Do athletes really go to war?

I was listening to the radio driving home from my daughter's freshman volleyball game. A local football game was to be played tonight between two rival schools. The guy on the radio that is helping call the game said this is going to be a war. A war? This is a high school football game.

Why do so many people these days term sporting events as a war. I know it's probably a figure of speech. But the game is nothing like war. There are no guns, no tanks, no shooting. You are not going to the game to kill someone. In these times where we actually have real soldiers in a war in Iraq and Afghanistan, I think people need to start choosing their words a little more carefully.

Why do some people just need to complain?

Last night was the first high school football game of the season. The community is always very excited about the first game. It makes for a nice evening and a change for family and friends to see each other. My nephew is in his senior year so this year has a little more excitement for our family than normal.

My brother-in-law has an RV and made team signs to put on the RV. He is planning on bringing the RV to all football games (home and away) and tail-gating before the game. Which is a pretty cool idea.

Last night the RV was parked in the front row right in front of the stadium. Which was cool because everybody had to walk past the RV before going into the game. They all saw the signs and some every stopped and commented on it. However, there was one guy who complained that the RV can not be parked here and that it had to be moved. The guy even called the school and had the AD come out and say my brother-in-law could not park there. The RV was only taking up three parking spots and was a nice symbol of school spirit.

My guess was the RV was sitting on one of the three spots that this guy usually parks and he now could not park there.

So the RV will be at all future games just in a different spot. Maybe if we get there early enough we can park it in the end zone and watch the game from on top of the RV. I wonder if anybody would complain then. I'm guessing someone would.

Having a baby at 40 !?!

I'm sure many people have thought about how old is too old to have a baby? Is 50?, 40?
My thought is if the body is able and God willing then having a baby in your forties is fine. However, there are many other things that you need to think about.

How many other kids to you have and how old are they? Well, in my cause I have four kids with the youngest being six. So if a baby would be born it's next sibling would be seven at birth. Not real close to be a playmate.

Another thing is do you want to be in your late 50s or 60s when the baby finishes high school and then needs to go to college? This is a big one. I'm sure all through your new baby's school years you might be called grandma and grandpa. By the time high school is over you will look older and the hair might be a little lighter if you have any at all. How will your kid feel having the oldest parents around?

Do you really want to lose sleep and start changing diapers again? This is probably a big one. As you age your sleep becomes very important. By forty you are probably taking multiple naps a day already.

There are many more things to think about. But the one thing that I think is most important is if both the husband and the wife want to bring another life into the world and there are no health risks to your wife then I don't think age is an issue.

Texting while driving ??

This is a video of young kids driving and texting at the same time. I think this goes way beyond kids. I think this also applies to adults as well. With the world we live in and the speeds we travel the last thing we should be doing is talking on a cell phone or even texting. There a times that my wife has called me on the phone and we talked about 5 minutes and after I get off the phone I don't remember any part of the the drive during the call.

Here is the video: (It is a little graphic)

School has begun ...

Well school has begun in our family. I have a daughter entering her Freshman year of High School and my youngest is entering all-day Kindergarten. So my wife has a empty house for the first time in 14 years.

It's hard to remember my freshman in high school. Probably because it was a long time ago. It was a different experience because I was in Catholic School through 8th grade and then started public school my freshman year. Much like my daugther is. It's a pretty big change going from a class of 25 to a class of 350. There are a lot more bodies in the halls.

Another big difference is the lockers have combination locks on them. That was a little hard at first but after a few days it was not a problem. I actually took her back to school and showed her how to open the locker.

One nice difference was I didn't have to wear certain clothes. I could wear jeans and t-shirts.
Which I think my daughter is enjoying. However, as a parent I like the uniform clothes better.

I did give my daughter a little advice before starting school and it was, it doesn't matter the clothes you wear, the cell you have, the car you drive. None of that really matters. What matters is how you treat other people. You treat them how you want to be treated. If you do that you should be ok.

Movie date with Wife "The Hangover"

Someone at work said I should see this movie. So me and wife decided to go. 11:45am showing at $4.75 a piece. We were two of seven people in the theater. The movie starred Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zach Galifianakis and Justin Bartha. Justin Bartha really was not in the movie much so if you want to see it thinking you are going to see him like you did in the National Treasure movies you will be disappointed.

The movie is about four guys that go to vegas to celebrate the soon to be wedding of Justin Bartha's character Doug. As you can imagine, everything that can go wrong does go wrong. The movie did provide some laughs but I think it was more of a rental movie than one to see in the theater. However, if you don't see this movie you already will not be missing anything.

The Budget!

Oh boy! This is one of the hardest things that a husband and wife have

to come to an agreement on. How to spend the money. My wife for the

most part is a stay at home mom but does work a couple hours at the

school lunch room during the school year. I work full time. For many

years, I always wonder where was the money going. Every month I

would pay the bills and then not have much of anything left in the bank

accounts. We would pay for everything on the discover card: Groceries,

gas, anything at Walmart, eating out, clothes, etc. With a credit card it

seemed like we could always afford what we wanted. It was

never the big stuff that was eating up the money it was the small stuff.
McDonalds here $25, a movie there $20, new shoes $45, etc. The

small stuff adds up.

Well, 18 months ago I decide it was time for a budget. However, I didn't

want to be crazy with the budget. I really didn't need to know where

every penny was going. That would just be too much work and we didn't

have any problem paying the bills. It was just we didn't have much

money left over and our debt was not going away fast enough for me.

So we stopped using credit cards and switch to cash. At first this was

really hard. But it has really help and we have more money in the bank

and our debt is going down really quick. Here is what we did:

1.) I grouped our expenses into six major categories. These are the six
categories: Walmart / Food, Gas, Clothes, Sams Club, Home, Dining Out

2.) I created six white envelopes for each category.

3.) I then figure how much money we would need in each group.

Walmart was most important, followed by gas, clothes, sams club,

home and dining out. Dining out was the least important for us.

4.) Each pay I put the correct amount of money into each envelope.

So the money in each envelope is to be used until the next payday.

So you have to do some budgeting so you don't run out of money

the first weekend. Except for dining out and home you want the

money to last the two weeks. If there is no money in the envelope

you can not spend it.

Example: If there is nothing in dining out then you can not go out to eat
or even order a pizza.

Example: When you goto Walmart for food and there is only $60

left then you can only spend $60 dollars.

Like I said this is hard at first but after the first six months it became
habit. I would also strongly encourge that the husband and wife are
involved in the whole process. Both of you are going to have to follow

the rules of only spending what's in the envelopes.

Movie date with the Wife - "The Ugly Truth"

Me and the wife went to see "The Ugly Truth" starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler.

It was somewhat of a "chick flick" comedy film. We went to the 12:25pm showing and we were two of eight people in the theatre. $5.75 a person. I'm all about the matinee.

I thought the movie was pretty funny. It had a lot of sexual / explicit language mostly from Butler. It's a little hard to see him in this role after "300." But he pulled it off.

Both the wife and I laughed many times in the movie and would recommend the movie for married / dating couples.