It’s a never-ending merry go-round, this game we call life. And in order to survive the game we must always pay attention.

There are no ordinary moments in life according to Dan Millman, and I agree with him 100%. At the most mundane of times life likes to give you subtle reminders that "Yes, you need to wake up, straighten up and pay attention". And sometimes those reminders are not so pleasant.

Case in point:

I drive 70 miles to work, one way. So I spend quite a bit of time in my car. The other morning, yes my 4am mornings, I was at Sheetz (A gas station here in town, not sure if you have one in your area) to do my normal routine.

I get the oh-so-cheap gas for my drive (CHA-CHING). And then I proceed to scrape off all the bug-guts on my windshield.

SIDENOTE: I drive nothing but highway roads, interstate, and city traffic, so I get quite a number of insects visiting my car at high speeds. My car is also parked in our driveway, which has direct exposure to all the elements. More specifically the blazing hot summer sun. So you can only imagine how many baked-in goodies are on my windshield after a day or two.

So here I am using a TON of elbow grease to grind off the remnants of some poor arthropod when my foot slips out from under me. Not so much to make me fall, but at least to lose my footing.

Now, I drive a mini-SUV. So in order to get to all of my windshield I do have to get on my toes sometimes and lean over the hood of my car. So my foot slips, I’m in a gas station … and I’m at the gas pump. So I chalk it up to an oil slick and go about my business.

I walk from one side of my car to the other repeatedly, because you know very well I can’t get all of it off in one try.

I walk around to the front of my car to make my way around the other side of my car and my foot slips again.

MAN, that must be one huge oil slick.

So I look down at my feet to get a look-see. And low and behold, there’s no oil.

I realize that my left foot is immersed.(yes I’m using the word immersed, because floating just didn’t do it justice)

Immersed in what you ask?

None other than your run-of-the-mill, post-bar-hopping, I had to much to drink and got the munchies… please pull into the gas station so I can get a chili-cheese-dog….VOMIT.

Yep. My foot was immersed in a very large pool of vomit, that the gas station attendants so kindly forgot to clean up.

So it’s 5am-ish, my gas tank is full and my windshield is clean!

But my left shoe is not.

So here I’m thinking about how pleasant my 90 minute drive will be with the oh-so beautiful shoe odor in the car!

At the last minute, before I pulled out of the gas station, I realized there is a grass lawn area just past the entrance of the station.

I pull over my car and proceed to vehemently and violently power scrub my left show until all evidence of my immersion are eliminated.

LESSON TO BE LEARNED HERE:

Watch where you step. ALWAYS. Attention to detail my friends. Attention to detail.

Tweightloss has begun!! A relatively small suggestion by Audrey recently on Twitter has gone viral! The response and feedback has been overwhelming according to Audrey. In fact she had to turn people away for the first round of Tweightloss. LOL I think that is awesome. Here’s more about Audrey and her Website.

I think it’s amazing how Twitter can spawn such a motivating and beneficial event. First it helped free a man from prison, and now a new outlet for someone to lose weight.

It’s kinda one of those things that makes you think "Gee why didn’t I think of that??!"

I believe we have something crazy like just under 100 people sign up. It was broken into teams with a virtual trainer for each team. And yours truly is a virtual trainer for one of the teams. (God help them all) Check out the cool button on my blog’s sidebar!

I’m not quite sure how this will unfold, but it seems pretty damn interesting thus far. I can’t wait to see how this will play out in Twitterland as well as the Blogosphere.

What better way to lose some weight, or get the motivation you were needing to make the attempt to lose weight??

My hats go off to all the participants for having the courage to sign up. I emailed my team and told them the same thing. It’s one thing to want to lose weight, and take that big step towards weight loss, but to do it in a public manner like this takes a lot of guts! The first step is always the hardest, so congratulations.

I thought I’d share my first tip in regards to weight loss. I had emailed this to Audrey in the early stages of Tweightloss, and I thought I’d share it with everyone. Especially my new team.

TWEIGHT LOSS TIPS

WEEK 1

BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF

If you want to lose weight, be honest. What are your weaknesses? Why are you overweight now? Meaning why are you not at the weight you would ideally like to be at? What have you been doing that contributed to the weight gain?

