My mind is getting into reflection mode, which is a natural state for it to enter this time of year. And not so much on the past, but on the future. I’m not too concerned with what I did or didn’t do this past year, but am more concerned with what I want to accomplish in the approaching year. That being said, I do have a list of lessons learned from 2019, and these are things that I hope to not repeat in the new year or ever again.

Leave in 2019 - “Side Hustles” - Money as the motivator - The opinions of others

Accomplish in 2020 - Finish writing Becoming A Father - More blog posts

That’s it. I just sat here for ten minutes or so trying to come up with more things to work on in 2020, but no. I think less to work on or focus on will create an environment that lends itself more towards success (which simply means accomplishing whatever it is I want to accomplish. If I accomplish it then I am successful. If I don’t, then I am not.)

Becoming A Father is a working title for a project I first thought up in 2015 when my best friend was expecting his first kid. I thought a nice gift would be a few thoughts from one unqualified guy to another on what it is actually like having a kid. I wrote a few thousand words but never finished it, so I forgot about it. Then my brother and his wife were expecting their first and I had the same idea. I found the draft, made the mistake of reading it, and immediately dismissed the idea as terrible and what I wrote as something worse than that.

Then 2019 happened. I immersed myself completely in the opinions of others, lost myself in the process, allowed acquaintances to direct my life, and hit the ground after falling through the sky in a nightmare. I “woke up” in October, realized what had happened in 2019 and even as far back as 2007, and immediately cut ties with everything and everyone that I deemed a negative influence. I spent some time thinking and remembered this thing I wanted to write about, the life altering experience of becoming a father. So, I have started writing it again. It is still something I want to write, even if my original audience of my friend (now with two kids) and my brother (now with a 7 month old) are better at this dad thing than I am. I still want to write it. I’m not sure on what type of book it will be (my gut says memoir) but I’m not worried about that just yet. Right now I am focused on getting the thoughts out of my head.

So in 2020 I’d like to finish an actual draft of Becoming A Father, hire an editor to help me fix it, and publish the damn thing somewhere.

That and blogging. I want to publish more to my blog. Complete sentences and incomplete thoughts. Pictures, too.

I am changing, and I’m getting back to who and what I once was. I see myself running away from the past decade and slowly walking into 2020 and beyond. Slowly, but confidently.

The Mandalorian (Disney+)

I really want to like this one but it lacks a lot of depth right now, and thirty minute episodes is not long enough to do any type of story or character development (especially within the world of Star Wars). That said, they need to speed up some aspects of the show. And let us in on the secret as to what the plot is. Where are we going?

SEE (Apple TV+)

Surprisingly enjoyed the first season. I was unsure of what a show like this would be like, or even what it would be about, but was pleasantly surprised at how well the story and characters were developed in the first season (with only eight episodes). Curious to see what is next in season 2, and kind of worried that this show has potential to turn into the never-ending plot that is similar to The Walking Dead. What is the main point of the show? Restoring vision to those who do not have it (i.e. is there a cure)? Or conquering those who do/don’t have vision? Or just a never ending show of finding new tribes and people to either befriend or destroy?

For All Mankind (Apple TV+)

I’m glad that I have stuck with this one because I think (and desperately hope) that we are getting into something good now. For a while there I thought this was just going to be an equal rights show, but things seem to be moving towards the potential conflict of having two countries on the moon simultaneously not working together (apparently). That said, I am unsure of where this show is going to land ultimately. Other than getting a man to the moon (done), a woman to the moon (done), and beating Russia at whatever they are doing on the moon (in-progress…I think), what is the over arching conflict/goal?

The Morning Show (Apple TV+)

I am enjoying this one the most. Something bad went down at the network and although one guy took the fall for that, there is an inevitable consequence in the works for the network at large. How that plays out and what happens to those involved is the unknown. Do they get away with further coverup or do things come to light and people are held responsible? And what will that look like? Enjoying each episode.

The Crown (Netflix)

I enjoyed the first two seasons and, even with an entirely new cast of the main characters, am continuing to enjoy the third season as-well. The pomp, circumstance, and history draw me in. I tend to watch this show with Wikipedia open on my phone, looking up names, places, and events as they are mentioned. I enjoy learning alongside the dramatized nature of TV when possible, and this show is enjoyable as a form of entertainment and also as an introduction into historical topics I otherwise may never have looked into.

Not enough money. Not enough time. Not enough land. Not enough bedrooms. Not enough freedom.

“If I only had more…I would be happy!”

Not true.

Being content with life now does so much. It allows us to be more present. Less concerned with what is currently not obtained and more concerned with what is.

This concept is something I have shrugged off for the past five or so years. What I had was never enough and I was determined to get what I wanted. I became a “side hustle” nerd. Trying everything. Spending countless hours and thousands of dollars on creating an additional stream of income. A noble pursuit, yes, but necessary? No.

My only debt was and is my mortgage and a small (compared to others) school loan. My living expenses are covered every month and then some. My family does not go hungry ever and we have comfort in both cold and winter months. We literally have everything we need. We have enough.

(My primary goal was (and is) being debt free. That’s where the determination came from. But at what cost? Time (probably thousands of hours over the past five years) away from my family. “I am working hard for my family, the one I never see.” The debt is there, yes, and I will get rid of it, but at a slower pace. I’m going to stop forcing the additional income stream.)

