Life is a Roller Coaster

Ups and downs. Peaks and valleys. Good and bad. That's life. Its like a roller coaster ride. Come ride with me:

Adoption Update: "WAIT TIME FROM LID TO REFERRAL - The current waiting time from log in date until referral is 24 months. We fully expect the wait time from log in date to referral to grow over 2 years in 2008 and continue to climb over time to possibly 4 years." This is the update we received from our adoption agency today. They visited with the Chinese Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA) recently and asked about the ever-increasing wait time from the moment the CCAA receives an approved family's dossier to the time they give a referral for a child. They said it is entirely possible for the wait time to be as long as four years!!! They claim that they receive over 1000 dossiers per month but can only process 600 per month. They went on to say that in April (two months before they received our dossier) the CCAA received 4000 dossiers. Four years, huh?

Missouri Tigers: Unless you live under a rock, you already know that Mizzou's football team is ranked #1 in the country. A win tomorrow night in the Big XII Championship will guarantee that the Tigers will play for the National Championship. Unbelievable. After being a Mizzou fan through the absolute worst of times, I am finally witnessing the very best of times. Talk about roller coasters!

My Mom: Mom has completed all of her scheduled radiation and chemotherapy treatments. She is feeling pretty good (all things considered). She is scheduled for follow-up CT scans and MRI's in mid December. We will find out then if the tumors are gone or if she will require more treatments. Keep her in your thoughts, please. Send her some positive vibes.

Brother Blake: Blake and Meredith just bought a house in Baltimore, Maryland. The week before closing, the mortgage company informed them that they needed a second inspection before they would approve the loan. Then, the day before closing, the same company insisted that Blake and Mer needed to cough up over $3,000 to cover taxes, etc that they never mentioned previously. Then, on closing day the movers showed up several hours late, forcing Blake and Mer to rent a U-Haul and finish the job themselves in order to be out of their old place in time for the new tenants to move in. The best part: The mortgage company misspelled "mortgage" in every appearance of the word in their contracts. Wow.

Alexander the Great: Tonight will be the official beginning to Alex's basketball career. His first practice will be held at his school's gym/lunch room. His mother and his aunt should be able to teach him how to throw elbows and get hit with technical fouls. I think he may be a power forward with his height advantage over his fellow players.

Joliet Jake Blues: Our four-legged son Jake has been "coughing" a lot lately so I took him to the vet Monday. She diagnosed him as having Congestive Heart Failure. He has fluid around his heart and possibly more in his lungs. I listened with a stethoscope to the heart murmur and labored breathing. It was painfully obvious. The doctor gave him Lasix to rid him of the excess fluid and another medicine to make him comfortable. She said he should be in intensive care were it not for the fact that at nearly 13 years of age, there is very little they can do for him that we can't. We are continuing his medications and were told to make sure he stays calm and relaxed to minimize the stress on his heart. (He sleeps 23 hours a day when he's healthy, so that won't be a problem.) With his dementia, bladder control issues, partial blindness and deafness, stiff joints, and failing heart, Ol' Jake may not have much longer to be with us. So if you come by the house sometime, be sure to tell the old guy "hello."

I used to hate roller coasters. But I learned that life is pretty boring on a straight track. I might as well sit back and enjoy the ride.

Ask and Ye Shall Receive

We're Number One

That's right. For the first time in my lifetime, the Missouri Tigers are the #1 football team in the country. The most beautiful sight my eyes have seen since my bride was in her wedding gown was the image of KU's quarterback Todd Reesing standing up after being sacked for a safety to end the Jayhawk's season. As he dejectedly walked off the field he had to endure the further embarrassment of trying to remove the three pounds of turf embedded in his facemask when Lorenzo Williams planted him in the field. Beautiful.

That poster will be on my Christmas list.

Blog Daddy Goes Legit?

A blogger is a rogue columnist. He doesn't answer to an editor. He can write whatever he wants without worry of getting fired by a publisher trying to sell advertisements and newspapers. Bloggers are the "pirate radio" operators of the 21st century. I am a blogger through and through, but could I go "legit" and become a columnist?

