Journal

Words To Live By

Carpe Diem

Discontent is the penalty we pay for being ungrateful for what we have.

Watch you thoughts; they become words
Watch your words, they become actions.
Watch your actions; they become habits.
Watch your habits; they become character.
Watch your character; they become destiny.

Life is a grindstone. Whether it grinds you down or polishes you up depends on what you are made of.

Temper is what gets most of us into trouble. Pride is what keeps us there.

The good news is that we’re still present to hear the bad news.

Goals are dreams with deadlines.

Dwight Eisenhower use to demonstrate the art of leadership with a simple piece of string. He’d put it on the table and say, Pull it, and it will follow you anywhere you wish. Push it, and it will go nowhere at all.

Life is too short to drink bad wine.

Love, like everything else in life is a risk.

Never send a ferret to do a weasel’s job.

Life is what happens while you’re standing still.

For thou hadst come from a kingdom of beauty, Thy trees have thorns and thy bushes blooms, Thy beauty is in thine own soul.

The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between political parties, but right through every human heart.

You can’t think your way into better living, you have to live your way into better thinking.

Share your wisdom, not your prejudices.

On the plains of hesitation, lie the broken bones of men who on the brink of victory rested and rested died!

Philosophy is the self-serving rationalization of a weak mind, unable to deal with the unknown and not having the wherewithal to figure it out.

Success is a journey… not a destination!

It is better to burn out than to fade away.

Be you. Nobody else can be.

Sometimes it takes an old friend to remind you who you are… and someone who you just met to show you what you can be.

Victory is what happens when ten thousand hours of training meet up with one moment of opportunity.

You can’t set sail for new seas if you’re afraid to lose sight of the shore.

My candle burns at both ends it will not last the night but, ah my friends and oh my foes, it casts a lovely light.

You have to choose happiness; It doesn’t chose you.

Luck is the residue of preparation.

You were once wild here, don’t let them tame you. – Isadora Duncan

Someone, somewhere, sometime is gonna love you for who you are.

Its good to have friends in both heaven and hell –George Herbert

One spark can set hundreds on fire.

Sorrow looks down. Worry looks back. Faith looks up.

Not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted, counts.

Happiness is wanting what you have, not having what you want.

If you are not living on the edge, you’re taking too much room.

I am what I like about others.

That which you cannot give away, you do not possess. It possesses you.

You never lose by loving. You always lose by holding back.

You have to learn from the failures of others, you could not possibly live long enough to make them all yourself.

If you fail to try, you fail to succeed.

g’nothi s’auton – Know thy self- inscription on the wall of the temple at Delphi

Honey, I can upstage you with out even being on the stage.
–Tallulah Bankhead

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson

Show me a thoroughly satisfied man and I will show you a failure.
–Thomas Edison

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly: what is essential is invisible to the eye.
— Antoine de Saint-Exupery

The times might have changed, but people haven’t
— Carol Brady (Brady Bunch)

If you are not a part of the solution, you are part of the problem.
— JFK

Use the talents you possess, for the woods would be very silent if no birds sang except the best.
— Henry Van Dyke

If you were happy every day of your life, you wouldn’t be a human being. You’d be a game show host.
— from the movie Heathers

He who cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself.
— George Herbert

A man should never be ashamed to own he has been wrong, which is but saying in other words that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.
–Alexander Pope

Deal with the faults of others as gently as with your own.
–Henrichs

Late to Bed, Early to Rise; Work like Hell, and You’ll be Wise.
— Hyman G. Rickover, Father of the U.S. Nuclear Navy

Who you are speaks so loudly, I can’t hear what you’re saying.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you want to keep on getting what you’re getting, keep on doing what you’re doing.

When nothing is sure, everything is possible.
— Margret Drabble

I’m an idealist. I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m on my way.
— Carl Sandburg

Dream as if you’ll live forever, live as if you’ll die today.
— James Dean

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength
While loving someone deeply gives you courage
— Lao Tzu

When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
–Yogi Berra

We are not Human Beings having a spiritual experience. We are Spiritual Beings having a human experience.
— Dr. Wayne W. Dyer

When choosing between two evils, I always take the one I haven’t tried before.
— Mae West

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
–Thomas Edison

Always listen to the experts. They’ll tell you what can’t be done and why. Then do it.
— Robert Heinlein

If you build it, they will come.
— From the movie, Field of Dreams

There is no security on this earth, there is only opportunity.
— Gen. Douglas MacArthur

Do the thing you’re afraid to do and the death of fear is certain.
–Emerson

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.
— Oscar Wilde

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living; the world owes you nothing; it was here first.
— Mark Twain

Success is a matter of luck. Ask any failure.
–Earl Wilson

I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.
— Stephen Leacock

Continue ReadingWords To Live By

True Love

  • Post author:
  • Post category:Inspiration

by S. I. Kishor

This story originally published in a 1943 issue of Collier’s magazine. More on the story here at Snopes.com

John Blanchard stood up from the bench, straightened his Army uniform, and studied the crowd of people making their way through Grand Central Station.