So, then, my mind asks the question: if enough is enough, and we need to be satisfied with that so that we can be more present and still, was all of that time and money spent on a goal of additional income a waste?

I think the answer is no. It was all a part of growing up, for me. Trying things that I had to try, and that I was going to try eventually. I had to “get it out of my system.” It was then or later. They all failed in the sense that they did not accomplish the goal of additional income, but they were all a success in that they taught me a lot that I did not I know before I started, and they ultimately brought me to the place I am trying to get to now. A place of focusing on one thing, being content with the skills, knowledge, interests, and gifts that I have been given.

Our past is necessary for the present in that it brought us to where we are now. That does not mean it takes us to our next destination in life, but it was an influence. And that is valuable, as lessons in life are learned in both the good times and the “bad”, and we must use those lessons to be better today than we were yesterday, and better tomorrow than we are today.

(Another copy and paste from my journal).

And that mindset of stillness is something I remember having many years ago. It was during those times when another version of me took over and did the writing. I have only experienced those times of “stillness” when I am writing. It is during those times that I hit a stride, I feel as though I am living or existing in a sweet-spot of sorts. It is like hitting a tennis ball at the right spot on the racket, the ball goes farther, faster, and seems to put no strain whatsoever on the wrist. Hit the ball with any other part of the racket and it will not go as far, it will no go as fast, and it will hurt to hit. The sweet spot is where it is at, it is where I want to desperately get back to. The sweet spot is when I am existing at the right place and time, and I am doing the right thing. It is when I am doing what I was made to do. No other time in life feels like the sweet spot.

Putting the mind into that space is not easy. We have constant input and, now at this point in my life, constant pulls for my attention (wife, kid, dog). Plus there is work, extended family obligations, etc.

I need to prioritize writing even more in my new routine (yep, another “new” routine). I need to sit down to write right away. Before walking, before taking any inputs from life, write. Up at 5, writing by 5:15. That should be the goal. Walk at some point during the day. I need a spot in the middle anyways that gets me up and away from the computer. A 30 minute walk and 15 minute stretch is good for that. Up at 5, write at 5:15, breakfast and stuff around 7. Shower then too. “Ready” for obligations by 8. Almost two hours of writing every morning. Yeah. That’s what I need. And journal first, like I do here, to warm up, get my fingers moving, my brain in motion, and then switch gears to something else. What that “something” is, I have no clue, as usual, but at least give my mind the opportunity to be still and figure it out. The routine of putting writing first is key. That way it gets done. I have accomplished the most important thing before anything else.

It is amazing to me how much we can lose our sense of self if we are not careful. I have lost what feels like all sense of who I am over the past twelve years, even more so in the past 6 years. I am only thirty-three, so still a child in many aspects of life, but I do know that who I was 13 years ago, maybe even as far back as 15 years ago (before dating and all of that), was the real version of me. That version had an unwavering confidence and the ability to enter into a mindset of stillness. I remember it clearly, as if it was yesterday, how that mindset felt then. The years of life since then, and the impacts I have allowed it to make on me have scarred that portion of my mind with a hard tissue that will take more time to remove. But, I believe, and hope, that with diligence I can do so.

This is not to say that the past, as a writer, is not valuable. It is extremely valuable and will most likely be what I pull from as I get back into the mindset of a being a writer, but the loss of self that was required is painful to reflect on. That sounds dramatic, maybe even overly dramatic, but that does not make it untrue.

As with everything in life, I am arriving at this point (this realization) at the precise time I was meant to. It is my job to not waste it.

With writing on my mind I have been thinking about my relationship with the practice over the span of my short thirty-three years.

I have an odd memory (odd as in “why do I remember this so clearly?”) of the first letter I really enjoyed writing (H). I remember writing it on everything. Over and over again.

I am not very clear on writing during my elementary school years, but things become clearer when I reach middle school (7th grade in my case). It was during this time that I started keeping a journal. Just filled with the thoughts of a thirteen year-old kid.

Journaling is a practice that I have kept up with ever since. I journaled all through high school and thankfully continued afterwards, which is when I would need it most. Journaling became a very real form of meditation for me, and remains this way today. The time of journaling is when I am most “centered” and “at peace” with my thoughts and how I am spending my time. I never feel pulled away from journaling, but instead feel a constant pull towards it.

My journal has had many different forms, but are all filled with the same thing: words. From plain lined paper kept in a three-ring-binder, to the classic Composition notebook with their splotchy black and white design, up to a more sophisticated Moleskine, Rhodia, and even hand-made notebooks. I have even used my collection of Field Notes notebooks as journals, filling a notebook in a few days.

More recently, in the shadow of the iPhone and the applications that were born as a result, I have Day One journal entires dating back to 2010. And even more recently, in the shadow of my continual learning and understanding of how technologies/applications/formats will come and go, I have resorted to keeping journal entries in plain text files (this seems to be the closest thing to a piece of paper). Pencils, ball-point, gel, and fountain pens. All tools to record my thoughts. The journaling habit I started back in middle school has persisted through many seasons of life and remains a key part of my routine to this very day.

