Happy Thought

Life cliques

February 20, 2010 by D. Gardner Leave a Comment

I pulled this from a website today and thought I would share.
Inspiration

1. Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It’s more healing than crying alone.

8. It’s okay to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up the present.

12. It’s okay to let your children see you cry.

13. Don’t compare your life to others’. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don’t worry; God never blinks.

16. Life is too short for long pity parties. Get busy living, or get busy dying.

17. You can get through anything if you stay put in today.

18. A writer writes. If you want to be a writer, write.

19. It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don’t take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over-prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words: “In five years, will this matter?”

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn’t do.

35. Whatever doesn’t kill you really does make you stronger.

36. Growing old beats the alternative — dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood. Make it memorable.

38. Read the Psalms. They cover every human emotion.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.

41. Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

42. Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.

43. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

44. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

45. The best is yet to come.

46. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

47. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

48. If you don’t ask, you don’t get.

49. Yield.

50. Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s still a gift.

Things are coming together

November 10, 2009 by D. Gardner Leave a Comment

I have really enjoyed the last couple weeks while meeting a bunch of new people and getting to know some friends better. I am amazed at how many people are doing cool things. I wish I had more time to chat with people. It’s always fun.

Today I attended a lunch where Jeff Kent, of MLB fame spoke. I am such a name dropper. I didn’t know before today he was LDS. He said that many players, really good players, were using steroids and that he had to work really hard to compete. He now own several motorcycle dealerships. He really seemed just like a regular guy. It was cool because his wife was there and she was very down to earth and nice.

I met with a lady today that consults no profit groups. She helps them find and focus on their core mission and helps people and organizations with their philanthropy. Very good very honest lady. I hope I can refer business to her in the future.

On a funny note. Our 6 year old son is very good a cleaning up his toys. He said to Amanda yesterday “Look I cleaned up with out permission.” very cute. He can be a handful at times. But he is always more than willing to help with housework, cooking and cleaning. Lucky parents are we.

Blessings come in small ways

August 30, 2009 by D. Gardner Leave a Comment

As I sit here trying to think of something that would be attention grabbing right at the first of this post to grab attention and make someone read further. I figure a couple things, I’m really just writing this for me, no one is reading this posts anyways and it probably isn’t worth the effort.

Back to the story. This week has been tough for me, as I am sure it has for millions of people. I spent a bunch of time working with young mens for the combined activity and then trying to pull off the camp out for the scouts. But a wonderful thing happened. The hobo dinners we made at the camp all worked to start the deal. But that was not the best thing. Durning the night while I was sleeping in my tent I got cold. This is a pretty common occurrence in the western states, but durning the summer, over the last 10 years camping in the south this has never happened to me.

And to top it off the sunrise was beautiful and I didn’t even have to get out of bed to see it. It’s just these little things that keep me having faith that God is there and he cares about me. Hopefully there were others that felt the same way about the cool night and the beautiful sunrise. But if not I am grateful I had those small things to make my life a little better, a little more enjoyable at the end of a tough week.

Another fun thing for me this week is I communicated with two people that I was connected with in High School. It was fun to see that both of them had kids that played waterpolo. That is what I played in High School and really enjoyed it.

Secrects of The Perfect Root Beer Float (PRBF)

December 7, 2008 by D. Gardner 3 Comments

You may be asking yourself, “What makes the perfect root beer float?” I am going to give you my definition. Then I am going to give you the directions on how. Then you too will know the perfect RBF is within your reach. You must be patient and practice.

I have always enjoyed RBFs for as long ago as I remember. I noticed, at an early age, not all root beer floats contained the same amount of good. I began to notice a few things; warm root bear and melted ice cream, so often delivered at church youth functions, were the least acceptable. So over my teen years I realized temperature was a critical factor. Through my college years I noticed the type of ice cream and brand of root beer also played a part. But still being young I was taking what ever RBF was offered and thankful for it.

After being married for over ten years and having more time on my hands I decided to make a effort to find the Perfect RBF the PRBF. This started sometime in 2004, while living in San Antonio Texas.

