Parenting Is Fun

I do my best to teach Weston sound life lessons.

When I sing / say "and it burns burns burns the... what?"

Weston shouts "RING OF FIRE!"

Awesome.

Motorcycle Trip

My Dad and I had an awesome motorcycle trip last weekend!  We rented bikes near Allentown, PA and rode back roads North to Route 6.  Then we drove West across PA zig zagging from the New York border and back down the Route 6.  We continued to the PA Grand Canyon, and down through a couple state parks.  At the end of our full loop, we started playing follow the leader and drove all kinds of crazy back roads that sometimes led us in the right direction, and sometimes turned into a dirt road and eventually hit a dead end.  The cost really isn't too bad to rent a Harley for a day, and the experience was just amazing.  The leaves are turning in Northern PA making mountain we climbed even more beautiful.  This is absolutely going to become an annual event.

I rented a Harley Fat Boy and my dad got a Harley V Rod Muscle.  These bikes have completely different riding styles, sounds, speeds, and overall experience.  It was great to switch back and forth every couple hours.  Here is a picture of the 2 bikes at the top of the Grand Canyon.

This is my dad on the fat boy.

Here is my awesome "strike a pose" moment on the fat boy.

We stayed in Covington, PA with a close relative on Friday night and greatly enjoyed lounging in a hot tub after a full day of riding.  I planned on us riding about 175 miles each day for a total of 350.  We ended up riding 540 miles because we were having so much fun and kept taking side trips on random roads.

We rode a really nice ridge in between Allentown and Bloomsberg with a long series of wind mills.  Up and down the mountain had some great switchback turns and climbs.  It was funny to look forward to the speed advisory signs for turns.  35mph was ok, but the best turns were 10-20 mph.  We could cruise through all of them about 15mph over the advisory speed leaning from the outside of the turn to the inside, and back out.

This trip was absolutely fantastic.  Maybe we'll get a couple more people to jump in next year and we'll go explore Western PA.

It's Late

For the first time in a very, very long time, I have found myself unable to sleep.  It is most likely due to sleeping in until 10:00 this morning which hasn't happened in quite a while, or a little bit of anticipation for the week ahead of me.  Either way, it seemed like a good time to sit by myself in the night and share my thoughts.  I still have the lovely ambiance of an occasional beep from the hidden smoke detector.

Tomorrow I am off to Mobile, AL for a 3 day business trip.  No need to get too excited there, it's primarily for a few insurance meetings.  I'm also getting more involved with out 2011 budget, which is fun.  I've been doing a good job of getting my name around the company as someone looking to advance and get more involved, so I am a little interested to see if any conversations pop up while I'm down there.  There is a good chance that nothing will come up, but we'll see.  I finally have a game plan to wait things out another 2 weeks for a possible transfer, and if nothing comes up, time to take action.  I think I'm going to pass at the possibility of being the assistant treasurer, which leaves me with my choice for my next title.  What sounds best to you?  Risk and Finance Manger OR Director of Risk and Finance.  I can't quite make up my mind, but apparently it is my decision.  

Aside from the above thoughts running through my head, I think the main reason I'm not sleeping right now is the excitement of next week's motorcycle trip.  After a year of dreaming of renting some Harley's and cruising some winding roads, the trip is finally going to happen.  My dad and I are heading out this Friday for what I hope to be an awesome time.  Lord willing, the weather will be nice, and everything else is all set.

That's right, the week ahead of me consists of 3 days in Mobile, a day at home, and 2 days on a Harley.  I really need to get some sleep now to be ready for all of this.

Thanks for reading.

All is Lost

Somewhere in or around our kitchen is a fire detector with a dieing battery.  It beeps every couple minutes to let us know the battery needs changed, but Liz and I can't find it.  It only beeps once, so it is really hard to tune in on the exact location.  Maybe it is in one of the cupboards, or tapped to the bottom side of our hutch.  All I know, is that it beeps, and beeps, and beeps.  I think Liz and I have been a little more on edge this last week.  Careful if you visit, because one false move could land you in a world of pain. On the other hand, if you happen to find it, we will most likely raise you upon our shoulders and shout acclamations to your name.

