The whale...

...or was it an elephant?

You ever hear the one where some one asks you, 'how do you eat an elephant?'  You might say, 'I don't know.' Personally, I would say, 'with a fork,' which usually causes the questioner to stumble and the joke gets ruined.  But if you aren't a smart ass, like me, and say 'I don't know,' then the person would say, 'one bite at a time.'

Now I don't know why anyone would want to eat an elephant, unless of course its because you've already finished off the tiger, dolphin, and horse, but the concept is intriguing.  Any large project, even one that might be small but is perceived to be big can use this idea to accomplish the goal.  But seriously, the immensity of it gets me sometimes, well actually it gets me a lot of the time.  Even setting small goals its hard to just start without the perfectionist mindset from setting in and stressing me into not starting.

I started digging holes in the yard tonight for my retaining wall, which I started working on last year.  Maybe by the end of the weekend this elephant will be devoured and I can begin on the next.

I should find something far more appetizing than an elephant for my next entree...

Play in the mud...

...or dine on pizza?

Yep, as a kid I don't think it ever crossed my mind that I may have to decide between those two activities rather than just shirking all responsibilities and enjoying both delights.  But alas, I'm a grown up now with responsibilities. 

Its gorgeous out, at least it was the last time I went outside, and with the warm weather and recent precipitation, I'm betting I can easily dig a couple holes in my backyard and try to finish up a project that I started last fall. 

Yet, I have to work tonight. And last week, one of the guys challenged us to get the truck unloaded and shelves stocked by 12:30 and we did.  Now he has to buy us pizza tonight.

So I could go home and work on a project or I could just work and make some dough while eating some cheese and meat covered dough (please note that I'm speaking of two different kinds of dough here). 

See children, life as a grown up isn't all fun and games! Of course if I had planned better I could've gotten out of here earlier, gone home worked in the yard, showered and then been in to eat pizza and unload a truck....sigh...

See children, if you learn plan ahead life can be all fun and games!

***Update***  After venturing outside at lunch I have determined that its getting cold and windy and decided playing in the mud this afternoon wouldn't have been fun after all.  Which makes this entire post somewhat pointless.  Oh well.

Paid Crastinator...

...that's when I'll know I'm a pro!

So yesterday I did one thing to further my goal of setting up goals for the year.  Ha.

I printed out a calender so I can X out the days when I accomplish my goal, but I never really set my goals.  And after much thought I've decided to take it easy and set two goals for daily improvement. 

1) Write one page of fiction or edit three pages of completed stories (I kinda stole this one from the author of the article that I got the idea from, and blogging doesn't count.  But it feels doable and I hopefully won't set myself up for failure.  And if I do write one page a day, I can easily knock out a book or two a year.)

2) Do something constructive at home.  (You might say that if I do number 1 at home then number 2 is done, but I mean something that betters the home, whether spraying weeds, mowing, raking leaves, trimming trees, doing dishes, taking out the trash, doing laundry, etc.  Most days, especially now that I'm working two jobs I get home and veg.  This isn't conducive to having a nice yard for my daughter to play in, or contributing to a clean house, which I prefer.)

There you go.  I think its manageable and it'll help me get closer to where I want to be in the future.  I do need to figure out what I'm going to do on sick days, or holiday and traveling days.  But maybe I should quit procrastinating and just go start writing.

I had a dream...

but not one of those earth shattering ones filled with racial harmony and nuclear disarmament.  No my dream was bordering on a nightmare.  In my dream, my back washed away!  Not only did it wash away, but so did my bank account and all that was left was a really poor looking terraced yard with concrete blocks.  The crawl space under the house was flooded and several friends and bosses came over to survey the damage and offer their advice of getting out while the getting was good.  At that point in the dream I was sure there was no getting out.

Then I woke up. And boy was I glad that it was only my sunroom's roof that had sprung a leak, rather than my yard eroding away.  And I was also glad that I had procrastinated to the point that I still hadn't mudded and taped the ceiling in the sunroom yet.

I should back up a few hours to explain the leak though.  DaNae woke me up at some awful hour (honestly it was so early that her alarm clock had decided to quit telling the time and only flashed 2:32 repeatedly).  It was raining and thundering hard.  She told me that she had six or seven buckets set up in the sunroom to catch the large streams of water flowing down.

After hearing this, I lightly cursed and turned over and tried to fall back to sleep, since she clearly had everything under control.  Then after about five minutes of enjoying the sound of rolling thunder, I realized that I should go take a look out side to see where the water was coming in while it was still raining.  I walked out in my penguin boxers with a pair of flip flops and a fleece jacket after tracking down a flashlight.  I waded through several inches of water that had piled up around the back yard, and then I saw it.  Vast amounts of water were pouring from the top of the down spout, where it connected with the gutter, and nothing was coming out of the bottom.  It was plugged.

I went back to bed knowing that I couldn't fix it then and the rain stopped shortly after.  Then today I fixed it and pulled some of the sheet rock down to see the damage.  Only a little bit of the insulation was drenched and if it doesn't dry an a day or so I can pull it and replace it with some of the stuff I have left in the garage.

As I showered I was amazed at how much of house problems revolve around water, yet how very necessary water is for survival and it reminded me of when I was young and thought about how I imagined when I was a child that clouds were invading ships filled with suicide drop troops, attacking us for all the water people we destroyed as we swam, drank and bathed.  Maybe I should do a short story on that.

Anyways, my dream has stuck with me all day and left me slightly stressed, but has still left me filling better about the actual problems.  And it reminded my of childhood imagination, I guess the water isn't so bad...