Father of Six

I have decided to write a list of 101 things to do in 1001 days, and set about accomplishing each item on the list. I think this idea started with triplux, and I have seen it on a 100 different blogs. I figure I’d jump on the wagon. Although the originator does not make reference, the thing I first thought of was the Arabian Nights fables.

1001 days is 2 years, 8 months, 25 days
Or 143 weeks, or 33/34 months

My start date is today, May 31, 2007 and my finish date is February 25, 2010.

I’ll be tracking, posting, blogging and otherwise recording my progress on this page.

This is my list.
1. Go to a Colorado Rapids soccer game
2. Go Camping
3. Go see Oklahoma play football against Iowa St. Oct. 20, 2007 at Ames, Ia. with dad
4. See Oklahoma play football against Colorado in Boulder, Co.
5. Find an Oklahoma game to see with dad in 2008 and 2009
6. Catalogue my books in LibraryThing
7. Go to the Denver Art Museum 3 times
8. Go to the Denver Botanical Gardens 3 times
9. Go to the Colorado History Museum 3 times
10. Keep membership in the Wine of the Month Club from the Wine Company (33 more months)
11. Exercise 30 minutes times 6 days per week for each week (143)
12. Swim one mile without stopping once a month beginning June 2007 (33)
13. Run a 5k race under 30 minutes in 2007
14. Do a MS150 Bike Ride
15. Do a triathlon
16. Go to the movies with Tami once a month (34)
17. Go for a walk with Boomer once a week (143)
18. Do the 26 Things Photographic Scavenger Hunt each month (34)
19. Write a 55 Fiction. (If I like the results, revise this entry and do more.)
20. See a Wagner opera
21. See a Verdi opera
22. See a Mozart opera
23. See three Shakespeare Plays
24. Visit the WWI Museum in Kansas City
25. Visit 3 National Parks
26. Climb one Colorado 14er
27. Drink 1-2 glasses of wine each day for good health
28. Take Tami on a “beach” vacation
29. Take a cruise across the Atlantic Ocean
30. See the Bayeux Tapestry in the museum in Bayeux, Normandy, France.
31. See the Bayeux Tapestry copy at the Museum of Reading
32. Compare the two
33. Watch Amanda graduate high school in May 2009
34. Take Amanda to New Orleans after she graduates
35. Get a Spa/Jacuzzi at the house
36. See the Gipsy Kings in concert – preferably at a venue with assigned seating
37. Smoke a real Cuban Cigar
38. Drink a glass of Absinthe
39. Increase the contribution percentage of my 401k
40. Learn and manage my 401k investments
41. Get a 529 College Invest plan opened for Boomer
42. Play my guitar once a week for 30 minutes (143)
43. Get my entire music library into iTunes and synced onto my iPod
44. Begin the “What Every ___ Grader Should Know” series with Boomer when the time is right
45. Learn the vocabulary words from “The Superior Person’s Book of Words” and blog about them. Abecedarian and Abecedarian Insult.

46. Compile a personal top 50 albums list and blog about it
47. Compile a personal top 50 books list and blog about it
48. Plant a deciduous tree in my yard
49. Take a fencing class
50. Go bowling with the entire family – Brad through Boomer
51. Play miniature golf with the entire family – Brad through Boomer
52. Read a biography of Napoleon
53. Ease into a routine Family day/night – activity, dinner, something
54. See a 6-man football game in 2007, 2008 and 2009
55. See a Seiling, Ok. High School football game
56. Subscribe to The Week magazine (143)
57. Make Credit Union balance $5000
58. Purchase home audio system for front room
59. Purchase new televisions for bedroom and TV room
60. Rig my iPod to my car
61. Rig my iPod to my Outdoor System
62. Post the answers to these questions for 4 consecutive weeks.
What will I try to improve on next week?
What was I most proud of this week?
What was my biggest accomplishment this week?
What have I done to get closer to my life goals this week?
What was hard for me this week, and why?
What was my biggest waste of time this week?
What did I do this week that made me ashamed?
63. Try #62 a second time
64. Play chess at least once a week for 3 months
65. See the Liberty Bell
66. Read “The Name of the Rose” by Umberto Eco
67. Have flowers delivered to ______ for no reason (10)
68. Hike a 3-day portion of the Colorado Trail
69. Ride my bike 100 miles in one day
70. Research Degree Programs
71. Enroll in Degree Program
72. Take one class each term of this challenge
73. Participate in Book Crossings
74. Locate and view celestial things in my telescope 6/21 through 9/23
75. Watch Doctor Zhivago every Thanksgiving after football
76. Participate in Post Crossings
77. Build a book about something on Tami’s software
78. Host a wine tasting
79. Go to a wine tasting at an Art Gallery
80. Go see the Roundhouse in Hugo, Colorado
81. Go to the observatory at the University of Denver
82. Host a Dinner and a Murder party
83. See Dr. Bell three more times – 2007, 2008, 2009
84. Call Dr. Leonard and ask him if he is interested in seeing me
85. Visit the Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden
86. Attend the Colorado State Fair in Pueblo
87. Ride the Georgetown Loop Railroad
88. Go to the Denver March Powwow in each calendar year
89. Spend the night at Indian Springs in Idaho Springs with Tami
90. Buy a $100 bottle of wine and don’t drink it
91. Make my house look like the “Griswold’s” for Christmas
92. Re-Read Beowulf accompanied by “Beowulf Aloud”
93. Learn how to rip DVDs and load them onto my iPod
94. Go to a DU hockey game against CC
95. Write a letter to my Grandma
96. Yoga once a week (143)
97. Retire one debt
98. Take the train from Denver to Glenwood and Back
99. Visit the Sand Dunes
100. Read “The Tropic of Cancer” by Henry Miller.
101. See Mary Flower perform at the Littleton Town Hall Arts Center (10/25-26)

Here are the remaining photos to complete the 26 Things for May of 2007.

