Wish I had a cat...

...then I could convince myself I'm just coughing up hairballs.

Seriously, I thought nighttime cold medicine would knock me out and suppress such things, but 10 minutes after I dozed off I woke up feeling like something was clawing its way up my throat.  Now I can't not cough.  Hopefully a cough drop will fix it and I can get more sleep.

Note to self, you need to write more.  And read less, its either that or quit working...

In the sky...

Is it superman? no.  Is it a plane?  no.  Its tweeting so it must be a bird.  Nope it just bill joining twitter.  Yep I joined twitter (@billysixtoes) today.  And why did I join?  Amazon was offering a free $5 streaming video credit if you started following them. I'm cheap as Josh says.  I guess I need to learn about hashtags now...

A walk to forget...

I walked, it wasn't vigorous, but it was with my wife and baby, and that made it nice.  The humidity didn't make it nice, but it was bearable.  I didn't write, but there is still a few hours left in today.  Maybe I'll just have to go ahead and do that...

still don't know about the race horse thing...

Return...

The summer hasn't been kind to me, but I feel the energy returning despite the horrid heat.  I think its time to return to my new years resolution of setting monthly resolutions. I wanna write and I wanna dance.  Wait that isn't right.  I want to write and I want to scuba dive.  Nope, not quite.  I want to write and be more active.

So there are three or four more days left in this month so I'm going to say my goal for this month is to mow the lawn.

Woo hoo, I accomplished my goal!!!

Oh okay that feels good.  I'm already off to a great start. So what do I wanna accomplish for September.  I'm torn between setting a single goal and setting two different goals to try and accomplish.  I tried the running thing while writing back in March and April with poor results.  But part of that was that I got sick both months.  So maybe I should start off small on both fronts since I haven't done either.

How about I walk vigorously for three to four times a week, and get back into writing by spewing out 500 words a day....should be somewhat easy to accomplish and not to draining.  I might also try to cut down on the number of times I use periods consecutively in any given post.  I've only done it once in this one, but I've been known to abuse them in the past on here and on facebook.  The period police might come searching for me soon.  Oh no!....

on an unrelated note, why do people say they have to pee like a race horse?  Do race horses pee more than regular horses?

Parei-what....

I said Pareidolia.

What's that, you might ask.  Well let me tell you.

pareidolia (ˌpæraɪˈdəʊlɪə)
 -n
  the imagined perception of a pattern or meaning where it does not actually exist, as in considering the moon to have human features (def courtesy of dictionary.com)

I just learned the word today when I saw someone posting pics of peoples burnt toast.  The burnt toast supposedly has the image of Christ in it and others had Mary. 

And then the thought hit me, if God has chosen toasted bread to reveal his son to the world, should I slow down while eating breakfast just in case he has some special message for me. Then I remembered that I don't eat toast for breakfast.  I do yogurt on the weekdays and on the weekends I tend to eat eggs scrambled by my wife which she then places on tortillas.  Adding a little salsa and cheese and they are great.  Sometimes I even get some sausage on them. 

Will I miss out on a word from God cause I'm eating my breakfast with south of the border flatbread rather than good ol' American burnt bread?  Should I start a ministry where we send loaves of bread along with toasters to people all over the world so they can have God reveal Jesus, or Mary, to them via scorched bread?

Maybe I'll have to invent a solar powered toaster for people in countries that don't have access to electricity.  Mmmm, solar powered toast!   I'll have to give this some thought...

'Nother blegh...

Life feels cluttered right now.  Cluttered with decisions, busy-ness, stress and concerns.  Part of the problem with that for the last month all of that was put on hold while we traveled.  Now I'm back to the grind and the things which were on hold are now back in full view. 

I've been dealing with some physical issues and have to wait til I see the doctor on the 16th to find out if I should be worried about it or not. 

I need to start looking for another source of income (read: second job) so we can stay afloat for a year or so until we can get another kid in the daycare.

I have some things piling up at work and have to wait some time to get them done because it seems like the people I need to speak to are out of town at the moment. 

And its freaking hot outside. 

All these things combined are crushing my inspiration.  I want to write again.  I want to finish the story I'm currently working on.  I want to do a second draft of the story I've already finished. 

I need refreshing.  I want to feel reinvigorated...

Whatever happened to Bill...

It's been a big month for us.  Over three and a half weeks, starting July 3rd, we traveled over 5200 miles (not including a weekend spent in northern colorado, where we drove another vehicle which prevented us from tracking the trip).  Seventeen of those nights were spent in twelve different hotel rooms.   Two family reunions were visited, and I lost track of the number of state and national parks we drove through.  Over 400 minutes were racked up on our cell phone bill because of DaNae contacting people to try and find trap sites (yes, I think she worked harder on this trip as a volunteer than I did as a paid employee, but she wasn't allowed to drive, and it was easier for me to set up the traps without her or Charleigh around.  We made ten different contacts on the road and then my wife made about a dozen more over the phone of people who would send us mosquitoes from their areas.  We ate fast food for over 45 meals (and I only gained about 2 pounds, which is a little worrisome).  Had to call a tow truck twice (in the same night) and no one was injured.

Before the trip began, my wife would call or text multiple times a day to see what the plan was for the trip.  I said I had no idea.  I knew that my boss wanted us to hit five states, but I thought he was finding contacts in those states.  I found out I was wrong a couple days before we left.  No biggy, I've done small trips like this.  You just go and find someone who'll let you trap on their land.  Once we left my family reunion in Gillette, I just told DaNae to start searching the internet for people who might have good places for us to trap.  By the time we were done with western Montana, she was a pro.  She found a person in eastern Washington who promised us stuff so we wouldn't have to go there, and by the time we hit Wyoming, she had found contacts for North and South Dakota, so we wouldn't have to trap there either.  I think she saved the government several thousand dollars right there.

Then we went to Wellington, CO for her family reunion and from there I headed to Casper while she headed home.  The truck broke down in York, NE and I had some issues when the road side assistance people asked me where I wanted the truck towed.  I asked who they recommend and  the lady said she was in Texas so she couldn't help out with suggestions.  I was miffed and wondered what good roadside assistance was if they couldn't help.  She then did an internet search for garages and found three for me.  All three were in Pennsylvania which wasn't helpful in Nebraska.  Long story short, I finally made it to a hotel at 10:30 that night, with the thought that I'd be stuck there car-less for a couple days. The truck was fixed the next morning and I was on my way home again without incident.

I think the hardest part of the trip was coming home.  I think I could've stayed on the road for another month without any worries, other than trying to convince someone to mow the lawn a couple more times for free.  And coming home to find a bill from the government for $700 didn't help matters any.  It actually felt like a big slap in the face after relocating my family to Kansas and then all the work my wife did on this trip for free.

SO in summary, great trip, happy feelings. Get home and bitterness and worry try to overtake.  Maybe we should just live on the road! ok, not really.