Frustrated

I am a little frustrated today.  I have a lot to be thankful for, and I shouldn't get frustrated over little things, but today, I am frustrated.  I signed up to be a distributor for AdvoCare a couple of months ago, and was working with it a little bit, but I wasn't really pushing the products or opportunity.  Over the months, I have still talked with people and shared my successes.

I have lost fifteen pounds and several inches while using the products.  More important than the weight I have lost, is the fact that I feel great!!!  People can tell a difference when they are around me.  I am less stressed and usually in a better mood than I was in the past.  People have been asking a lot of questions too. 

I decided that I was going to place more focus on building the business that I had signed up for in AdvoCare.  In my mind, people would have to be crazy to not want to feel better.  People who wanted to lose some extra pounds would surely be interested in something that has helped me lose 15!!!  On top of that, I have actually made a little money and who can't use a little money in today's economic times?

So, I said I was frustrated.  I am frustrated because people keep asking about what I am doing, but they aren't interested in doing it themselves.  I know that shouldn't be a reason to get frustrated, but I can't grow my business if I can't even convince people to try the product once.  On top of that, I listen to calls that have a ton of great information, but I want one single question answered.  I want to know where to find more people I can share the products with when my friends and family don't want to share with their friends.  I have several of my friends and family that buy products from me, and I really appreciate that, but I need to meet new people.

In October, I will be in Sand Springs, Oklahoma and I am trying to get a "mixer" together to share the products with a group of people there.  I only hope that I am able to help a number of people there on a path to losing weight and feeling great while I am there, because right now I am a little Frustrated.

www.advocare.com/130514347

It Is Finished

So, it has been a little while since I  blogged last, but for those of you who read my blog on a regular basis, I know you aren't surprised.  I'm not going to make excuses or promises to blog more in the future.  If it happens, it happens.  I am blogging today, because there are three things that I really wanted to share.

First, I recently decided that I was feeling run down, eating really bad food, and needed to do something to improve my health.  A friend of mine had been losing weight and was displaying an increase of energy that I wanted to mimic.  So I asked him what he was doing.  I am grateful that he decided to share his secret with me.  He was using AdvoCare products.  When we first started talking about it, I thought I could get the same results by going to Kroger and buying various vitamins and just taking a lot of vitamins.  That turns out to not really be true.  So, I started drinking Spark.  My eyes were opened to a new world.  Since that day, I have used some of AdvoCare's other products and plan to embark on a 24 Day challenge in June.  I am looking forward to training my body to be more healthy.  Beyond just using the products, I decided that since I have seen how the products work, and I really believe in them, that I would try my hand at selling the products.  I have tried selling stuff in the past, and it has never worked out.  I am hoping that I am better in this endeavor because these products change people's lives for the better every day.  If you or anyone you know are interested in looking into these products, check out my site at:  www.advocare.com/130514347.  If you are looking for a part time job that can help bring in some extra money, you can find information on becoming a distributor from the same site.

Second, I have been a little bored the past few weeks.  I found a new job with the same company, after my last project ended.  It isn't as much work as what I was doing before, so I tend to have more time to try to fill.  It has been really weird coming home and not having to worry about getting back on the computer to do more work.  It has also caused me to learn that I have to find other things to fill my time.  I enjoy the fact that I have been able to spend more meaningful time with my wife and kids, but there is still time left in the day.  So, I have decided to pick up a project that I started six years ago that was put on the back burner while I was working on my doctorate.  Some of you have read excerpts of The Memoirs of a Foolish Heart.  I have decided it is time to finally get back to that work and finish it.  It is completely emotionally draining at times, but I am excited to be pouring myself back into something that means a lot to me, and I hope will mean a lot to others when they are able to experience it.

Finally, I have completed a goal that has filled much of my free time the past year.  I know, I didn't have a lot of free time, which made it more difficult.  I finally finished reading War and Peace.  It was a difficult read at times, but has been very rewarding.  If you have not already read the novel, you might not understand how great of an achievement that is, even for someone who loves to read as much as I do.  Russian literature from the 1800's is much more different than reading Harry Potter or some of the other contemporary works.  If you love to read and want a challenge, pick up War and Peace.  Although I enjoyed reading the novel, I am excited to say It Is Finished!

