24

Things I've done in the past 24 hours:
- Poured my youngest 6 bowls of Kix
- Knocked down a wasp nest and ran like....heck
- Listened to cello practice
- Shopped unsuccessfully for Gaelic Storm's latest CD
- Taken a Sonata
- Read the transcript of Obama's acceptance speech
- Updated my iPhone
- Perused 70 reader reviews of running shoes on-line
- Done an 8 mile "hill" run
- Read the Sunday Oregonian with a Grande Nonfat Latte in-hand
- Weeded out part of a blueberry patch
- Sent Persepolis back to Netflix
- Logged 2,675 calories (65% carbs, 22% fat, 11% protein, 2% alcohol) onto FitDay
- Attached a climbing bolt to the roof outside my son's window
- Watched the Daily Show on Hulu
- Taken the recycling out
- Read about Hurricane Gustav
- Waited in a drive-thru lane at Taco Bell for 25 minutes for a bean burrito
- Sent an e-mail to William P. Young
- Explained to my youngest how people get married

Get a life

Although there are lots of things that need to be done, sometimes I just completely waste time on inane things.

Case in point: photoshop contests. So, I spent about 45 minutes today for an ongoing online "contest" (you don't win anything but votes on your submission) changing a picture of some dude and his turtle into something else.

The before and after pictures are here for your perusal.

Oh, and this is my third blog post for the day. Must be a long weekend where I'm not on call...

Wrinkles

I'm fairly confident this has only been an issue for the last 5-6 months. When I shave in the morning, there is a crease (smile line?) to the right of my mouth, half-moon in shape, that is so deep that when the razor glides across, there remains a semi-circle of white shaving lotion within its depths. It's a stark reminder every morning of my advancing age. Well, that and my hairline. Eh, what can you do? (short of Botox)

I have this plant in my office that sends out long shoots / tresses (I'm not sure of the correct botanical term) that I have, over the past several years, continued to re-affix to my ceiling. The entire top expanse of my office now has vines draped across and hanging down in various spots. About a year ago I affixed a plush-toy monkey to one of the vines. Another monkey followed, then a Toucan, then a butterfly, another bird and, little by little, my "jungle" has accumulated quite the menagerie of suspended wildlife. There are a few clever office personnel who continue to add creatures to this jungle. In addition to that, the creatures are now variously outfitted with medical gear - makeshift stethoscopes, clipboards (complete with little office note replicas), sphygmomanometers, and other stuff. It's quite creative, really. Next time you're in my office, look up.

My oldest is planning on going out for cross country (X-C) this year. We went running twice this week for about 20 minutes. It's been fun to run with another family member. At this point, I slow down for him, but in all likelihood, in a few years it will be the opposite.

All our kids love the comics. Since I'm a bit anal retentive about getting the paper in its pure form, the kids are on a one-day delay with the comics. Every day I read the comics (and the metro section, the front page, and occasionally the business section) and recycle all but the comics, which are put in a special place in my (home) office, where they are brought out for the next morning's breakfast, and promptly destroyed by four children fighting over them.

Had a LOT of psyche stuff in the office this week. People in all kinds of tough situations. Doing the long listening / counseling sessions takes a lot out of one. It's a holiday weekend, though, so I have an extra day to regroup.

Happy labor day all!

Politics - sucked back in

This is not intended to be a political blog, and I was hoping to abstain from a lot of partisan comments on it (at least until late October), but, dang it, I got sucked back in.

This morning McCain announced Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska for one year, for his running mate?

Huh?

She's been governor of the state for a year and a half, and before that was the mayor of a town of 7,000 people. And they want her to be second-in-command to the potentially oldest U.S. President ever? She admitted last week that someone in her administration fired her former brother-in-law who is currently in a custody battle with Palin's sister - that's going to stir up controversy.

I'm guessing this is an appeal to the Hillary supporters, but I think the supporters liked Hillary not just because she was a woman, but because she was Hillary. Hillary definitely has her own unique style and energy, and I don't think Hillary supporters are going to jump over to a Palin ticket just because she's also a woman.

So we've got Biden, long-time Washington insider and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Palin, 18 month governor of Alaska as the two VP choices. Ouch.

As an Obama/Biden supporter I'm pleased to see this move, but in a weird way out of respect for McCain, it's been hard to watch his politicking maneuvers slowly destroy his previous accomplishments. I think his legacy would have been much better had he not thrown his hat in the ring.

