Earlier in the month I wrote about Sammy, our blue jay of happiness. Sammy is the semi-tame jay who loves Kris. (Well, he loves her peanuts, anyhow.) Last weekend, I set out my camera and filmed ten minutes while Toto and I sat at the picnic table, eating fresh strawberries and feeding the jays. I’ve …
Kris Gates, my wife, partner, and best friend, turns 38 today. She’s not as old as I am, but she’s catching up! To celebrate, Simon decided to play games this morning with a toy mouse. He’s managed to ignore this toy mouse for lo these many years, but today its doom had come. And the …
Here’s a little story demonstrating two ways in which I am getting old… I biked to the gym this morning to do my upper-body lifting. Because the aerobics floor was vacant, I started by doing my stretching there. I touched my toes. I crossed my legs and touched my toes. I crossed my legs the …
Yesterday morning a crew from KGW (Portland’s channel 8 ) stopped by Rosings Park to interview me about my personal finance blog, Get Rich Slowly. Both Amy Troy (the reporter) and Rod Stevens (the cameraman) were awesome. They were interesting and fun to talk to. Most of all, they were very understanding when I explained …
As a birthday present to myself, I bought the complete DVD set of Upstairs, Downstairs, an award-winning British drama from the early seventies. Kris and I have been digesting episodes slowly ever since. “You know who would like this?” I said after tonight’s episode. “Not Lisa,” she said. “Buh. Buh,” I said. “How did you …
You’d think that if I were home all the time, I’d be able to keep the grass mowed. Heck, I’d certainly think that. Well, it just hasn’t been the case. It’s been a constant battle this spring to keep the lawn at its proper length. I don’t mind mowing — in fact, I find it …
I seem to have found the key to my productivity: delay my gym trip from 7am to noon. Instead, I focus those first five hours of the morning on Get Rich Slowly. It’s amazing what a difference that makes. Though I spend plenty of time on miscellaneous blog tasks (checking stats, design work, answering e-mail), …
Kris is sick. I am tired. It’s 5:38 on a Saturday afternoon, and we’re both in bed, ready to sleep. We may not get up until morning. Kris started getting sick in the middle of the week. “I always get sick after our trip to Sunriver,” she said when she first began to wheeze. “And …
I’ve just returned home from my morning workout, and am sitting at the computer writing a piece for Get Fit Slowly. I can hear Maxwell thumping around, but I’m not really paying attention. Soon, however, the thumps turn into squawks, and then to growls. Max and Nemo wrestle a lot, so I’m not too concerned. …