I think there is a 50-50 chance that the previous resident hid a fire detector in the wall just to play this cruel cruel joke.  If that is the case, you win.

I also have one more announcement that will surely bring great sadness and anger to all of the western world.  They have discontinued Wal-Mart Chicken!  We could hardly begin to imagine the ramifications of such an event.  The downfall of our society has begun, the end is near.  Soon McDonalds will decide to no longer sell burgers, and switch to all fish sandwiches instead.  Pizza Hut will become a wing place.  And Pepsi will reduce its product line to only Crystal Pepsi.  

Perhaps you don't know what I mean by Wal-Mart Chicken.  I'm talking about those amazing little boneless BBQ chicken pieces thought brought such delight to my pallet.  They are sold in the deli area, and you paid by the pound. Often in college, my roommates would venture over to get a pound each for dinner. I kid you not, there were many a time that I would waste 40 minutes of my lunch break just to drive to a Wal-Mart and back.  And people caught on in my area, because there were many days I would drive all the way over to find an empty container where the chicken once resided.  I had to start taking an earlier lunch break to beat the crowd  I would even pass by a chic-fil-a on my way, they were that good.

But now they are gone, and I am left empty.  All is lost.  

I'm Beat

This morning, before work, I ran a little over 8.5 miles.  That's a third of a marathon baby!!  Now if you'll excuse me, I need to collapse on the floor and cry.

Since you came along, you sexy thing

Did you know that August is the cheapest and best time of the year to buy a bicycle?  I did, so I just went out and bought a bike.  It was a tough decision among the many options and whether I wanted a road bike, mountain bike, or hybrid.  When it comes down to it, I love mountain biking, so I went with that option.  Check out this beautiful beast:

I went out on a couple trails on Sunday, made some adjustments, and I’m ready to tear up Michaux State Forest later today with Justin. 

Pray I return with no major injuries.  Rocks aren’t always as forgiving as you would like.

The Claptrap

I think that I am a somewhat creative person, and lately I've been thinking about putting that to the test.  I tried to do a little bit of writing, but that didn't work out all that well.  Mainly because I lacked the dedication.  It seems to me that my creativity exist better in short bursts, and it is in that spirit that I created my own web-comic.  For now, I plan to update it once a week.  I got 5 comics posted before revealing it to the world, so check them out and let me know what you think.  2 of the comics weren't as funny on paper as they were in my head, but they still might be worth a laugh.  I have 5 more written out, and ready to create, so I hope to keep this going for a while.

The link is in the menu bar above.  As a side note, if any of you are good with html and can figure out how to add a next and previous post button to the menu, that would be awesome.  There are links at the bottom of each post, but I would rather have them in the menu bar.

I hope you enjoy, and thanks for reading.

8 Hours is a Long Time

Today I wrapped up a few projects at work and decided there wasn’t enough time left to start something new. 

Sadly, I confess that decision was made at 2:00.

That next project had better be a doozy.  

Changes in Attitude, Changes in Latitude

Some time ago, soon after getting back from China, I decided I needed to change my lifestyle a little bit.  This is something that I mostly kept to myself because I didn’t want to go around telling people this and then fail miserably, but now that I have been relatively successful, I felt obliged to share it with the world. 

Simply making a small effort to eat healthy and exercise has not worked for me in the past.  I would also find a way to mess it up by being lazy or craving bad food.  This time around, I didn’t set a goal for weight loss, nor did I limit myself to any kind of fixed diet.  My changes in life started by the simple realization that life is much sadder when you wake up less than an hour before work or school starts.  I’ve done this my whole life.  Sleep until the last possible moment, wake up and rush around to get ready, and speed off to work or school just in the knick of time of often even late.  What I have found is that this practice evokes the feeling that your life is about work.  I wake up and work all day, I’m tired when I get home and do a few things until I go to bed and do it all over again.  My first lifestyle change was simple, wake up early enough to allow at least an hour of free time before work.  That one hour changes my reasons for going to bed at night and getting up in the morning, and it makes work feel like something I need to do in the middle of my day instead of it feeling like all of my day.

