On Being and Being Home part 2

One day I would like to write a treatise on the value of property ownership and the greater value both physically and spiritually of making a home with your own hands. My current days are overwhelmed with work and with efforts to obtain the degree by which I might further my career and thereby by effect on the greater world around me. This work, however, takes great energy and leaves little time for the joys in life; friends, family, conversation, writing and my newest love- woodworking.

There is light at the end of the tunnel and this challenge will fall at my feet. Until then some dinners will be missed, some conversations unhad and some projects undone. The progress of these pictures are old the cabinet was done months ago and the smaller cabinet was worked on weeks ago. However, audience has asked for an update and this is what I can manage at this time.

Know Your Role

Sometime it just feels like the proverbial fecal matter just hits the oscillating metal fins and all of a sudden I have just should all over myself. I'm feeling a little like I'm in that predicament. I can tell because I have been driving too fast and listening to music that I have not enjoyed since my college years. You know the type, every other word is missing and it only sounds good if played at a decibel that will shatter car windows and ear drums alike. Yeah, angst. It happens in your thirties too apparently.

So what brought this about? Working too hard on things that aren't really important while falling behind on things that are really important. Not enough exercise. The monotony of repetitive tasks. Need for adrenaline. Setbacks that in all reality are far more minor than they initially seem to be. Spending too much time judging myself. It's funny how when you are dissatisfied you can suddenly call yourself a bad husband, son, friend, man; whatever you want to be down on yourself about.

So what went awry? I happened to scroll through The Art of Manliness, which is a great website on how to be more the man you want to be. They have an article about building a blueprint for your life. Light-bulb! I am a man with a plan, have been my entire life but I haven't checked back in with my plan in while. When I was deployed I put my plan off to the side. I was planning for others, helping them run their lives/careers and concerned with getting all my Soldiers and equipment back home. However, the tasks to get there were stuff that I had drilled for years. Auto pilot was so easy. I came home and stayed on auto pilot.

So it's time to check in with my plan. If it still makes sense then I need to keep going forward with it. If not, I need to make some adjustments. No offense Linkin Park; but you need to go back to my workout mix and not be a staple of my life.

Rum? Beer? Thanks, I'll have both.

Life is too short for cheap beer. I'm sure we've all done this  and many of still do because they either actually like it (not sure how) or just don't know any better. I'm talking about drinking bad beer.

Well, I've gotten over that affliction. Long gone are they days of drinking "Natty Ice" because, "hey after the sixth one they don't taste so bad". I've moved on and this is the kind of thing I've move on to.

Innis & Gunn oak barrel aged beer is a delightful change from the usual. Don't get me wrong, I like a good IPA and I will gladly drink a hoppy beer, nice amber or good stout. The Innis & Gunn Rum Cask aged beer is unlike anything I have ever had before.

It's hard to describe. It really is one of the roundest beers I have ever had and the rum cask aging gives it a touch of sweetness that is seldom experienced. The flavor has the slight sugary aspect of the rum while being distinctly a beer. It hardly carries any after taste but what little after taste is does have is pleasant and almost vanilla. Also, at 6.6% 7.4% alcohol it is fairly strong. At twelve dollars for a four pack it is definitely a treat, not a staple.

So, I like the Innis & Gunn rum cask beer and I recommend that if you are a beer drinker you give it try. It is not an every day beer but it is nice to treat yourself to something a little out of the ordinary once in a while.

On another note, a couple of friends introduced me to an App that is on both Droid and iPhone called Beerby. It is fun, it combines my love of beer with gaming. I can earn accomplishments for drinking beer. Aside from that, it is a great way track the beers that you have tried and to remember the ones you like. I started from scratch last night so I look like a beer noob but don't let my current ranking fool you. I am a pro.

On Manhhod pt. 1 of ?

Out on my back porch, with a good cigar and and glass of scotch, I got to thinking about my life and about what makes me feel alive. As the cherry on the cigar started to burn my fingers and the 34 degree temperature bit at my face and hands I reminisced about the hard times when I have been tested. I remembered that being a man is dichotomy between the times when it is necessary to be steel and when is is necessary to be caring.

Many of the times when I have felt most alive have been when the odds are against me or when I could (maybe should) have been in danger for some reason. The thing about being a man in today's world is that so much of society wants us to not be what we are. Society tells us that all that we are is wrong, so much of what comes natural to us is seen by the current social order to be destructive and uncivilized. Men live in world where we walk the fine line between being creators and destroyers.

So begins a topic that I hope to explore at different points throughout the year. It should be an interesting ride.

Squirrel Carnage or Pumpkin Zombies

Myrrh promised that once the pumpkins were starting to rot I could take them out in the backyard and shoot them with my airsoft guns. The wildlife around my house thought differently about this proposition. The squirrel (big gray king that threatened to shoot more than once) beat me to it. I rather enjoyed the carnage though. I think he made a bigger mess than I intended to.