I had thought about the prospect of writing for a paper for some time. The other day, I decided to go for it. I tweaked my resume, submitted some writing samples, and wrote a solid cover letter. I submitted these materials via a local newspaper publisher's email and prepared to hold my breath for a few days, weeks, or months to get a reply. I received a response within 12 hours.

On Sunday morning I received a reply from Bruce Wallace, the publisher of the Boone County Journal. He prasied my blog (I had sent him some links to a few of my favorite posts so he could review them as writing samples) and said he enjoyed reading it very much. He appreciated my interest in writing but declined to offer me a position at his paper due to having several columnists already. (He actually had six columnists when he bought the paper a few years ago, but has managed to reduce the number over the years.) Instead, he is focusing on reporting more actual "news." Imagine that- news in a newspaper. The funny thing is that Bruce actually asked if he could add a link to my blog to his newspaper's website. I told him I was flattered, but that my uncensored content probably would offend his readers from time to time, so I respectfully declined.

So now you know the story of how Blog Daddy almost went legit. "Whew! That was a close one!" Now where was I... oh yeah...Shit, Piss, Bitch, Ass, etc. Try to get away with writing that in a newspaper.

Making the World a Better Place

We've all talked the talk. We each have stated at least once since we were old enough to realize that we have a conscience that we want to make the world a better place. It is a noble goal. Most of us really do mean it when we are young and idealistic. How many of us, when we grow up, make a sincere effort to live out that ambitious goal? Do you? After watching Nobel Prize and Academy Award winner Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth", I asked the same question of myself. My answer was "I do."

I almost missed the most important message of Gore's film. It was embedded within the closing credits. Simple, one sentence thoughts on how to reduce one's carbon footprint, reduce pollution, and stop global warming were mixed in with the various film credits. I was proud to learn that our family already does many of the things mentioned. Here are a few:

1. Use a programable thermostat in your home. We set ours at 65 degrees in winter while we're at work and overnight and at 67 degrees when we're at home and awake. In summer, we have it set at 78 during the day while we're at work and 75 when we're home.

2. Use new, energy efficient appliances. We recently upgraded our refrigerator, stove, and washer & dryer. All operate way more effciently and we have already received an adjusted bill from our utility company that reduced our projected energy consumption based on the past few months usage.

3. Use less water. We did not water our lawn a single time during the long, hot, dry summer we just endured. Sure, the yard is half dead, but that just means less mowing which in turn means less gas burned in the mower which means less carbon dioxide emissions. We used so little water this summer that our lagoon completely dried up for the first time in the eight years we have lived in our house.

4. Recycle. Our family of three, which also feeds and supplies seven pets, usually places only one garbage bag on the curb every week. Often we wait an extra week to take the trash out because our garbage can is rarely ever full even after seven days. We recycle every plastic container that Columbia accepts (#1 & #2 plastics), and all glass bottles, aluminum cans, tin cans, paper, and cardboard that we use.

5. Use alternate fuels for vehicles. Bethany and I both drive vehicles that can use either gasoline or ethanol. As I have written before, E85 ethanol reduces carbon emissions slightly. More importantly, it is a completely renewable resource that is currently made from corn, but can be even more enviornmentaly friendly when made from bio-mass such as fast growing switchgrass, compost, sugar cane, and other yet to be developed technologies. In the near future, more of the trucks that haul ethanol to storage tanks and filling stations and the tractors that are used to grow the crops to make ethanol will be running on blends of bio-diesel made from renewable resources like soybeans and vegetable oil. This will make using e85 a very earth-friendly choice.

6. Teach the younger generation about ways to save the planet. Bethany and I have taught Alex about protecting the enviornment since he was old enough to listen. He has a profound love of nature and a desire to protect it. When he was four years old, Alex starred in a home movie in which he toured our woods talking about habitat protection and wildlife management. Conservation will be in the hands of the next generation soon. It is our responsiblity to teach the children well.