My other changes were a natural flow of that one decision.  In order to wake up in the morning and have energy to do what I wanted, I needed to get a good night’s sleep.  In order to get a good night’s sleep, I needed to get into a regular routine and most importantly, eat healthy.  Eating the right food in the day is the single biggest factor in the quality of my sleep.  Now I need to eat healthy, not because I want to lose weight, but because I want to sleep well and be able to enjoy life.  All I had left to do is figure out what to do with my free time.  Occasionally, I would just hang out or play some video games, but I ultimately discovered that the early AM in the summer is the best time of day to be outside.  Spending time outside led to a walk, which led to jogging.  I also decided that I wanted to get back into golf, and the early morning is a great time for that as well.  Now I am walking 18 holes of golf a week, and running 2-4 times a week.  With all of these things combined, I dropped 25 pounds in 2 months and I didn’t even set a goal to lose weight.  I have set some small goals here and there, but the only real goal I set was at the beginning of the year when I decided I wanted to run 365 miles in 2010.  I’m happy to say that I just finished mile 180 leaving me about 25 miles behind schedule.  That’s not too bad since I took off 35 days for the China trip and work travel.  I have also not counted any miles for sports or other activities like the 24 hockey games I’ve played which would easily compute to 2 miles a game.       

I have to say that life has been more enjoyable for the past couple months which is funny because I always thought being overweight was worth it to enjoy delicious food.  The only other life change I would really appreciate is moving out of central PA.  I’ve just been here for way to long and I would really like a change.  The opportunity to discover a new area, and make a town our home instead of Liz and Wes living where I grew up would be excellent.  I haven’t had very much luck in my job hunt, but I am hopeful for the right opportunity to come up in the not too distant future.  I have a meeting with my boss this week to see where she sees me a year from now.  Perhaps I’ll find that I need to stay here a while longer, or get an opportunity to transfer to a different location.  Worst case, I’ll discover that I need to kick my job hunt up a couple notches. 

With vacation days and family events over the past few weeks, I’ve dropped the ball a little bit on the front of eating healthy and waking up early.  I also haven’t applied for many jobs recently, so I hope to pick back up this week.  I did shoot an 89 this morning at Range End, so things aren’t going too bad.

Thanks for reading.  

Sorry

I often think of this cartoon when I haven't posted in a while.  Thank you XKCD for writing my blog for me.

Also, if you like XCKD, I found this very interesting website: http://xkcdsucks.blogspot.com/ I don't know why somebody would take this much time to express their hatred of something.  Not only are there general posts, but there is basically a post for every XKCD cartoon describing why they hate that specific cartoon and how it could have been done better.  Ultimately, it just make me want to read more XKCD, but it is interesting to read none the less.

Thanks for reading.

Man Weekend 2010

Man Weekend this year was a little bit different from last year, but similarly awesome!  There wasn't nearly as much fire and explosives, mostly because I didn't plan on as much, but also due to poor weather and malfunctioning fuse.  At the same time, the cannon was particularly fantastic!  9 of us set out for that hallowed ground in northern PA.  We kicked the weekend off with a nice round of golf followed by a lot of gun and cannon fire.

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but Keith was able to take a couple shots and videos along the way.

A good game of poker rounded off our first night, and we prepared for our main event day.  A good breakfast and a pancake battle led us into MAN-LYMPICS.  This great championship consisted of clay pigeon shooting, pistol shooting, bowling ball shot-put, football toss, longest golf shot, caber toss, and a game of poker.  I was way out in front in the beginning, but Jimmy made a triumphant comeback to claim victory.   In the middle of all that, we set off the cannon a couple times and  played a game of Ultimate Frisbee.

This is the best of the videos I was able to collect.




The weekend was a great success.  Keith had the great idea of making a short bar trip to a local establishment.   The stories and pictures from that gem of an event will be left off this blog, but you could only imagine what happened when 9 crazy guys loaded into the back of a pick up truck and ventured into a crazy redneck bar for a drink at the same time a bachelorette party dropped in.

Thanks for reading.