High school is when I started to dabble in writing stories. Again, a clear memory creates a mark on this particular page of my relationship with writing. I was asleep one night in my bedroom. Then, as if prompted by a spirit, I opened my eyes and realized I had to write the thoughts that had just run through my mind. I got out of bed, walked over to the desk I had against the wall, and turned on the desk lamp. I found a few scraps of loose paper and began to write. I even put headphones on and listened to a wonderful album that I still enjoy to this day: Freedom by Michael W. Smith. That album was the soundtrack to the story I wrote that night. I titled the story “Freedom Shot”.

It was a short story, turned out to be five or so typed pages (double spaced, etc etc, as per my English teacher’s requirements). So maybe 1,000 words. But I remember how much fun I had during that moment of inspiration. There are a few other instances during high school where I would bolt out of bed after sleeping for a few hours and furiously jot down the idea running through my mind. I wrote another short story, I forget the name, but it was based on a newspaper article I found one Sunday morning when I was looking for the comic section (a ritual I would like to get back to). It was about a conman doing his conman thing. Something about the article sparked an idea and I wrote about that idea. Another short story, and another moment of enjoying the creative writing process.

My confidence was building and I tried to write a story about Christmas. I forget the specifics, but my teacher simply wrote, in red ink, of course, “This is not a story. There is no plot.” I disagreed with her then, but understand now. What I wrote would have made a great scene in a larger body of work, but it could not stand on its own and be called a story. This was deflating for me at the time.

But I continued to write stories as they would come to me, and I continued to show them to my English teacher, and she continued to encourage me in my writing.

Then I graduated and floundered for a bit, or for a while depending on the day. A semester at a local Bible college was enough for me to realize that college was not for me (especially for what I was studying there…I know what I would like to study now, but now is not the time for that). In my brief time on campus I did have an Engligh class that I thoroughly enjoyed, and again, found encouragement and constructive criticism from my teacher. But, one class was not enough for me to stay, so I left and pursued another dream I have always had which was flying, becoming a pilot. That experience is another story for another time.

(One cool thing that did come out of college was blogging. The year was 2005 and I started my first blog. I’m sure it is gone by now, but it was on Xanga (which is running on WordPress now?)).

After leaving college I went back to the job I had in high school (selling baseball cards on eBay), started to learn how to fly airplanes, found a higher paying job (flying is expensive), got involved with the recording studio a friend of mine was starting, was introduced to WordPress, moved out of my parents house, got married, left the higher paying job, and kept writing.

This is now early 2008. I am publishing to my WordPress blog on a fairly regular basis. Publishing devotionals of sorts, or reflections that I had after reading a specific portion of scripture. I was enjoying it, I had a few readers who would comment regularly, and it was something I easily kept up with as a part of my day to day routine. But, I was unemployed and newly married. And I was looking for a job.

Someone close to me told me, “You need to stop writing to your blog. If someone finds that they may not hire you.”

And thus, fear of what I wrote creating negative consequences was introduced into my mind and has somehow persisted ever since. I heeded their advice. Stopped writing, stopped publishing, and made the site private.

I have never fully recovered from that experience, as minor as it may appear on the surface. The artist in me was stifled, over ruled by the part of me that needed to do certain things, look a certain way, and not rock the boat. He, the artist, has tried to come back up to the surface since then, but has never been successful in breaking through the decade of normal that has trapped him.

I digress :-)

How dramatic! But true.

And so, the writing I have done since 2008 has fallen into the categories of work emails, professional documentation, school assignments (I did go back to college, online courses, but again for the wrong thing and never graduated), and SEO writing (I dabbled in niche/authority websites for a time). I did complete NaNoWriMo in 2008 (after I got the job everyone was hoping I would get), but since then have not written anything for the simple sake of creativity. It has all been about money. Quite literally. Money.

I have written and published online at all of the places you would expect (WordPress, Medium, Ghost, SquareSpace, etc), but none of that has stuck around. Just the artist trying to break through but not really knowing how. Floundering.

That’s my story so far with writing.

Currently, 11 years after my last creative writing project, I am doing my best to get out of my own way and to not let the thoughts or opinions of others (especially those closest to me) keep me from writing what I want to write, even if I don’t know exactly what that is yet :-)

What I need more than anything right now is coffee, and not for its effects, but for it alone. The smell, the warmth, the presence of the mug. It does something to my mind when I have that mug full of hot liquid by my side, next to the keyboard (dangerously so), available both mentally and physically. I use coffee as a tool to help with thinking, writing, and doing what needs to be done during the day.

It is the same with tea, as far as it having a purpose is concerned. I prepare tea for the evening. Tea is what concludes my day. I approach it differently than coffee. Tea is more of a transaction in my mind, as opposed to a tool for my mind. I am drinking tea for the positive effects it will give my body as I sleep, and for the relaxing state it provides before I get there. I use the same kettle to boil the water and even the same mug that I used in the morning for holding my coffee, but it is vastly different from its morning counterpart.

I fill the kettle with fresh water and set it to boil on the stove. Then, I place the tea bag into the mug and fill it with the water after it has boiled. Next, it steeps for ten minutes. I change into something more comfortable. I brush my teeth. Lay things out for the next morning. Let the dog out. And then the timer goes off and I squeeze the tea bag before throwing it in the trash. Add honey onto a spoon and stir it into the hot tea, gently clinking the sides of the ceramic mug.

Next, something I look forward to all day: reading.