Here are my findings;

First is the choice of the vanilla ice cream. It has to be the right consistency. Surprisingly Wal-mart Great Value vanilla is a great example, and my typical choice. While Hagen Daas Vanilla is devine it is too rich for the PRBF. The homemade or vanilla bean types of vanilla ice cream are not the right consistency or flavor. So take my word for it and just buy some Wal-mart Great Value vanilla, in the blue box. Once you develop the art of the PRBF, you can experiement with other ice cream. As I discovered early on, temperature is critical. Make sure the ice cream has been in the freezer sufficently long that is is hard. If it’s so hard you can’t scoop it it is cold enough. However, it can be a really frustrating shaving a little cream from the rock, so give it a couple of minutes outside the freezer. Once the Ice cream is a bit softer it will work great. You may even need to adjust the temperature of your freezer lower to make sure the ice cream is firm when you attemp the PRBF. This is one of the secrets of a PRBF.

The next step is extreemely critical and may take the most amount of practice. This step is getting the root beer to the right temperature. The average refridgerator is not cold enough to get the root bear to the right temperature so you will need to put the root beer in the freezer until it is almost to freezing. At first I tried with two liter bottles. I found that the two liter is difficult to get it to the best temperature and once it’s to the right temperature it is only good for a float or two and then it needs to go back into the freezer again. So I have found that 20 once bottles are the best. They are enough for a float or two and they take less time to get to the critical temperature. Be careful not to leave the bottles in too long so that they freeze. I a very small amount of ice, as long as the ice will flow freely out of the bottle is not a problem. If there is so much ice that the root beer will not flow freely. Abort the process and thaw the bottle before attempting again. This is probably the biggest secret and probably the most overlooked process of root beer float creation. You will know the root beer is the correct temperature when you pour the root bear over the ice cream and there is no foaming. That is right no foaming! The root beer semi freezes as it runs over the ice cream and becomes almost slushy, and there is NO foaming.

The last aspect is the glass. Glass or ceramic containers work the best. This is something I didn’t encorporate until Late 2007. place the glass or mug into the freezer about 15 minutes before you are ready to make the PRBF. This helps the root beer reach that perfect non-foaming temerature.

After all the patience and pratice you are ready to experience the perfect root beer float.

There may be some that claim you need to put the root beer in first. Everything still applies, but it is more critical that the root beer is very near freezing to eliminate the foam.

Most of you will say, the foam is part of the root beer float experience. And I say the foam is part of the less than perfect RBF experience.

Have faith and experiment for yourself and I know you too can experience the Perfect Root Beer float.

Enjoy

I've got to be better at writing

December 3, 2008 by D. Gardner Leave a Comment

Since my last post I have been to Utah and back. Thanksgiving traveling and everything went really well.

My new job is really flexible and let me have a couple of days of PTO early which helped.

Staying with Jeff and Ally (Amanda’s Sister Family) was the best. It was really good because the kids have cousins their ages so they can keep each other entertained. Wednesday night we had a fire outside at Ally and Jeff’s and everyone was over. There was just hot coco and hot dogs because all the real food was being saved for Thanksgiving. All of this helped Amanda relax and really enjoy the holiday.

Amanda and Ally were amazing with the food. Amanda was up at 5:30am on Wednesday and worked about 10 hours and then another 8 hours the next day on the food. As always the Anderson girls know how to make great food. I did what I could with out getting too much in the way. Plus I was able to get in a couple of football games on Thanksgiving. Plus I got to see the University of Georgia(13) Play Georgia Tech(18) the final score was 42 to 45. Great game. The UofG’s running back is pretty amazing, their quarterback may even go pro this year. So the Gtech beeting them was pretty amazing.

My job is rocking. I am learning a bunch and starting to contribute. It’s a great place to work.

I have also found a new music service, thanks to Jen Hannigan, Amanda’s sister. It’s www.pandora.com. You just type in the name of a song or a band and then it starts to play music like that. It’s really pretty cool and I have found a couple of new artists and songs from the playlists it creates.

I have also discovered the Genius feature in itunes. It is pretty good at coming up with play lists of good music to listen to.

I started a new instructional website on how to make skimboards. I will put it up on my cool links when I get it a little further along.

That’s all the journal writing for now

I only ran once in the past week. I’ve got to get better about that.