There is not enough time

There really isn't.  There are so many things I really, really want to do.  But having a family and a full-time job means very simply that many ... most of the things that I would love to spend some personal time on ... I can't.

Like sit down for hours a day and 'invent' things with LEGO.  Some people seem to have that kind of time (not a slam, because I am sure he has a real full-time job and kids, but I just don't know how people like http://tinkernology.blogspot.com/ find the time, yet he does some absolutely amazing stuff).

Like spend much more time cooking, playing in the kitchen and out on our deck with our BBQ grill, learning and designing new cuisine ... I just re-read that and now see how funny the word "cuisine" sounds coming from me ... But I do love to cook.  Nothing too out-of-the-ordinary; I think the most unique food I have ever cooked myself was plantains.  I love watching Good Eats with Alton Brown and Primal Grill (formerly "Barbecue University") with Steven Raichlen.  I have several of each of their books and am very eager to try more of their recipes.  It is just plain fun to tinker with food, play with flavors and spices, design new rubs and marinades for the meats and veggies that we eat.  But pasta and various simple forms of chicken inevitably rule the day.  They are quick and easy ... as is the Chinese delivery guy ...

Spring and Fall Olympics?

So we've got Winter and Summer Olympics.  And we all know that each includes sports that entail lots of cold weather and warm weather clothing and paraphernalia, respectively.  You know, activities that make you think of those seasons (mostly).

In the Winter Olympics we have lots of skiing, both bumpy and jumpy.  We have ice skating and speed skating, both long distances and very short.  We have luge and skeleton and possibly other body part-sounding sports.  We have bobsleds and ice hockey.  Oh yeah, and we have curling.

In the Summer we have gymnastics, lots and lots of gymnastics.  And we have various -athlons (pent- and dec- that I know of, keeping in mind that tri- isn't part of the Olympics (or is it?)).  Lots of traditional jumping activities (high and long and triple and probably others) and pole vaulting and chucking stuff (hammers and javelins and shotputs and disc ... um, disci (??? what is the plural of discus?), among others).  And lots of running, from short dashes to long marathons.  Swimming?  We've got swimming, singles and teams.  Diving?  Uh huh.  Water polo?  Yup.  "All-American" sports like baseball and volleyball and basketball?  Yeah (for now).  Synchronized swimming.  Martial arts.  Wrestling and rowing and badminton and weightlifting and ping pong and sailing and lots and lots of others.  And I hear tell that chess may become an Olympic "sport".

So that covers half of our year.  But what about the other half, the pseudo-warm and pseudo-cool seasons of Spring and Fall?  Since we want to include sports that evoke memories of those seasons, I propose the following, at least as a start:

Spring Olympic Events:

• Yard saling
• House cleaning
• House painting
• Spring Break planning
• "What the hell to do with the kids during the upcoming Summer" planning
• "Oy it's already getting hot out and it isn't even Summer yet" bitching
• Planting
• Mowing
• Picnicking (does that really have a 'k' in it?)
• Sneezing and wheezing

Fall Olympic Events:

• Leaf blowing
• Gutter cleaning
• Wood chopping
• Fireplace cleaning
• Heavy coat buying
• "Oy it's already getting cold out and it isn't even Winter yet" bitching
• Getting a flu shot
• Getting another damned flu shot depending on what pain in the ass new flu strain is popular this year

Of course, this also begs the question of why other sports haven't made it to the current two seasonal Olympic events.  There are a few extras in this post from some very mysterious but absolutely hilarious person who is evidently an ardent Flash Gordon fan in New York (I particularly love the "freestyle insult hurling").

This guy is good

IllDoctrine.com.

I just happened to fall into this guy's website, sort of a verbal blog site.  Ranting and raving --- one of my favorite pasttimes (DON'T GET MY WIFE STARTED!!!) --- and in a very intelligent way.  I am NOT a fan, in any way, shape or form, of hip-hop music or culture or anything related to hip-hop, but this guy, who is evidently a hip-hop DJ-type [from the site: creator of the hip hop music blog and founder of New York's longest running hip-hop radio show, WBAI's Underground Railroad] is just plain good.  I love this crap!

In particular, I just have to say "Poor poor Michael Steele".  I love (at about the :30 second mark) that he is "well-meaning and sincere and charmingly oblivious to the reality that his party doesn't really respect him all that much and they only gave him his job as a cynical ploy to pretend they're down with black people."  Now THAT is a great quote.  And probably quite true.

My first post ...

... and you never forget your first ...

Thanks to my wife, who has been nudging me ... or noodging me ... to begin writing or blogging or something ... ANYTHING!! ... because there is just so much stuff crammed into my head and I do need some way to get it all out.  Will people read this?  Who knows?  Will people LIKE it?  I just dunno ...

What I plan to chat about:

My kids -- nothing else matters as much
LEGO -- fun, just plain fun
Harley-Davidson -- my very large motorcycle, and a life's worth of waiting for it ...  well, a third of a life by the time I bought her ...
Investing -- a long-time hobby, but I'm just not good enough to quit my day job ... YET!!
Reading -- how else to learn about ... everything?
Disney -- my family's love of all things Disney
80s music -- yes, 80s music, because little music since then has not sucked
What I did or thought about today -- can't wait for these, can you????
Other fun and/or random stuff -- as things and ideas pop up

I do already have some words that I have "blogged", in a simple Word file on my wife's laptop, over the last year or two.  And I do plan to use much of this in the short term.  However:
1) Is it cheating?  If I have already written it, is it a log (OK, for precision, a current log)?
2) If it is not on the web, then is it a "blog"?  Remember that the "b" stands for Web (yeah, that sounds weird), as in Internet.  This is in a file, so it ain't a blog yet.  Soon ...

To be truthful, I found this blog just recently: The Erin O'Brien Owner's Manual for Human Beings.  It was a random find; actually I think she made Blogger.com's Blogs of Note recently, and I happened to see it, so I clicked.  Dunno who she is, aside from her self-descriptions as a mom in Ohio.  It is not so much what she says, but HOW she says it.  I really like her writing style.  More on her later.