This time of year we have our family room decorated for the Christmas season (which I believe can safely start on the first of November), so our Christmas tree is up and decorated, and we have small things here and there throughout the room to add warmth to an otherwise cooler time of year. After the house has been put back in order from the activity of the day, when our dog is softly snoring, when there is no request from anyone to do anything, when the loudest noise in the house is the hum of the refrigerator in our kitchen (which is something I need to look into), I will settle into the corner of the couch with my tea and a book to read.

My early morning walks are filled with non-fiction audio books, mostly books to help me become a better person. My evenings are entirely different. The day is done and there is nothing left to improve except for the approaching time of rest, and so I read a story. Fiction. Anything from an Agatha Christie to something in the Science Fiction genre or a spy thriller. All it needs to do is take my mind away from the here, now, before, and after, and just put me somewhere else. In another world, another time, with different people, places, and things. I look forward to this escape!

When I finish the last drop of tea I will read to the end of the current chapter and then simply go to bed.

Coffee for starting and thinking, tea for ending and relaxing.

I’m glad I am not spending any time on anything “productive” or meant for monetary gain. It is nice to do things for the love and art of doing them. Makes me really nervous about starting up with a particular idea I’ve had and planned to start in the new year. Should I take a less direct approach to things and just follow a passion to see where it goes, if anywhere? I have been so direct and purposeful with my “side hustles” (for lack of a better term) that maybe it is time now to just do me and see what happens…should I stop forcing it? Or is that a form of giving up?

I do think I need to remain focused on writing. It is something I have always wanted to “do” but have always been torn away from in some way. And I think that is telling…there is something trying to keep me away from writing…and so maybe this time around I just ignore whatever pulls I have on my life to do other things and remain focused on writing.

As I have said to myself many times before today: I am a writer.

“Writer” was the occupation I chose way back in elementary school, and was something I actually excelled at as far as my education was concerned. From elemtary school all the way through the few years wasted at a University, every teacher and professor would say that I was a great writer. Even that one time last year when I attempted to write a business plan. I wrote the thing, and had a local business advisor take a look at it. His review: “You are a great writer. This is a terrible business plan, but an incredible story. Share this with your family and friends but don’t take it to the bank.”

I need to identify as a writer first and always.

And in order to be a writer I need to write every day. My “job” then will be showing up daily to write.

“But, what are you going to write?” My inner critic asks.

“I have no idea, but I’ll start by writing about that and see where it takes me.”

Travis Clark:

The series, starring Hailee Steinfeld as the 19th century poet, recently broke through Parrot Analytics’ top 10 most in-demand original streaming shows.

Dickinson was the first Apple TV+ show I watched. And after watching all available episodes of the current show list of ATV+, it remains my favorite by far. It is refreshing, different, and emotional. Looking forward to season 2.

Jason Kottke:

It’s comforting to know that warmer weather and longer days are waiting for me in the distance, when I can do more of what I want to do and feel more like my true self. But in the meantime, pass the cocoa and I’ll see you on the slopes.

Leaning into Winter and embracing what the season has to offer, as opposed to dreading it and choosing to have a negative attitude about it, is something I am trying to do this Winter, too.

• my current use of Drafts
• being so excited about getting an Apple Watch
• the past year and some of the lessons learned
• some of my most used Shortcuts
• adding more automation to my home
• watching Mozzie ice skate
• the process of learning (based on observations from the previous item)
• voting
• working from home (I have made it back)
• taking time to make a decision - slowing down
• the balance of living now but preparing for later
• the ever present challenge of being present
• cutting ties with negativity
• trusting my gut

And then there are other types of things I want to write and publish. The ever-present link post with a line or two of commentary above or below a block of text from the linked post. I want do this for myself because sometimes after reading something I want to save it with a few comments of my own (for reference or otherwise) and publishing this to my blog is a great way, I think, to save it for later but also share widely (ish) at the same time. Just need to figure out the quickest and most efficient way to do this.

Writing and publishing more, that’s what I want to do now that I have the time to do so.

Monday

🚶🏻‍♂️Took a family walk today, which we thought was a good idea. Turns out that it wasn’t, but there was no way for us to know until we started. That’s just how things go in life sometimes. With things that are “big” and things that are “small” - most times you just have to start to see how it will turn out.

Tuesday

✅ Solid day of working through all items on my todo list. A rare day of actually completing every item!

Wednesday

🌈 Rainbow in the sky today after a good rain.

Thursday

📚 Had our final cigar event tonight. Glad to be closing this chapter.

Friday

📮 Drafted an email today that I will send on Monday. It is a breakup email of sorts. A business that I thought was going to last for at least a few years is not going to work out, and instead of prolonging the inevitable I am cutting loose immediately. Following my gut on this one, which I should have done at the start when things started to seem off. Lessons learned!

Saturday

🦖 Took a trip down to Washington D.C. to take Mozzie to the National Museum of Natural History. We thought he’d love to see the dinosaurs…turns out he was more interested in the LEGO sets in the gift shop…made for an interesting time trying to make the best of it. We’ll go back in a few years to try it with him again. Other than the museum the trip was a success. No travel issues or delays, and it is always good to get out of town.

After returning home I went back out in the evening to see friends I haven’t seen in a while. It was good to catch up.

