Yesterday, 08/08/08, my family and I had the pleasure of attending a wedding in the Applegate Valley of a close family friend. We left our house and drove the backway through Jacksonville and Ruch to get to the wedding. Of course both of the women in the car, Kristen and Maree, were concerned with my direction of travel.

"Not to worry", I told them. Maree, my 4 year old, had been there on the previous day for the rehearsal so of course she should know how to get there. "NO Daddy" was her quick reply, "you should have a paper..." Of course I did, but I love to tease (torment) her and I said "No, I am trusting you".

As we were driving down N. Applegate Road Maree cry's out "Bad landing, bad landing..." I start looking around for an airplane about to crash, or has already crashed. What can she be seeing. We ask her what she is talking about and she says "Daddy you were suppose to turn back there, I saw a gate. We are going to the apple gate and I saw a gate back there."

I am easily distracted. There I've said it. My wife can attest to this, and she has told me this countless times in the past. When I am having a conversation with someone I will catch myself listening to someone else's conversation (usually it pertains to something I have expert knowledge in) which takes away from the person I am supposedly giving my attention to. The reason why I bring this up is that the bombardment of outside distractions are getting so out of hand. Take for instance the mobile phone. Why is it that if someone is calling, you feel obligated to answer. I don't know how many times I have been in the middle of a conversation with someone, and suddenly they are talking on their phone to another person as if they were alone. Did I miss something? My importance factor just went way down. I get annoyed when my phone rings during a conversation I am having with a friend. My usual response is to hit silence and let it go to voicemail, but however somethings just have to be answered. So and so only calls if there is an emergency. I am not trying to sound holier than thou, I am guilty of this I am quite sure. It is just something that I have become intensely aware of lately.

I think what I am trying to express is that I have to be conscience of what is going on around me to warrant any distractions, and that means to not be disrespectful of those that I am conversing with. My wife would call this multi-tasking. I would agree, but at the same time disagree. Multi-tasking has a place, but it definitely should not be while you are with others. This is definitely something that I hope I "try" to do. Kristen I know I said "try". That's one of her peeves. Her and Yoda would get along great. "Do, or do not. There is no try"

The target is on my back. If anyone reads this I will now be held to a standard that I hope I can measure up to successfully.

The Segathalon is one of the new events that China will be hosting at the 2008 Olympics. The chinese are currently favored to get the gold.

This week has been "life changing" for me. I started a blog, created a face@book page, and am compiling a reading log of all the books I have ever read and how many pages they contain. I started my list by pulling out 2 full boxes of books and putting them into a spreadsheet. Kristen couldn't help but shake her head and comment on how anal I was. I really don't see the problem, I love to read and a reading log sounds like a good idea I wish I would have started it long ago. Unfortunately there are a lot of books I have read multiple times in the past that I can only log once because I can't accurately count how many times they were read. My son Aaron was super supportive of my endeavor and decided to start his own reading log. Kristen, bless her mixed up self, completely supports Aaron. Go figure.

Last night when I was inputting more books into my list Kristen was being ever helpful and told me to put down the one that most people read in school about the mice and whoever. I replied "Of Mice & Men"? She said yes. Unfortunately I have never read that book, but I did read "The Mouse & the Motorcycle" when I was a kid.

I have decided, after reading Kristen's blog, to jump in and start writing some of my thoughts and opinions, for what they are worth. Also, I wanted a place to rebutt any comments she would send my way, even though 99.9% of the time she is probably right. However there is always that .1%...
This will really be a spot to channel my opinions with what is going on around me, around the States, and around the world. I might not update daily, but then again there is so much going on that something should stand out. So check back and hopefully you won't be to disappointed.

Testing....