not a great show. It is a very fun Saturday-morning-type cartoon that Blake and I have enjoyed together. I make the kids wait for me to watch each new episode -- just in case there is a scary part (but mainly because I want to see it).

Another Book: In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan

http://www.michaelpollan.com/indefense.php

The author makes a compelling argument that most of what we eat in our current culture is not food, but "edible foodlike substance." As discussed before, I'm a sucker for anti-status quo writing. His suggestion is simple but not easy: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Another Website: www.kayak.com

This travel site takes the best of the others (Expedia, Travelocity, etc.) and puts them in one place. It also adds a piece that is missing from most of the others: Southwest Airlines.

Feel free to share more of your favorites. You have about 15 hours 'til 2009!

Favorites of 2008

I guess if you have a blog it's pretty much expected to list some sort of End Year post. Here's my attempt to follow that crowd and share some of my favorite stuff of '08.

Rock Song: Old Enough by The Raconteurs
I'm a late adopter of The Raconteurs, and I thank BXR for overplaying this song over the summer so I didn't miss it.

Pop Song: I'm Yours by Jason Mraz
Another on the overplayed list, this was our family sing-along song all summer. This is a full album pick up.

DVD and Movie Dispenser: Once and The Redbox
Once is a great movie with incredible music. I was tempted to watch it again as soon as I finished it the first time. I wanted to renew my piano lessons from 1986.

The Redbox is genius (especially the one within walking distance of my front door) and will make a fortune off me -- one dollar at a time.

Video Game: Mario Kart Wii
I've been playing video games for more than 20 years, and this one ranks toward the top for pure fun, especially multiplayer, and especially-er online multiplayer. I'm not very good (yet), but for the first time in a long time I actually want to play enough to get better. (Sorry Guitar Hero - I just couldn't muster up the effort to dislocate my pinky in Expert Mode.)

Book: The Four Hour Workweek by Tim Ferris
I tend to read/listen to a lot of books over the course of a year. And most years I don't read a book that changes the way I think. This guy did it by challenging conventional wisdom and doing it well. It's not a "do this" book, at least not for me. But it has a little something for everyone. A quote reference in the book is a good summation:

Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination. -Oscar Wilde

Website: Facebook
I check two websites every day: Gmail and Facebook. I now know much more about current friends of friends than I ever knew about people I went to school with for 12 years (check that -- now that I've "reconnected" I also know more than I ever wanted about my old friends from high school).

Tech toy: Moleskine
OK, I lied. I went anti-tech this year, trading in my PDA for some a pocket-sized notebook. It was a great trade. I always have it with me, and I don't have to memorize anything anymore -- it just goes in the Moleskine. It contains random sketches, grocery lists, and that million dollar idea that would have been lost by the bedside in 2007 (In the interest of full disclosure, I'm still waiting on that idea). Oh... and I don't check my e-mail every 22 seconds.

Trip: New Orleans
I had the opportunity to take a business trip to New Orleans last spring with Janelle. We had an incredible time eating seafood, drinking frozen something-or-others, and soaking in the environment. Highly recommended.

Musical Performance: David Cook on American Idol
At the risk of outing myself as an American Idol and Michael Jackson fan in the same sentence, my favorite live performance of the year was David Cook's Billie Jean. If you didn't see it, take two minutes to watch:




Favorite Person: Janelle Chandler, my rock-awesome wife
We've been married nearly 10 years (next June) and this one has been the best by far. We've had lower lows than most years, and higher highs as well. We've laughed, cried, traveled, sang loudly, defaced our otherwise perfect bodies with tattoos, and otherwise had a heck of a good year. I'm in love with that girl.

So there it is. What about you? What was your favorite song/movie/book/game/website/techtoy/trip/person of the year?

Where's the Funny?

I'm not a newspaper guy, but the break room in my office has a St. Louis Post, so I occasionally skim over it at some point during the day.

I had an epiphany this week as I was looking over the Funny Pages. They're not funny. As I read through the comics (Ziggy, For Better or Worse, Family Circus, etc.), I was amazed at the lack of humor.

Zero laughs above the fold.

Things got a little better with Dilbert lower on the page, but I've determined that the laughs per comic strip metric is not good -- at least for me.

It sure seems that comics were comical when I was a kid. The Far Side comes to mind. But maybe that's it. Garfield wasn't really funny, and Peanuts seemed to get less funny each year.

