Keep Your Blood Lust

We were visiting my friend Cabinet Lady last Sunday because she was growing tons of little plants with grow lights and wanted to share them with us. Once Mrs. de-I got her hands on them, all hell broke loose.

Once Wife decides it is time to garden it's just like when a Viking Horde heard that there was rich monastery in England for the taking...instant berserker activity...all rationality gone...the lust for gardening battle upon us...we must get a purple rose...more veggies...more flowers...more mulch.

Like those attacked by the Vikings, I now have my strong hold built up in the Towers from which I took these scenes from the battleground.

Working out with Weights

I have never been a lover of weight training going back decades and decades. Cardiovascular stuff - never a problem. But lifting heavy things and building the muscle strenght - no way.

Wife a long time about got us a complete set of hand weights and has pushed me to use them.

I've finally broken down and put them to use

Weight Work de-I Style

I See My Future and It is in Construction

At least this weekend it will be. Wife has stated in no uncertain terms that the new pre-fab garden shed will be erected this Sunday. I am shanghaiing Gaius Derf to help. Primarily because I have the mechanical ability of an advanced sponge...an uncoordinated sponge at that.

Derf has taken a vow to avoid all home related projects now that he is back in NM from Salt Lake City. He used to be the kind of guy who would repaint his house at the drop of hat if he though the paint was fading from the sun (One room three times in two years!). But no more.

He was totally going to kiss me off on this project but as fate would have it his wife Agent W was standing next to him when I called. Agent W is Wife's biggest supporter. Bless her she piped in immediately that Derf would be happy to help.

We did this with the prior shed around 8 years ago. We nearly froze our asses off and we managed to put the walls on upside down to boot. Having set the standard so low, we are certain to score better this time around.

Potatoes and Leeks

Short of writing material for the blog. Drop back 10 yards and punt to the cooking post. GO TEAM!

While shopping this weekend at the local plain ole market, I found some fabulous leeks. For those who don't know, a leek is member of the onion family. Most leeks in the us have small white parts and lots of fibrous not so good green. But these babies were over 60% white. Real beauties.

So I decided to make a French Country Classic - Potato and Leek Soup.

This recipe is so easy even certain readers from St. Louis who don't cook can do it. And it's tasty and low calorie

Two of three main ingredients - Leeks and Potatoes

Cut the tough green ends off and the root ends.
Then cut into three pieces, cut those in half, and cut crosswise into rough chunkc
Leeks need to be cleaned well as there can be sand in between the layers.
Put them into a bowl with water. Roughly rub them then lift them out into a colander. Do this a few times until the water in the bowl no longer has any sand in the bottom

Peel and roughly cut the potatoes

Put into a pot and cover with some broth, the third main ingredient.

Bring to a boil, add salt and pepper, cook until potatoes and leeks are soft maybe 30-40 minutes.

Take out your trusty immersion blender and puree. If you don't have that use a potato masher for a more rustic version.

Serve with some good bread

Why Not Calm Down?

I promote my business through intense networking with people who can potentially refer business to me. I have about 20 to 25 of these a month with a mix of new people I'm meeting but most with people I know already.

On Friday I was meeting a new contact, a person a little younger than myself but certainly experienced enough to have lived through plenty of tough times. I was surprised at how 'freaked out' he was concerning the economy. I hear a lot of this these days. Earlier the same week it was with a lawyer from Chicago. But at least he has the excuse of being young. If you started your career after 1987, this is probably the first time you've experienced any major economic disruption.

Getting back to the first person, after he had gone on and on about the national and world economic order, he asked me what I thought. I told him I didn't really care what was going to happen in the economy. I had options, strategies and tactics for all scenarios except the total collapse of the world order. He acted quite surprised. But I told him that I had lived through plenty of economic and personal crises in the past and I had every intention of not only making it through this one but prospering through it as well.

Which gets me to the point of this post.

In working both personally in crises and with many, many clients going through crises, I have noticed one universal truth. Those that stay calm, that focus on what they need to get done, that acknowledge their fears but don't let themselves be overwhelmed or enslaved by their fears, are the ones that usually end up coming out OK.

If you are finding yourself caught up in all the news generated noise and hysteria, I'd like to make a suggestion. Stop paying attention to the media. It's not helping you to cope with whatever you need to cope with. You're not going to change what is going on in the macro-economy or the world political system. Know that it is the nature of the world for good and bad times to follow each other. Yes you have stuff to worry about and think about in your daily life but you will be best served by being able to deal with it in the calmest way possible. Don't let all the hysteria mongers detract from the steady hand you need to captain your fate.

Party Aftermath

Guests Leaving Addictive Substances

I guess it shouldn't be a surprise. Whenever you have a lot of people over there is the danger that someone is going to be using something addictive. Unfortunately for us, son-in-law Armenian Deal Hound insisted while we were shopping at Costco (value provider to the upper middle class) that we pick up some 'Pirates Booty'. This turns out to be a kicked up, healthier (healthier than shooting one's self?) version of Cheetoes. And Wife and I looooovvvvveeee Cheetoes.

Not Good
Sports Graffiti

After everyone goes we find all over our white board various sports related trash comments.

(for you non-internationals, hup Holland hup, is for the Dutch soccer team and Allez les Bleus is for the French)

Measure Your Sugar Status

Wife recently gave me an article to read from the NY Times Sunday Magazine. It was all about this website that acted like E-Harmony and Match.com except for Sugar Daddies and Sugar Babies. The former are older men who are looking for relationships with with the later which are younger women who want to be in a relationship. They differentiators from other sites being that there is a monetary component expected in these relationships going from the Daddy to the Baby. Of course these types of relationships are as old as history. The article went to great lengths to point out the differences between these relationships and others such as prostitution and mistresses - the primary being that these are mutually consented to often with significant like/dislike components and emotional components.

What struck me was that most of the 'Sugar Daddies' referenced ranged in age from the mid 30's to the mid-40's. What gives? My mental image of the Sugar Daddy is the guy from Monopoly, you know with the top hat.

At Wife's surprise party I was mentioning this to hiking buddy Wild Bill, his wife Jill (yes, yes Bill and Jill) and comrade Gaius Derf. I was waxing a bit sadly that I was even too old to be a Sugar Daddy.

Wild Bill - "Yes you're more like caramel"

Jill - "I think he's all the way to the hard candy stage!"

Gaius Derf - "Further. He's burnt sugar"

:(