Sunday

💭 Spent some time this evening reflecting on the week. It was good, overall, despite a few interesting events thrown in for fun. As always, plenty of lessons learned, some big and some small. I am beginning to think about 2019 in general, looking at the themes of the year in retrospect. It did not turn out the way I thought it was going to, but I think that is for the best.

Monday

🍁 Picked up a very appropriate leaf on our morning walk today. Autumn is definitely in full swing at this point. The next week or so should bring very colorful mountainsides.

Tuesday

🧘‍♂️ My new schedule is very nice. Not having my evenings tied up has freed up my mornings. Could just be a mental thing for me, but I’m not fighting it. Getting back into my morning routine of stretching, meditating, and journaling. Today it clicked for me that my time is mine again (although it never wasn’t mine, I just gave it away for a while). Rejuvenated by this thought!

Wednesday

📺 Dusted off my personal YouTube channel. In addition to writing again I want to get back into recording screencasts showing how I do certain things. I enjoy doing them, and maybe they’ll help someone along the way. Enjoyed a cigar and bourbon outside before the evening got too cold to do so.

Thursday

👫 Dangerously close to the weekend. Actually had a date tonight with Lindsay, been a while, too long to be honest. Enjoyed our time together, and especially enjoyed being able to talk [mostly] uninterrupted.

Friday

👰 Wedding rehearsal and dinner afterwards for a cousin’s wedding. Lindsay and Mozzie are both part of the wedding party, so I’m involved be default (mostly with making sure Mozzie is where he needs to be so Lindsay can actually be a part of the wedding). The cathedral is absolutely beautiful and I enjoyed taking photos while it was mostly empty. The dinner afterwards was a nice time with everyone. Wish we could have stuck around longer, but a 6 year old requires a bedtime before 10pm as often as possible.

Saturday

👰🤵 Day of the wedding! Lindsay had to be out of the house at 6:30am, so it was Mozzie and me all morning. We did our normal routine before getting ready to leave the house for the day. Our first stop was the house where the bridal party was getting ready.

📸 Photos there, then off to the ceremony. Went off without any issues. Mozzie did great and got his LEGO set as a reward.

⛪️ The ceremony was beautiful! Photos afterwards went well and without any issues. While the party went off to get more photos, Mozzie and I went up to the

🏛 Capital building so he could run around before heading home to let the dog out. Once she was good to go we were off again, this time to the reception venue. We were early, so we spent our time relaxing with the wedding party. Another good time to unwind with a fun group of people. All around our age too, which is rare for us and very enjoyable when it is enjoyable!

🎉🥂🕺👯‍♀️💃 The reception itself was awesome. Family parties are a good time when everyone is getting along. The wine was flowing all night and the DJ was good. Made for a very active and fun dance floor.

I never want this type of evening or event to end, so I tried to get to the afterparty, but again…6 year old problems :-) Despite missing a bit more time with the wedding party, it was an awesome time with everyone!

Sunday

☕️ A much needed day of rest.

Monday

😕 Unmotivated start to the week, unfortunately. I am constantly at a adjusting and making decisions, do I go left or right? My decision, as with all decisions, will have an impact now and in the future. Need to make a decision this week.

Tuesday

Cannot recall this day. Photos and calendar tell me nothing either.

Wednesday

🎥 Lindsay and I revived our YouTube channel. Not sure why, but we did. Finished the night with cigars and wine 🍷. Felt good to create content together and then unwind.

Thursday

💭 Made up my mind about continuing to work at the lounge or not. Will stop effective 11/1, probably sooner. Felt good to reach the decision. Focusing on finding remote part-time freelance work in IT. Found 6 realistic options to apply to. Goal is extra income each month towards this goal. Watched Mozzie ice skate ⛸ today and took him to Get Air in the evening. His face beams when he is on the ice!

Friday

🕰 Fast work day, cold morning. Even colder evening later as it went as low as 38 degrees Fahrenheit. Work went well, additional processes are being thrown my way which is good for me. Went into the office for two meetings. Parked myself at the coffee shop all morning and early afternoon. Found out that my ITIL instructor passed away on Tuesday. He was also the owner and founder of the coffee shop. He was only 43. Definitely gave me a bit of a jolt, found it hard to focus. Cigar event in the evening. Ready for that work to be done. The owner only partially paid me for work done in September. Not to mention the pay is not what we originally agreed to to begin with. Will do one more event for him that I previously committed to and then I am done. Unfortunate, but necessary. I will not allow my time to be taken for granted.

Saturday

🥾 Ran errands and otherwise lost sight of the day. Went hiking later in the afternoon with my brother and sister in-law. Watched Toy Story that evening, which Mozzie enjoyed! Stayed up late with a second Manhattan and watched General Magic. Phenomenal documentary. They were just way ahead of their time. Everything they wanted to do with technology eventually came to be, just years after they first attempted.

Sunday

🌧 Cloudy with rain all day today but that didn’t stop Mozzie and I from going on our morning and afternoon walks. Got hooked on Mini Motorways from Apple Arcade. Hooked. I live a good strategy game. Another family movie 🍿 night. This time Despicable Me 2.

