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What an exciting event! Our oldest turned three and officially exited the Terrible Two's. Unfortunately, whoever coined the term "Terrible Two's" hadn't yet had a three year old. Turning three just means a new set of challenges to work through. At two we were worried about potty training and getting good dietary habits established. At three it's bullies at school and learning to look both ways when crossing the street. Every stage in a child's life brings new challenges, but new joys as well. Our daughter's party was an exciting time. This was her first party where her "friends" came and they really enjoyed one another.
She decided that she wanted a pumpkin cake since her b-day is so close to Halloween, but she also wanted it to be her favorite color...PINK! So, she got a pink pumpkin cake. Her lovely pink pumpkin cake is all gone now thanks to Mom and Dad!
This is the first birthday that I really feel like my little girl is beginning to grow up. Any parent will tell you how fast kids grow up and I'm beginning to finally understand what they mean. I guess I have to move past the Terrible Two's and take advantage of the fleeting, but Terrific Three's.
The second law of thermodynamics is an interesting concept. Simply put, it states that whenever there is an energy distribution that is out of equilibrium, a "force" acts to dissipate or minimize that imbalance. If I've lost you, consider this simple example:
You place a glass of hot water in a cold room. What happens? The heat from the water dissipates into the room until the room and the glass of water are the same temperature. The glass of hot water represents a concentration of energy (heat in this case) that is acted upon by a "force" to minimize the imbalace. Sometimes the second law is described as a natural decay from order to disorder.
I am convinced that the second law of thermodynamics is actively at work in my household. Every time I get a room picked up, some "force" is at work behind me that takes the order I have created and turns it into disorder.
After intense experimentation and statistical analysis of the data, I now have the answer to the question that will redefine the known universe. This breakthrough likely represents the single greatest achievement in science in the last two-hundred years. I have finally discovered the origins of the mysterious "force" that acts to dissipate energy imbalances...
...Her name is Claire and she's three years old. No matter where I go, she's right behind me bringing chaos from order. It's as if it is her God-given role to be the enforcer of the second law of thermodynamics in my household. As much as I would like to keep a room clean for long periods of time, I would rather have the ensuing chaos Claire brings then imagine the terrifying world where the second law of thermodynamics does not apply! Thank you Jesus for Claire and the second law of thermodynamics.
I recently had the pleasure of attending my cousin's wedding in Abilene, Kansas. My cousin Donnie (I can't seem to bring myself to call him Don because I've always known him as Donnie) married the love of his life, Shelley. The wedding was nice; nothing out of the ordinary. Besides being an usher, an escort and a candle lighter, I had the opportunity to be a groomsman as well. During the wedding I found myself being distracted by cramps in my back. It has been a long time since I had to stand still for that long and I think my back was trying to tell me to sit down. Anyway, about the time that the exchange of vows started, I really began to resonate with the words that were being said. I thought about the idealistic words that were being spoken between lovers and remembered saying those same kinds of words over five years ago when I got married. In that short time, I was able to reflect on my own marriage and take away a few thoughts that I could use that week in my own marriage.
To make a long story even longer, I found that my participation in someone else's wedding provided a lens for me to examine my own marriage. Reliving that moment of connection with my spouse stirred something in my soul that made me want to recommit those things to my own wife. I think Than's post titled Walking Among the Dead was very insightful. His post exhorts us to ponder our own mortality and sense of being by being in the presence of others who have gone before us. In a similar way, I think those of us that are married should make every effort to attend weddings we are invited to. That experience provides a mechanism to evaluate our own marriages and recommit to the vows that were made. I'm beginning to understand why many couples enjoy a time of vow renewal. I think I would like to pursue something like that in the near future.
I'm one of those penny-pinching husbands that refuses to purchase cable television. We've survived five years of marriage with rabbit ears so why change? Anyway, having rabbit ears means putting up with a fuzzy picture most of the time. The other day I happened to be at an unnamed DINKs house. Being a DINK, this particular individual not only had cable, but expanded digital cable being shown on the latest plasma-HD-flat screen thinga-ma-whatchit.
Impressed as I was with the ultra-sharp picture, the thing that was most fascinating to me was my new found ability to read the fine print shown at the bottom of commercials. Many were your standard benign legal mumbo-jumbo. For example, all the great car commercials with sporty models hugging turns always have to say something about professional drivers on closed courses...yada yada (very similar to the red button with the words, "DON'T PUSH" plastered across it). By the way, don't even try to read all the legalize on car dealer commercials, it's futile without your DVR. So back to my revelation. I'm reading all this fine print when a fast food commercial airs touting a new cheap price for a particular item. The fine print states that the actual price may vary. So, they can legally advertise a $0.01 burger and charge you a buck for it. That's messed up.
About the same time I ran across this horrendous misrepresentation, I stumbled across this website: mouseprint.org Mouseprint is a consumer education site that aims to ...help educate the public about the catches or "“gotchas" in disclaimers, and to encourage advertisers to abandon the motto, "“the big print giveth, and the little print taketh away."”
If you think mislabeling food prices is a crime, wait until you see some of the items catalogued here! It just goes to show that corruption does in fact extend beyond politics.
For an ethical approach to sales and marketing, check out Ryan's website.
I've been watching that new Jericho show on CBS and I'm trying to figure out who decided to make Denver west of the Rockies?!Much to my dismay, the first episode has Denver obliterated by a nuclear blast. Too bad for me and all my friends who are now crispy taquitos. We know Jericho is in Kansas somewhere (presumably western Kansas) so when they see the mushroom cloud over Denver, why is the cloud behind the mountains? Did Denver move west, or has there been some sort of massive geological activity that has raised a new mountain range between Denver and western Kansas??
Apparently the producers of Jericho haven't ever made that terrible drive from Denver through Kansas and back again. If they had, they would know that even on a clear day you can't see the mountains in the west until you hit about Limon, Colorado.
So given that the show isn't all that great and the fact that every time I watch it their ignorance of the local geography makes me mad, I don't think I'll be watching it any longer. Way to go CBS!
