this is how i’m doing: in case you were wondering…

So, I decided to tuck in my shirt today and a student worker told me I looked hot.  So I’ve got that going for me.

“You will make a lousy anybody else, but you will make the best “you” in existence”

Do you have enough iron in your diet?  A quick way to check is to look in the cabinet with your pots and pans and look for your cast iron skillet.  Don’t have one?  Then you need more iron in your diet.

Mine was $20 at Target and has got to be my favorite piece of cookware.  Weighing in around 5 pounds, it’s not exactly light which is good.  That bulk holds on the heat like no other and will give you forearms of steel as you maneuver the thing from stove to oven to sink to campfire.  In the mornings I cook homemade (alright, home COOKED) tortillas on it.  It’s great for pan frying anything worth pan frying and makes the absolute best cornbread.  Go get one today, and become an Iron Chef.

Tuesday I had the opportunity to teach the ESL (English as a second language) class that I volunteer at.  The actual teacher had to be at another function so Matt (the other volunteer) and I were given a lesson plan and the class.  I like being in front of the class — though I am an introvert by nature, being in front of the class appeals to my control freak side — and I had a blast teaching these parents about subject and object pronouns.  I didn’t realize how much our language depends on the use of pronouns until I was staring another language in the face.  While not nearly my favorite subject to teach, I was both honored and excited about the opportunity.  One of the lady’s said she would make me homemade tamales, another told me I looked like I was only 18 years old.  Let that be a lesson to any students out there — give your teachers and professors food and tell them how young they look.  These students are sharp

In other news, running is going phenominally well — much better than my last attempt a few months back.  I have “3:10:59″ posted around my office, and every time a student or a co-worker asks what it means I get to tell them my goal, which futher reinforces it in my mind.  If you didn’t read my “Dreaming Big” post a few days ago, you should probably read it now.  “3:10:59″ is what I will have to run the Houston Marathon (January 09) in to qualify for the Boston Marathon (April 09 or maybe 2010).  My goal is to run the Boston and, being all about efficiency, I’d like to run as few marathons as possible to get there.  So, if I can spend the next 8 months getting my endurance up and my mile times down, I’ll reach this goal soon!

My first run back in mid April was horrible.  I felt horrible during and after the run.  My catch phrase was “what the heck am I doing??”  My legs were so sore after that.  Determined to get through this intitial out of shape phase as quickly as possible, I ran again the next day which was even worse.  I put in a good weeks worth of active resting and when I ran the same 2.6 miles this week, I did it in 22:45, which is not spectacular, but it was 3 minutes and 15 seconds FASTER than the week before.  I’m running in a 5k next Saturday with some co-workers;  my goal is 24 minutes.

My Greek is coming along nicely — I know the alphabet and can read basic sentences — granted I don’t know what the sentences MEAN but I can at least sound out the words in my head.  I’m using the Bible, because it’s the only book I’m familiar with that I KNOW is in Greek and English — and that’s kinda the whole reason I want to learn to read Greek :-). 

I tried to post something in Greek here, but it came out as a bunch of random characters so, next time you see me ask me to write something in Greek.

Randy Pausch is dying.  He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and his life expectancy is measured in weeks and months, not years.  You might have heard of Dr. Pausch and his “Last Lecture” (which I highly recommend — google it) or his book of the same title (which I also recommend, it’s on iTunes).  Seeing this man squeeze every ounce of life out of each day has been truly inspiring.

I stumbled upon Randy’s videos through iTunes U.  I’m such a nerd that instead of keeping up with the latest albums by the latest artists, I’m searching for free knowledge on iTunes.  I saw that a new University had posted content (sweet!) so I check out Carnegie Mellon University.  Not really sure why I clicked through to Computer Science, but I did and I saw a video titled “Time Management”.  I thought it was a bit odd to be placed in Computer Science, and I needed some help managing my time, and it was only an hour long so I watched it.  This is when I find out that this guy is dying and immediately after watching the video I check him out on Google.  Apparently I was a little slow on the uptake — he’s kind of a celebrity now.  Anyway, that doesn’t change the fact that this guy’s story has definitely left more than a few chisel marks on my life.

When you think about it, we’re all dying; it’s the only thing guaranteed coming to us.  Randy is fortunate enough to know that he is running out of time which has given him the opportunity to make the most of it.

No links in this post; Look him up — it’s worth it.