Are you a snacker? ( I WAS!!!, STILL AM)

What are your bad habits.

It’s time to do a gut check. If you REALLY want to lose some weight, and it doesn’t matter how much you want to lose, any amount of weight loss is tough. Look at yourself, your lifestyle.

You don’t have to be an expert, you see the news, your read the articles, you are exposed to all the same media everyone else sees.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that your Big Mac is not healthy.

So what is your gut check. And no, not a physical check of your gut, but really looking within yourself. If you want to continue feeding your ego, or ‘convincing’ yourself it’s not your fault that’s your prerogative. Finger pointing will get you nowhere fast.

But it seems to me that everything you’ve been doing and everything else you’ve been tryin’ hasn’t been working. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here now.

This is where it begins.

As always take care of yourselves and yours

Carpe Diem

So here it is Thursday, and this week has been a blur. I worked midnight shift on Monday. Anyone that has been around me or my blogging should know how much I love the night shift.

I can’t decide if it’s the shift itself, or more the flip-flopping with my sleep schedule? Either way it sucks.

I then worked my other job on Wednesday, which also sucked. One because I really wanted the day off.. and two because I didn’t actually work in the ICU. I instead floated around other units helping out where needed. A good thing and a bad thing. (Those of you who are nurses understand this one)

In between all that I of course squeezed in my workouts. And this particular week I ran into the same fellah at the gym 2 out of the 3 times I was there. Ergo the reason for my Useless Exercise bit.

This particular gentleman is older than me, by maybe 5 to 10 years. He’s tanned, drives a convertible BMW. A quote-unquote self-proclaimed ‘ladies man’. He’s by no means what I would classify as ‘fit’. He has quite the ‘beer’-belly that protrudes, although he does sport his semi-muscular arms quite often in his sleeveless shirts.  

He seems to go out of his way to lift as much weight as possible in all of his free weight exercises. Specifically his Bench and his Bicep Curls, which he squeezes in between his socializing with the ladies (who are so happy to have him interrupt their own workout!). After all his ‘power-lifting’ he then proceeds to the stationary bike. Here’s my rant.

The Stationary Bike?! 

Grr.

Another useless exercise. Just as effective as that wonderful seated calf raise I blogged about.

Why you ask?

OK. Outside of having any previous medical conditions or physical limitations that hinders you from doing any of the other endless cardiovascular exercises, the Stationary Bike really is a waste of time. The only piece of your body that may benefit from this exercise is your quadriceps, and if you really push your limits… maybe your hamstrings and/or glutes.

Here is my biggest problem with ANY stationary bike. First of all… uuuhh.. it’s stationary. So your not required to maintain any balance. No Proprioception. So while it may ‘work’ your legs… that’s all it does. It indirectly exercises your legs as if you were doing anaerobic exercises like a leg press and leg curl as opposed to the intended effect of a bicycle which is an aerobic exercise!

If you’re going to do any type of aerobic/cardio exercise you HAVE  to include your CORE! Without grave detail and definition your ‘core’ is all the muscles your torso uses to balance and stabilize your body when it is thrown off balance. Core = Balance Stability

So if your SITTING on a bike that doesn’t require you to balance yourself do you think you are taxing your core?

Once again, if the stationary bike is what you use because of injuries or illness than by all means it’s the safest thing for you, and can effectively get your heart pumping if you work hard enough.

My problem is that here you have an individual who can lift heavy weights, and has no other obvious physical limitation. He chooses to ride a stationary bike, and somehow that’s enough to qualify as a cardio workout??

I mean, get on the treadmill, or the stairmaster. If your knees can’t take the beating (like mine) then use the elliptical or an ARC trainer.

And you wonder why he has muscular arms and a pot belly??

OK. Sorry. I’m done.

On a lighter note. I broke down and downloaded the latest version of the Mozilla Fire Fox web browser. And after molding it, tinkering, and playing with it. I’m really starting to like it!!! And I’m a die-hard Microsoft user. Everything from Internet Explorer to Microsoft Office, and Windows Live Writer. So using Fire Fox is a huge leap for me. I’ll keep ya posted!

