Obliviots be warned!

Janell's most recent posting reminded me of a term I recently learned used to describe the type of people that drive me crazy - obliviots!

obliviot - a term used to describe an idiot who is completely oblivious to those around them. Example: "That person just cut me off because they're talking on the cell phone and not paying attention to what they're doing! What an obliviot!"

I know how you feel, Janell! Certain people who don't have clue who you are seem to know exactly how to push that one button that makes you as mad as a hornet!

Some obliviots who I've recently come into contact with:

- The lady who chose to ignore her shreiking child in a crowded waiting room.
- The lady who used the Self Check Out Lane to purchase her month's worth of groceries . . . with coupons!
- The guy who shared his cell phone conversation with the rest of Chick-Fil-A.
- The guy in the movie theatre who actually answered his cell phone!
- The guy stepping on to the elevator who shot me a glare because I got in his way as I was stepping off!

Someone once told me, "Don't walk away mad - just walk away!" Sometimes that's easy to do, but sometimes it just plain maddening that people can be so oblivious to the way they make others feel.

In the meantime, obliviots be warned! Janell and I are watching you!

Feel free to comment on any of your own obliviot sitings!

Has it already been 7 years?

Today is our 7th wedding anniversary!

This morning, Kelly said, "Wow! 7 years!" I have to admit that at first I got a little defensive, "What? Are you surprised that we made it this far?" On one hand I thought, if you expect to make it past your 50th anniversay then the 7th shouldn't be any big deal. But on the other hand, Kelly's right - it's 7 years! If you add our dating years, then Kelly and I have been in a relationship for 10 years - which is one third of my life! Wow! Needless to say, the last 10 years have been my favorite!

Just out of curiousity, I googled 'wedding anniversary' and this is what I found from the 52,800,000 search results:

- The gift suggestion for year 7 is either wool or copper (Thanks, that really narrows it down!)
- A vacation package called 'Romance in Canada' (I've never understood why Niagara Falls is the number one honeymoon destination in North America - there's not even a beach!)
- An advertisement for marriage counseling (It's the gift that keeps on giving!)
- A florist advertising an especially nice (and especially expensive) floral arrangement specially made for those knuckle-heads who forgot thier anniversary (If you forget your anniversary then you need to be thinking in much bigger terms than just up-sizing her flowers)
- Wedding Anniversary Speeches (No kidding, just fill in her name and you'll impress her with your spontaneous poetic rhetoric. Let's see . . . what rhymes with 'Kelly'?)
- Many, and I mean many, websites boasting exclusive photos of Prince Charles and Camilla as they vacation in Scotland during thier first wedding anniversary (Get a life, England!)

My favorite search result was a quote from Honore de Belzac (French novalist) who said, "A good marriage would between a blind wife and a deaf husband." Although I pretty much fulfill the position of a deaf husband, I think this is great advice on how to make it to the big 5-0. You have to close a blind eye and turn a deaf ear and instead focus on the things that make you smile.

If you have to know, for our anniversary I sent Kelly some flowers (I up-sized eventhough I didn't forget) and we purchased airline tickets to Playa del Carmen because water falls are over-rated!

I love you dearly, Kelly - always have, always will.

How tired (yawn!) are you?

One part of my job is to teach physicians how to use the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) – which is a commonly used daytime sleepiness assessment tool.

Rate how likely you are to fall asleep in the following daytime situations using this scale:

0 – I’m wide awake with no chance of falling asleep.
1 – I’m a little tired but I can fight through it.
2 – There’s a good chance I could fall asleep.
3 – I’m out like a light!

Daytime Situation:

1. Sitting and reading
2. Watching television
3. Sitting inactive in a public place (eg, a theatre or meeting)
4. As a passenger in a car for an hour without a break
5. Lying down to rest in the afternoon when circumstances permit
6. Sitting and talking to someone
7. Sitting quietly after a lunch without alcohol
8. In a car, while stopped for a few minutes in traffic

Now total up your score.

Results:
0-10 – You are not considered to be excessively sleepy.
11-14 – You’re considered moderately sleepy. Try to keep from napping during the day and go to bed at a decent hour.
15-19 – There’s a good chance you have an underlying medical condition causing your excessive sleepiness. You may want to talk with your doctor.
20-24 – You are considered to be severely impaired by your excessive sleepiness. Untreated narcoleptic patients score in this range. See a doctor!

I usually score between 4-6. If you’re comfortable sharing, I’m curious how you scored.