I'm just an average Jo, however, and anything can happen in politics, so I guess we'll see how all this shakes down. I'll be very glad when it's all over, however.

Ok, that's all the political commentary for a while.

Silliness

It certainly wasn't my longest day ever, but it was a typical middle-of-the-week-and-already-way-behind type of day today. I'd been in the office for 11 1/2 hours and still wasn't done with all my work, but dinner was on the table and, living close to work, I drove the 90 seconds home to eat with the family. Driving up the street, the kids were all out front playing in the driveway with various rackets and balls. It was a great welcome home with waves and shouts of "Dad!". We quickly gathered up the balls and went inside to a nice dinner Mom had prepared. The mood was one of fun and silliness. Despite long days for each parent, the kids and the moods came together in that right combination of craziness without obnoxiousness, and the dinner was filled with "Christmas card cute" sayings from the kids and laughing fits from everyone. It's amazing how 25 minutes of silliness can erase a day's worth of stress. I learned that my 6 year old knows way too many words to the "I'm a Barbie Girl" (apparently passed down from the siblings who learned it from ???). And, with apparent diligence and practice, my 10 year old daughter can rapidly sing the entire score of the freecreditreport.com song:



I'm back at work now (ok, taking a short break to blog), it's 8:15 pm, but the day has been great thanks to a dinner table full of my family and silliness.

Last week of freedom

• It's Monday morning, the last week of Summer before school starts. Our kids are divided on how eager they are to get back to school but, like it or not, it's coming. The elementary school has been under construction all Summer (we finally got a bond passed last year to upgrade it) and the changes are very nice. The playground has become huge, with lots of fun equipment and the nice foam base instead of pea gravel that the kids bring into the classrooms in their shoes. The building itself has had a major expansion, and looks incredible. The funny thing in Oregon is that there is a mandatory covered play area to every school. So many times during the school year it will be pouring rain, and if it weren't for the covered play areas the kids wouldn't ever get out of the building. The kids got their teacher assignments last Friday. Most were happy with the teachers they have, but there are some friends who were put into different classrooms with different teachers that has been a little disappointing.
  
• Last Friday we had our staff picnic at one of the other doctor's house. We had a lot of people show up, and it was a lot of fun. There was roasting of hot dogs over a big fire pit, tractor rides, and lots of food (including tons of Oregon berry desserts). I took all my tree-climbing stuff, and made a swing in one of the trees, WAY HIGH up. The kids had a good time with that. Drs. Cornwell (he's a physician that used to work for us, she's a surgeon) were there having returned from Benin, Africa a month or so ago. They are medical missionaries there for SIM, and our office supports that ministry with regular donations. They shared a presentation of their time there.
• I did finally go running yesterday for the first time in 6 weeks. I'm trying to take it slow, and only went 3 miles. The toe seemed to be doing ok - better than my fitness level anyway. Now with the days getting shorter and rainier it time to try to increase my running. I've tentatively planned on doing the Mississippi Blues Marathon just after New Years, and my 16 week training plan for that starts in about 3 weeks. I've also re-started logging my eating and exercise and other stuff on FitDay. It's a very nice, free, website that helps you keep track of your eating and a bunch of other stuff. If you're trying to lose weight, or watch what you eat, I'd recommend it.
• Saturday was spent grooming one of our blueberry patches. The weeds were absolutely taking over, so I spent a great deal of time digging them out. Then I laid down that porous sheeting over the whole patch to keep out future weeds, then got Hemlock mulch to put over that. My back and shoulders are still sore. We need to do the same thing to the rest of our raised beds, but who knows when we'll find the time (or the energy) for that.
  
• Books on tape update: I hardly read anymore, since books on tape allows for multitasking. I finished up this weekend The Guns of August, a Pulitzer prize winning book on WWI written before I was born. It was interesting, but a little more history than story. I'm currently listening to The Shack, to see what all the fuss is about. This is a religious book that came out of nowhere to get to the top of the bestseller lists. The writer lives here in Oregon, so there are a lot of local references (I'm not that far into the book yet, though). The theology expressed is a little controversial. I haven't gotten into much yet, but when I'm done, I'll run it by Kate, my resident Theologian. (You too, Dad). Next is Twilight, the first in a series that Kate loves and convinced me to try.
• I spent about 90 minutes watching the closing ceremonies of the Olympics last night. I'll admit it, I buy into the hype. It's amazing to see this celebration, with all the countries of the world represented and everyone partaking of the joy. It does present this small, brief glimpse of a possibility of a world where we can still have our cultural and religious differences, and yet all get along and cooperate together. *sigh* It was touching to see the whole crowd of 90,000 in the "bird's nest" stadium honoring the runner from Kenya as the Kenyan flag was raised and he received his gold for winning the marathon.
• We are renting two cellos currently, so Mom and daughter can do duets. I have to say, it's wonderful to hear them playing together. The kids are all working diligently (some with more prodding than others) on their instruments (cello, piano, guitar, and baritone).
  