Maybe it's me. Perhaps I'm just not a "comic strip guy." There are definitely things I laugh at (Stephen Colbert, The Office, Saturday Night Live, dirty limericks), but this just wasn't it.

In the Moment

I had an absolutely great Columbia weekend, and have had a tough time attempting to put it into words. I thought maybe a quick event log would help me share my thoughts. Advanced apologies for the ramblings...

Saturday 8:00 - Haircut with Blake at Tiger Barber
Blake had a deep conversation with his barber about Halloween, and we got to have a race to the finish. Blake finished his cut first and earned extra pennies for bubble gum. Big props to Tiger Barber on 9th Street.

Saturday 10:00 - Marko at the House
My brother came in from Denver this weekend to watch the Mizzou game and catch up with friends. He hung out with us for a couple hours in the morning. The kiddos loved tackling him and showing off their Lego Star Wars skills (they are quite good). Good to see the little brother again.

Saturday 12:00 - Living Canvas
I got my first tattoo (pics coming once healing is complete) and had a great time with my wife and Laurie and Erick Creach, all of whom added ink to their exterior. Surprise visit by the VanDykes topped off the afternoon, as did valuable discussion of the parlor's choice of artwork in the waiting room. (My personal favorite: Inappropriate Blue Frog)

Saturday 4:00 - Tin Can Bar & Grill
Had a mediocre dinner and great discussion with aforementioned group. They serve beer in cans and a WIDE variety of food (wings, pot roast, chicken fried steak, and probably stir fry if you ask). I'd suggest a more focused menu.

Saturday 6:00 - 30 degrees at Faurot Field
Walked from downtown to the game. It was a blast...and freezing. Drunk guys nearby added to the game's entertainment value. Hearing the "Z-O-U" from 35,000 people on the other half of the stadium still gives me goosebumps every time. Loved it.

Saturday 8:00 - 72 degrees at Home
We wimped out at halftime and finished the game in the comfort of our living room. We weren't alone, as evidenced by the TV shots of the crowd in the second half. Hot chocolate, cookies, and warmth made it a great decision.

Sunday 3:00 - Hollywood Theater Birthday Party

To top off the weekend, Madilyn celebrated her 8th birthday party at the theater. She invited a few other girls, chaperoned by two strapping gents (Blake and me, both newly haircutted). After cake eating and present opening in the party room (yep, they have one - it's awesome), we enjoyed High School Musical 3 on the big screen. Huge props to Hollywood Theater for taking care of screaming girls running amok in their establishment all afternoon. Highly recommended for your next b-day party.


Not to give away the HSM3 plot, but Troy and Gabriella have some minor relational conflict that turns out OK in the end. Insert funny guys and lots of music and dancing, and you get a nice close to the gang's career at East High.
(Note: Yes, I know High School Musical. I have a 2nd grade girl in the house. And of the range of things she could be asking me to participate in, this one is a pretty easy give.)


So there you have it. A full Columbia-themed weekend with family and friends. Good times, good friends, good memories.

The Speeches

All in all, Election Night was pretty uneventful in terms of "who's gonna win" drama. That never seemed to be in doubt.

What I wasn't prepared for were two of the best speeches I've heard in a long time. McCain was incredible, and I'm sure I'm not the only one wondering where this John McCain was hiding for the last six months. He's a true patriot in every sense of the word, and I hope he's able to do exactly what he wants to do the rest of his life.

Obama set the course for the near-future, inspiring as he has for so many months, and leading me to become more interested in the process than I had ever been. I'm excited to see what happens over the next 4-8 years.

Palin Live

OK, so I'm probably one of a handful of Missourians who attended both the Obama Rally and Palin Rally in the span of five days.

This rally was similar to last Thursday, though smaller and more sunny. It sill included typical opponent-bashing by the underlings, with a special "I can't believe he said that but I guess it's OK because he's so old" speech by Kit Bond. I've always been a general fan of Sen. Bond, but I could envision a number of Republican higher-ups cringing a few times during today's ramblings.

Then Palin showed up to the usual fanfare, and she announced the next special guest (I guess she wasn't the headliner, after all): Hank Williams, Jr. It was my first Jr. experience, and it was kinda fun.

Hank sang the national anthem (pretty good) and a rewritten McCain/Palin version of Family Tradition (absolutely awful).

Then M.C. Palin got back to the podium and gave her typical speech. Not bad, but similar to everything we've heard so far. I wasn't close enough to know if there was a wink at the end.

The basic message of the day was Palin's governance of Alaska is the trump card for Executive Experience and McCain is the only man in the U.S. who has ever really faught for our country.