He looked for the girl whose heart he knew, but whose face he didn’t, the girl with the rose.

His interest in her had begun thirteen months before in a Florida library. Taking a book off the shelf he found himself intrigued, not with the words of the book, but with the notes penciled in the margin.

The soft handwriting reflected a thoughtful soul and insightful mind. In the front of the book, he discovered the previous owner’s name Miss Hollis Maynell. With time and effort he located her address.

She now lived in New York City. He wrote her a letter introducing himself and inviting her to correspond. The next day he was shipped overseas for service in World War II.

During the next year and one month the two grew to know each other through the mail. Each letter was a seed falling on a fertile heart. A romance was budding. Blanchard requested a photograph, but she refused. She felt that if he really cared, it wouldn’t matter what she looked like.

When the day finally came for him to return from Europe, they scheduled their first meeting – 7:00 PM at the Grand Central Station in New York City.

"You’ll recognize me," she wrote, "by the red rose I’ll be wearing on my lapel."

So at 7:00 he was in the station looking for a girl whose heart he loved, but whose face he’d never seen.

I’ll let Mr. Blanchard tell you what happened:

"A young woman was coming toward me, her figure long and slim. Her blonde hair lay back in curls from her delicate ears; her eyes were blue as flowers. Her lips and chin had a gentle firmness, and in her pale green suit she was like springtime come alive."

"I started toward her, entirely forgetting to notice that she was not wearing a rose. As I moved, a small, provocative smile curved her lips, ‘Going my way, sailor’ she murmured."

"Almost uncontrollably I made one step closer to her, and then I saw Hollis Maynell."

"She was standing almost directly behind the girl. A woman well past 40, she had graying hair tucked under a worn hat. She was more than plump, her thick-ankled feet thrust into low-heeled shoes."

The girl in the green suit was walking quickly away. I felt as though I was split in two, so keen was my desire to follow her, and yet so deep was my longing for the woman whose spirit had truly companioned me and upheld my own."

"And there she stood. Her pale, plump face was gentle and sensible, her gray eyes had a warm and kindly twinkle. I did not hesitate. My fingers gripped the small worn blue leather copy of the book that was to identify me to her.

"This would not be love, but it would be something precious, something perhaps even better than love, a friendship for which I had been and must ever be grateful.

"I squared my shoulders and saluted and held out the book to the woman, even though while I spoke I felt choked by the bitterness of my disappointment.

"I’m Lieutenant John Blanchard, and you must be Miss Maynell. I am so glad you could meet me; may I take you to dinner?"

The woman’s face broadened into a tolerant smile.

"I don’t know what this is about, son," she answered, "but the young lady in the green suit who just went by, she begged me to wear this rose on my coat. And she said if you were to ask me out to dinner, I should go and tell you that she is waiting for you in the big restaurant across the street. She said it was some kind of test!"

It’s not difficult to understand and admire Miss Maynell’s wisdom. The true nature of a heart is seen in its response to the unattractive. "Tell me whom you love," Houssaye wrote, "And I will tell you who you are."

Continue ReadingTrue Love

My Chinese horoscope

Figuring out my Chinese horoscope.

Birthday/time: June 6th, 1968, 7:01 a.m.

Latitude and Longitude where I was born: West Des Moines, IA (US): 41n35, 93w43, Iowa.

Timezone: -6 GMT.

You are Red Sheep, born in the year of Brown Monkey. The first character in DAY represents you. So you are equivalent to Fire.

Lucky element: Water.

Luckiest decades – age 40-50, age 50-60, age 60-70

My Chinese Horoscope

Continue ReadingMy Chinese horoscope

Utilities turned on

On Saturday, the phone guy and the cable guy redid the lines to my new house. The cable’s working fine, but the phone still needs to be worked on–apparently at the central office. But I cleaned out the shed at the back of the house, and got some of the linoleum off the living room floor, and vacuumed and dusted the upstairs. I weeded some in the front of the house. Moved the TV and some small furniture, and a box of glassware. Sunday, I painted another coat on the dining room floor and moved some more stuff. Packed my CDs and liquor. Saw The Count of Monte Cristo on television, and decided that I’d paint a pattern on the floors. Don’t know what yet; I’ll do it after I move.