(I promise next time I will only post once - when the task is final, and in numerical order.)

#26. Sticky #2. Dance
#5. Tangle #18. Before
#19. After #3. Fold
#25. The Number Nine
#17. Multicolored #9. Nose
#13. Large #24. Telephone
#21. From the Hip
#15. Stop #6. Panoramic
#14. Fake

Today is my 46th birthday. Hooray me.

I swam a 1500 yard workout this morning before work in 35 minutes.

This is a lot harder than it first looked. But it is a good challenge. Here are four more entries, bringing the current statistic to 11 down, 15 to go, 8 more days.

#4. Soft

#10. Round

#12. Electronic

#23. A Difference

Any questions?

Whilst in search of inspiration I came across an interesting web-site proposing an interesting idea.
26 Things (http://www.sh1ft.org/26things/) is a “photographic scavenger hunt” whereby each month the creators of the site list 26 words and those interested “participants set out to photograph each item in their own interpretation.” The design is a “photography exercise to help us develop our photographic eye in our daily life.”

Well I’ve decided to accept the challenge for the month of May. Since there are only 12 official days remaining in May, I’ve got plenty of work to do in short order so I’ll not dilly-dally around.

(All of these photographs were taken on Saturday, May 19th.)

My entries for:
#1. Keys

#7. Truck

#8, Sparkle

#11. Currency

#16. Feast

#20. Landmark

#22. Front Page

7 down, 19 to go.

A team I led was selected as one of the 2007 Team Excellence Awards. Tonight was the banquet. Here are Tami and I as we head out for the evening. The event was held at the Hyatt at the Convention Center. The place settings were personalized. Tami and I were seated at a table with several other couples.

I thought it was funny that on the same night I received an award, my brother Greg was also a recipient. Both of us on the same night!

Finally, a photograph of Greg and Maxine, plus me and Tami, together at Awards Night.

Its been over a week since I last posted. Life certainly does not stand still, but I have been struggling to find any meaningful topic on which to converse.

Sure the kids have daily instances of brilliance, and crisis, but sometimes those things seem either too mundane or too personal when I consider whether or not anyone out there would or should read about them.

I continue to exercise (this is the second week of the swimming routine and it is going well) and work and complain about my foot.

Outside of a viewing of a very well acted version of “Inherit the Wind” starring Jack Lemmon and George C. Scott, nothing in the past 9 days has been a source of inspiration.

Someone asked me if a reason for my exercise habits was to lose weight.

Good question.

I answered that losing weight doesn’t matter to me. I weigh about 190. If I weighed 175 that’d be cool, but at some point you would figure that you’ve lost all the weight that is reasonable, and so what do you do now, stop exercising?

I want to be healthy, have a strong cardio-vascular system, and be able to do the physical things - like run a half marathon, swim a mile, bike a MS-150, etc – to demonstrate that I’m “in-shape.”

I want my heart and lungs to be in super-human shape. I want to be strong enough to carry my 2-1/2 year old son all day if he needed or wanted me to. I want to be able to hang out with my 23 year old son and do the physical things that 23 year olds do. I want to be able to help my four daughters move their furniture, or whatever young women might want their dad to help them with.

I’ve found it inspiring to set goals for doing exercise. I want to exercise with a purpose. Just lifting weights without some challenge, goal or performance in mind would be a snooze-fest. Running to race reminds you daily of the reason you’re doing it. That’s how I’m going to tackle the 6 weeks swimming plan. If I were swimming just to get exercise, then I’d be half-assing it.

So my Saturday, June 16th, swim one mile without stopping is the target. I need to execute my training plans in order to demonstrate my ability to perform.

I suppose it’s a peak, it’s the pinnacle, and it’s the “why.”

Since I’m on a “no-running” diet due to the broken foot, my exercising will now focus on swimming. My goal is to swim one mile without stopping six weeks from now. Today was the first day of exercising to make that goal. This is the workout I did.

100 yards…rest for 12 breaths…repeat 3 times.
50 yards…rest for 8 breaths…repeat 3 times.
25 yards…rest for 4 breaths…repeat 3 times.
total: 700 yards

This routine took me about 20 minutes to complete. It may not seem like much, but I was whipped when I finished. No problems with my foot, but my previously sprained right ankle hurt from the kicking action.

Recall back on 4/18 I wrote:

“I ran a few days the week after the Half Marathon, but was experiencing some pain in my left foot, so I gave it a rest 4/6 through 4/16. I ran three miles on the treadmill on 4/17 and the pain was worse. I went to the Dr. and had x-rays, which came back negative. Dr. suspects a stress fracture. I’ll rest another week then try it again. If the pain persists …”

Yeah well, I rested 4/18 through 4/30, ran 3 miles on the treadmill on 5/1 and again on 5/2. In the 31 days since the Half Marathon, I ran a total of six days. My left foot continued to hurt with each stride in the exact same spot. Dr. had an MRI taken of my left foot on Thursday 5/3. I just got off the phone with him.

I have a stress fracture of the 5th metatarsal of my left foot. Dr. says no running for an additional 6 weeks, wear hard soled shoes and bicycle, elliptical, swim all I want – just don’t flex the foot.

Looks like I’m about to become amphibious.