This and That

• I like the bulleted format, but apparently, with this particular blog template, I get little flowers as my bullet points. Lovely. Perhaps there is a way to change this (without changing the template). If anyone out there in blogland knows how, please enlighten me.
• Back to school shopping done this am with the 4 kids. *shudder* It wasn't that bad, despite long lists for all classrooms. We decided to spend more money by avoiding WalMart and going to Staples instead. I think there is a price to pay for peace of mind, and certainly avoiding WalMart during BTS frenzy is good for peace of mind. First grade requires a LOT of glue sticks (12). Sounds like it'll be a sticky year. 7th grade requires a scientific calculator. My confidence at helping my kids with their math homework is waning with each subsequent year. I remember when back-to-school meant Trapper Keeper notebooks (with those annoying plastic hitch 3-ring "binders") and PeeChee folders. Just looking at a Pee Chee folder makes me feel like I'm in 5th grade again.
  
• The last two days seemed like Fall. We had a TON of rain, cooler weather. It was kind of fun to have the rain, but I'm definitely not ready for Summer to be over (despite the fact that it is practically over). It's nicer today, sunny, warm, blue skies.
• The Hood to Coast relay is this weekend (starts today). This is the third year I've not been on a team and I really really miss it. Maybe next year. Please please please. It is such a kick!
• NBC has been getting some flack about their Olympic coverage, but I have to say the on-line experience has been amazing. I've watched Mens and Women's Triathlon, the 10K Marathon swim (mens and womens), and other events live, on-line (for free) and the feed and commentary has been great. I've been impressed.
• Politics: Aarugghh! I think I'm burnt out on politics and am going to make a deliberate effort to not get riled up anymore by the constant stream of commentary, opinion, polls, debate. In the end, I think we get the government we deserve. I get most frustrated that the people who are greatest affected by economic downturn and national fear-mongering are the ones who also tend to be the most apathetic or ignorant (or reactionary) when it comes to electing leaders. I tend to vote progressively (now that "liberal" is a bad word, one has to use the word "progressive") because of my conscience and religious beliefs, but frankly, as a well-educated, high-earning, white guy, when things don't go the way I hope, it just ends up being better for me (economically, anyway). My hope is that come November, things will be looking worse for me but better for most of the country.
• I hope to start running again this weekend. It's been 6 weeks tomorrow since I've ran - the longest break from running I've had in the last 5+ years. My weight has gone up, my attitude towards exercising has gotten worse, and it's time to reverse this trend.
• I met the cops at the clinic last night. The alarm had tripped. I'm still not sure what happened, but we made a quick walk-through the building, and things seemed ok. My hunch is, that if someone did get inside (probably from an improperly closed patio door), they ran out as soon as the alarm went off. Or it was simply a false alarm, but that really doesn't seem to happen. I had the alarm set once on me by janitors who were leaving and didn't know I was in my office (and I guess I had music on or something and didn't realize the alarm was set). As soon as I stepped into the hallway (there are motion detectors throughout the office) the alarm went off. It is LOUD, and scared the crap out of me. It's nice that the new police station was built 1.5 miles from our office, on the same street. When I got to the office there were two police cruisers there and two officers who went around with me.
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Hot Hot Hot

I thought I'd try it in Spanish "Hace calor" (if that's even right), but I couldn't figure out how, in this blog template, to make the upside-down exclamation point at the beginning, so instead the title got changed to the boring English "Hot Hot Hot".

We've had record-breaking heat here in the valley. We'd had a camping trip to the mountains planned for this weekend, but given the heat, bagged it for the coast instead. Good move, the weather was perfect at the beach!

A short (arguably even at that too long) video shows a brief portion of our fun on the coast this weekend. I spent a great deal of time in the water (in a rented wetsuit - hot or not, it's still Oregon) and technically surfed (rented board) but realistically, I managed to stand up for about 2 seconds maximum. Tiring stuff.

