Category — General

We were down in FL visiting H’s parents and we were able to take the boat out for a quick spin. Here’s a picture of Captain Emmy driving the boat – really. She’s pretty darn good!

I can get along with just about anybody.

Seriously, I’m not joking. In my entire life I can literally count on one hand the number of people that I’ve met that I didn’t like. And, if I’m honest, the number is really only one person that I just couldn’t get out from under my skin.

Its true. Only one person in over 3 decades. Isn’t that amazing? Oh, I freely admit that there are some people that I like spending time with less than others, but thats just natural. The other? Not so natural.

A very good friend of mine said to me today, “Andy, your greatest strength is that you love people very easily.”

He’s right, I really do. In fact, its easy if you know how to.

You can do it too.

Seriously! Wouldn’t you like to be able to take almost every annoying jerk in your life and somehow turn them into a New Them? A Them that you can get along with, learn to like and eventually, maybe, even one day love? Who wouldn’t want that!?

The secret is maddeningly simple when you know it.

When I start to get to know someone I simply think to myself:

What was God thinking when He made them?

I’m sure you’ve met some people that have made YOU think that too, right?! Seriously though, I really don’t mean that in a funny way. I mean it with all sincerity.

I picture the Master Craftsman sitting in His workshop with a handful of new clay, pondering the beauty of the raw material of life. As His hands start to mold the clay, all of His Love and blessing pours into the form as he works it into a shape unlike any other ever created. His thumbs mold the face, and his fingers set the nose just so. He places the eyes in the exact way that He means them to be and He knits the strands of their being in a way that make complete sense to Him. He even numbers the hair on their head, each one having its place and purpose for that which He has called them to be – for what He is creating them to be, right before my eyes! Then, when the outside shell is ready, His Word breathes life into them and makes their spirit in His image. He creates them just like Him – He the Father and they the children. He knows each challenge and fear they will face; each triumph that will make their spirit soar. In His awesome wisdom, He knows and Loves this new creation and desires nothing more than a deep relationship with it. He wants to be loved by it in return.

REVELATION!

That jerk is the object of God’s desire!

Have you ever worked with someone, or known someone that is a hard and tough person most of the time, but then you see them with their kids and a new person leaps out of their eyes? They smile, they joke, they goof around and make funny noises and for a brief moment, you can see the love that they have inside finally come out on the outside.

That’s what I’m talking about. I envision the Love that God has for that person and try to see exactly what it is that He loves about them. Is it their laugh? Their heart? Or maybe its the kind of weird way that they stick their tongue out when they are concentrating on something. How many ways does a Parent love His child? It is nearly immeasurable. All you need to find is just one. One will make a huge difference in how you see that person.

Sure, with some people it is harder than with others. Some people take a bit of effort, but the more that you do this, the easier it is. We are called to be more like Him, and He is love.

Would you like another small revelation? God Loves His children and therefore they are lovable! Isn’t that alone an amazing thought? The person that you can’t stand is LOVED by someone! Loved by God, if by no one else. If you try to see someone from His eyes, it is hard to not like them.

This attitude really can help in everything – in family life, with friends, with coworkers, with neighbors – everywhere!

I know, I know… Some of you probably think that this is a childish and stupid philosophy. That’s really OK with me. You can live your life however you would like. In fact, I believe that you have a God given right to choose to live with those jerks and hate every minute of it! The choice is really up to you. There will always be jerks in your life, but how you choose to view them can really change how you feel about them.

Me? I’m going to go spend some time with some of my other friends…

My brother recently got the recipe for my Dad’s tomato sauce. He’s a graduate of the Culinary Institute and has been cooking for his entire adult life, so anything out of his kitchen is worthy of note. This sauce is simple to make and really freakin’ good – true Italian American cooking at its finest. If you guys are nice to me, I may just share his meatball recipe. Its absolutely out of this world!

But, you’ll really have to be nice to me!

Enjoy the “gravy”!

