6/9/12

On Monday we become homeless.  Yup, we are taking IRV in for some work and will be moving in to a hotel room.  On the plus side, the internet connection will probably be much better.  On the minus side, everything else.  Well, not totally.  There will be a pool and some workout facilities.  I will be closer to work.  Doesn't matter, things need to be done and this is the best way to do them. 

I had an interesting patient the other day.  He was a gentleman who was riding in the AIDS Lifecycle event.  This is an annual (I think) event where riders ride bicycles from San Francisco to Los Angeles to raise money and awareness for AIDS prevention.  It is a great event.  My patient was a rider in the event.  While talking to the patient and the patient's significant other (I never definitively established a relationship) we talked a bit about fundraising for a good cause. I mentioned the I will be doing the Tough Mudder next month and that I can use the event to raise money for the Wounded Warrior Project.  He told me a touch about his fundraising efforts for the AIDS lifecycle and it brought me to the conclusion that I am negligent in my duties as a fundraiser.  I am not running the event for the Wounded Warrior Project.  I am running for me.  I can, however, raise funds for them.  To that end, I wrote a little essay and posted it on Facebook trying to raise donations.  I will include it here. 

What did they give you?

They all volunteered at the least to give a few years of their life in defense of yours. All of them. And these are the young and healthy years. Time spent away from family, loved ones and the familiar comforts of home like hot water and fresh food. Many of them gave much more.

Some gave up their lives as they knew them. They gave arms and legs, sensations and the ability to walk. Love lives were lost forever before they were ever really started. Some gave up the ability to walk down a street without waiting for a garbage can to explode or a window to erupt in a blaze of gunfire. They gave up peace of mind so that many others could have it.

What can you give back?

The Wounded Warrior Project is an organization devoted to aiding those who have given so much. They provide services for wounded veterans and their families. Among their programs are the Combat Stress and Recovery Program, the Transition Training Academy, the Warrior to Work program and many other programs developed to support the returning veteran and their families.

On Sunday, July 8 I will be running in a Tough Mudder event in support of the Wounded Warrior Project. This is your opportunity to give back. Please remember, all donations go directly to the Wounded Warrior Project. I am not asking for money for me, but for them. For more information, please visit woundedwarriorproject.org To donate today, visit this link.

https://register.toughmudder.com/fundraising/donate.aspx?event=6819&fundraiser=r3943709

Please share this with your friends so they may have an opportunity to give back. Help our veterans today.

Thank you.

If this made you guilty enough to donate, thanks.  If it didn't, check out my facebook page, I am only getting started. 

6/6/12

Today I feel like hammered dollar sign octothorpe ampersand exclamation point. 

Subsequently didn't do much today.  So not much to write about.  But, I'm supposed to say something right? 

So...howya doin?  Read any good books lately?  How 'bout them Cowboys? 

Yup, got nothing.  Just wanted to spell out $#&! in long hand. 

6/5/12

Success.  Of a sort.

Today I woke up and felt even worse than yesterday.  Tough Mudder I thought.  The event doesn't care how I feel today.  Nope, not one little bit.  So I strapped on the shoes and took off running.  Yesterday we passed by a park where the Sarah and the kids went to play one day while I was at work.  I noted it and discovered it was a little over two miles from the house.  Hmmmm.

So that was today's goal.  Run to the park, exercise there and run home.  And I did it.  Ran to the park and there I did three rotations of 20 push ups, 5 pull ups and one minute planks.  Yaaayyyy.  Felt like crap, but did it.  I figure I need to train to the event and the mudder is running interspersed with exercise to that should be good training.  I need to do it more.  Satchel seemed to appreciate the rest while at the park too. 

Then home for lunch and more errands.  After dinner we went to play in the dunes.  It was too windy to do much, 30 mph with gusts to 50, but we played.  Now we may just sit down to a guilty pleasure of some TV and alcohol. 

I am thinking I might add a training portion to the website, but most of my internet presence is on hold til we get a new computer which is on hold til after we get IRV back from the shop.  Sigh.  So much to do. 

6/4/12

I have some sort of throat infection today and not feeling to great.  That's life.  So I didn't get a workout in.  I did get some much needed stuff done around here though.  Tanks got emptied and flushed.  I called Open Range and the 'local' dealer in Ventura and scheduled for IRV to be taken in to get some things fixed prior to the warranty expiring.  We have some reasonably significant bubbling on the roof and a frayed slid out cable that need attention plus a few other things.  Did some research on a computer to replace the one that recently died.  The laptop will get us through, but isn't good enough with the photos for me to be comfortable and doesn't work as a multimedia center either.  So there.  Any excuse to spend more money.

OK, the last post about my less than stellar run got me thinking.  Well, a call from my Dad after the fact got me thinking.  That thought bled over into today.  One of the things that Sarah doesn't understand about why I sit on the computer as much as I do is my strong desire to acquire knowledge.  Now, don't get me wrong, Sarah is very smart and can/does acquire a ton of knowledge her own bad self.  What I am talking about also extends out into the books I read.  I love to acquire knowledge for the sake of knowing it.  Sarah is much more practical.  She wants to know how to do what she needs to know how to do.  The other stuff, while interesting, is just getting in the way of the other things she has to do.

I figured out a way, I think, to have her understand.  This acquisition of knowledge is how I plan.  See, I see her planning.  She figures out what needs to get done and plans on how to do it.  I gather as much knowledge about everything I can constantly so I can feel prepared for whatever happens.  She will logically plan out what she expects to happen, including likely eventualities, and then prepare for that.  It can be frustrating at times when one of us just doesn't get what or why the other is so worked up about something, but we are just preparing for something in the best way we determine.  Luckily we are both pretty accepting of what we don't understand because we trust the other to be doing what is best.  Works out nice that way.

How does all this relate to my previous post about mu run?  Glad I asked!

My father called and started talking about how what I wrote related to something about which he has a large body of knowledge.  MBTI which is, I believe, Meyers Briggs Type Indicator.  This is something of a fairly sophisticated personality test.  It grades on four different traits along a spectrum.  You fall somewhere in between two opposites on a scale.  The results of this test can suggest to you much information about how you take in and process information.  He noted that what might be difficult for me, and result in ego depletion, could be very different for someone who rates at a different place on one or more of those traits.  Makes sense right?  What is easy for me, might not be for you.  Even when it comes to what you are thinking about and what you notice.

All this draws to the conclusion that it is important to be self aware and know what and who you are.  This information will help you in all aspects of your life.  I'm not sure how you go about taking the MBTI test if your Dad isn't qualified to administer it or if they don't do it for you where you work.  Maybe I will remember to ask him next time I talk to him. 

I think Shakespeare summed it up more succinctly, "Remember this, above all else, to thine own self be true."  I am actually paraphrasing.  If you are true to yourself especially about yourself then you will know more about yourself.  Which is very helpful.  He may have said it better, but it's my blog and he's dead.  So there.