Again, it wasn't bad, but it did come off as a "let's rally the base, and do it quickly, as we're about to lose" kind of rally.

It was fun to experience both this close to the election, and I did get a warm fuzzy feeling (start the band here) that we live in a country where people can get very excited about how they feel government should work, and that we all get to cast our vote to see who gets to try it their way for a few years. Overall, I think it's a pretty good system.

Obama Live

I'm sure the world has been waiting with bated breath to hear my thoughts and opinions on the presidential race, and I guess I declared by attending the Obama rally in Columbia last night.

First of all, it was mostly gibberish, as various politicians (Jay Nixon, Judy Baker, among others) gave us the same attacks, rhetoric, and promises for twice as many services for half the tax burden. Baker teased us with a, "...and let's give Barrack Obama a great Mizzou welcome!! When he gets up here later."

Then we said the Pledge of Allegiance.

I don't think I've ever done that with 40,000 other people. It was one of those community bonding moments for me, as I stood next to an Army private with his family and said the words I've said thousands of times in my life. It felt different this time ... like it mattered.

Then he spoke.

Much of Obama's language was similar to what we've heard over the past few months, with many phrases copied directly from his Wednesday night TV special. But there was something about being there in person that was inspiring. I'm convinced that Barrack Obama is not a perfect man, and he will not be a perfect president. I don't even agree with some of his policies, in much the same way that I don't agree with some of McCains.

But I'm also convinced that things will be different after November 4, and in my opinion they will be different for the better.

Unplugged Weekend

Our internet was out this weekend (insert collective groan here).

I know. It was awful. I was disconnected from the world, from my e-mail, my fantasy football team, my Facebook status updates, and the always comforting "virus database updated" voice that pops up every day or so (he was replaced by an ugly red X over the application - a sorrowful reminder that we were not up-to-date, and when we finally did get back online we'd better watch out).

It was nice. I didn't run downstairs every 45 minutes to check my Gmail, blog, and whatever popped up on Google Reader (I did run down multiple times to power cycle the modem, check the wireless router, jiggle some cords, and test the resolve of Mediacom's customer service reps -- but that's another blog).

What I found by Monday was that although I was annoyed that I couldn't check up-to-the-second injury updates on my football team, I still won my game. I didn't really get any significant e-mails. And the virus updating guy's calming baritone returned to keep our family spyware-free.

What I did do was hang out with my family a little more, visit the library, spend time with friends for beer & BBQ, and watch late-night (well, late for us) football and movies with my wife.

I'm glad my super-high-speed, YouTube-friendly internet is back and I wouldn't wish our plight on anyone, but there were some advantages to the forced time warp to ... 2004.

No time to count the many blessings (nor name them one by one). I'm off to share my wit on Facebook.

Bikes and Stocks at Yard Sale Prices

We just bought the kids "new" bikes this week at a yard sale, and we were more than happy to get a deal. Their old bikes had gotten too small, and Dad has not taken to time to properly teach his children to ride (insert guilt trip here). The new bikes, awesome September weather, and excitement from the kiddos has encouraged me to get them out riding this fall.

I've been equally excited to pick up common stocks at uncommon prices over the past few weeks. I'm no day-trader, just a regular contributor to my retirement plan at work. And as stocks get cheaper, it seems to me I'm getting more and more for the money. Granted, if this truly is the "worst financial crisis since the 1930s," there could be issues. But even if that's true, I think regular purchases of stocks over the next few years will pay off in the long-term.

It'll be another 30 years before I need the money, and I'm sure we'll have the "worst financial crisis since 2008" sometime between now and then.

Simultaneously we're attempting to pay off a car loan early. It's a 6% loan, so I know that every time we make an extra payment I'm earning about 6% on that money. It's the best savings plan we have going at the moment.

Am I missing something here? Should I be following the crowd to bonds and my 0.3%-earning savings account before our nest egg hits zero? Anyone with an actual financial background (I just count cars for a living) with insight?

Naked Streets

I'm generally a fan of "contrarian" writers and thinkers, and those who challenge so-called Conventional Wisdom. From the Freakonomics guy who questions everything, to Marcus Buckingham's views on management (First, Break All the Rules), I'm a sucker for this stuff.

I'm also a Traffic Engineer, so when I run across a "maverick" in my field, I perk up. Enter Hans Monderman from the Netherlands, who passed away earlier this year.