Lastly I’d like to thank Ken over at Change Forge for including me as a contributing author to his wonderful website. I met Ken through the all-mighty Blogosphere some time ago when I first started my blog over at WordPress.com . I can’t rightfully remember how we crossed paths, but I’ve been a fan of his ever since. And he’s been one of my readers that has stuck it out with me through my horrible WordPress.org debacle. Here you can find me and my first post on Ken’s website.

It’s an interesting arrangement, since he’s in the customer service industry of business and technology and I of course work in the healthcare field. Two fields that can seem unrelated actually have a lot in common. He often has many applicable themes to my ‘Strong Living’ theory in his blogging, so when he was looking for contributing authors I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. Please stop by Change Forge if you get a chance.

As always take care of yourselves and yours.

Carpe Diem

We’ve all been down that road. At the crossroads of a difficult situation, or a difficult decision. We have 2 choices. Take the easy way out and quit, or stand your ground and handle the hard.

It doesn’t matter what aspect of your life is or was applicable to this scenario. They all have the same didactic lesson.

How much do you want it?

How bad do you need it?

What are you willing to do to accomplish your goal?

No one likes to quit. The mere sound of the word ‘quit’ leaves us with a shudder. We all would like to believe and boast that we don’t quit more often than we do.

What would have happened if you HAD quit? An ‘alternative universe’ of sorts. The hypothetical situation. What would the world be like?

Instead of convincing you that handling the hard is the right path to take, I thought I would share with you some inspiring words of wisdom and video clips that in my opinion keep my flame burning. I often refer to them whenever I feel beaten and want to quit.

QUICK FACTS:

Did you know that Abe Lincoln lost 8 elections for various offices before winning the presidential election of 1860? What if he had quit?

Were you aware that Michael Jordan was cut from his varsity high school basketball team his sophomore year of high school? Think of the sport of Basketball without him.

DON’T QUIT- here is a copy of the infamous inspirational poem and a video of the poem as well.

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,

When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill,

When the funds are low and the debts are high,

And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,

When care is pressing you down a bit,

Rest, if you must, but don’t you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,

As every one of us sometimes learns,

And many a failure turns about,

When he might have won had he stuck it out;

Don’t give up though the pace seems slow–

You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than,

It seems to a faint and faltering man,

Often the struggler has given up,

When he might have captured the victor’s cup,

And he learned too late when the night slipped down,

How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out–

The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,

And you never can tell how close you are,

It may be near when it seems so far,

So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit–

It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.

More of Michael Jordan: (worth watching the whole video)

An inspirational speech by Al Pacino in the movie ‘Any Given Sunday’. Life IS a game of inches.

And lastly, a favorite quote of mine. It’s from the movie ‘A League of Their Own’. Tom Hanks’ character is angry at one of his star players for quitting. The video clip is quite long, so please forward the video to the 8 minute mark for the take home message.

Chance favors the prepared mind and luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.

I wish you luck in Handling the Hard.

Take care of yourselves and yours.

Carpe Diem.

My version of everyone else’s ‘Link-Love’. It seems appropriate to make it a weekend watch.

It seems appropriate to share this Balding article, on counting the hairs on your head! (coming from a bald man)

Wanna lose some weight? Maybe we should all try McDonald’s??

One of my vice’s just might help me in the long run.

When was the last time you really listened to your Doctor?

I had to include this one. I loved her ‘Stop the Insanity’.

Wash your hands.. Wash your hands.. Wash your hands. I know I washed them twice after reading this one.

This last one is just entertaining. How are you, or how did you spend your stimulus check?

We’re off to dinner and then some drinks afterwards. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Have a great weekend.

As always take care of yourselves and yours.

Carpe Diem

OK here is why we are all certifiably crazy.

I just read this article about a new ‘innovative’ product that supposedly will give you a ‘great butt-toning workout’. It’s a supped-up flip-flop?

BUT… just 2 months ago, there was this article published on the harmful effects flip-flops can cause to your stride?

Grr.

Any questions??!!

