Some Catblogging for You

Cats, cats, cats. Seems like it's impossible to live on a farm and not have a billion of them. At my parents' place they already have three house cats (one of them being mine, but my current housemates aren't too keen on letting him live with me so he stays at home for now) and a few outside barn cats. Of course with the passing of summer there were a few new additions to the Gebhardt family farm cat family.

We had a litter of three kittens at the beginning of the summer--Bob, Monster, and Batman. Unfortunately Bob didn't make it. He got really sick and didn't pull through. Monster made it through ok, but now she's wild and you can't catch her, which is what usually happens to most of the kittens we try to raise as outside only cats. Batman, however, is friendly as all get out. When I go out to the barns, he's always just hanging out and will come up to you looking for attention. It's great having a friendly outside cat again.

About a week ago, my mom heard a kitten meowing from the loft of one of our hog sheds and found a small, orange kitten abandoned by his mother. The poor little guy wouldn't have made it if my mom hadn't found him. When she found him, she put him in with the mother of the first litter and the mom took to nursing him and caring for him. On top of that, my mom and I love to bring Robin (the name we gave him) in the house and play with him. Kittens are so much fun. I just don't understand those people that hate them. Anyhow, here's a couple of pictures of the little guys. The first is Batman posing for the camera and the second is Robin chilling on the floor.

Henry Rollins

Last Friday I finally had one of my lifelong goals fulfilled.  I’m sure many of you will scoff at it, but I really don’t care.  Anyhow, for years I’ve come to really admire Henry Rollins, his work ethic, his music, his spoken word, and his commitment to what he believes in.  I’ve always wanted to see him speak live, but before Friday I’d never had the chance.  That all changed as my brother, Randy, scored us front row seats for his performance at Stephens Auditorium at the Iowa State University campus.

Henry Rollins is an interesting person in that I originally got into him for his music with Rollins Band, specifically over the song “Liar” which I must have played a billion times when it first came out.  Later on I listened to more of the Rollins Band discography before exploring Henry’s first band, Black Flag, another band I grew to appreciate.  Then I found out that Rollins was doing spoken word and, frankly, I thought it would be good for a laugh because the idea of a heavy metal band’s frontman doing spoken word is inherently funny.  Seriously, could you imagine Rob Flynn or Phil Anselmo or any of the hundreds of heavy metal singers doing a successful spoken word stint?  I sure can’t.

Oddly, when I downloaded a couple of mp3’s of Rollins’ spoken word, I was indeed chuckling, but I was laughing because he was honestly one funny guy and to top it off he was funny because what he was saying was so pointed, absurd, and crazy, yet it was true.  His diatribes against the government, politics in general, apathy, and the downfalls of western civilization are a wonder to behold.  He can make a poignant political point while simultaneously making you laugh.  There’s not too many people nowadays that can do that with any regularity outside of John Stewart.

Beyond his views on the world, the various stories of his life experience are amazing.  Sure, he spends a good portion of every performance pointing out how much his life isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, but after hearing about his experiences and his commitment to exploring all the areas of this world, while trying to learn as much as he possibly can, you can’t help but be a little jealous.

Just listening to his experiences with the USO, which was one of the main focuses of his talk at ISU, made me want to go out and do something to make our soldiers’ lives better.  For proclaiming to be nothing more than an old, jaded, burnout Mr. Rollins sure has a knack for being able to get people fired up for causes.  

After his two hours of conversational storytelling, I was both saddened and ecstatic at the same time.  I finally managed to see one of my personal idols… but I wanted more.  Who would have known that the lead singer of an underappreciated duo of metal bands would turn out to be such an amazing speaker.  Buy one of his cds and give it a listen.  I don’t think you’ll be too disappointed.  I sure wasn’t.

Everyone Get on the Train

Can you see what's wrong with this sign? Take a good close look at the first word... now you see it--Pedestrain. My brother pointed this sign out to me down in Ames, Iowa this last weekend. It's on the pathway from the Fredrickson apartments to the ISU campus. What's really ironic is the exact same sign is on the other end of the walkway, but pedestrian is spelled correctly.

Thinking about it, during some of the peak travel times between classes and such, it might seem like a train of pedestrians was pouring through the walkway that this sign is by, which just happens to be a tunnel under train tracks.

Fitness Extravaganza - Day Three and Four

Day Three
Today wasn't too good when it came to either exercising or eating. Didn't get much of a chance to exercise since I was down in Ames and I just didn't care about what I ate... so yeah.

Food intake:
--Four slices of potato bread (plain)
--Some scrambled eggs
--Small bowl of ice cream
--Half a frozen thin crust sausage pizza
--Chocolate chip cookie
--Two cans of Mellow Yellow
--One Diet Coke

Exercise:
--Walked a couple of miles examining the throngs of humanity at the Iowa / Iowa State game.