In other news - Google street view has hit McMinnville (it looks like they did last Fall). Check out Google maps and then click on "Street View" if you live in an area that's been filmed. Crazy technology!
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Drug Lunches

I guess the sales pitches paid off today, I wrote scripts for both Skelaxin AND Avinza after they bought us lunch. Coincidence? I don't know. The female drug rep made lots of conversation today about triathlons (she'd cheered me on (her husband was also running) during the Boise Ironman 70.3 in June) and the male drug rep spoke a lot to another nameless doctor at our office who attended the same college this nameless doctor's child is currently attending. Fun, light-hearted shared interest conversation or crafty salesmanship? Who knows? Less luck for Micardis / Spiriva who brought coffee and bagels this morning - no scripts for either of those for a long time. The Micardis rep is that annoying rep who absolutely cannot make eye contact - it's very disconcerting.

The pharmaceutical representatives ("Drug Reps") bring coffee and breakfast to our office every morning and lunch every afternoon (with a few unfilled spots occasionally). The lavishing of gifts by these salespeople has actually dropped way down from the heyday when I was treated to a guided fly fishing expedition on a local river, overnight stays at Timberline with ski lessons, and luxury box seats at the Rose Garden for Blazers Basketball. (The latter was particularly memorable as it was my first and only Blazer game, and the night we learned the Hillary Clinton was elected to her first NY Senate seat while no one could figure out whether Bush or Gore was going to win the presidency. Everyone was watching the TV's in the box showing the news and ignoring the Blazer game down below).

Nowadays we get the free food, and trinkets, but no more of the big-ticket items. I'm ok with that (who wouldn't be with free food), but it does bother me that they've taken all the doctor perk money and dumped it into prime-time commercials. How about just making the drugs cheaper?

The "new pharma guidelines" are now calling for a stop to the little physician trinkets: pens, reflex hammers, post-it notes. So the days of Vyvanse and Flomax sticky notes are fast coming to an end. I expect the food won't be far behind - and it will be back to instant oatmeal, sardines, and almonds from my office stash of food.

It's an interesting aspect of my working life, walking into the sales pitches twice a day. You learn to recognize (and call the reps on it) the "closes", such as "Can you think of a reason why you wouldn't prescribe _____?" or the blatant "Will you promise to use _____?" Occasionally we'll get a plead about their "numbers" being down, and how just a few scripts would really help them out. There are manager ride-along days, where the reps have their bosses with them and have to "use the glossies" as we say (pull out all the printed sales materials) and really hit their points and throw out their closing statements. We allow it when the managers are there, usually play along ("Yes, I remember you telling me BARBARA about the benefits of Levaquin last time you were here, and you're right, I have noticed that the side effect profile really IS comparable to placebo in the multiple patients of mine who've benefited from all the extraordinary characteristics that make Levaquin my first choice in quinolone antibiotics!")

Reps actually have it pretty hard these days. There are constant lay-offs, and no one is sure that they'll have a job the next day. We try to be sympathetic at our office and let the salespeople do their thing. Doctors refuse to acknowledge that the sales pitches have any effect on their prescribing habits, but I'm sure we wouldn't keep seeing reps if that were the case. Still, although I have my favorites in each class of medicine, I really do try to preach that drugs are not the answer to every problem, and use the cheap, generics whenever possible. I'm sure the food and the feigned interest "How're things going Dr. Schieber? Are you training hard these days?" exerts some effect, though.

We kill the messenger a lot. The reps often get an ear full about drug prices, or all the TV advertising - things that they don't have a lot of control over. One drug rep made a comment about "enjoy the food, because if the Democrats get elected we'll all be out of a job". Not a smooth move when the three biggest liberal prescribers (including me) happened to be the ones going through the line. It's much more likely that we WON'T prescribe a drug because we don't like a certain sales rep, than we WILL if we do like them. Lesson: politics and sales don't mix unless you're damn sure you know what side of the political fence you're selling to. Overall it's kind of a symbiotic relationship that keeps the good looking college grads in fancy clothes and company cars, and keeps us and our staff fed. Remember that the next time you're paying $85 dollars for your migraine medicine.

