This was part of the village at the Farms. The main attraction were three farms representing different eras of America’s past. It was a neat place to visit.
Monthly Archives: February 2011
No 2. Make Peace with Imperfection
This like the other posts in the category is from the book entitled “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff… and it’s all small stuff” by Richard Carlson. It has many items that are particularly useful to us seniors. Our retirement years should be sweat free so to speak.
Making peace with imperfection is something that I don’t have much of a problem with but I know several other seniors who still have a problem with things that are not perfect. My wife is one of them. Perfectionist seem to go through life fretting almost everything they encounter. Things like: dirty cars, disorganized desks, and windows that need cleaning just drive them crazy.
Let’s look at some of the words in the book:
The very act of focusing on imperfection pulls us away from our goal of being kind and gentle…. It is about realizing that while there’s always a better way do do something, this doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy and appreciate the way things already are.
Our senior years should be peaceful and enjoyable so learn to allow things to be the way they are. It is not up to any of us to make everything perfect.
And the journey goes on…
U.S. vs. the World
I started getting the National Geographic magazine again. I used to look at them regularly when I was in grade school and high school many years ago but haven’t noticed them much since then. Many joke that older people like myself get NG because of the larger print. 
Personally speaking there is probably some truth to that. But it does have a lot of very interesting topics in between the covers and I have more time to read them now. This month there is also a large wall poster about the "World of Seven Billion”. I will spend a few posts here discussing that topic.
In the U.S. the top 20% of households are make more than $90,000. The top 20% of the world households make more than $12,000. This is a huge disparity! In the overall scheme of things everything seeks balance. As the world becomes more connected we become more homogeneous. Some don’t like that at all but it generally the case over the long run. Given the fact that there are so many people in the world that will the unskilled work for $1/hour it seems very unlikely that our industrial base will ever return to the U.S. So, the factory work that paid $20/hour or more is pretty much gone. The sooner we accept that fact the better.
Where the U.S. excels is in new discoveries. That is what keeps us in the affluent lane of the world. But since new discoveries pretty much depend on a strong math and science background, how long will we maintain that technological advantage? Long story short, we need to do a better job of educating our youth. The big part of that is to get away from the ‘nerd’ mentality. Instead of mocking nerds all of us should be one!
But what do I know…
Waiting to Die….
One of the most depressing things to me is that some seniors seem to spend their lives just waiting to die. They have no ambitions or goals for their senior years. They spend their days do little or nothing. In other words they are very passive seniors; they say they gain their joy from inactivity but is that really true or just a cop out for not doing anything?
I must admit that I am probably more adventurous than many seniors. I enjoy constant stimulation. I enjoy planning and doing things that I have never done before. To sit around the house day after day is very boring to me. My senior years certainly give me an opportunity to do some adventurous things. Unfortunately, like many other seniors I imagine, I am married to a spouse who doesn’t share my sense of adventure. She is much more inclined to spend her day just lying around the house. To her an ideal day is pretty a pretty passive experience. She says she enjoys the simple things.
Living for the past twenty five years together has been a interesting experience. Our differences in personality, she is yin and I am yang, have made for some unusual times. I have mellowed a little over the years and she has shown a slightly more adventurous spirit but not to any significant degree. So, here I am wanting to travel and enjoy new things in my senior years and here she is just wanting to do pretty much the same thing from one day to the next. I’m not sure how to resolve these differences? Compromise doesn’t seem possible. That is what is most challenging for me right now. Do I dare suggest that we both do what we each went (she stays home and I travel)? I just don’t know. But I know I don’t want to spend the rest of my life just waiting to die. I am dreaming of too many adventures just to do that.
And the journey goes on (or not)…..
About Passwords and the Internet….
I must admit that I am a Internet junkie.
- I pay most of my bills on-line.
- I get most of my news on-line.
- I purchase a lot of goods and services on-line.
- I follow friends on Facebook
- I get and receive many emails daily
As a result of all this activity I have a lot of logins and passwords strewn across the Internet. I also must admit that until recently I had not really taken my many account passwords very seriously. That changed about a month ago when I discovered that someone had gained access to one of my accounts and had ordered some pretty expensive equipment. The perpetrator had not managed to change my shipping address so I guess the hack was more for a thrill than for material gain. After several weeks working with the company I managed to get the purchases and their corresponding charges removed and now the account it back to its normal charges. Of course one of the first things I did was to change the password on the account to make it much harder to break.