As always take care of yourselves and yours

Carpe Diem

I posted this blog about a year ago while I was a member of a social network. I belonged to numerous forums and groups. And one of my groups did a ‘TEST’ a while back.

The moderator of the group picked 5 ‘volunteers’ from the group. They then visited each of these 5 members profile pages, and from their profile pages alone, and no other information, attempted to locate these individuals.

Yes you read that right. Locate them.

From the harmless information that they share on the internet waves, these 5 people were geographically located within a couple miles, and in some instances, located to their exact physical address.

In each instance, it took a certain number of sleuth-like steps to find them. Some were harder to locate than others, while some were almost scarily-easy’ to find.

I’ll let that sit for just a lil’ longer.

Now at the time, my profile page divulged a lil more information about my personal life than I’d like to admit. Everything from my occupation, where I work, my personal life, etc.

The irony of it all was my wife had urged me to change and/or delete some, if not most, of my information on my page for this very reason at the time.For my safety. For our safety.

The sad cold hard truth is that there are some very evil and some not-so nice individuals out there on the internet. They are out there to wreak havoc and prey on the innocent and naïve.

It’s kinda like the difference between a new cop and an old/seasoned cop. The new cop thinks like he/she has been taught. They search and or discover their evidence by the means they were taught.

The seasoned cop simply thinks like their perpetrator. The cop thinks like the thief. The cop thinks like the stalker. The cop thinks like the murderer. The cop thinks like the person they are trying to catch, or the person that is running from them.

So lets mirror that image.

How do you think those nasty individuals think when they see your profile page? What information do they need? What information can they use? What are you telling them about you? What are you telling them about your life? What are you telling them about your loved ones? What other ‘useless’ information do you share that becomes ‘useful’ to them?

I’ll let that sit for just a lil’ longer.

My wife proved that simplified point to me with the greatest ease. In two easy key strokes, or 2-4 easy steps she (or someone else) could easily locate me and my family. Someone diabolical enough could find out things about my life that, at-the-time, seemed harmless, but now have made me vulnerable to identity theft, burglary, or god forbid be the victim of a physical attack on myself or loved ones. If you wanted to, and were motivated, or determined enough, you could find me. Anyone could find me. Anyone could find my friends. Anyone. Anyone.

I only blog about this because I am not one to be overly-paranoid. I’m not the type of person that looks over my shoulder when I’m out walking alone. I’m not the person that thinks the worse in people whenever I meet someone for the fist time.

I am however protective of my personal privacy. I am protective of my loved ones. I am concerned with my personal security. I am concerned with the safety and security of my identity. I am someone who lives my life striving to always be prepared.

And until now, I thought I was prepared.

Are you?

As always take care of yourselves and yours

Carpe Diem

Due to the continuous unappreciated gift of rain in my neck of the woods, I hear this phrase more often than I’d like to admit.

I heard it the other day, and had to wonder, how in the world did we ever come up with a phrase about the ongoing battle of our pets that gives reference to a type of weather?

I mean as long as I’ve been inhabiting this earth… I can’t say I’ve ever seen a dog or a cat fall from the sky? (outside of the occasional mishap from a tree)

So I had to Google it. LOL

Here are, in my humble opinion, the best references of explanation for this very unusual weather report.

Cat’s & Dogs the Wiki Way

The Phrase Finder’s answer

Idiom’s Answer

I must say, it also brought back childhood memories of what thunder was compared to. I can vaguely remember someone telling me that thunder was simply ‘God’, or ‘The Gods’ bowling. And the sound of thunder was simply their bowling ball rolling across the sky.

Heh heh… I love how we answer the unanswerable.

I have become somewhat of a ‘field -expert’ on sunburns over the past 20 some years. I grew up a fair skinned Irish boy with blondish brown hair who evolved into an Bald-headed Irish man. So over the years I have had some ‘tactical’ training in regards to sun management.

So lets start with the basics.

