Being Mark Winder

Tooks the family (and a bunch of kid friends) geocaching for the first time this year.  It was perfect; the ground was pretty dry and the bugs haven't come out yet.  It's a great sport if you're looking for an active family outing (but not too active).

 

 

It's almost Valentine's Day.  I wonder if this Valentine guy ever knew he'd  have a day named after him?  How about Winder's Day?  Now that has a nice ring to it.  But I'm not sure what it would be in celebration of.  Mediocrity?  Balding?  Allergies?  Self-depricating humour?  Maybe a day dedicated to using big words you can't spell and don't even understand?  So many possibilities.

 

I was talking to co-workers at lunch discussing what we were getting our wives for Valentine's day.  This year I bought my wife jewelry.  This is a step up from my usual gift of a CD or book that historically 50/50 odds she already has, but she's been extra good this year (and I could use the extra brownie points).  But I refuse to buy a card.  Waste of money and they just get thrown out.  I also bought her an oversized toy rose.  But not real roses.  Waste of money and they just get thrown out.  An oversized toy rose lasts forever when properly stored in a box in the basement.

 

Anyway, one co-worker is buying a card, real roses, and jewelry for his wife.  And not just any jewelry - custom desiged jewelry from a goldsmith friend.  He set a precendence very early on in his marriage and has had to keep it up for 20 years.

 

My second co-worker's wife forgot their first anniversary and has already lost her wedding ring.  Now that is the perfect start to a marriage.  He can do anything for tomorrow and get away with it.  (He went with alcohol.) 

To save time I set the same new year resolutions for 2007.

I have more New Years Resolutions than days in 2006 (my new strategy is to make so many resolutions that some will have to be successful).

 

One of them should be to catch up with old friends and aquaintances.  I have 364 lunch dates still free.  Book yours now.

Best wishes to all my friends and family (and anyone else who reads this) for 2006!

 

It feels like it's going to be a year of changes.  I wonder if that will be good or bad? 

 

Here's wishing for good...

Well, I'm done my Christmas shopping.  The malls in Calgary are absolutely crazy, so I'm very glad.  The bank account is also giving a sigh of relief.

 

I asked Lori what her favorite present she ever got was (and I don't recall getting a good answer, I'll have to ask her again).  How about you? 

 

I have a really really bad memory, but I've given it 10 minutes of thought.  I'd have to say it was my first computer, an Apple IIe clone.  It wasn't actually mine, it was Santa's gift to the whole family.  I really really wanted one, but I knew we couldn't afford it (I was about 15 or 16 at the time).  I suspect my parents made a lot of sacrifices to get it, and I'm not sure how thrilled my younger sisters were to get a computer that I was to monopolize.  But it was a great Christmas for me and I knew from that point on that I wanted a career in computers.

 

A close second is a craft book on how to make pet rocks I got for Christmas in Grade 4.  I loved those pet rocks.

 

 

I finally managed to get the Christmas lights up today.  Thank goodness too!  It's now blizzarding... 

 

Wish I'd got the winter tires on the van too .

frm nw on my blog iz goin 2 b SMS frNdlE.  Im hip & hapNn.  Im getin jiggy w it.  d mo I Et @ McDonalds, d jiggier I git.

 

My parents drove down and we all went to the Museum of the Regiments on Remembrance Day.  If you are in the Calgary area it is worth seeing anytime.

 

I am very grateful that I have not had to experience war first-hand (I'm excluding the war on terrorism, which we all certainly have experienced in small degrees).  But it also concerns me that worldwide the understanding of what it really to be at war is sometimes being relearned rather than remembered. 

 

Hollywood's war movies are realistic and sometimes even factual now.  They show us the tragedy of war.  They don't sugar-coat the death and destruction.  So we all know what happens in wars.  But is watching a stranger die horribly on  a TV screen a deterrant or entertainment?

 

Take my Great-Uncle Edwin.  He was killed by a mortar in Holland near the end of WW II.  To my grandmother, she lost her little brother, and she grieved him until the day she passed away.  My mother lost an uncle and remembers the impact his death has had on her family.  I lost a distant relative I never met. 

 

Take Lori's grandfather.  He was wounded by a bomb in Europe and spent weeks close to death.  He came back wounded and alcoholic.  He later went on to become President of the Chamber of Commerce, but the drinking caught up with him and he had a stroke.  He survived only to spend the next 20 years unable to care for himself.  Lori's grandmother lost her husband to war, but is was long and drawn out.  Her mother became the child of an alcoholic.  Lori grew up in an atmosphere that was overshadowed with ripple effects of her grandfather's illnesses.  The impact on our children is minute.

 

Lori started work at the Foothills last week.  After almost 10 years of being out of the work force to raise the kids she's returned in a big way.  She worked very hard getting recertiifed and making all the arragements for child care and the like.  I'm very proud of her!

 

And I'm very tired!  Although I hope I've never taken her for granted, I've certainly grown accustom to having the home front run so well and with little inconvenience to me.  I know she's making a huge effort to work and still be the homemaker.  But now it's only fair I take on more of the domestic duties.  All the changes, my blogging, and the usual workaholicism has taken its toll this week.  Just one demanding full-time job at a time now.  Which is good, I'll probably live longer and have more fun.  As long as finishing the contracts I've committed to doesn't kill me...

 

Back to it...