Monday

⛅️ The mornings this week were all typical for this time of year, but once the afternoon hit Summer temps came back into the forecast. I didn’t complain, but everyone else in this area seemed to. They all prefer Spring and Fall, tolerating Winter only because it isn’t Summer. I tend to complain during every season except Summer, but am setting a goal now to not complain about the weather ever. I want to do a better job of enjoying every single day regardless of where the sun is and how hot or cold it may be. Rain or shine I want to appreciate it all!

🎂 16th birthday party for my niece tonight. I remember holding her when she was just a few months old. Incredible how quickly time goes by!

Tuesday

💨 Cigar event in the lounge tonight. I thought it went well, but I determined that this part of the cigar industry is not for me. I have tried writing about it, talking about it, and now am in the retail end with online and brick and mortar sales. None of it is for me. But this is ok. I am learning. I’ll try to remain where I am through the end of the year so I can at least make a clean break (as far as the calendar is concerned).

Wednesday

😡 Snapped. Left the humidor early and may not last much longer. Plan to give it until the end of the year and hopefully transition to plan c beginning in January of 2020. Some things just aren’t meant to be, and I never want to be someone who forces that which need not be forced.

Thursday

☔️ Rained today and I was ok with that.

Friday

😌 Took the day off today. From everything. No cigar work. No day job work (well maybe just a little). After taking Mozzie to a playground he was picked up by my mom, so then Lindsay and I could start out “staycation”. We decided to leave though, making our way out to Lancaster to do some shopping and then dinner before ending the night with cigars at a local cigar shop. It was a great evening full of uninterrupted conversation.

Saturday

🧳 Up early today, for a Saturday, as we want to be on the road to Washington DC as soon as we can. We stop once for a coffee refill but otherwise make great time and catch the 10:30 metro 🚇 into the city. We get off just south of the National Mall so we can grab a quick bite to eat at L’Enfant Plaza. Once fueled we make our way to all of the sights, doing a great job, if I may say so, at seeing most of the big ones before catching the 3:30 train back to our car. We had a great day exploring and look forward to heading back to DC soon. It is too close to stay away for very long.

Sunday

💭 We walked a total of seven miles while in DC so rest was needed today. I was in my head a lot, trying to figure out a few things. One big thing is that my plan b isn’t going to work as I had expected or hoped. So I am currently trying to figure out what will replace it. I need it to produce an income rather quickly and prove to work long term. Not an easy thing to do. But my idea is something I have come back to again and again over the past twelve years. Now may be the time to actually give it a go. Otherwise, concluded the day by running a few reports for my day job and then watching Cars 2 with my family. First time for Mozzie and I to see it and I think we both enjoyed it very much!

Allow me to get personal. Okay, not too personal, but at least hear me out with a crazy goal that I have with my little family of three.

We want to travel around the country (USA) in a RV. Or as Mozzie, my six-year-old, calls it, a “camper van.”

We want to travel as a family and we want to start where we currently live. The world has a lot to offer, but I believe starting our journey as “travelers” here in the States will be a fine way to kick things off.

But it isn’t that simple, as anyone with a family, job, and financial obligations will know. Just packing everything into a trailer on wheels and waving good-buy to the suburbs is not a reality.

It takes planning. Extra income, in my case, as my wife’s sole focus is training/raising/educating Mozzie. And guts.

Guts that I think we have, but will know for sure when things become a bit more of a reality.

I have two goals, or prerequisites, that I want to hit before embarking on this crezy journey of taking my family from a 1,200 square foot ranch home with a big back-yard and shoving them into a twenty-some foot RV.

1) I want to do it debt free. No financing on the RV. Pay cash. Entirely. And no debt from our “previous” life. No student loan. No mortgage. (The only debt I currently have).

2) I want to have a few streams of income, all “self-employed” income sources if possible. If my current traditional employer is game, I’ll consider it. But as of now they are pretty structured on the normal 9-5 window of availability, even with me working from my home office 99% of the time.

So, with those two goals in mind I am beginning to plan things out now. And my life has become increasingly busier as a result.

In order to hit the first goal I need to be making a certain amount of money above and beyond my day-job salary. So, to accomplish that, I built and run an e-commerce site for a local cigar shop where I split the profit, and then took a part-time role with that same cigar shop for a fixed monthly amount of money. The fixed amount hits my goal of what is needed annually to knock out all debt within five years. Any income from the website is extra and simply not planned on since that can realistically take years to get to a point of providing financially.

In addition to that, and also with the second goal in mind, I am doing whatever I can to learn iOS development. I have been living on the edge of “becoming a developer” and just need to do it already. So I am using it to reach a few goals. My aim is to develop an app that I can market and sell in the App Store. I know, I know, lofty dreams and goals, but I am going to try. I do not want to do client work because that creates ties and obligations to others, which becomes complicated while traveling. And iOS because, well, I just like the way Apple does things. Plus their hardware is the best I have used.

So an app or two or three to replace the income generated from working at the cigar shop (retail work is not for me) and then to somehow carry that into life on the road.

Another stream of income I would like to developer is tied to writing. Not writing code, although some would argue that counts, but writing to tell stories, educate, inspire, or scare away. “Being a writer” is another thing I have always wanted to do but never did anything with other than to think “that would be nice, for people to pay for my written thoughts.” Never before has it been more of possibly to connect with an audience who will pay to read what one writes, but also never before has it been more difficult simply based on the sheer number of people trying to do the same thing.