Hopeful for Summer

I keep trying to tell myself that I need to take the time to blog and talk about stuff going on in my life.  I think this week, I realized why I have such a hard time blogging on a regular basis.  The only conclusion I have come up with is that I just have a hard time sharing.  I am a very private person and share very few details of my life with most people.  Although I don't think many people actually read my blog, it is hard for me to open up and talk about everything going on in my life.  I find this to be especially true when I am having a rough time or things just aren't going as well as I hoped.  My goal for this year is to work on that and do a better job of blogging.  The other part of my problem is that I don't think my life is very interesting and don't feel like I have anything to say about it.  How many people want to read about how much time I spend sitting at home watching TV.  I have decided to make a list of things that I have done or are going on in my life and try to write about each of them.  This way I can try to be a better blogger, even when I don't feel like writing anything.

I mentioned in a previous blog, I think, that I wanted to take a trip to Oklahoma this spring.  We have been talking about it and my son really wants to go.  Last week I had to give him the unfortunate news that we aren't going to be able to go anywhere during his spring break.  Needless to say, he was very upset about this, as am I.  So, what is the reason?  My job.

Last August, my company asked those of us working on my project not to take vacation time through the end of the year as a way of booking as much revenue as possible and ending the year strong.  We did that and had respectable revenue numbers to end the year.  In January the restrictions on time off were loosened.  People started planning time off.  Last week, we were again asked not to take any time off between now and April 13.  The goal is to book as much revenue and produce as many results for our customer.  This past Friday, our client informed us that they would not be extending our contract beyond the current year, ending April 13.

We are now tasked with the difficult job of finding new jobs, preferably within the company, while working as much time as possible, up to 40 hours, on our client.  So the job search is on, the current work is still on, but for March there will be no trip.  This makes me sad, but I am still hopeful for summer.

I'm a Doctor

It is completely official, I am a doctor!!!  I completed all requirements in November, participated in my commencement ceremony in December and got my diploma in the mail in January.  I am finally done with school for the rest of my life.  I don't have any degrees above me.  I am at the top of my field, educationally speaking.  I'm a Doctor!!!

What's Up

I wanted to update you on what has been going on in my life lately.

After my family vacation, I fully intended on posting more regularly and adding pictures to my blog. I planned to post pictures and blogs about my son playing football, as well as updates on my doctorate and anything else that I think might be interesting. Since that time, I haven't posted a blog and have felt like life is speeding by and at times I am watching from the sidelines. I have had ups and downs and have been working to get through everything and remain positive.

As a part of dealing with stuff going on, I would go to post a blog and would look at the page for a few minutes and decide my heart just wasn't in it. I applaud those of you who blog on a regular basis and are consistent with your posts. I wish I was as good at it.

What has been going on:

My son did start playing football in July. It was his second year and I was once again one of the assistant coaches. On the second day of practice, Nathan decided football was not his thing. His heart wasn't in the game and nothing I could say or do would change his mind. We decided to respect his decision and let him take the year off and decide next year if he wants to get back into the sport. At the same time I was facing some personal issues that I felt required me to step down from coaching. The first few weeks following the decision for Nathan to quit playing and for me to quit coaching, I was miserable. I missed it so much. Nathan didn't miss it, and showed no interest in even going to watch his former team play. People have told me that I shouldn't have let him quit. That I should have made him play. My response: have you ever tried to make a six year old do something physically when their mind is set against it? I guess we made the right decision because so many other things have taken place that would have been hard to work around if he was still playing football.

One of those things is my job. I got a promotion where I now manage a team of people who are trying to do something that has never been done before. It has been a crazy experience so far, because we have to come up with the plan on how to do it, and then prove that our plan works. When it is something that has never been done, a lot goes into developing that plan, and there is a lot of trial and error. Also, we are on a limited timeline. We have to have a workable plan completed by the end of the year and prove it works by the end of February. Needless to say, it has been taking a lot of my time. It has also required a little more travel than what my old job did, but if we are successful it will all be worth it.

To add more to my schedule, I will be defending my doctoral dissertation this Friday, October 26th. It is open to the public if anyone wants to come to Nashville to participate. This is the final hurdle in my degree before I sprint to the finish line towards graduation. The plan right now is for me to graduate on December 8th. It is exciting to think about, but hard to believe that it has already been almost five years since I started the program. What is harder to believe is that I am about to cap my college education and have a terminal degree. There will be nowhere else for me to go from hear, unless I decide to try for a second doctorate somewhere. That idea only has a .00000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 percent chance of happening, if that good.

I am thinking about planning a trip to Oklahoma next year. I am really missing someone really special to me and hope that we can work out a time to get together.

For now, my brain is telling me that's what's up.

Family Vacation Part 2

Yesterday I talked a little bit about shopping at Destin Commons. Below are a couple of pictures from one of the days we were there.

