Heaven is for Real

I finished reading the book "Heaven is for Real" yesterday. If you haven't heard of the book, here's a brief description:

Heaven Is for Real is the true story of the four-year old son of a small town Nebraska pastor who during emergency surgery slips from consciousness and enters heaven. He survives and begins talking about being able to look down and see the doctor operating and his dad praying in the waiting room. The family didn't know what to believe but soon the evidence was clear.

Of course, my Catholic upbringing taught me about heaven and purgatory and limbo and hell. I don't know...I'm not sure I ever was that convinced about it. But, the story of Colton will make you question your beliefs, while giving you hope of one day seeing your loved ones again. Personally,  I cannot wait to see Grandma Scherrman again, not to mention to finally meet my Grandpa Scherrman.

Today, I also learned that someone I was once very close to died. He was only 55. The obituary said simply that he died at home. I hate that. I understand that it is a private matter for the family. To anyone who knows the person who passed away, you are just left wondering what happened. A whole host of scenarios played out in my mind. Mostly I was wondering why I let 10 years pass without making an effort to reconnect with him. We parted ways for reasons that seem awfully insignificant now. I suppose the mundane dealings of ordinary life and our own self-righteousness got in our way.

Even though we had drifted apart, I'm saddened to hear of his passing. He was a unique spirit, full of life, and ready to share a laugh. We became friends after I moved back to Dubuque as an adult. He was a colorful soul in homogeneous Dubuque. As I reflect on our friendship, though, I sense there was a quiet sadness to him also. It makes me think of the Clown's Prayer, which I recall was read at Chris Farley's funeral (useless trivia, my mind is full of it):

As I stumble through this life,
help me to create more laughter than tears,
dispense more cheer than gloom,
spread more cheer than despair.

Never let me become so indifferent,
that I will fail to see the wonders in the eyes of a child,
or the twinkle in the eyes of the aged.

Never let me forget that my total effort is to cheer people,
make them happy, and forget momentarily,
all the unpleasantness in their lives.

And in my final moment,
may I hear You whisper:
"When you made My people smile,
you made Me smile."

Rest in Peace, Michael

A Geek at 50?

I have to take a minute to brag about myself, even at the risk of jinxing myself in my future PC troubleshooting endeavors. Over the course of the last four weeks, I have had to perform a series of tune-ups on my laptop for a variety of reasons. I am pretty darn proud to report that I managed to handle these on my own and (knock on wood) everything still seems to be working fine.

First issue was that I was lounging on the couch one night in my typical TV watching fashion with my laptop on my lap (duh). My Internet connection blanked out. This has periodically occurred before. My usual fix, go unplug the modem and wireless router and let it reset. I did that numerous times to no avail. Then I booted up my work laptop just to see if it was something specific to my laptop. Nope, it didn't connect either. My first troubleshooting effort was to unplug the wireless router and plug the modem directly into the laptop. Yes...that works, so obviously my router has crapped out. (Wow, so spoiled now. It really sucks having to be confined to one room with an Ethernet cable connecting you to your modem.) Off to Best Buy I go, where some helpful child (OK, young man -- but seriously he looked to be about 12) asked me a couple of questions and sold me a new router that I successfully installed and secured with only one slight glitch (that was really a result of some bad technical writing in the instructions and no issues on my part or the part of the hardware).

The next problem that cropped up was when I was trying to prepare my 50th birthday party playlist and wanted to get some new music from iTunes. I hadn't logged in to iTunes for months, so of course the first thing it told me was there was a new version of iTunes available to download. Did that, but then I couldn't actually get into the iTunes store. Grrrrr...totally annoying. After about an hour of googling this issue, I came across a YouTube video (again from someone who looked like a child) that explained how to downgrade to a prior version of iTunes. I successfully restored my previous version of iTunes thinking that would solve the problem. No! Dammit. I then determined it was my virus software preventing me from getting to iTunes. I was using the free software provided by the cable company. I guess you get what you pay for. I could see that it was blocking my outbound attempt but could not figure out how to override that. I bit the bullet and purchased some new virus software. When I first downloaded and installed it, however, for a brief moment of panic I thought I really effed things up because EVERYTHING disappeared from my desktop and I couldn't even get to the start button to reboot. Whew, after doing a hard shut-down, everything was restored.