My Goal Deployment Training

A couple weeks ago I was offered the opportunity to join the top management of our company for special training for a new process to create goals and implement useful action plans.  The training was overall quite helpful and will hopefully be a useful tool for the people more involved with the operations.  My role was to add to the discussion and provide some financial analysis to the goals the teams were setting. 

I was quite proud of myself for my level of attention to these long meetings given my track record from school.  I had very little difficulty fighting off sleep despite the grueling 12.5 hour meeting on day 1 and 10 hour meeting on day 2.  However, I did find myself a little stir-crazy on the second day and started to doodle a bit.  As we walked our way through the 110 page power point, I couldn’t help but notice the ridiculous clipart pictures tossed in.  Some were just silly like a caveman chipping at a wheel demonstrating that we don’t need to “reinvent the wheel,” while others just came off creepy when printed without colors.  To entertain myself, I took to adding dialog to some of the pictures.  This one in particular was a gem to work with.  It came up every time we had a breakout group session:

Despite the concern I had that someone would pick up my book by mistake and see the comments, I pressed on.  Here are some of my cartoons I thought you would find amusing:

I’d love some reader input here.  The main reason I put the blank one on top is to get others to copy and add there own dialogue.  I don’t think you can embed the picture in a comment, but you can put it online and post a link, or email it to me, and I’ll make another post with reader’s cartoons. 

Thanks for reading.  

The Life of an Analyst

If you have a little bit of curiosity of what it would be like to to have my job, or if you work in a corporate setting, you might greatly appreciate this. All of the jargon they use in this video is purely hysterical. I kid you not when I say I've heard at least 90% of these phrases around the office and often in contradiction to each other as displayed so beautifully here.

I couldn't get the video to embed, so here is a link to watch it.

China Trip

It has been a crazy few weeks since we returned from our China Trip.  I wanted to post pictures a while ago, but work has just been out of control busy.  But at last, here is a picture tour of our trip.  Most of these were taken by Liz, but a couple were taken by Becky and Sarah.

The trip started in San Fransisco.  Sarah was kind enough to allow Liz and I to hijack her car and tour the area for a day.

After the Golden Gate Bridge, we went to Muir Woods to see the Redwoods.  These aren't the ridiculously wide ones, but are really tall... and still wider than any tree we've ever seen.

  

We left the Red Woods and ate at the Pelican Inn.  This little English restaurant and inn that was recommended by Sarah's boss.  We sat out in a screened porch and enjoyed some fantastic food and atmosphere.

  

Then we carried on to Muir Beach so we could see the Pacific Ocean.

And it was very very cold!  We were fortunate to have nice weather for the day, but with the ocean breeze, light jackets were comfortable.  We did see some people tanning which was somewhat odd for March, but also saw some lunatics who jumped in the water. Yikes.  There was also a die-hard surfer who had a wet suit, but that is still pretty nuts since his feet, hands, and head were exposed.  

After 14 more hours on a plane, we finally arrived in China.  It was night time when we arrived, and the first picture taken was at the hostel of a peculiar foosball table.  We played a game the next night because I was so intrigued.  It was wider than any table I've ever seen, and had a unique configuration from defense to offense of 1-3-3-4 instead of the traditional 1-2-5-3.  You'll also notice the feet are separated instead of one solid piece.  It was much harder to be accurate, but made for some crazy angle shots when striking just off center.  The metal made team also made a loud ping every time the ball was hit.

Ok, on to more Chinese-related pictures.... The Great Wall of China!

The wall sits on the ridge of a mountain, so we took a cable car up to it.  We literally walked on every part of the wall you see in these pictures with the exception of the above picture where we weren't allowed to venture to the level part on the very top of the ridge.

Yes we did walk quite a bit, but it was mostly downhill from where we started to the point the below picture was taken.

You may not have ever noticed that the vast majority of the wall is steps.  Even the subtle changes in elevation were small steps with a 1-2 inch lip.  A few of the parts were actually quite annoying to walk because you couldn't take a normal stride.  Sarah and I were clearly the cooler people in the group, and decided to climb the big hill.  And we climbed and climbed and climbed.

