As a child, I was swept up by the Oscar Meyer PR machine. I knew the words to the hot dog song, singing it in the bathtub and in bed when I couldnt sleep. I hummed it in my mind while Ms. Cole droned about math equations. And oh how I loved those tubular delights, filled with mysterious product that always had perfect consistency. And then there was the day when I saw the Wienermobile slowly come down the street at the Nevada Day... Read more
Last year, I was blessed to attend the Laity Lodge Writer’s Retreat, located about two hours from San Antonio. If Texas sounds unappealing to you in the West and North, this location will forever change your preconceptions.The location is magnificent, with great hiking, kayaking and swimming. I was totally isolated. Photo by Glynn Young And the real beauty of this retreat? There’s no agents, book selling or hawking. It’s all about the writing. I’m headed back. This year, the writer’s retreat is being... Read more
Is it possible to have a partnership with someone who believes differently than you, to create a successful business? One of my favorite new bloggers is Mike Eaton at Greater Seas and he posed this question to several of us who write about faith and the marketplace. Bradley Moore, of Shrinking the Camel said yes, that it was acceptable, because running a business requires many partnering relationships, and “business is filled with gray areas that don’t provide a flat biblical yes-no framework.” True.... Read more
Photo by Malena Sometimes, you just have to quit thinking and start doing. At least, that’s the argument that Mike St. Pierre gives when confronted with over planning: “Don’t think unless you have to.” There’s some wisdom in this for us in the workplace, at home and in life I tend to overthink—and then get bogged down in the mess of it all. There’s a certain ability God puts in us to make decisions, to analyze and review all the... Read more
They sat on a shelf in the corner of the Disabled Veterans Thrift Store. There were at least 20 of them, unmoved for years, as evidenced by the thick layer of dust that encased the polished bronze plastic. A bowler in perfect handshake follow through stood on top of one of them; A golfer driving a ball, looking into the distance posed on another; A cup with two handles given for the best 4-H goat in the teen class for... Read more
That Saturday is a day I won’t forget. It was the day I lost my mind. You see the day before I found an unexpected bounty. It happens a couple of times a year, you know when there are three paydays in a month. No mortgage payment. The power bill was paid. No car payment. I had a whole paycheck — extra! I was going to live large. I sauntered through Lowe’s like I owned the joint, buying tools I didn’t really need. And then I went to Foot... Read more
One of my favorite all-time movies was Karate Kid, released 25 years ago! Mr. Myagi, the wise handyman and old karate master, agreed to teach Danel a thing or two about defense, about standing up to the bully. So he had Daniel sand his deck. “Left the circle. Right the circle.” He had him paint his fence. “Brush stroke up. Brush stroke down.” And he had him buff his car. “Wax on. Wax Off.” It was excruciating to the boy.... Read more
Have you noticed? Men are fools. For proof, just look at the jokes, the innuendo of stupidity, and the subject of thousands of sitcom gags. The fool, the oaf, the bumbling male is so common in movies that it’s expected. Jim Carrey, Jack Black, Ray Romano, and Owen Wilson have made millions strutting this persona. They are the complete opposite of the Archie Bunker-George Jefferson-Fred Flinstone buffonery that dominated the airwaves a generation ago. Admittedly, for thousands of years, men dominated and put down femininity. Women... Read more
It was a living room circus and my boys were in the center stage. My back was flat on the carpet and the sheer delight was evident from the peals of laughter. One at a time, they leaned forward on my legs, and with a kick upward, I would vault them into a mini-backwards summersault, only to catch them with my hands and give them a soft landing above my head. They circled around, again and again, to perform the... Read more
Despite the fact that there are more than a million English words, sometimes you are left wordless. Mental Floss has assembled a few foreign words that simply have no English equivalent. In Yiddish, a Luftmensch is someone who is a dreamer, with no practical business sense. In Turkish, the word Gumusservi is used to describe moonlight glimmering off water. In German, Kummerspeck is the word to describe excess weight gained from emotional overeating. It literally translates “grief bacon.” In Japanese, there’s a word to describe gazing... Read more
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