Hans took urban street planning to an extreme, believing that a mix of vehicular, bicycle, and pedestrian traffic would be better served by removing signs, stripes, signals, and curbs to creat "Naked Streets." In his shared-space environments road users communicated with each other to travel safely and efficiently.

Here is an excerpt from an article written just after his death:

His maxim was: “If you treat drivers like idiots, they act as idiots. Never treat anyone in the public realm as an idiot, always assume they have intelligence.”

To prove his point, Monderman was known for boldly walking out on to his naked streets and junctions, turning his back on the moving traffic and walking to the other side to show that drivers would not run him over.

In the world of Engineering you don't see "out-of-the-box" thinking like this every day, so it has been refreshing to me to learn of those around the world who push the envelope. Rest in Peace, Mr. Monderman, and thank you for impacting the way I do my job.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article3167372.ece

Wizards in Training

I'm beginning to understand how wizard teachers feel when their wizarding students finally "get it." Our kids are currently on a magic kick, where they are constantly coming up with random spells to cast on each other (and their parents).

Janelle and I have both had our fair share of time frozen solid, waiting for the "Unfreeze" spell so we can continue our walk down the hall. Fortunately for us, our extensive Harry Potter and Diablo II experience has served us well.

Our little mages were hard at work last night, dabbling in elemental and creature-summoning activities in a tough-fought duel. Here is an excerpt:

Madilyn the Magnificent: "Super Fire!"
Blake, Necromancer: "Super Black Widows ... that eat fire!"
Madilyn: " ... drat."

But not to worry, I'm convinced Madilyn will come up with the proper counter-curse to attack the seemingly all-powerful Super Black Widows That Eat Fire before their next battle.

Happy bDay eBay

On this date in 1995 eBay was officially founded. I don't recall anyone having "World Wide Web" access in 1995 (though we might have had a few computers on campus with it), but I'm sure there were some Apple IIe machines, PEZ dispensers shaped like Yoda, and more than a few other random items.

Of late I haven't spent much time on eBay. When I do, I tend to use it more as a "price check" website than an actual place of business. It's nice to know somethings true value (i.e., the price someone - or a lot of someones - has actually paid for it).

And it is always good to know that if I need to replace my worn out "Hangin' Tough" cassette tape, I'll always have a place to go. Three cheers for eBay.

Ready for Some Football? Well, kind of...

After years of being a ravenous NFL football fan, I'm finding myself not quite as excited this year. I think it boils down to a couple reasons:

1. My team (Kansas City Chiefs) have extremely low expectations. They'll probably not be very good this year, and the excitedment level for the team is just not there.
2. My fantasy football team (Laser Cats) drafted in July based on schedule. As such, it's been a long time since our league owners talked, and there haven't been any big news items since our draft to make our preseason interesting.
3. My college team (Mizzou) has National Championship expectations, which I've never experienced in my life. I have found myself much more interested in studying the Top-10 college programs and all the teams on MU's schedule than digging into the NFL. Living in Columbia we have more access to the games, and with the kids getting older we're planning to attend later this month. Due to the cost of the NFL games, we likely won't be seeing the Chiefs anytime soon (even if we wanted to).

Don't misunderstand. I'll still be bellied up to the Plasma Thursday night, and again for the Chiefs-Patriots Sunday. And I'll probaby be over this post by next Monday and ready to write a retraction. But for now, I'm feeling much more Black & Gold than Red & White.

The Convention

Has it all felt just a little too perfect to anyone else?

Don't get me wrong. I've enjoyed the pieces of the DNC that we've watched this week, and I've verged on "emotional" a time or two during a speech or introduction. Bo Biden - who I couldn't help comparing to Chip Esten from "Who's Line" - gave a particularly nice intro for his father.

And I'm confident Obama's speech has the chance to be "semi-old-school-rapper-makes-a -video" worthy once again (yes, it can).

But the staging, the speech-reading by some, and the goofy crowd chants and silly attacks on anything un-Liberal was tiring. I couldn't imagine sitting through the entire broadcast. And don't get me started on the "Hi, I'm Barack Obama, and I happened upon some nice folks' home in Kansas City (or St. Louis, or Kansas City) to watch TV and say hello via satellite."

Joe Biden was interesting, and I'm becoming convinced that he knows as much about US-Foreign policy as anyone not named Leo McGarry.