And exactly what I would write…I have no clue yet, but there must be something that I can do with this idea…

So the next 4-5 years is what I am working with. During that time I am preparing for what I hope to be a crazy life change that is an adventure for my family. One that we will never forget, and maybe never quit.

I plan to share my progress here and hope that doing so creates a sense of accountability for myself, but also helps one or two others who also have a crazy idea they’d like to try. Not to say that the way I am doing things is right, it is probably all wrong, but maybe the spirit will be all that is needed to give someone that push they were looking for.

So that’s a long explanation for posts and such to follow. If you read up to this point, I thank you!

Here we go :-)

Dear Diary for week ending Sunday, September 22, 2019

Monday

In the forties (Faranheit) when I woke up, Autumn is eager to be official. Worked from home and saved a toad from what would have been a very dry death. Phenomenal salad for lunch with ingredients from our garden, which is late to provide this year. Worked late into the evening in the humidor.

Tuesday

Cold morning again but managed to get out for a walk with Mozzie before the day started its typical pace of insanely fast. Unintentionally wore an Adidas outfit head to toe. Very comfortable. Took work outside for pet of the afternoon and enjoyed a new to market cigar while continuing to chip away at my todo list (which I am beginning to migrate more of into the Apple Reminders app).

Wednesday

Walked again this morning. Fast work day. Conference calls in the afternoon. Humidor work in the evening. Prepped for Friday’s event, a routine that needs to stick (preparing early). Got to bed earlier than usual as I had to rise early the next day for a meeting in the city.

Thursday

No walk. Drove to the office for the first time in a while. Had two meetings, both of which could have been emails. Back home in time for lunch. Mozzie has his second ice skating lesson and seems to be catching on quickly, and enjoys it! Early family dinner out and a target run for Mozzie to pick out a lego set to buy with his allowance money. Spent the evening watching him build and play. Early to bed again, early meeting the next day.

Friday

No walk again. Meeting at the coffee shop across the street from my office building. A meeting that could most definitely be an email, but I guess the face to face time is good in this instance. Home again for lunch, then did some prep work for the event later. Then the iPhone 11 Pro Max delivery happened and all productive work was tossed aside. But then I had to run out the door to set up for our Friday night event at the lounge. The weather was nice that evening, so not too many folks stopped by to smoke cigars inside. Everyone is taking as many evenings outside as possible. Winter Is Coming.

Saturday

Lindsay is out of town today and tomorrow so it is just me and Mozzie. A guy weekend! So we did nothing all morning. He watched tv and I sipped through many cups of coffee while tinkering with my new iPhone. Then we got our act together and spent the afternoon at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania. We had an incredible time there. I’m still amazed at the size of the trains, and what they accomplished early on! This will be a repeat trip in the future. Quick stop for groceries on the way home, then popcorn and pizza for dinner :-)

Sunday

Breakfast of doughnuts 🍩 and eggs 🍳. Another surprise trip to Target for Mozzie to get another LEGO set. He is now on a mandatory spending freeze until at least the end of November! Spent lunch and early afternoon putting it together before Lindsay returned from her trip. Then we all packed into the car to head out to Little Buffalo State Park for a late afternoon hike. Squeezed in 2 miles before calling it quits. Beautiful day to be out, and I guess the last day of Summer. Cannot believe that. Subs and pizza for dinner and Newport. Talked about RVing on our way home. A dream we have had for at least fifteen years. Evening of more legos before the bedtime routine. Not quite ready for another week to begin, but the work and time spent working will pay off in the near term.

1. The exhaust fans need to be turned on to exhaust things, and where those switches are located is also good to know.

2. They have seasonal hours, closing at 9pm on Friday instead of 10pm. Would have been good to know, as an event I had there was scheduled to run until 9:30. Happy to know now!

3. People are generally afraid to try new things.

4. It is easy to convey urgency, but difficult to have urgency shared by others if it does not directly impact them.

5. The Spotted Lanternfly is actually a thing and is something that I need to take seriously while out and about. Found a bunch of them (dead) outside of the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania.

6. Back in the day the Pennsylvania Railroad equipped their steam engines with more coal than they could actually use before the water would run out. So, in theory (or not), they were hauling dead weight.

7. Turning a hobby into something you are paid to do isn’t always a good idea.

8. The routine that a male Western Parotia goes through in order to attract a mate is absolutely amazing. And crazy. (First learned about the routine while watching episode 3 of Our Planet on Netflix (beginning at the 11:30 mark).

9. Nature takes care of its own.

10. Not new, but worth noting as I was reminded of it again this week: there is a reason for everything. Absolutely everything.

Daring Fireball:

There’s also a shortcut that not many people know about, but when you show it to them, their minds are blown: with 3D Touch iPhones, you can 3D Touch and hold anywhere on the keyboard (that is to say, keep your thumb or finger pressed on the keyboard) and the keyboard turns into a virtual trackpad for moving the insertion point around any text editing field, exactly like moving a mouse pointer. With non-3D Touch devices (including iPads), you can still do this, but you can’t press anywhere on the keyboard to initiate it — you have to press-and-hold on the spacebar. I picked up this shortcut years ago and it long ago became second nature to me. It took me a few days to get used to having to start by pressing on the space bar. It’s a small regression in the user experience.