Other news:

• HOT HOT HOT. It's supposed to hit over 100 degrees tomorrow. Yikes!
• Dad (Rich Schieber) had surgery to his hand to screw down the bone pieces. Not fun! He had a lot of pain initially (you think? screws into bone), but was doing better on POD (post-op day) #2, when I went over and hung out to see how he was and watch the Olympics with he and mom.
• I've semi-committed to the Mississippi Blues Marathon (January 3, 2009), since I didn't get to run Portland (busted toe). I'm planning to start running in about two weeks (that'll be 6 weeks out from my fracture), and got my training plan typed out onto my calendar yesterday.
• We're lovin' our laundry line, but it sure makes the clothes stiff.
• A good friend came back from Czecheslov....Czeckeslovakia.....overseas, and stopped by today, that was cool!
• I haven't been studying my Spanish nearly enough (read: not at all)
• I had to pull a small "Hey you kids, get off my lawn" last night to a group of skateboarders using our cement ramp by the back door and our (overturned) picnic bench as their own personal skate park. I told them they could "use the concrete, but leave the furniture where it is".

Bits of News

• It's been fun watching the Olympics. Swimming, gymnastics, volleyball (regular and beach), water polo, cycling, fencing - when else can you see all these sports? Since I don't follow any professional or college sports teams, I almost never watch sports, and it's fun to indulge in these interesting sports during the two weeks of Olympics. I'm most looking forwards to the triathlon and the 10K swimming events, but I've enjoyed watching pretty much everything broadcast. Even the on-line stuff is cool (handball, equestrian), NBC put together a nice web site. Of course, being the idiots that we are, I called to downgrade our cable service to the very basic channels about two weeks ago - Duh!
• We went to the museum today (Air & Space here in town) and saw an IMAX film in 3-D (Sea Monsters). It was good!
• I had another x-ray done of my toe, and it's healing up nicely. I'm about two weeks out from starting to run again, but I've been picking up more and more time on the bike, and will get back into the pool probably this week.
• Dad is going to end up having surgery on his hand (poor guy), that is scheduled later this week. He's going to have some pins put into the bones.
• I've been trying to incorporate some daily Spanish lessons into my life. I've been using a Podcast called Coffee Break Spanish (a very fun podcast with a Scottish couple teaching Spanish, great accents) and our Rosetta Stone computer program. It's proceeding exceptionally slowly. My desire to speak Spanish seems to greatly outweigh the effort I put into it.
• In case anyone was wondering on the "guess the photos" from two previous posts: iPod, $20 dollar bill, iPhone "button", back side of a credit card ("3" embossed in the hologram part), top of a blueberry, and a peacock feather.
  

Insomnia

Can't sleep, will post.

There was a time in my life where I was pretty dedicated about recording, journaling, my day to day events. I decided to dig out those old journals and look them over.

20 years ago today I was in Hawaii. I was beginning my Senior year in college with my first real international experience - Biology in South India (the title of the course). Another student of the 10 of us taking the course and I decided we were going to leave a couple weeks early and see some of the world before we ended up in India for our class. So Cara and I set off towards India, but did so via: Hawaii - Tokyo - Seoul - Taiwan - Hong Kong - Singapore - Madras (now Chennai).

I found my old journal of the trip, and 8/8/88 found me waking up after my first night of the trip, in Hawaii. That was 20 years ago - Wow. My journal reads:


Monday, August 8th. Slept on this air mattress thing. Semi-quasi comfortable. But wait, before we go any further - today is 8-8-88. Pretty cool huh? I don't know exactly when I got up. Anita left about 6:15. I got up about 6:30, watched TV a while, the phone rang about 6:45. It was one of Iina's friends from Sweden. I didn't understand her the 1st time and I thought the call was a wrong number. So Tina's call got everyone else up. Cara, Tina and I talked a while then Tina went back to bed while Cara and I wolfed down some plain-wrap raisin bran. Then about 7:30 we left for the beach. It was cloudy at first. We spent the 1st 45 minutes just playing in the water. There weren't a lot of people out. We were right on Waikiki beach in front of the Royal Hawaiin Hotel. Unbelievable !!! Then Cara laid out while I went snorkeling with stuff from Anita's apt. There are "reefs" right in the water. I saw a lot of beautiful, fluorescent tropical fish, some anemonies, and even found a dollar bill. Then I played in the water some more, laid out. Back in water snorkeling again. Then went back to the apt and got 3 bucks and some stuff for Cara. I rented a surfboard. It was real big and heavy. Spent the 1st 40 min trying to get just even one wave, didn't. Finally, when my arms were exhausted from paddling around, I caught a wave and stood right up. It's easy 'cause the boards are so big. It was great, but I was tired so I came in after an hour. Eventually Cara and I came back here for lunch - raisin bran. We went back to the beach afterwards but didn't stay as long because it was really hot and we were fried. I did a little snorkeling! Back here we watched Dragnet on VCR and goofed off till dinner. Anita and Tina made this super good homemade pizza. I can't believe how gracious Anita is being through all this!!! She's great! Then Cara and I went shopping. We bought postcards. She bought Gecko shorts and shirts, I bought one Gecko shirt. Everything here is gecko, it hilarious. Then we walked around the international market a bit and came back here. This place is incredible. I still can't believe what all we're doing. We both got fried today, Cara has some pretty bad tan (burn) lines and my face is beet red. This is the life, Hawaii, the beach, and sharing an apartment with three gorgeous girls (Cara, Anita, Tina). My eyes are real heavy and it's only 10:00. I wonder if I've adjusted to the time? We walked through the Hilton also, very nice. I called NW Airlines and Eric also today. An absolutely incredible day!!!!