1. Any exposed skin can burn. In fact, some covered areas are susceptible to burning depending on the material that is doing the covering.
2. Sunblock is your friend. (In fact it’s my best friend.. My BFF!) Use it generously.
3. Pre-plan your sun exposure
   • Apply any sunblock 30minutes prior if you can
   • Apply any sunblock to all areas you can reach to save yourself the mistake of thinking a certain body part was ‘covered’ and safe from being sunburned.
   • Bring along extra sunblock wherever you go!
   • Reapply generously, at the very least every 2-3 hrs regardless of what you’re doing (swimming, sweating, etc)
4. Contrary to popular opinion and recent articles of study, getting a base tan DOES help.
   • NO IT DOES NOT PREVENT SUNBURN, but it does lessen the effects of that initial sun exposure (take it from personal experience)
   • You STILL need to apply sunblock, regardless of what kind of ‘base tan’ you think you have
5. The color/shade of your skin does matter

• Are you a ‘red’ tanner?
• Do you bronze? Or do you simply get a darker red?
• Do you tan at all?
• Your color will affect how long or how little it will take to get burned!
  • If your skin is lighter in color, be much more mindful of your exposure time

So here’s the scoop.

I have had a shaved bald head for 10+ years now. And in that time I can count on one hand how many times I’ve actually burned my scalp. Twice.

The first time was when I first shaved my head. I burned it in April, during the first real sun here in the northeast. It was an overcast, but warm day. (Man did that hurt!) The second time was last fall. We were touring Washington, D.C. and I was too caught up on not getting lost, and I did not realize the sunblock that I  normally have my car, was not there.

I don’t burn my head, nor any other parts of my body because I plan ahead. And simply because I have sunblock no matter where I go. There are bottles of spray in the closet in the house, a bottle in my car, a bottle in the garage, oh yeah and a bottle In my wife’s car.

The other part of my equation for sunburn survival… and this is the BIG ONE… Baby Oil.

No.. I don’t use baby oil for tanning. That would be a horrific sight.. Could you see this bald headed Irishman applying baby oil to magnify the sun!!!! Geesh.

If you want to know how to help your skin recover from a hard day in the sun, shorten the amount of time it takes to recuperate from a burn, or how to lessen the ‘sting’ feeling on those horrible nights.

Here is the secret.

When you’re in shower, usually the shower you take after you’ve been out all day, or the shower you take to peel off all the sunblock and/or sand off your beautifully burned body. You need to turn up the heat on your water. As high as you can tolerate comfortably. No need to torture yourself. After you turned up the heat, apply the baby oil while you are still in the shower.

I’ll say that again. Apply the baby oil while you are still in the shower.. Yes, while you are still wet! Do not dry off and apply the baby oil, it will negate the effect.

Here’s the reason why this works. It’s two fold. First of all the increased temperature of your water.. As hot as you can tolerate.. Opens up the pores in your skin. It dilates and vasodilates everything goin’ on with your skin and circulation. The baby oil serves as a ‘softener’ of sorts. The open pores literally suck up the baby oil. After your done applying and when you get out of the shower be sure to dab yourself dry, don’t dry off like you normally do. It will wipe away what little bit of baby oil is still on your skin.

If you haven’t noticed, burned skin is dry as a bone. And that dry skin is what causes the ‘sting’. The reason why most sunburned areas hurt so bad, is not so much the state of the skin itself, but the folding and wrinkling of the skin is what causes the sting. Every time you bend your elbow or raise your shoulder you get that ‘stinging’. Well the softer skin, or should I say the more moist your skin is, the less irritating those movements are.

Here’s the crazy part about all this. I can use up 1/4 bottle of baby oil in the shower in one application. By the time I get out of the shower, and dab myself dry, the baby oil is gone. Your skin literally sucks it all up. That’s how dry sunburned skin is.

Think I’m pulling your leg? Try it.

My wife thought the same thing. But guess who uses this technique whenever she gets a bad burn?

This technique I stole. It was something shown to me when I was a competitive swimmer in high school. Spending the many hours you do in chlorinated water tends to dry out your skin, and the baby oil helped stop that side effect from worsening.

Oh, one side note (as my wife kindly pointed out). The baby oil will not turn you into one big oily pimple. You will not break out with acne like you’re a teenager again.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this one

As always take care of yourselves and yours.

Carpe Diem