Next issue occurred when I plugged my new Kindle into the laptop using a USB cable to charge it. The very next time I tried to go online, my laptop would lose Internet connectivity every five minutes. I couldn't even see the list of available networks. Again, I booted up my work laptop and that worked just fine. The laptop would "troubleshoot" and each time it would give the same message:

Specifically, it kept telling me that the Microsoft Virtual WiFi Mini Network Adapter was having driver problems. So annoying...having to reboot every five minutes. I kept going back to the fact that this happened after I had plugged the Kindle in. I spent the next week searching the web every night to figure out how to resolve the problem. Last night, I finally happened on a forum where someone described the same issue I was having. The person who posted the comment said that the Microsoft WiFi Network Adapter was designed to create a virtual network off your own laptop if you wanted to allow others to access the Internet through your device. Hmmmm, OK, the wifi feature was turned on when I plugged the Kindle in. The blogger noted that there was no way to remove the Microsoft WiFi Network, but he gave two commands to turn the thing off using Command Prompt. I followed those two lines of instructions to the letter and "voila" problem solved.

While doing all the research to resolve that annoying problem, I saw a fix for a long-standing problem I had with my Dell printer being incompatible with my HP laptop. Now that problem is also fixed!

Who needs Geek squad? The key to success is A LOT of patience and persistence. The answers are usually all out there. Of course, I'd much rather that everything just work perfectly without any human intervention on my part.

The Road to 50 is Well Traveled

I had a great birthday. I didn't think I could top my 40th birthday celebration in Jamaica. I mean, who wouldn't love 85 degrees, white sand beaches, clear blue sky, warm azure waters, fantastic sunsets, and all the Red Stripe you could want delivered right to your lounge chair on the beach in the first week of January. It was all for the pleasure of my mind.

As I approached my 50th birthday, I toyed with the idea of again jetting off to a Caribbean island and basking in the warm sunshine (with my SPF 30 of course) for a few days. It is clearly a sign of aging when what you really want to do on your birthday is be around family and friends.  

Turks & Caicos will have to wait for another day. I spent my actual birthday in Indiana, where we did a little gambling, had some cocktails, and enjoyed some wonderful meals. Note to all the smokers out there, you can still smoke in a bar or restaurant in Indiana.

My official birthday soiree was at the Black Horse Inn at the Sherrill Mount House. It is a gorgeous old inn from 1856 that has been painstakingly renovated into a lovely bed and breakfast with five guest rooms. The night started out pretty well. We were all proper having wine and appetizers.

We had a lovely dinner.

I got presents.

We played Catch Phrase.

My Carter was there. (Yes, he *is* wearing a Burberry sweater. He's stylish that way at age 4.)

We stayed respectable until the parents left.

Then...things might have started to go downhill; or, maybe uphill depending on your perspective. We made a trip to the local night club, "The Barn." Lots of cocktails, a few shots, and much dancing. There might even have been tears of joy! Suffice it to say, we were the life of the party in Sherrill that night.

Safely back at the Black Horse Inn, the die hard partiers kept it going a while longer.

Ummmm, yeah....I think that picture pretty much says it all. Time check....

Yep, that's 4:10 a.m. That was way, way, way past my normal bed time. There you have it, the perfect 50th birthday celebration. It would have been made only more perfect if all my family members could have been there. Of course, I cannot say that the day after the blowout was perfect. I was tres fatigue (two of the few French words I remember from Madame Hornsby's class my freshman year of college).  

40  -- 50 --  I'm already thinking of how I can top them at 60.

Shout out to my family and friends who made the night a great one. Love you all!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Go shawty, it's your birthday
We gonna party like it's your birthday
(Fifty cent)

And I'm sure you will agree
It couldn't fit more perfectly
Than to have a world party on the day you came to be

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
(Stevie Wonder)

Yes, people, I am now officially 50 years old. Technically it happened at 7:46 this morning, even though I started celebrating at 12:07 a.m.

I don't feel any different. Of course, it's 9:35 a.m., and I am still in bed. So, that seems to be helping A LOT! Maybe I should start every day like this....oh, plus the three pudding shots I just did by myself. Why not pudding shots for breakfast on your birthday.

Happy New Year!

It's 10:29 p.m. on New Year's Eve, and I've already been in bed for 30 minutes. Party on! That's me.

Part of the problem is that New Year's Eve 2010 was the coup de gras of all New Year's Eves (I'm not sure if I have properly pluralized that, but whatever...). Last year at this time, I was partying it up at the Grand Harbor in Dubuque at my niece's wedding. What a night! Never mind that it took me nearly two days to fully recover.

Me and nephew Ryan -- No idea what we were singing!

When the shots started flowing, it was all down hill.

I have a feeling NYE 2010 will never be topped. Although tonight was not as grand, a low-key spaghetti dinner with the breakfast crew was just as nice. And, I'm pretty sure it won't take me two days to recover.