DAD’S SAUCE

Ingredient List

• crushed tomatoes 1 28 oz can
• garlic 8 large cloves
• onion 1 small
• fresh basil nice handful of leaves only
• tomato puree one-28 oz can
• salt and pepper to taste (optional crushed red pepper method)

Directions

1. chop onion and slice or crush garlic
2. sauté in olive oil til just starting to brown
3. add tomatoes and puree
4. rinse out cans with water and add about a half can to tomatoes
5. roll basil leaves together and slice
6. add to sauce
7. add crushed red pepper and salt and pepper
8. cook about a half hour and taste. Adjust seasonings and cook for another half hour
9. EAT!

to those who believe differently than I do about this topic.  I’m going to rant a bit…

I was just surfing a forum for some tech information and read a post by someone whose signature said:

__________________
The meaning of life? There is no meaning. You’re just a more complex carbon chain reaction than a dog, a tree, or an amoeba.

Now, I believe that God gave us free will and that this guy is entitled to his opinion.  No problem there.  I just think that it really must suck to live that way!  I mean, thinking that you are just an accident of chemistry, that there is nothing more to life than a complex happenstance of quirky molecular attraction.  How the hell can someone live like that?  How can you live thinking that there is NO meaning??  What keeps you from acting out every tiny whim?  Why don’t people like that stab their co-workers with a pencil when they whine during staff meetings?  How come they actually pay their taxes?  Why would you bother to do anythingother than exactly what you damn well pleased to at that exact moment?  See a hot chick?  Bend her over a barrel!  Like that guy’s car?  Hit him with a brick and take it!  It doesn’t matter! There is NO MEANING TO ANYTHING!

I can hear someone saying now – “Well, stupid, you don’t do that because of the consequences!  You’d get arrested, because in a civilized society people don’t do that to each other.  And those that do, suffer the consequences…”

Ok, good point, sounds good.  But think about it a bit more.  That means that society is the ultimate authority, the ultimate judge and the ultimate standard by which everything is measured.  We live our lives by society’s standards.  Isn’t that a “meaning” to life then?  Isn’t that what a “meaning” is?  If I say, “The meaning of life is to be happy” or “The meaning of life is to serve God” or “The meaning of life is to get rich” – aren’t those all things that one then judges himself by?  Am I happy?  Am I serving God?  Am I getting rich?  Meaning is a delineation – a mark in the sand whereby other things are judged.  So, if we say life has no meaning, but yet live in society, we are making society the ultimate authority and therefore the ultimate meaning.

Don’t you see how horrible that is?!  Society is the ultimate meaning!?  Are you kidding me?  All we live for is civil obedience?  Fitting in?  Keeping up with the Jonses?  Peer pressure is REALLY the best that it gets?

Society is the ultimate meaning???

How on Earth can that be?  Are you kidding me?  People really believe that crap?  Come on! Society produced these people:

And, even

I know, I know…  Not nice of me to throw that freaky drag-queen in with the picture of Hillary…  Oh, um, well um… Never mind.  *SNICKER*  (sorry, couldn’t help that! )

Anyway, my point is that society simply cannot be the paragon of existence and the ultimate achievement of life.  And, there MUST be meaning to life, because we all judge ourselves by something.  Even if you don’t believe in God – something is the lord of your life, and therefore it has meaning.  In fact, I really feel sorry for anyone who pretends that it doesn’t.  I think they are scared of reality with meaning, because they simply haven’t quite figured out what it is yet.  And, if they are wrong, there could be serious consequences.

In fact, I almost feel more sorry for them than I do for the goat pictured above.  No, not Hillary, the other one!  Ahem.  Really, I’m sorry. I’ll stop – honest, I will.  :D

Well, I’ve taken the plunge and ventured into the world of flat panel televisions.

My trusty old 20″ Magnavox TV finally died. Bought with money we received from our wedding, this standby piece has been relegated to the bedroom since 2003′s purchase of a 65″ Mitsubishi widescreen projection TV. As such, it was pretty much on light-duty – only getting any amount of use when I was traveling and Heather needed some noise in the room to get to sleep. It just couldn’t compare to the big screen on the first floor. Since my new job doesn’t require as much travel, the TV has been nearly unused for several months. But, a recent week-long stint in Las Vegas for the National Association of Broadcasters Show, simply brought the old TV to its knees. It died a sad death of high-shrieked static noise. Sleep well, old friend…

Now, what to do? I just couldn’t see spending any money on something that wouldn’t last a while and the placement of the old TV in the bedroom was really awkward. Really, the room screamed out for a flat panel, mounted to the wall, directly across from the bed. Oh great muse of decoration, twist my arm again, please!