It was an eventful year. That trip to India gave my life a sort of about-face, and I returned to school with a new ambition (my senior year, no less) to become a doctor.

Two years later I was ending my summer as a part-time EMT and a full-time banquet waiter at one of the "resort" hotels in Sandusky, OH. I was getting ready to move to Toledo to begin medical school later that month. The closest date in my journaling I could find was from August 4th, 1990:

Got home from work about 7:30, ate, and decided to take a nap. I got woken up (of course) by Dottie, asking if I could come work. Ok, I said. Around 1000 I drove to the mall. I ordered blinds at Sears, found a better deal at K-Mart and came back and canceled my order. Then I bought a pretty cool answering machine (except it's a GE, boooo) at BEST for 40 bucks even. Came home and it took 30 minutes to get here from the causeway because Cedar Point was totally crowded. Mary and her family (from 4-County) came over along with her sister and brother-in-law who's an orthopedic surgeon just out. We talked, it was kinda interesting. Then I went to work. We had a group of doctors at an hors d'oeuvre party. It was pretty fun. Good food (including mozzarella sticks. There was even a clown who made balloon animals. Also put up tables in Halyards. Took some stuff (medical) from the drug reps and came home. It rained all day (mostly) today.

It's crazy looking at these journals from 20 years ago. That was half my life ago!

Picture Fun

I think I saw something like this last in my 3rd grade "World" magazine, but nonetheless, here it is. I got the dissecting microscope out today, and took pictures of stuff around the house with it. Can you guess what each of these pictures is?






Ooooh, next week we'll have a picture with OTHER hidden pictures in it. (I'm regressing to Highlights Magazine)

Random News

• Blueberries! Oregon blueberries are the best (in your face - Michigan) and we are eating and freezing them by the bushel. I'm feeling a little like this girl.
  
• Friends are here from Ohio, which is always fun.
• Toe News: the toe break is feeling ok. I haven't checked another x-ray yet, but I hope to this weekend. I've been doing some limited biking, and went to physical therapy twice to get some instruction on getting some upper body strength.
• We had another injury at the Antibody softball game last week. We're dropping like flies.
• No call this week, Yay!!
• Downloaded Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog. It's awesome, and totally worth the $4-5 bucks from iTunes.

I'll try to keep these short for easy reading, so that's all for now.

Sharing and Privacy

The internet is such a mixed blessing. Overall, I enjoy the openness of communication, and randomly keeping up with the various tidbits, exciting or mundane, of my friends and relatives. The open posting of life details, videos, pictures, is a remarkable way to do this.

However, this high level of access also comes with some risks. I tend to view them as minimal. My life is too boring to have scathing details that risk public exposure, I doubt a posting will come back to haunt me as I run for office in ten years (because that's just not going to happen) and I'm a little too old for cyberbullying.

Still, details of friends, family, children are a gray area and I have to respect those who feel that that is not information that should be available, however obscure and trivial, to a wider audience. So for better or for worse, the blog will transition to be mostly about the details of my own life.

I've removed previous posts that potentially intruded upon the specifics of the lives of others (unless given permission to share those details - like my Dad's hand fracture).

Writing / journaling is a cathartic, satisfying process, which is part of why I do it. I have a definite genetic predisposition to it, I'm sure (thanks Dad). Sharing the details of day to day living on an open forum like this is not so much an exercise in narcissism as an urge to share my thoughts and experiences with others, and a reciprocity to those other individuals and families whose posts, photos, stories, and other online communications I enjoy.

I won't belabor the point beyond this particular entry, but I thought a post of explanation was in order.