I’m pretty sure I am not alone in being lazy with my Internet accounts. It is just easier to remember a simpler password than making it harder to break. I picked up one of the password generating and storage software programs that are available. With some work I am now pretty sure my accounts are much more secure than they once were. So, my advice to all you seniors out there is to take your security info seriously. It will save you many hours later on.
This incident has not scared me away from the on-line world but has made me more aware of potential problems.
And the journey continues….
Global Food Crisis…..
This is just too sad to take lightheartedly. There is a global food crisis in much of the third world. Part of that is due to us using so much corn for ethanol. We have so much in the country and so much of the world is starving. Something is wrong with that!
Door County Wisconsin – September 2006
Here is a converted barn in Door County Wisconsin near my favorite winery. I must admit that I am hooked on cherry wine from there.
Rainy days don't always get me down….
It is a rainy day here in Indiana but considering that it is not snow it doesn’t get me down. And the fact that between July and September of last year we had less than an inch of rain total, I welcome a rainy day now and then. The picture above is one of my favorite ones of my hubby. It was taken about 25 years ago during our visit to the Wisconsin Dell. I love her more now than I did even then.
What is Satire?
I just changed the word “Satirical” to “Lighthearted” for this blog title. It seems that the word “Satirical” has come to mean something quite different than in Will Rogers’ day. Looking at what Wikipedia says http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satire some might get the wrong opinion of what I am trying to do here. According to Wiki there is now a definite dark side to satire that is more predominant today than the more light hearted approach that Will Rogers used. I am definitely not on the dark side and neither was Will! 
Its funny how some words change at time goes by. In Will’s day if he called someone a gay person it had an entirely different meaning than today. I guess the same thing applies for satire. It just doesn’t mean what it did in earlier times.
Some of the current definitions of satire include: sarcasm, ridicule, demeaning! I often purchase pictures from the website http://www.canstockphoto.com for use on this and my other blogs. When I entered the search word satire it came up with, among other things, an image of the “middle finger of an arrogant man”! One of Will’s most famous quotes was “I never met a fellow I didn’t like”. The current meaning of satire is definitely not aligned with that quote or with Will’s life (or mine for that matter). Some say today’s satirists include: Glen Beck, and that radical right and radical left crowd. Will would have definitely steered very clear from them yahoos!
So now I will start calling Will, and humbly myself, a humorist-philosopher instead of a satirist. To that end I am taking a lighthearted look instead of a satirical look at today’s world now.
About being Religious
I seem to be on a Pickles streak here but it is nice to see something focused on us seniors. Almost everything else is for the 18 – 35 crowd.
Over 85% of the people in the U.S. claim to be religious. But just what are they religious about? That is the question.
Indiana–June 2009
Here is a well used Indiana barn.
Anxiously awaiting…
This is my favorite view of our homestead. I call it “up on the mountain” as it is the highest point on our property. This is where my outdoor glider resides and is where I do most of my spring/summer/ fall reading and the corresponding naps. I ache to get back to my mountain home. Given the warm weather lately, hopefully it will be soon. But that is probably wishful thinking.
The Thing about Facebook…
There has been a lot of press lately about how Facebook was used during the Egyptian protests lately. Showing its affect on democratic reform definitely put a positive spin on this social network. But then I go to my Facebook homepage and I see something entirely different. There are no great social causes being espoused there. Of the 50 or so “friends” I have there are a few organizations who try to promote common causes but not many.
I do want to admit up front that I am not very active in Facebook. I post occasionally just to let people know that I am still here. But I seem to be the exception rather than the rule. For the most part the never ending status messages go something like this:
- “Just had a cup of coffee and it was really good. Now it is off to work”.
- “I watched TV tonight with my boys. Nothing much on”
- “Why do I feel so sad?”
If I opened myself up all these types of messages I would surely get hundreds of them per day. One of the best features on Facebook is the “Hide” button. It allow me to not have to see particular posters daily comments. I hide the more frequent “fluffers” as I call them. I admit that 90% of my “friends are in the “Hide” category. It would be nice to know the “real” news from my friends; I don’t get that because there is no button to eliminate fluff while allowing substance. Maybe Facebook can work on that feature.