This is after going to Godiva
This was in one of the sunglasses stores. I know that is really obvious,
but you just never know. I would like to note here, that she did not get
that $250 pair of sunglasses. Although she really liked them and I think
she looks really cute in them!!
There are other things to do besides shop and look for dolphins (that I mentioned yesterday). This year we went back to one of the places that the kids enjoyed the most the last time we were in Destin. It is a miniature golf place that also has kiddie rides. Nathan and Reagan both love mini golf and Nathan is really getting good at it, for his age.

Before we started, the kids wanted to get their picture taken with this big gorilla.

Along the course, they found other statues to pose with. Nathan really loves elephants, and had to have a picture with this baby elephant. Reagan didn't want to be left out.

What would a golf course through the "Jungle" be without some fish?

Finally, what would mini golf be without someone getting upset? This actually made two people upset because she through a tantrum, but nobody takes pictures of Daddy when he is upset. She cleared her attitude up within a couple of holes, but those were some frustrating holes.


After mini golf, we decided to let the kids ride the kiddie rides. Both Nathan and Reagan remembered riding this train the last time and really wanted to ride it again. The enjoyed ringing the bell every time they circled by us.

The only other ride that they rode together was the carousel. It was hard getting them both to look at the camera at the same time, so this ended up being the best picture we could get.After the carousel, Nathan and I rode the bumper boats. Reagan really wanted to ride this also, but she was too short. I was in charge of driving while Nathan sprayed the water. It was a little difficult at times to steer since the button to shoot the water is on the steering column. Nathan would tell me to turn the other direction as he pulled the steering column towards him. It was a blast.

While we rode the bumper boats, Reagan went and rode one of her favorite things. The swings. I can't watch her ride these, because they make me sick, so it was great that Sharon was able to take her while Nathan and I were busy.

One ride that Nathan rode that Reagan would not get on is the Ferris Wheel. She was going to ride, however when the operator told her she couldn't ride in the same car as Nathan she lost all interest. After the kids had their fun, it was time for Daddy to have some fun. This fun still included the kids, but I was the driving force behind it. After all what would a trip to The Track be without a trip around the track. My parents went to Florida with us, so my dad got the privilege of driving the car that Reagan rode in.

While Nathan had the privilege of riding in my car. He also had the privilege of winning since he was in my car. We passed so many people and never let anyone pass us. It was so much fun!!!
After a long day of fun, there is only one thing left to do. That is eat. In Destin there are so many unique places to eat. We ate at most of them. One of the places we ate at is a restaurant named FudPuckers. The kids loved eating here, although Nathan's face may not show it. This picture is from the second time we at there. The first time it was pouring down rain and so pictures were not happening that day.

There were a couple of things Reagan liked about this restaurant, but the one thing we couldn't get her away from without a picture was this Indian. She was completely fascinated by it.

The main attraction for FudPuckers though is their "collection" of live alligators that you can feed. They claim to have over 50, although we never counted more than 30. Here is a picture of some.

Yes they are small. What did you expect? They are in a restaurant!! Along with feeding them, you can actually hold one and get you picture taken with them. We did not do this. They tape the mouth shut so you won't get bit, but Sharon doesn't care to get any closer to them than we were at the point in the picture above.

On the last full day we were in Destin, I woke Nathan for a special treat. He wasn't too excited to be woken up at 6:00 in the morning, but he came around. The treat was a guys only trip to a secluded beach to search for sea shells. He loved it!!! For the record, we brought back enough shells for Reagan, but since Reagan enjoyed the shopping more than Nathan, I wanted to do something special for him.

When we got to the beach, we were a little disappointed with the number of shells we were seeing. The picture below shows the number of shells we saw in one small area close to the entry point of the beach.

We didn't let this get us down. We walked and walked and walked for a long time down this empty beach. Finally, we found this:
These shells were all in a smaller space than the first picture and look at the number. We called this area the shell grave yard. It was a very large area that was a ways down the beach, but well worth the walk. We found all sorts of different shells of various shapes and colors. I haven't taken pictures of them, but if I remember I will try to do that and blog about them. The picture below is of Nathan picking up some shells here.
After almost an hour of looking in this one area, we decided it was about time to head back and get some breakfast. We had plenty of shells. The trip back was more fun for Nathan because he wasn't focused on finding shells so he just played in the water.

By the time we got back to the car, his feet were hurting because of being in the sand for over two hours, but he said he wouldn't change it for anything. The memories of that morning are priceless.

The last two evenings we were there, we decided to take pictures on the beach. When you leave the beach you have to wash the sand and salt off, so here is a picture of Reagan washing the sand off her feet.

