March 31, 2007 by David.

Here I am in the San Francisco Bay area, having just arranged to rent a temporary apartment while we look for a house.  We’ll be move into the apartment in two weeks.  Can’t wait.  Imagine:  Living with my wife.  Novel concept, that.  Heck, we even got a license to do that whole live together thing some four years ago, but alas, for various reasons, she or I are either traveling a lot or she moves ahead of me to an area while I finish up business where we had been living.  So, soon I’ll be a Californian for the first time and Sharlet will be back in her beloved state.  We are in the Sonoma Valley with good access to Hwy 101 and San Francisco.  Sharlet lived in the Napa Valley for 18 years, up until 2001, so it does put us close to many friends and lots of fun stuff like riding Harleys on the back roads.  Heck, I’ve even picked out the HOG chapter I’ll join, Redwood Empire, sponsored by Michael’s HD in Cotati.  Not a fancy  or huge store, but it is the most friendly dealership I’ve ever walked into, and I’ve walked into my share of Harley Dealerships.

Now, I’ve never been a team sport fan.  Ever.  I never followed the Portland Trailblazers when living there, I rarely watch team sports on TV (with the exception of the super bowl), and I certainly don’t know much about any team’s roster.  However, a few years back in the 49ers glory days, I did watch football occasionally just to see them play.  I will never forget a game where near the end of the 4th quarter, Joe Montana methodically marched the football up the field at a calculated speed.  Although the 49ers were ahead, if he went up the field and quickly made a goal, the opposing team would have had time to possibly make a return and the point spread was close enough that if they did, they would have won.  He got a first down each time he needed to and mixed plays so that they ended up with a goal right before the end of the game, leaving the opposing team without time to make a return.  I was amazed at a team that could be so methodical and calcualated, not to mention, confident.  After all, a mere mortal team would have run a high liklihood of having to punt from a bad position because they didn’t push hard and fast enough.

Yesterday I was in downtown San Francisco and we walked by a sports shop. I had to stop in and get a 49ers hat and tee shirt.  Yes, for the first time in my life I’m going to actually support and root for a team!  Guess I’ll have to get busy and start figuring out who’s on the roster and following their games.  Dang, I believe life will be good in this here state of California!  Can’t wait for the next two weeks to slip by and actually be living here!

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March 26, 2007 by David.

Today our whole family got together at a Napa Valley restaurant.  Daughter Jill came out from Nashville; Son Dustin from Hawaii; Heromi and Aimi from Japan (Dustin’s girlfriend & baby); Sharlet’s brother Ed’s family and her Mom & step dad; plus Karen, a long-time family friend who was the kids’ first grade teacher. This trip is the first time I’ve seen (My “first sighting”) grandaughter Aimi.  She slept through the whole thing, flash pictures and all.  She’s damn cute.  We celebrated three birthday’s: Jill’s 21st, her cousin Katie’s 18th, and Aimi’s 100th day, which I’m told is a day of note for a baby in Japan.  Family days are good!

Here is  a pic of yours truly doing his best to continue his encouragement of decadance in the younger generation.

More pictures of the cutie can be found at http://s129.photobucket.com/albums/p236/murl_taiji/

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March 23, 2007 by David.

Literally.  It is duck breeding season here in Mississippi.  I love sitting on my dock and the last week there has been three ducks that think they own the inlet my property is on.  Two male Mallards and one female.  They have quite the threesome going, although the two males don’t take kindly to a third male.  They’ll chase off any other male that shows up, but sure don’t have a problem between the two of them.  Must be brothers or something (hey, it’s the south here…).

Here’s what I think is funny.  After taking a turn at the female duck, the male will quack and quack and quack [and quack!] for like a minute.  Must be something in male genes or something.  Ten to thirty minutes later the other male does his best to drown the female, followed by a bout of intense quacking, like the mad (proud?) duck he is.  I’m not too sure how the female doesn’t end up with a broken neck, but afterward she swims around like nothing happened, going tooley de doo.

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March 20, 2007 by David.

Today our daughter Jill turns 21.  May the world look out.  The Girl is on the loose!

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March 20, 2007 by David.

Interested in custom boots made from high quality materials?  Check out boots from West Coast Shoe Company.  The quality of materials is second to none and make my boots made by Harley Davidson look like, well, cheap imports.  They are made by hand, and have been for a couple generations.   You have the option of customizing the boots and/or customizing the fit.  Their online site allows you to step through the options and pricing for each of their boot models, selecting the sole, leather, color, height, hardware, etc.

I’ve always liked extra tall black boots with serious, slanted heels ever since I was a teenager stomping around the corral.  That’s not the big seller, however, so finding a place that would make exactly what I wanted is nirvana.

The boots I ordered were the “Jobmaster” lace ups, 16″ high with Read the rest of this entry »

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March 14, 2007 by David.

The Secret.  I like it.  I haven’t read the book, but I’ve viewed the DVD.  Twice.  It aligns well with my philosophy of how life works.  In fact, just viewing it gives my day a wonderful boost.  I like to listen to the summary section to start my day.

For a long time I’ve been a firm believer in visulaztion.  I find that the biggest benefit from visulazation is a change in my own attitude and actions.  By visualizing the outcome, complete with the emotions involved, I find what I say and do is different.  Sometimes dramatically different.

Here’s a personal illustration.  A few years ago had a performance evaluation for an under-performing staff member.  I wasn’t expecting it to go well.  As I drove out there I was listening to an audio CD about visualization.  That was a timely occurance.  When I arrived, I sat in my truck five or ten minutes, shut my eyes, and visualized the discussion ending positively.  In fact, I visualized the person thanking me for helping him in his career - a real stretch as I thought it wouldn’t be long till I fired him and I thought he’d be quite defensive about what I had to say.  I have no doubt that if I hadn’t done the visualization of a positive outcome, I would have gone in there on the attack, laying out to the person his “sins.”  Instead, the mental image of the discussion going well changed my lanuage, my attitude, and, wonder of wonders, the outcome.  Before I left, the person actually thanked me!  I couldn’t believe it.

This stuff works!

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March 10, 2007 by David.

After over being down over a week, I’m happy to report this site is live once again.  The end of February BaggerBlogger.com returned a 404 (not found) error message.  1and1.com, the webhost, had a hard time figuring out what had happened, but apparently there was a bug in their code somewhere which required a patch.  To use 1and1’s blog software, you tell the system you want to use a particular URL as a blog and from there all configuration happens behind the scenes.  But, all of my original pages are intact, so I’m off and running again.  Yeah!

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