Happy New Year!

Hello everyone!

I wanted to give you a quick update on what has been going on with me since I post so infrequently on this site.

The main reason I have not been posting here so much is because I have been dedicating a lot of time to my other site Find Your Peak. Find Your Peak is a self-improvement/personal development blog that I started a year ago. Traffic has really been picking up lately, so that is where my focus has been.

I have a lot of things planned in the new year. I have a couple other sites going up that I am going to be working on, I am back to traveling a bunch in my job so there should be some more travel posts on this site, and in February I am going to LA to Mega Partnering to meet Gene Simmons! I am pretty excited since Kiss was my favorite band growing up.

I am going to try to post more frequently over here, but since this is just my personal blog, my business blogs take precedence. Gotta make that money!

So until next time, check out Find Your Peak and I will see you next time!

They made it!

Image via Wikipedia

Well much to my surprise, the Texas Rangers made it to the World Series! I got to attend one game, and it happened to be the only one that they won! The Rangers beat the Giants 4-2!

This was also my first World Series game, and another check mark on my lifetime goals list!

Take Me Out to the Ball Game!

I went to the Rangers game last night, and I couldn’t get over how passionate the fans seemed. This might not be a big thing to some people, but in Texas, it is a rarity. I have watched the Rangers as long as they have been in Texas, and I have never seen the fans as fired up as they are right now. Typically the Rangers fall apart after the All-Star break, but they are on fire this year! There are whispers of the first Texas series.

While the game was great, Rangers beat the Tigers 11-7, the after the game was not. We got a flat on the way home, did not have a spare, had to be towed, and did not make it home until after 1am. Hopefully I will be posting about going to my first World Series in a few weeks!

Hello Again!!

It has been a loooong time since I posted on this site, but I am going to try to start up regular posting again. I will try to bring you up to date on what has been happening in the last year or so since my last post, but please for give me if I miss some things.

Job

I am still at the same company, a bit different job though. I was a consultant, and now I am a sales engineer. The new job is a lot less travel, so there won’t be as many cool travel posts. I will still have the few odd delivery projects, but they seem to be few and far between. I am greatly enjoying spending the extra time at home, but miss the work of consulting.

Family

Nothing much has changed here, still living in the same place, no new additions. Football season is in full swing, so that means many nights and weekends either on the field coaching and watching my son, or at the Dallas Cowboys stadium watching the game. My son is on two teams this year, so we are practicing or playing a game at least five nights a week! It is all great fun, but once it is over we will have some time to do other things.

Fitness

I am still working out, trying for five days a week, but it usually ends up being three or four. That is not bad I guess, but I really need to kick it up a notch. The wife and I have started working out with a trainer on Saturdays, so that makes at least one day that is set in stone!

Business

As you know, I always have several things going here. I am still doing some real estate, but not very much. I currently have a house listed if anyone is in the market. You can check it out here. If anyone is looking for a house, let me know. I also started a website at the beginning of this year called Find Your Peak. It focuses on helping people improve their lives and achieve success in their endeavors. I am also working on getting a product to market which I hope to have out before summer of next year. I will keep you posted on that one, but it has taken over a year already. I am looking at doing some investing and investment management as well as some niche website creation.

Travel

Unfortunately I have not been doing very much travel this year for vacation. The picture at the top of the post is from Huntington Beach, CA where I was last week for business, the one just above is Cancun. We did go to Hawaii and Cancun early this year, but it doesn’t look like any other vacations are on the calendar near term.

Well there you have it. Like I said, I probably missed some things, but I am going to try to start posting more regularly on this site to keep you up to date. Stay tuned!!

Great Book; Crush It!

I just finished Crush It! by Gary Vaynerchuk while on a flight from Dallas to Sydney. I have to say this was a really great book. It was a very quick read (about an hour), it gave some insightful advice regarding social media, and it stayed true to the Vaynerchuk in your face style. It emphasized the fact that even though you have to give your business your all, you still have to put your family first. I would recommend picking up a copy if you have any aspirations of starting your own business. it applies the rules of social media to the most esoteric businesses and explains how by using these tools you can capitalize on the Internet and social media movement no matter how brick and mortar your business happens to be.