This is a picture of the woman I love with me. I mentioned yesterday that she got some sun on her face and you can kind of see where her sunglasses were.

What would a family vacation be without a family picture. The lens was fogged up a little because of the humidity. We should have let the camera get acclimated before taking the pictures, but what fun would that have been?

The last picture is how I like to remember the vacation as a whole. I can't say it any better.

Family Vacation

I have talked a lot in past blogs about how I was going to try to do better and blog more frequently. I think I am done making that "promise" because I am the worst person in the world when it comes down to blogging. I have great intentions but do a really bad job of following through. Today's blog is not to talk about that though, it is to talk about something that I view as a great success. I am blogging about my family vacation that occurred less than two months ago.

Our vacation took us to a favorite spot of ours. For the third time in the last four years we went to Destin, Florida. Specifically we stayed at the Surfside Resort in the Marimar Beach area, right outside the Destin city limits. The picture below shows the condo building we always stay in.


The day we arrived, a tropical storm was churning in the gulf and the forecast was for rain almost the entire time we were there. As you can see in the picture below, the clouds were already moving in.

Fortunately, the first full day we were there was the only day that it rained. That left us with views like the one below for the rest of our stay.

With weather that nice, there are several things that you can do, and as you will read later we did other things, BUT the most fun thing to do at the beach is to get in the water. Both of the kids loved the water, but even more than that they loved to get out into the deeper water and have the waves hit them. I would not let them get out into the water without me, so I had one in each hand.

We would let them play in the water by themselves a little, but they were not allowed to go out very far. As you can see in the picture below knee high to Reagan was about the limit without me being with them, but they still had a blast. Nathan was trying to sit down in the waves and a couple of them surprised him and knocked him backwards.

When I was ready for a rest, Sharon and I would sit under the umbrella provided for us and watch the kids play in the sand. We didn't get pictures of the best day where we buried Nathan and Reagan in the sand, but there were other fun pictures. In the picture below, the kids are trying to get water in Frisbees that they had gotten from a restaurant the day before. We forgot to take any of the dozen sand buckets we had at home and kept forgetting to buy new ones.

There is only one downside to all of the fun in the sun. That down side is seen in the picture below. That is my lower back that was burned, and despite what I told my wife, it hurt pretty bad. It was well worth it to make those memories with my kids though. As you will see in some of the pictures later on, Sharon got some sun on her face. It is most noticeable because she had her sunglasses on.

I mentioned earlier that there were other things to do on nice sunny days. One of those things is shop. We did our share of that on this trip, but specifically we like a mall called The Destin Commons. This mall has most places that the kids like to shop such as Build-A-Bear Workshop, The Croc Store, Godiva Chocolate and a really neat toy store, but I don't remember its name. It also has a movie theater. That is where we took the kids to see Brave. Nathan loved the movie, but Reagan was asleep half an hour into it. The other part of the mall that we really like are the fountains. It is so much fun for the kids to be able to get out an play in them, especially on a hot day after a couple of hours of shopping. At first Reagan didn't want to play. There were several kids there, but I didn't want pictures of them. So, Nathan was out playing in the fountains by himself. Then he made friends with a couple of boys who were there and they started playing together. He is so outgoing it is crazy. I don't know where he gets that!!!

Finally, Reagan decided that she wanted to get in on the fun and play in the fountains. While she was there playing, there was another girl about her age who might as well have not had anything on because of the size of her "swimsuit" if you want to call it that. It wasn't decent enough to take a picture. I'm not going to get on my soapbox about that right now though. Most importantly, we all had fun there.

One of the other days we decided to take a Dolphin cruise. The last time we were in Destin we took a Dolphin cruise, but Reagan wasn't old enough to remember it, so we thought it would be nice for here to see the dolphins. This trip wasn't as much fun for me. I spent most of my time standing in lines like in the picture below.

First, the kids got to feed Sea Gulls off the back of the boat, then the kids wanted to get something to eat and drink. What was a dad to do, but wait in line? We were on a boat with about 50 other people. Ultimately, we stood in line for the best part of the trip. Nathan got to drive the boat. The picture below might look like a prop, but the captain just to the left of the window had to keep telling Nathan not to turn the wheel. He was so excited about driving the boat!!!
On the trip we did see Dolphins. Well, let me clarify, they all saw Dolphins. I got to see the pictures. After buying food and drinks, someone had to sit down and hold them all. It was okay though, because the family had a great time. Ultimately that is all that matters.

I was going to write about some of the other things we did on our vacation, but they will have to wait for now. Hopefully, I will be able to blog about those tomorrow. For now, that is the first part of our Family Vacation.