Bailey and I are sitting in bed. I flipped over to ABC to see what was happening in Times Square. I'm sorry, I'm just going to say it....Dick Clark, for the love of God, it is time to retire. I couldn't watch it...

After I sign off here, I think I watch a couple of episodes of Californication. Nothing scary there.

Good bye 2011 and hello 2012! Be good to us, OK?

Christmas Traditions

Through the years, every family develops traditions that are carried on from one generation to the next. Well, sometimes they are carried on. For one reason or another, traditions sometimes fade away. On this Christmas Eve morning, I wanted to take a few minutes to reminisce on traditions past and present.

It all started when mom and I made our yearly attempt to get a cute picture of the dogs in front of the Christmas tree. It's a circus. We go through the same thing every year. The dogs hate it, we get covered in dog hair, and eventually throw in the towel. One year, we had all the dogs neatly lined up in front of the tree -- perfect....except they were all facing the tree instead of looking at the camera. It was a nice butt shot. Then, we tried individual photos instead of a group shot. Those attempts were hit or miss, too. Like this one of Annie, taken a few years back. She was sooo tired.

Then, this year, here is Lucy...with Pearl trying to corral her. Not happenin'.

Jack is disinterested and uncooperative and looks like your typical disheveled old man.

My girl is picture perfect, of course.

Here are some of my favorite Christmas Eve memories, in random order.

• Until I was in high school, Christmas Eve was always reserved for going to Grandma Scherrman's house. The day seemed to d-r-a-g on forever. I couldn't wait to get to Grandma's house, with her cute little 3 foot tree she had decorated on a table-top in her living room. Presents were stacked up around the legs of the table. We would have a huge dinner, after which the adults cruelly made the kids wait until *after * the dishes were done before we could open presents. As you can imagine, most of us were pretty hyped up. One Christmas, the boys were all running around in Grandma's unfinished basement, and my cousin Tom smashed his head into one of the support columns in the basement. I think that necessitated a trip to the emergency room for some stitches. Grandma Scherrman was always the center of attention. She held court with her stories. And, if she had just enough wine, she would start reciting. I can't actually recall what she recited -- poems, songs, dirty jokes? I just remember all the adults laughing, so it must have been funny knowing that Grandma was a little tipsy. My Grandma's spinster friend Meta was always there, too. She was the nemesis of us kids -- picture crabby old lady. Yep, that's her.
• Also, growing up, I would awake on Christmas morning to the aroma of freshly baking cinnamon rolls. My mom would be up at the crack of dawn with her trusty circa 1950 Betty Crocker cookbook on the counter making fresh bread and cinnamon rolls. Nothing smells better. She got out of the pattern for a few years. I guess kids, college, and work got in the way and she said "screw that...we can buy rolls at the grocery store." But, after some cajoling, she has resurrected the tradition...using the same food-splattered and worn-paged Betty Crocker cookbook from the 1950s. As I type this, the dough is rising in the kitchen. OK, so maybe I didn't get the pleasure of awaking to the smell of baking bread, but I will give her a pass. I wouldn't want to be up at 4 am making dough either. The fresh-out-of-the-oven rolls will be my lunch today. Mom says they should be ready by 1 pm.
• I think the only Christmas that I wasn't in Farley was in 1997. I had just moved to Indiana and did not have vacation time built up. I had to work until about noon on Christmas Eve. The plan was for everyone to meet in Janesville, WI for Christmas at my brother's house. I was picking up my sister in Waukegan, IL, and we were driving together. I said I would get to her place about 2 pm, and we would head out. When I left Gary, IN at noon, it had started to snow. By the time I was on the Dan Ryan, it was a full-blown blizzard. I didn't get to my sister's until nearly 4 pm because of the traffic. And, get this -- SHE WASN'T READY! WTF? I am over two hours late, how can you not be ready. So, by the time we actually got back on the road (after a short tiff because she suggested we not go -- and I said I was *not* spending Christmas Eve in her undecorated apartment with no food and her cat...) it was after 5 pm. Now, I hadn't had anything to eat since breakfast, I was starving. We stopped at a gas station/McDonald's along the way. They had just closed, but I could still see hamburgers lined up under the heat lamps. I pleaded through the closed gate for the guy to let me buy some. I said I would pay double. He refused. I blurted out "Well, Merry Christmas to you too!" There was no one on the road to Janesville, because it was seriously still a blizzard. We saw cars in the ditch everywhere. We tried singing Christmas carols to pass the time and quickly realized we didn't know all the lyrics for shit. We'd get halfway through the song and then kind of mumble the rest. Needless to say, Janesville never looked so good and a lot of beers were consumed on arrival.
• My Grandma McBride always insisted on bringing something to Christmas dinner. Every year it was the same thing. An 8x8 glass pan with red jello. That's it. Oh, maybe if she was really fancy, she would add pineapple chunks or bananas. Let's just say cooking was not Grandma McBride's forte. Sometimes, now, to be funny, Mom will make a square pan of jello as a joke. We get it, some of the grand kids don't.
• Mom always made a strawberry dessert for Christmas. It had a graham cracker crumb crust, frozen strawberries, and a whipped concoction of eggs, sugar, and butter. It's the only time of year she makes it. We all look forward to it. Except this one year, after she went on a Tupperware buying frenzy and put all the "dry goods" in Tupperware containers instead of the original packaging, there was an epic fail when she inadvertently used Shake and Bake crumbs instead of graham cracker crumbs. My uncle Father Jim took the first bite (because, of course, you had to serve the priest first), and all of us busted out laughing when he practically spit it out and threw his fork down.
• Our new tradition, now that all the "next generation" kids are of legal age, is to just have a little par-tee at the house. We had a rousing competition of Wii Let's Dance in 2010. This year, we are seeing who can wear the ugliest Christmas sweater. Prizes will be awarded.  