An iOS shortcut I use daily and am happy to see it is not disappearing completely with the removal of 3D Touch.

The iPhone 11 Camera is app is very different, but I took to it right away. It feels less like an app and more like a camera. It’s just great software.

I am also really looking forward to the camera (I ordered the 11 Pro Max).

I have always tracked how I spend my time. Whether I was doing it to track time for a future invoice to a client, or for self-improvement, time tracking has always been a thing for me. (Those are the only two reasons time should be tracked: making money, or looking for areas to improve.)

For me, at my current stage/phase/place in life, time tracking is meant to identify areas that I want to improve (personal and business).

On a personal level I am tracking time in the following “projects” (in Toggl):

• Family
• Writing
• Reading
• Sleep
• TV

And then, for each item above, I have goals that I want to see happen over time (thus tracking my time so I can track my progress towards those goals). These goals are primarily Monday through Friday, weekends are extremely flexible.

• Family - I want to see this hit at least 3 hours every day
• Writing - Although I don’t do enough of it, a “writer” is what I have considered myself to be, and what I want to be. Goal is at least 1.5 hours each day. This will go up over time and a lot of writing will be spent on a business that I am in the midst of starting. But, for now, personal writing time is what I am looking at with this item.
• Reading - Something I love to do, as with writing, but always put off for continuing to work into the wee hours of the night. I want to do at least 1 hour of reading (primarily fiction) every night before bed.
• Sleep - Goal here is a minimum of 7 hours, and not much more than that.
• TV - I want to see this go down and hopefully stick to the weekends (starting with Friday evening). I don’t have a trend for time spent watching TV during the week, but I have done it quite frequently the past few weeks just based on how disjointed my schedule/routine has been.

For business tracking I am only focusing on tracking time spent on a business that I am starting. It is an online cigar retail website which will have over 1,000 products when it is “finished”. I am currently in the phase of building the website and populating the product database with products and all of their associated variations. My primary areas of focus at a high-level are running the business operations and managing the website (and all of the connected services (customer service, transaction emails, credit card processing, etc). My wife is handling marketing and will also primarily handle pick/pack/ship.

Anyways, that is just some context.

I am tracking time related to everything I do currently for the business as we are ramping up. Over time I hope to see less and less time tracked to areas that are not my primary area of focus (marketing, shipping, etc) and more time spent on a continual improvement process for the website itself.

I also want to see time spent on the business as we start get back to a sane level. Lately I have been putting in anywhere from 30 to 40 hours each week on this project on-top-of a full-time job. That cannot continue. It just can’t. And so I am capping myself at 10 hours each week, Monday through Friday. Putting a cap on my time will help me to spend it much more wisely and efficiently, and will enable me to meet all of the other obligations and goals I need to meet.

So that’s time tracking for me: personal improvement and accountability.

Like I mentioned before, when I planned to start blogging again I seriously considered going the route of a self-hosted WordPress website. Nothing against WordPress, but I decided to not start there. Instead, through a bit of a rabbit hole, I discovered micro.blog…which is doing things a bit differently.

Back when Twitter started, and everyone was trying to figure out how they could make money, I always said that they should just charge me/users monthly or yearly to use the service. I enjoyed the platform, enjoyed the community of people I met, and wanted to see it remain the way it started: community first.

I believed then, and I believe now, that if we want to see something or someone succeed/last money is required. Nothing is free. Money is being made somewhere and I’d prefer to keep the relationship simple: I pay you, you provide a service/product. Period. End of discussion. Nothing murky about it.

And so, after a 7-day trial of using micro.blog, I am happy to begin spending $10 each month to publish on the platform. $10 provides them with what is needed to support my site each month (I hope!) and it provides me with a simple yet flexible/powerful site that I can use to publish and own both short-form and long-form posts, including photos, videos, and even a micro-podcast if I choose.

Plus the community here is awesome. Just seven days in I already see the value in this community, and the quality people it attracts. I am happy and excited to be here and to contribute whatever I can to keep micro.blog going strong. I am also excited to be publishing again :-)

I plan to start writing and publishing online again. For the past 12 years, this has been an endeavor that I will pick up for a month or so then fizzle out. That has been based on life and my current place in it. Right now I am feeling more confident about what I’d like to write about, and can continue writing about when I don’t feel like writing.

I was planning to do all of this on WordPress, which is what I have done in the past in many different iterations and domain names. I have also experimented with Medium, but get “corporate” vibes that I’m not really a fan of. Then, I went down a rabbit hole and found micro.blog.

Rabbit hole -> listening to the Mac Power Users podcast again -> getting back into using Omnifocus for task/project management -> using scripts from @curt to do things in OF -> noticing micro.blog in his sidebar -> and here I am.

So now I am stuck figuring out where to publish. Or, more accurately, what to use to publish. I am leaning towards using micro.blog entirely: for the short thoughts and the longer “essays.” Borrowing from @brentsimmons:

It was well-understood that blogging is provisional, is thinking-out-loud. It was the flow of life-on-the-web. Not everything was an essay.

When Twitter came along we collectively decided that this kind of thing was Twitter’s jurisdiction — that these are just tweets.

But why should we agree that Twitter, or any company, owns an entire form of writing for the web?

So that is all. This is me thinking out loud. I think I’ll give blogging a go again, and settle in with using micro.blog for all of that, short and long.