Nearly every part of the wall has been restored at one time or another.  The first parts of the wall were built sometime in the 7th century B.C. when China was separated into states.  China was unified in 221 B.C. and the government started to connect separate parts of the wall to form the Great Wall.  Much of what you can visit today was built between 1300 and 1600 during the Ming Dynasty.  Tourist spots have been restored more recently to accommodate the visitors.  A lot of the wall is restricted because it is so old that it would crumble.  Sarah and I walked up to a restricted part and could see the clear difference between restored wall and older wall.       

The top part of our climb was so steep that we were using our hands and feet to climb.  It was a little scary, but the view was spectacular.    

Finally, we met back up with Liz and Becky.

And took the alpine slides down!  No I did not expect to be able to jump in a cart and slide down from the Great Wall of China, but it was awesome.  

Becky took a picture of this funny old guy that was sitting outside the entrance smoking his wooden duck pipe.  Becky has been there 2-3 times over the last few years and has always seen this guy there.

Day 2 of our trip took us to Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City.  This is the biggest public square in the world and has quite a history which I imagine you know about. 

On one side of the square rested the embalmed body of Mao Zedong who died in the 70's.  Yes he was embalmed and not embossed as I have been incorrectly telling people.  I'm not the best with words sometimes.  Anyway, the picture below shows the incredibly long line to see his body.  

The opposite side of the Square held the entrance to the Forbidden City with a huge portrait of Mao on the front, even though he had little to do with the city.

There were quite a few people walking through the city.  In fact, there a lots of people everywhere you go.  Many of the Chinese people are infatuated with Americans.  While we were walking around, aside from the many stares, a few people asked to have their picture taken with us.  We felt like celebrities.    

The Forbidden City is forbidden because no on was allowed in or out unless the Emperor gave permission.  Generally, men were not allowed.  This ensured that any women that got pregnant in the city were carrying heirs to the throne.  The Forbidden City housed the Emperors for 2 dynasties.  In general, each emperor built a new building during his or her reign.  

Many of the buildings were restricted to enter.  From what we could see from the outside, they contained thrones and other significant resting places or centers of worship.  Most of the buildings had cool names.  Some emperors focused on supremacy while others focused on harmony.  There was a Hall of Imperial Supremacy, but we were more interested in the Halls of Supreme and Middle Harmony.  The buildings we were allowed to enter contained some great ancient collections such as the jade item below.  

We also visited the Olympic Park from the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

You may remember the Bird's Nest.  Interestingly, since the Chinese tend to build things very fast and to look nice, they often overlook structural integrity.  Though this was built just over 2 years ago, it is already showing signs of wear and is costing Beijing $9 million a year to maintain.  

All of those sites plus some shopping, crazy driving, and western food concluded our time in Beijing.  It was now time to do some more traveling.  Here is a map summarizing where we went.  We had a 5 hour train ride to Zhengzhou, followed by an hour car ride to Xinzheng where Becky works.  When we left Xinzheng, we had the hour car ride, followed by a 7 hour train ride to Shanghai.  I was going to make an Indian Jones style map video, but got lazy.     

Here are some pictures of Sias University where Becky works.  A good bit of the campus is modeled after other cultures.  The theme of the administrative building is East meets West.  The next 2 pictures are the same building from opposite sides.  

East:

Meets West:

They are supposed to be the entrance to the Forbidden City and the White House.  They call the next area Italian Square.  The square had a number of small shops and places to get food.  

The only stairway from the campus down to Italian Square was being renovated while we were there.  This work was done in one day.  I never really saw the workers working, but each time we went past it, a lot of work had been done.  I thought it picture worthy because of the odd method of laying brick, covering in concrete, and then topping with marble.  It was also interesting because nothing was roped off.  In America, that mess laying across open stairs would inevitably lead to a law suit from some student tripping.

Xinzheng is considered one of the birthplaces of the Chinese Nation and is located not far from the Yellow River.  It is considered to be a very small city for China.  I thought it would be fun to put a little perspective of one of their small cities.  Harrisburg, PA is a small city in America.  Its area is only 11.4 square miles and has a population of just under 50,000 people.  Xinzheng is half the size of Harrisburg with an area of only 5.8 square miles.  However, its population is over 600,000 people!  The picture below is in the square of Xinzheng.  The 2 guys are brothers and are considered to be the founders of China.           