Book Rant! The Simple Faith of Mister Rogers

To prove to you that I’m not using this corner of cyberspace just to “sound-off”, I present my first installment of Book Rant – which is my simple review of a book that I have recently completed.

For my first Book Rant, I am actually going back to a little book that I read in February of last year called The Simple Faith of Mister Rogers by Amy Hollingsworth (161 pages). This book takes a peek at the spiritual insights of the world’s most beloved neighbor, Fred Rogers.

Many don’t realize it, but Mister Rogers was actually an ordained minister in the United Presbyterian Church. As Hollingsworth points out, "It’s hard to think of Mister Rogers as a minister when we have memories of him asking us with a smile, “Can you say (insert inane word here)? I knew you could.” But what about some of his other phrases like, “You’re special. There is no one else in the world just like you.”

Hollingsworth points out that Mister Rogers was able to preach without ever saying a word from the pulpit. Rogers said, “I’m so convinced that the space between the television set and the viewer is holy ground, and that what we put on the television can, by the Holy Spirit, be translated into what this person needs to hear and see.”

I think the reason we loved Mister Rogers so much is because he tried so hard to be our good neighbor, “Fred sought to see their Maker in [others] and then to treat them accordingly.”

Here’s one of my favorite quotes from the book:

Pg. 78 – “[Fred Roger’s] definition of neighbor was simple: the person you happen to be with at the moment . . . Every person is made in the image of God, and for that reason alone, he or she is to be valued and appreciated.”

After I read this book, I actually TiVo’ed a few episodes of Mister Roger’s Neighborhood and as I watched those old shows, I suddenly began to realize why, as a child, I enjoyed watching a grown man in a cardigan feed his fish – it was because I had hoped he was right. I had hoped that I was special and that, indeed, there was no one else in the world just like me.

This book is well worth Amazon’s $12.99 asking price. Click below to order this book.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1591452295/sr=8-1/qid=1145337697/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-0790861-5919219?%5Fencoding=UTF8

Just one of my beefs with Adam & Eve . . .

Whoever said that yard work is therapeutic obviously had never worked in a yard!

I don't mind working in my yard. I'm the typical guy who likes to pull out the power tools and cut, trim and edge a perfectly manicured yard (and then take credit for it as if I was the one who made the grass grow and the flowers bloom). However, my frustration comes to a boil when I feel that my yard seems to be working against me.

Case in point: Last year, I came to the conclusion that the reason I had brown grass was because the $10 sprinklers weren't getting the job done. So, I brought in the pro's and installed a sprinkler system - my neighbors were green with envy (sorry, I had to!). But now, instead of green grass I have perfectly watered, huge, green WEEDS!!

So as I spent this beautiful Saturday afternoon tugging and pulling at weeds, I suddenly remembered that there was a time when keeping a garden was a easy thing to do!! The Garden of Eden surely must have been a cool place to hang out! Adam and Eve got to sit back, relax and enjoy the beauty of God without ever having to cut, trim or even edge.

I'm not trying to say that the worst thing about the fall of man was that it made it more difficult for me to work in my yard - I'm just saying I would have loved to have stood next to Adam the first time he had to pull a weed.

"You just had to eat the apple, didn't you Adam? Of all the things to eat in the garden - it had to be that apple! Nice play, big guy! . . . Oh by the way, Adam, if you don't pull up the entire root - the weed grows back!"

On that note, Happy Easter!

I have come to the Dark Side

First, allow me to apologize to all my fellow hold-outs to whom I promised to never have a blog of my own. We all vowed to each other to resist the temptation to blog. We were supposed to stand strong together and look upon bloggers as overly-opinionated people with entirely too much time on thier hands. But it appears that my resolve to remain blog-free has dried up. Forgive me, for I have blogged (whimper!).

I'm sure my own dear, sweet, loving wife will be the first to say, "I knew you'd get a blog someday!" And knowing me like she does, she's right. I guess what pushed me to the Dark Side of blogs was knowing that everybody seemed to have a soap box to stand on and rant about something - except for me!

So it gives me great pride to announce the grand opening of Wade's Rantings - the unsolicited opinions of a thirty-something with a "grumpy old man" complex ("grumpy old man" complex is a hybrid of "good ol' day" syndrome and "this is the way things oughta be" psychosis - for which there is currently no cure).

I've never been one to think that I would have anything interesting to say; or if I did, that anyone would be interested in hearing me say it. But since that hasn't stopped anyone else from blogging - why should it stop me?

I guess you can say that is my little rant about blogs . . .