Have you ever told yourself or someone else that you want to make the world a better place? Have you ever thought about the legacy that our children will inherit? Are you willing to change the way you live in order to ensure that your grandchildren won't have to live in a world devoid of the natural wonders that we have enjoyed thus far in our lives? If so, take action now and do what you can to reverse the climate crisis. "Save the World!" You'll be a hero if you do. Especially in your children's eyes. What could matter more?

My Apologies, Coach Pinkel

First, let me just say, I am not a fairweather fan. I had Mizzou season tickets from 1990 thru 1994 when the Tigers managed to win just three games per year. I rejoiced when Larry Smith brought home our first winning season in fourteen years back in 1996. I have stuck by the team through a few "ups" and a lot of "downs."

Fast-forward to 2005. On this very blog I called for the firings of Mike Alden, Quin Snider, and Gary Pinkel. Snider and his staff had been implicated in multiple NCAA violations and couldn't manage to get into the Big Tournament. Pinkel had the Uber-talented Brad Smith, but couldn't manage to beat Kansas. And Mike Alden was the guy who hired both of these overrated coaches. He also raised ticket prices, ended all free-parking privileges at games, and banned kegs from tailgates. In short, I was disgusted with the whole athletic department.

Well, Alden made a wise choice to do-away with Quin in favor of the very highly respected Mike Anderson. He also stuck by Pinkel, who had an ace up his sleeve named Chase Daniel. Apparently as athletic as Brad Smith was, he was not a pure-passing quarterback. Unlike Daniel, he did not thrive in the "spread offense" formation that Pinkel is so fond of. It turns out, Pinkel had to change the way he ran his offense to accommodate the natural talents Smith had. It appeared that Pinkel's coaching strategy was to either let Smith run like crazy (which he was born to do) or else force him to be a drop-back, pocket passer (with miserable results.) I called for the coach to be removed, but really he was doing the best he could with the personnel he had.

Chase Daniel ran the identical style offense to Mizzou's while he was in high school. When he came to Columbia, he didn't have to learn a new system. He naturally fit into Pinkel's plan. And guess what- apparently Pinkel can coach. It helps to have a Heisman qualtity QB, but Brad Smith was mentioned in that category, too. The key is that with Daniel, Pinkel can be free to be himself. And he is showing the football world just how good he is at his job. He has recruited two of the best tight ends in football. His receivers are fantastic. His defense forced Colorado to go "three and out" on seven straight possessions and shut down Texas Tech's top rated offense. And now the Tigers are 8-1 with their only loss on the road to a top-ten Oklahoma. Mizzou is poised to square-off against arch-rival Kansas at Arrowhead Stadium on Thanksgiving weekend. The Jayhawks may be 11-0 and the Tigers 10-1 when they play. The winner will win the Big 12 North and go on to play Oklahoma for the conference championship. If Mizzou wins out, we will be 12-1, Big 12 Champs, and will have beaten two top 5 teams and three other ranked opponents. Depending on what Ohio State, LSU, and Oregon do the remainder of the season, The Missouri Tigers have a chance at playing for the National Championship.

So I wish to extend my heartfelt apologies to Gary Pinkel for being overly critical of him in the past. He is showing that he is an excellent coach and he is making it fun to be a Mizzou fan again. He also took a moment to help a friend of mine named Jim the other day. Jim's son had recently been kicked-off his high school football team for having a bad attitude despite being one of the best athletes on the team. As Pinkel was walking out of Jim's store, Jim's son was was walking in. Jim asked if the Coach would talk to the kid. With his trademark look of intensity and a twinkle in his eye he asked my friend, "Do you want me to yell at him?" Jim said to do whatever he wanted. Pinkel proceeded to give him the traditional coach's "rah-rah-rah, get your head out of your ass and be a team player" speech. He talked about supporting your teammates, listening to your coaches, and giving it your all. It seemed to make an impact on the kid. Here was Coach Pinkel preparing to leave town for the Colorado game during one of the most dramatic seasons in MU history and yet he still took the time to help straighten out the troubled son of a complete stranger. That says a lot about the man's character. Win or lose, Coach Pinkel has earned my respect.

Now if only we could get Mike Alden to lighten-up on tailgaters...