Continue ReadingUtilities turned on

sanding floors

On the homefront — I sanded Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It sucked. It was really hard and the sander I used didn’t do a very good job. I picked the square buffer-type sander because the drum sander is too big for me to control easily. The square sander is also really hard to control, and it isn’t as efficient: I went over the floors dozens of times and they didn’t get up all of the first layer of junk off the floor. So I gave up and decided to paint rather than stain. You can also see murphy bed in Boise here and buy it at a great price.

My reasoning is this: I need to preserve the wood now that I’ve sanded it, or the traffic will damage the wood. I need to do it quickly and cheaply, and hiring a pro to finish the sanding would take too long. Simply putting down a polyurethane isn’t good enough because the floors look like crap. So I’m painting with an oil-based polyurethane paint that will protect the floor for a year or two until I can hire a pro to sand it up and redo the floors. You can see the website if you need for flooring services.

I put the first coat on the foyer and part of the dining room last night. I take tonight off and pack, Wednesday I’ll spend with friends. Then Thursday, I’ll finish the dining room and put a second coat on the foyer. Saturday the cable guy and the phone guy are coming, and when they’re done, I’ll put another coat over all the floors.

Floor sanding & painting

Continue Readingsanding floors

Working On Floors

Rich came over Tuesday night and we finished ripping up the foyer and the entryway. Last night I went back over and removed more of the baseboards and ripped up some of the plywood that’s still around the edges of the room. I still need to get the baseboards in the living room and then try to work on the linoleum that’s still stuck down in there. Then I can start sanding!!! I might try to get the sander this evening just to have it in the house. I could potentially start on the dining room tomorrow morning.

I also put the legs on the dining table Paul gave me and set it up in the game room, which is going to be the dining room temporarily until I get the living room finished. I’m starting to feel more and more like the place is mine.

2165 N. Penn - House Projects

Continue ReadingWorking On Floors

Celebrity Tattoos

Cool: Celebrity Tattoos.

On Sunday I finished the ripping up the living room and most of the foyer, with Gary’s help. Good thing in the foyer; where the window was broken, all the plywood was rotten and molding. If I hadn’t decided to rip it up, it would have been a huge mold problem in the future. Fortunately, the floor underneath it is okay. Gary also brought me Paul’s dining room table; it will look great in the dining room. Cool, that’s one less thing I have to worry about buying off the bat.

The foyer is the wide plank flooring like the living room. There’s a small section where it would probably be a good thing if I replaced a couple of the planks. I hope to god I can find the planks to replace all these easily. Tonight I’ll go to the house and try to finish up ripping up the flooring. I also want to try to knock the plaster down off the ceiling this week before I begin to sand the floors, take down the outside edge strip of the drop ceiling, remove the ugly tacky baseboards they put in the living room and foyer and generally clean everything up.

Continue ReadingCelebrity Tattoos

living room work

Rich came over last night at helped me pull up the plywood floor in the living room…. discovered two things:

1) I’m definitely doing the right thing pulling up all the crap floor to get at the hard wood.

2) It might take longer than I thought.

The floor in the living room looks… right. It’s definitely the right choice to fix it an go with that floor. It is fire damaged. I’ll need to replace about 8 boards, with the help of experts from water damage restoration san diego as they repair all forms of home damage due to water or fire.If you want services, you could check here! And they will look like the historical period of the house! Awesome. It will not be that hard to do and I will have tremendous satisfaction from it. According to some guys in the neighborhood who had a fire in their living room too, I should go ahead with the sanding before the board replacement, because some of the boards I’m thinking need replace might be just fine when the top layer is sanded down.

The “longer than I thought” part… I will probably only be able to do the downstairs before I get moved in. Rich and I worked 4.5 hours and there’s still one corner of the living room I have to do. I might be able to get the foyer ripped up this weekend, and the extra room downstairs done this week, but I don’t know about upstairs. It depends on how easy/hard the linoleum is to get up.

Continue Readingliving room work

Don’t Leave the Baby Out in the Rain

  • Post author:
  • Post category:Dreams

I had a dream last night that I was babysitting for people I didn’t know, and I accidentally left the baby out in the rain. Then the parents came home, and said, hey, where’s the baby? And I went out and found it in the backyard. It was soaking wet, but in good shape. Although it was one gigantic fat baby. Not a toddler at all, but a big big kid. I was horrified that I’d forgotten him, until I started to wake up and realized that, thank god, it was only a dream. Now I’m worried that if I have a kid, I’ll leave it in the yard. Is that like throwing the baby out with the bathwater? I wonder.

Continue ReadingDon’t Leave the Baby Out in the Rain