Most importantly...it's being together as a family, celebrating the season, and taking a few days to just have fun together.

Winter Solstice

Whenever it is the winter solstice, I am reminded of the Astronomy class I took in college. After struggling through a semester of biology and barely eeking out a "C", I looked for alternatives to fulfill the rest of my science requirement. Thank God my advisor suggested Astronomy. First of all, the professor Ulrich Hermann, was this eccentric German who spoke with a thick accent. When we had to go into the planetarium as part of our lab work, he always had Bolero blaring. Then, there were the nights we had to go out for field labs. Where our class of about 300 students met at a remote park outside at 10 o'clock at night. We would all lie down on the grass while he used a high-powered flashlight to point out the planets and constellations. It was during this class that I finally understood the whole winter solstice and vernal equinox thing. Secondly, the class was actually interesting. Way more interesting than stupid biology. And, to this day, I can still identify Jupiter (the brightest object in the northern hemisphere), Cassiopeia (the mother of Andromeda who is sitting in a rocking chair), along with Ursa Major and Minor (big and little dippers).

What is always exciting about the winter solstice is that it is the shortest day of the year...shortest in terms of daylight. For the record, today there is 9 hours and 9 minutes of daylight. Praise Jesus...there is at least some small satisfaction knowing that from here on out we'll gain a few seconds of daylight each day. Not to mention that we've basically gotten through November and December unscathed in the weather department. Just two more months of true winter to go.

Four days to Christmas, and I'm still not quite ready. I managed to get my Christmas cards finally all sent out on Tuesday. I have two more presents to buy, and all my presents need to be wrapped. I've gotten a really late start this year. The month of November was a total blur. Beginning the first full week of November, my travel schedule looked like this:

• Arlington, Virginia
• East Chicago, Indiana
• Lawrence, Kansas
• Burlington, Vermont
• Boston, Massachusetts
• Arlington, Virginia

Bailey had an extended stay at the farm, but that's another story. When I finally had a full week in the office, I was buried working on a huge project. I've got a short reprieve until mid-January, then it will probably all start over again.

What I haven't been lacking during this time is food. In fact, all this traveling and stress has exacerbated my emotional eating. At the rate I'm going, I'll probably be like 300 pounds by February 1.


So, I've resigned to owning my lack of restraint and lack of exercise to just enjoy the holidays and my birthday. January 9, 2012 is my new red letter day.

When I committed to being a blogger for 2011, my "hook" was to blog about what it was like leading up to 50. Sheesh...here I am feeling fat and lazy. I guess that's what I've really been leading up to all year. All my so-called training for the 5K went right out the window.

A friend asked if I was going to continue blogging or was it the end when I hit 50. Tonight on the news, there was a story about baby-boomers needing joint replacements earlier and earlier. The doctor interviewed said the majority of his patients are between 45 and 55. What the ??? I was pleased to hear that power walking is favored over jogging to save your knees. Whew -- no more guilt for giving up the running regime.

That said, my 2012 blogging hook will be my campaign to save the joints! But, ummmm, don't look for any serious efforts to begin until January 9th. I've got to get through Christmas, New Years, my actual birthday, and my birthday soiree!