I'm more confident than ever that Bill Clinton is one of the best communicators of our (well, my dad's) generation. He's as likeable a speaker as I've ever seen. If he ripped on the Republicans I don't remember it, and if he's not truly an Obama fan he hid it perfectly. He had a couple pieces of paper with notes, but we never saw him look at them. He didn't read the teleprompter, and he seemingly looked at each of the 16,000 people in the audience individually at some point during his speech.





I'm looking forward to seeing how the RNC responds with their own convention, and who they'll be able to trot up their to compete against Billary and the Obama kiddos. My fingers are crossed for McCain's mom.

"I don't wanna be teached"

As our kids (7 and 4) continue to grow up, it's amazing how different their little personalities are. Our older is big on learning the correct answer, and not moving forward until all facts are laid out in front. Blake just wants to try it, regardless of the info available.

This week they were playing a game, and Maddie wanted to show Blake what to do. She asked if she could help him when he replied, "I don't wanna be teached."

It just reminded me that we often try to help (or teach, or communicate with) others in the way that we would like to be helped/taught/communicated with, instead of determining how they would best be helped/learn/understand.

No big "Special Lesson from Jerry Springer" here... just a quote I wanted to keep in the blog.

Blog Catch Up

Now that I've figured out the Blogger/Facebook connection, I haven't come up with a good reason to keep up with my Myspace page (I still use it to connect with a couple people I haven't convinced to move to Facebook yet).

For my own nerdy completeness need, I'm pasting some of the Myspace blogs here so I can have them around for posterity. Not that they're works or art of anything, but they are me.

-----------------------
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Parenthetical Writing
I’ve noticed lately how often I write (on blogs, e-mails, or even formal business correspondence) using parentheses. I think it’s a way for me to share all the (typically unnecessary) details that I want to reader to read, or I’m attempting (often unsuccessfully) to add wit to my writing -- parenthetically. I can’t decide whether it’s such a bad thing, but I am making a point to attempt writing without them -- at least for a couple days. My fear is that I’ll probably just replace the parentheses with hyphens and/or dashes to get the same effect. Hmmmm...

I truly enjoy grammar rules, particularly punctuation, but I don’t recall ever learning anything formally about parentheses. Are their official rules? Does anyone abide by them, or have they gone the way of "don’t end your sentences with a preposition?" That tends to be the first one people give up on (err...on which people give up). And speaking of punctuation, what’s with putting periods and question marks inside quotes when they have nothing to do with the quote (don’t get me started)? Crap. Couldn’t do it. My parentheses are here to stay (at least for now).

------------------------------------------------
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
The Urinal Experience
I'm not a big urinal fan. Maybe it's the "open-ness" or the "side-by-side-ness" of peeing next to some other guy, or maybe I just like to go in a regular toilet to feel more like I'm at home. Anyway, Blake (4) had his first urinal experience this weekend at Sam's Club. As I've seen him grow up, it's been fun/cool/weird to see my son experience things for the first time, and I see myself being emotionally impacted by some of the strangest things -- like his first whiz in a urinal. It is sort of a passage into the next stage of life. I mean, he's been peeing standing up for awhile now (another emotional moment, let me assure you), but to see my boy, my heir, performing such a masculine task ... it was a special moment. Am I crazy? Anyone else get choked up over random life events?

-------------------------------------------------
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Kangaroos
So I'm on the Washington, D.C. subway this week and I see a dude in Kangaroos shoes. You know, the ones with the best invention ever -- Shoe Pockets!
I totally remember putting something in my sweet blue Kangas...maybe quarters for the arcade...or a dollar bill (folded six times) for school lunch...or something else 1/4" by 1/4" that dug into the side of my foot. But that's before I upgraded to the Super Kangaroos with the pocket in the tongue. Perfection.

I need a "Welcome to 2008" techy friend

I'm trying to figure out how to link all of my websites together (an old blog site, Facebook, Myspace, ILoveDavyJones.com), and I'm beginning to feel old. I programmed in Apple Basic as a 2nd grader and used to be able to build a computer, but things are much different now.

I'm buried in RSS and IPs and lots of numbers with multiple decimals (192.168.1.1 is my current favorite) as we've linked seemingly everything in our house to the wireless network.

I'm searching for a kind soul who can teach me how to use these new-fangled World Wide Web applications I've been hearing about -- and lead me through the pain if I ever upgrade my cell phone. Send your application to my Facebook e-mail. If I don't respond, try pinging me or something... or just send a note to CoolDude@juno.com. I think that address is still active from my 1996 entry into e-mail.

10 PRINT "THANKS!"
20 GOTO 10