Poland, update, etc.

Well it has been over a month since my last post, so I thought I would throw one up. I am currently in my favorite place in the world (other than being home), Sydney, Australia. I have talked several times about how awesome Sydney is, so I won’t go into it again. I never made the car trip to Prague while I was over there, but I did take a train down to Krackow and tour Auschwitz. WOW, what an incredibly sobering tour. I always heard about the Holocost, saw Schindler’s List, etc., but actually visiting that place really brings it to life. It is unexplainable the feeling you get walking around and hearing the stories of what went on. Other than the children’s toys they had on display that they had found, the thing that impacted me the most was the display of human hair. They said they found tons (TONS! how much does hair weigh, not a lot) when they liberated the camp, and they had enough still on display to fill a swimming pool. I highly recommend if you find yourself anywhere near that part of the world you should visit Auschwitz. I didn’t write anything on the election, there is plenty of bit wasting posts out there already. But, like it or not, we have a new President and should get behind him and support him. If you don’t like how things are done, you have a chance to have your voice heard again in another four years. America is still awesome in that respect. I will be taking a much needed vacation to Hawaii in January, and then it will be back to the grind. I hope your holidays are happy!!

European Travel

I am currently on a business trip in Europe, and I got to knock a couple more countries off of my list. I started out in Ireland, a country I had never been to, then Frankfurt, then on to Poland (never been there either), and finally Oslo. Ireland was very green, but very dreary. We had one good day the entire time we were there. if you ever get a chance to visit Ireland, you have to make it to Johnnie Fox’s Pub. This pub has the distinction of being the highest pub in Ireland. It was opened in 1798, and has a rich history of visits by heads of state, movie stars, and sports stars. While the food is awesome, it is just as great wandering through the place and looking at all of the stuff they have there. I am about to leave Frankfurt to head to Poznan, Poland and then to Warsaw, so I will be posting more once I see the sites there. I am also getting a bit of a reprieve from work, and will be doing some traveling by way of car to see some of the other sites in Poland and maybe making a trip down to Prague. Stay tuned!

I did it!

If you remember, I mentioned a while back that I was training to run my first half-marathon. Well, yesterday I finished the Big D Half-Marathon, 13.1 miles, in 2 hours, 25 minutes, and 53 seconds! That was a 11:08min/mile pace. Not a bad time considering 1. it was my first half, 2. I had been sick and had not ran in two weeks, and 3. I had never ran more than 8 miles in the training leading up to the race. I will say while being excited to actually finish, my body is not thanking me. I am planning on running a full marathon either in December at the White Rock Marathon, or this time next year at the same event. I am not sure which, but I will keep you posted when I figure it out. Congratulations also to Raj who finished his first half also, about 17 minutes faster than myself.

What happened to punctuality?

One more rant…

What happened to being punctual? No one cares about being on time anymore! People show up at meetings, whether business or social, 5, 10 minutes late and it is completely accepted. When did this become OK? I remember when on time meant 5 minutes before the start time, now it seems to be OK if you show up 15 minutes or later after something has started as long as you interrupt everyone with the obligatory “sorry I’m late”. Why is this? I think if someone is not there at the start of the event, they should not be allowed to attend. Heavy traffic? You should have left earlier. Other meeting ran long? Maybe it wouldn’t have had everyone showed up on time to that one. All it says if you are late to a meeting is that you do not value that persons time. Period. Unless something completely random happens (which is not often) you should be on time. Give yourself an extra 15 minutes and bring a book, or work to do, worst case scenario you have carved out extra time to enjoy a good book or read that report you have been meaning to read but can’t because of all the damn meetings you have to attend.

Running

So I just signed up for the Big D half-marathon on April 6, 2008. I have always wanted to complete a half or full marathon, and have started training several times, but ended up not going through with it. This time I have put my hard earned money down, so hopefully it will motivate me to complete my training and really focus. I will keep you posted on my progress.