So, I did some research and began shopping online and in stores and settled on a Panasonic 42″ Flat-Panel Plasma HDTV Model: TH-42PX75U. I loved it! It was the right price ($1500 at Best Buy and 10% off) and it was also the clear winner in picture quality in that price range. An excellent buy. So, I bought one.

It sucked.

The first unit that I brought home whined louder than an ill-mannered child in a never ending art museum. I think it might have actually been louder than the old Magnavox I was trying to replace. Well, clearly that wasn’t going to work.

The second unit that I brought home had severe menu burn-in all along the left hand side of the screen. It was so bad that I could easily read the words “Setup Menu” during a dark scene during a movie.  Aw, crap…

The very nice folks at BestBuy offered to order me another one or to have one brought in from a neighboring store. While their customer service was very good, I wasn’t about to take a chance on what seemed to be a bad product.  No, thank you, I don’t think so. The units that I had were manufactured in March of 2007 – a big aluminum sticker said so right on the back. Being a new model for Panasonic, these units were hot off the presses and clearly they are having a few issues with production quality in the early units – at least in the 42″ model. A neighbor of mine has a 50″ that looks and works beautifully.

So, what to do, what to do… Do I return it and not get a TV right now, or get something smaller, larger, what?

Being the cheapo that I am, I ended up negotiating with them on the Pioneer 42″ 4270-HD Plasma instead. They didn’t want a $1500 return, and by the time I finished the negotiations and returned the power cleaner they talked me into buying to stop the “humming” of the first unit, this beauty only cost me $150 more than the Panasonic. Not bad for the model that I would have picked originally if it wasn’t for the cost.

The Pioneer has amazing, very life-like color. A bit richer than the Panasonic, and certainly more realistic than LCD. It makes no noise whatsoever and looks absolutely phenomenal. As all plasma’s do, during the day it can suffer from some glare, because it has a glass front, as compared to the plastic front of LCD’s. That’s OK with me though, as this unit was for the bedroom and doesn’t get used during the day.

As I mentioned, my intention was to put it on the wall – and after testing it out for a few days to make sure it worked, etc. I started the process of hanging the beast. The $99 medium tilt bracket (also includes a slim profile bracket) that they sell at Costco did the trick in no time – and it was $100 less expensive than the BestBuy equivalent. The hardest part was running the wires through the wall, as I ran the power cord through as well, so it would have a completely “cordless” look to it. A decent sized HDMI cable running to a sweet Motorola HD-DVR, a set of component video and TOSLINK to my slightly older DVD player and things were right as rain.

See… Everything works out for the best. Now I have a GOOD reason to buy the Logitech Harmony 1000!

All rhetoric aside about how megastores like Costco are putting the Mom and Pop shops out of business, I really do love Costco.

Recently I bought an Ironman Aeros Elliptical machine to aid in my quest for some kind of body weight normalcy.  After doing a lot of research on what was was out there I settled on a model from Costco largely because of their fabulous return policy.  If you are not familiar with that policy, its very simple – if you don’t like something, bring it back.  No questions asked.

Much to my dismay, after about 15 weeks of use, the product broke.  Honestly, it was a joy to use, but one of the wheels that ride along the back tracks simply snapped right off.  I would have expected this on a normal quality elliptical, but I was really surprised considering that I specifically bought this model because it was made to hold someone my size and larger.  Maybe I just got a bad unit, or maybe Ironman just sells junk – either way, my machine was toast.

Crap, now what??  I have to return it.  I started dreading the experience, but then I rememberd that I bought it at Costco for this exact situation.  So, I simply took off the handles and the console and loaded it up into my wife’s van and drove to Costco.  In roughly 15 minutes, 2 guys had helped me unload the sucker and I was walking out the door with $1,100+ cash, in my hand.  Not a single hiccup.  All they asked was what broke.  Remember, this is over 3 months later!  Nothing about, go to the manufacturer for service or we’ll replace it, etc.  They just gave me my money back.  $1,100 plus dollars!!  That’s really great service, and that’s why I love Costco.

I would have preferred a unit that worked, but I can’t blame them for that.  Now I’m on a quest for a new Elliptical machine and I’m quite bummed that I can’t buy it at Costco! 

I guess my grade school suspicions were correct…  Girls do have cooties! :)

“Women have three to four times the number of bacteria in, on and around their desks, phones, computers, keyboards, drawers and personal items as men do…”

Get full story here.

In further news, a shocking realization that I no longer care that girls have cooties.  SIGH!  Women and their wiles!