Day Four
Today was a little better for exercise, but not so great for eating. It also didn't help that I ate that steak at lunch and tried to run later. Tummy felt like it had a rock in it.

Food intake:
--Cinnamon roll
--14 oz. sirloin steak
--French fries
--Coffee flavored Kit Kat
--Bowl of Spaghetti-O's
--Two Diet Cokes
--One Donkey Kick no-calorie energy drink

Exercise:
--2 mile run
--Bench press, 3 sets of 10 at 180 lbs
--Shoulder press, 3 sets of 10 with 40 lb dumbbells

Who Does This???

There is just something a little bit unsettling about this.  Take about a, say, 14 minute break from reading this and listen to the almighty Troy’s Mixtape of Love.  

I don’t know what I’m more sad and disturbed over—the fact that this guy could get a girl to actually date him for six months, or the fact that he would do something like this.  Who makes a 14 minute audio recording that consists mostly of saying “I love you so much”, “You’re perfect”, “These six months ruled”, permutations of those two sentiments, and crappy singing?  For crap’s sake, go talk to her and take her out to dinner or something.  This is just sad.  No wonder she broke up with him a few days afterwards. He comes off like an odd mash-up of a drunk college freshman, a fifth grader who eats glue, and a crazy emo kid.

If this guy can get a girl to date him, anyone else on this planet should not have a hard time getting dates. Seriously, this is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever heard.  Personally, I’m one of those mushy, emotional, cutesy guys when it comes to romantic things (yeah, hard to believe sometimes, I know), but not even I would think of doing something this crazy. Maybe recording something for a girl, but I don’t think I’d make it 14 minutes of rambling.

This guys is one piece of work.  The end.

Fitness Extravaganze - Day Two

I can tell you already that yesterday's diet wasn't very satisfactory. What's also really interesting to me is that my day one post generated a good little set of comments as soon as I posted it. Apparently my diet is WAY more interesting than anything else I talk about here. As for exercise I really didn't get a chance to do any since right after golfing I had to drive to Ames to see Henry Rollins. I'm sure today won't be any better in the exercise department.

Food intake:
--One Kwik Trip breakfast sandwich
--One can Spaghetti-O's (I'm loving 'em)
--One Toll House Brownie candy bar
--One McD's chicken sandwich
--One McD's double cheeseburger
--One McD's medium frie
--One Diet Coke
--One Monster Energy Drink
--Four cups of coffee

Exercise:
--Nine holes of golf (walking)

Fitness Extravaganza - Day One

Lately I’ve been feeling quite out of shape. When I get stressed and busy, my eating habits are one of the first things to hit the toilet. I also don’t get as much time to exercise, which sucks because not only do I like exercising to keep in shape, but it is also a good stress reliever. As I went out for a couple of runs this week, I noticed that I was lugging a few extra pounds around and that I was having a harder time getting through my regular course as compared to usual.

No doubt this is because last week I was in Iowa on business all week and then in Wisconsin on vacation, so I had very little time to exercise and since it was vacation on the weekend, I really didn’t watch what I ate.

Since one of the things I really want to do right now is get back into better shape I am setting a goal for myself—to successfully get down to 175 lbs. while still maintaining a solid muscle base. In order to help motivate myself, I am going to keep track of what I eat and how much I exercise right here for you all to see. That way when I’m eyeing up those Oreos and candy bars, I’ll remember that I’ll be listing them as food that I ate for all to see, and I don’t want to make it look like my eating habits are too utterly terrible, although I realize they are.

So with that said, here is DAY ONE in my fitness extravaganza!

Yesterday’s food intake:
--One can of Spaghetti-O’s
--A medium sized bag of Sun Chips
--A Twix bar
--Three egg rolls
--One "everything" bagel from Panera
--Four cups of coffee
--Two Diet Cokes

My exercise for the day:
--One game of office worldball
--Three mile run

Weight: 185 lbs.

A Monster Deal

I like deals. I often shop clearance racks, not because I'm just a cheap ass, but because there are often some good deals to be found there. I also like to only buy things when they're on sale. It's just in my nature to save money. Knowing that, I made one hell of a purchase at Kwik Trip today.

On our daily afternoon walk from work to Kwik Trip, I saw they had Monster Energy Drink on sale for $1.50 a can instead of $2.19. Considering that one Monster is like a double Red Bull, which usually costs about $2 or so, this sounded like one heck of a deal to me. So what do I do?

I buy an entire case.

That's right, I walk right up to the counter after unstacking part of their display in order to get down to the bottom to get at a fully sealed case. You might think I'm crazy, but I got one friggin' sweet deal on Monster and I'll be in energy drink heaven for a few weeks... as well as more hyper than a squirrel on crack. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go seize on the floor and foam at the mouth for a few minutes.

Vacation Envy

Last week was a tremendously busy week at work and after work.  I had our championship softball game last Monday, which we unfortunately lost, but we kind of deserved to since we utterly choked.  After that I was in Iowa for work, training in clients on one of our software packages.  Each of those days were so long, but not as long as I thought they would be.  Actually, I’m kind of glad there were since there really isn’t too much to do in Clear Lake, Iowa.

