Saturday, March 8, 2014

Transcending

I recently came across a poem that fails to escape my mind.

"Drawing Hands" by M.C. Escher.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drawing_Hands)

Transcending

Escher got it right.
Men step down and yet rise up,
the hand is drawn by the hand it draws,
and a woman is poised
on her very own shoulders.

Monday, January 13, 2014

The Guy Who Is Living My Dream

Meet Jeff Kruys. He is, without a doubt, a crazy guy on a bike.

Jeff, a crazy guy on a bike.

Jeff has biked more than 70,000 miles! And that doesn't count the numerous trips he's done without an odometer on his handlebars.

Sunday, January 12, 2014

Panning for Gold

You need to pan to find the gold.

When I first quit my job, I made a mind map of interests I wanted to pursue.

A skinnied down version of my mind map.
(Some of the map is not for public consumption;
refer to "Guarding My Intentions.")

Once I started investing large chunks of time tackling these interests, I noticed that exploring my interests led to even more interests. The panning led to riches, and so my mind map grew.

But the explorations revealed that some of my supposed interests weren't really interests after all. In these cases, the panning yielded pebbles, and these pebbles were tossed by the wayside.

Saturday, January 11, 2014

A Fun Job: Not An Oxymoron

I have been enjoying semi-retirement for 14 months now. What exactly, you ask, is "semi-retirement"?

The "retirement" part means that I left my job, and I no longer need to work. (I am using the word "work" to refer to a paid job.)

The "semi" part means that while I don't need to work, I may decide to work. If I do work, it will be by choice and not out of necessity. It will be on my own terms.

My days of having to work are over. This means no more unrelenting stress. No more endless adrenaline rushes. No more days of back-to-back meetings when I can't get any real work done. No more days of a backlog of emails in my inbox, every one needing a response yesterday.

Quoth the raven: "Nevermore."

Friday, January 10, 2014

Nine Lives

Cats in the United States have nine lives. Cats in Italy, Germany, and Spain are said to have seven lives. And cats in the Turkish and Arabic regions of the world are said to have only six lives.

Update 10/16/2014: The above information was gleaned from the Wiki article called "Cat." Having traveled to Turkey and surveyed a number of locals about cats, it seems as though Turkish cats actually have seven lives -- not six.

Meet Russell and Mitzy. These kitties are American kitties, so they are fortunate to have nine lives.

Mitzy & Russell.

I adopted these two furr balls nine years ago. They were the children that I was never going to have.