It seems for every status message as above there are half a dozen comments attached to them. People today often talk about how they are so busy there is no time for things like family time or such. But they do have time to scroll through hundreds of mundane messages from their friends and then comment on many of them. If they spent as much time becoming aware of the social and moral issues of today, instead of blindly following their favorite “talking head”, their time would be much better spent and “our” democracy would be stronger.
So, here I am seeing how Facebook was critical to the formation of the democratic movement in Egypt and at the same time totally frivolous in my own backyard?
But what do I know
Guadalajara Grill–October 1994
I have had many interesting meals and cherished friendships at the GD Grill. I also got “popped” there one year for my birthday thanks to my friend Dave R. I haven’t been there in 15 years. We will have to plan another visit there sometime in the future.
Independence Hall Philadelphia–April 1994
This is where our democracy started. It is a very spiritual type place. This was my second visit there.
More with Less
Some probably think that the phrase “More with Less” is a recent invention but I was brutally hit with it in the 1990s. As my team around me was constantly shrinking the workload was constantly increasing. The above term was almost nauseous to me during that time.
I wish I could have come up with some of the things in the Dilbert cartoon at the time. The last couple of years of my corporate life were not pleasant. I was working sixty hour weeks to do “more with less” (less meaning I was never paid for the extra hours!).
No there never were less meetings or micro-management; I got plenty extra of that. I left the corporate world almost eleven years ago but I am pretty sure pretty much the same thing is happening today. This goes back to a previous post about the three legged corporate stool. See it at http://whatwouldwillsay.wordpress.com/2011/01/13/about-the-bailout/ The employee leg of the stool was constantly being shortened and it hasn’t stopped even now.
But what do I know
Elmora Indiana – June 2008
We came across this barn while visiting a Tractor show with our good friends the Hoffmans.
I didn't know I had a choice…
I just came across this comic strip a few weeks ago. It is not one of my favorites but it does from time to time give me some ideas. Better done well or not at all has been around for a while now but i never thought of applying it to me senior years and especially as far as my hubby is concerned. So I will be putting this one on the back burner for use when it is most appropriate.
And the journey goes on.
Multitasking??
I just watched a episode on FrontLine (on PBS) about multitasking. Kids today insist that they can do many things at the same time and almost all of them involve some form of electronics. The FrontLine episode basically said the kids think they multitasking very well when in reality they don’t do any of the things well at all. The brain is just not meant to do multiple things at the same time.
I’m definitely not a kid anymore but I too can multitask if I need to but I prefer to work on one thing and then get it done. My wife gets very upset when I don’t give her my full attention when she is talking. I, unlike most kids today have an almost tunnel vision when it comes to completing a task. Everything else almost disappears until that task is done. Maybe sometimes the old ways are just better. But, having said that, I wouldn’t give up my smartphone, laptop, or fully equipped desktop for anything. I just don’t want to use them all at the same time. I can remember a time when I carried around nothing electronic on my person except maybe a watch.
It just goes back to the old saying:
Jack of all trades and the master of none
If you are doing six things at the same time you are doing none of them very well. Some are afraid that we are dumbing down our kids by allowing them to multitask at the level they do today.
But what do I know…..
HGTV Dream House 2011 Intervention…..
Let’s pick on the TV folks for a few posts.
I have always enjoyed seeing the new HGTV Dream House each year. But this year seemed to be different than the past. I watched about five minutes of this years show and found myself a little dizzy and still wondering what the house looked like. It seemed that every time I saw a picture it was either zooming in or panning out and lasted for no more than a second or so. I tried several times to watch but the result was always the same.
Thank goodness for the internet. I logged on to HGTV.com and found the 2011 house and this time I could casually browse through the two dozen or so pictures of the new home. Of course I signed up for a chance to win but I know that will not happen. As usual the house lived up to my expectations. It was a shame that the TV show didn’t. Maybe I can find a way to watch it in slow motion or something?
Here is a suggestion to the folks at HGTV. Next year hire a production company that does not have A.D.D. A slow lane intervention is definitely needed here. I know scores of very capable craftsmen spent many hours construction and furnishing the house. So, it was sad to see it all flash by so quickly without having a chance to savor any of their work.
The condition called “attention deficient disorder” gets a lot of play these days. It definitely should be attached to the crew that made this years TV episode. Get out the Ritalin.
But what do I know…