Thursday night and Friday I was in Ames working at our Ames office before heading to Des Moines for an Iowa Cubs game.  Then the next morning my brother and I drove to the Wisconsin Dells to meet up with the rest of the family.  The vacation was a good time to relax and I really needed it.

While in the Dells we did the traditional mini golfing and browsing of the downtown shops.  The rest of the time we mostly spent just relaxing and hanging out by the bon fire at the campground, which was just fine by me since the previous week had been plenty hectic.

There’s one thing about vacationing, especially walking around downtown, that always seems to make me feel a little bittersweet—couples on vacation.  Any vacation spot you go you’re going to see couples vacationing and whenever I do I simultaneously think, “It’s so nice to see couples on vacation, having a wonderful time,” and “Dammit, why can’t that be me?”

You see in my 24 plus years of existence on this planet I have yet to take a vacation solely with a significant other.  I’ve always wanted to, and I’ve tried to make it work in the past, even taking on the burden of planning trips and/or offering to completely pay for them, but for some reason or another it never works out.

Sure, I’ve had significant others come on vacation with me and my family, but it’s never been just me and someone I was dating on vacation or taking a trip of any sort, and at times I feel like I’m really missing out on something.  When I see those couples, especially the ones my age or younger, I just want to be them.  I want to be carefree, smiling, and living the vacation life with someone close to me.

Not to knock my family or the friends I’ve vacationed with because I always enjoy it, I just wish that I could take a vacation with a significant other sometime.  I simply want someone to share those experiences with, in a capacity that my family or friends cannot fill.  I’m sure, or at least I’m hopeful, that I’ll eventually have countless vacations with a significant other or spouse that will fill my brain with so many wonderful memories, but that doesn’t help how I feel when I vacation right now.

To make things even more interesting, I have 30 some vacation days to use up in the next year or so, but I really don’t know how to spend them.  I don’t want to vacation alone.  My family will only get to take about a week off next year for vacation just like every year since they both have two jobs each.  Most of my co-workers are married and go on vacation with their families.  Many of my friends don’t have nearly as much vacation time to use or don’t have any at all.  Other friends are still in college.  

All I want is someone special to travel with to make those vacation days seem worthwhile.  I don’t want to end up spending them uselessly to just have days where I can be lazy.  I want them to be meaningful and I want to have someone to share my experiences with.  I suppose a little more than a year is a long time, so I can just keep hopeful that things will work out.  If not, at least I know I can be really, really lazy for about six weeks straight!

Conversationalist Wannabes

Over time I’ve come to find out that there are certain types of people that are just impossible to have a conversation with.  Of course someone is going to say that if you are sociable enough that you can manage to find a way to carry on a conversation with anyone, you just have to know how to do it, but I will disagree with that person, and quite vehemently.

At work, a couple of the people that we do business with will take the time to socialize with us, which is always a good thing.  I’d rather work with someone that I know and can converse with than work with someone who is only completely concerned with business matters.

The odd thing about these couple of people is that they will talk to you, talk your ear off even, but they will be as far away from holding a conversation as if they simply weren’t speaking to you.  There is a definite difference between people that talk just for talking sake and those who actually allow participation in a conversation.

As I was talking to these people, it became quickly apparent that they had no desire whatsoever for me to be an active participant in what they were talking about.  As I would try to interject my own thoughts or make an addition to something they said, I’d be met with a look that screamed out, “excuse me, I am talking and you are listening and I did not say that could change.”

Fine, I could deal with that.  I find that I can quite easily pick out when people aren’t actually interested in talking to me, at which point I let them go on and on while I simply ignore them.  What was interesting this time, other than the fact that I didn’t have the option of ignoring them or leaving, is that these two people seemed to be in heavy conversation with each other but, in fact, neither of them were actually participating in a mutual conversation—they were just taking turns talking.

At this point I was drawn back into the conversation, not because I wanted to participate, or attempt to participate, but because I was intrigued by how both of them could be so seemingly engrossed in each other’s words, yet they simply weren’t paying attention.

They would go on and on telling stories about themselves, but it seemed more like a chess match.  One would talk about him/herself for a bit, then there would be a pause at which point the other would tell a story about him/herself.  Then there would be a pause so the original speaker would continue his/her story, then pause, and the other would continue his/her story.  This happened the entire time I was with them.  

Amazingly, I don’t think they ever once actually related to each other.  They may have used each other’s stories for springboards to start their own stories, but that was as close to actual interaction as they’d get.

Amazingly, there are altogether too many people that I’ve met in the corporate business world that operate in this manner.  It seems almost like a prerequisite for becoming successful in the business world—that you can no longer hold actual conversations, but instead can only talk about yourself over and over again.  Talk about soulless and boring.