This is an alleyway near the square.  The tailor Becky goes to is located at the end on the left.  Check out the excellent Chinese wiring on the right side.

Many of the vehicles were oddly shaped from what we are used to.  They are a bit more narrow which helps to cram 5-6 wide on their 4 lane streets.  Yes, driving is crazy.  Everyone just moves as a crowd, you honk your horn just to let people know you are passing, traffic signals are no more than recommendations, and driving in the oncoming lanes or on sidewalks is totally acceptable.  I thought the 3 wheeled trucks were worth a picture.  

The clothing the Chinese people wore was mostly beyond understanding.  Tradition determines the proper attire.  You wear heavy clothing and coats up until a certain date in April, and then switch.  It does not matter how warm or cold a particular day may be.  The children are always bundled up like the kid in A Christmas Story.  The kid below has on many many layers.  I think it protects them if they happen to fall, or maybe get hit by a car.  They would just bounce off and continue on their way.  They don't, however, wear diapers.  The seat of their pants is simply a whole to do their business wherever they happen to be.  I did not take a picture of this, so don't worry.  

We rented some bikes one day to see what life is like outside the city.  This is a nearby village.  Notice the old building in the middle surrounded by newer and ugly concrete buildings.

This is one of the main streets.

For reasons none of us were quite sure of, one of the buildings had a 4 step explanation on how to have a child.  There was a bit of detail written out that we couldn't read, but based on the pictures, it explains what is going on and that a doctor should be contacted.  Your guess is as good as mine as to why the 4th step shows a baby popping out of an egg.

Sarah, Liz, and I were all pleasantly surprised by the delicious food we had while staying at the university.  Our meals were family style and we were thankful to Joe and other colleagues of Becky's that knew the best dishes to order. The lazy susan in the middle was helpful since our plates were smaller than the diameter of your fist.  Fortunately, we had a little experience with chop sticks.

We also experienced Hot Pot where a big pot of broth is resting in the middle of the table with a propane tank beneath heating it.  Everyone makes selections from a wall of food on skewers to add to their pot.  After a few minutes, everyone digs in.  It is a time consuming meal as you spend a bit of time chasing after homemade noodles with your chopsticks while hoping not to burn yourself too bad.    

Just outside the front gate of the university is a wonderful group of vendors serving "street food."  They are out there every night making wraps of awesomeness right in front of you from scratch.  When you place an order, you ask for one, grab your choice of 7 skewers with vegetables and meats and the vendor goes to work.  Each vendor makes something a little different, but the food is all fairly similar.  The teachers have nick-names for each of the stations.  In the picture below, Liz and I are splitting a "crunchy goodness." 

To wrap up the trip, we all headed down to Shanghai.  We are walking on a popular road in the picture below where cars can't go and there are many shops and restaurants.  

Here is a picture of the 4 of us along the Bund with a portion of the Shanghai skyline in the background.  Every city has a large building that serves almost no purpose other than looking cool.  Shanghai has the pearl tower.  For a price, you can go up in the tower.  Their is a river between us and that section of the city that we didn't feel like crossing.    

We all throughly enjoyed the shopping in China.  Beijing and Shanghai had a number of "fake markets" for our shopping pleasure.  Since China isn't as strict with copyright laws, the merchandise has the correct name.  There were no prices for anything, you just have to stroll by seaming disinterested, let the vendor give you price, insult them with a much lower price, and then haggle to a reasonable solution.  Some people don't know the prices you can get, so the vendors always throw out silly high numbers to see if you will bite on.  I bought a Gucci wallet that the merchant priced at 250 yuan.  To which I offered to pay 20.  After she asked me if I was joking, we haggled for a bit longer.  I walked out a time or two, only to have the merchant yell down a better number to bring me back.  After 20 minutes or so, I bought the wallet for 33 yuan, or a little under $5.  Not a bad deal.  I'm sure we spent in excess of 8 hours shopping at these markets.  They were just so fun and rewarding when you got a good deal.   

And that is the trip.  We took over 1500 pictures!  And we have many more great stories and experiences if you haven't heard them yet.

Thank you for reading.