random

I had a hair-brained idea last week to email Suze Orman for the Can I Afford It? segment on her TV show when I kept waffling on whether to head to Texas in May with Kaitlin for the Beyond the Lights celebrity golf tournament.

To give a little background, Suze is a financial guru and has people call into the show that want to buy something that’s way outside their budget…like a $10,000 ring for their wife that wants it for no other reason than to keep up with the Joneses or a $250,000 sail boat they’ve wanted for 20 years or a $500 brief case for a new college graduate just because. It’s stuff outside your budget that is a definite WANT not a NEED and callers ask if they have the extra cash for it.

When I announced I was doing this but not for what yet, I had several guesses.  Mom guess adoption but guess what?  I KNOW we can not afford that.  Someone else guessed a new car.  Boring!  Someone else guessed plastic surgery.  You think I’m going to ask Suze Orman if I can spend thousands of dollars on bigger boobs?  I’d rather not feel the wrath of Suze in front of several million people.

Yes, the celebrity golf tournament is silly but it’s unique, not too extravagant and definitely a want, not a need.

Anyway, the trick is “extra cash” is very loosely defined.  Someone may have 100K in the bank but if they’re getting ready to retire, she won’t let them spend it.  As a viewer, it’s a game to see if you will approve it or deny it like Suze based on the financial stats that were given.

So my deal is the Beyond the Lights celebrity golf tournament is a fundraiser that cast members Brad “Buddy” Leland and Kyle “Coach Eric Taylor” Chandler started to benefit charities that support folks with spinal cord injuries.  It’s a one day event that includes the golf tournament, dinner, a silent auction and a concert.  The tickets are $200, my plane ticket would be about $300, hotel about $130 and then some spending money. I’m guessing it’s going to be about a $700 trip.  It’s not a $250,000 sail boat but it’s not a drop in the bucket for us either.

The golf tournament is held in Austin where FNL is filmed and most if not all of the cast will be at the tournament.  And since this is the last year of the show, it may be the last time so many are in Austin together.  I’d put this off another year but I really think if this is something I’m going to do, I need to do it this year.  Fringe benefits are I’ll have another weekend to hang out with Kaitlin, I’ll get to visit Texas and help a charity!  It’s win-win for everyone but our bank account!

I got an email the same day from the show that they were interested in my story. Just a week later after a finished budget and lots of answered questions, I was on hold waiting to talk with Suze.  All of that explanation above was a lot to get out in a fast-paced phone call with Suze Orman.  Her assistant said they were excited about my request because it was new and different.  She wanted me to have fun with it and really try to convince her.  I was nervous. 

All the callers were lined up in a queue and I just sat and waited for Suze to activate my line and ask me what I wanted to buy.  I didn’t get much explanation at all in and I didn’t hear her ask one question quite right and probably looked silly on one of my answers but I came away mostly unscathed.  The best news?  She said I could go!

I’m waiting on an air-date so you can see how it all went down.

What would you ask to buy?

Salchow, axel, lutz…it sounds like a list of Russion music composers to me.  One of my fascinations with figure skating is just how the announcers figure out what jump the skater is doing.  Besides the fact they have their program written down in front of them, of course.

I did a little digging and while I’m not proficient yet, in order of least to most difficult, here are the types of jumps:

• Toe Loop
• Salchow
• Loop
• Flip
• Lutz
• Axel

If you have about 10 minutes to spare, here is a video explanation on all the jumps. The good news is it has lots of explanations and footage. The bad news is it looks like it was created in 1991 and has awful music. If you can get past that, I think you can learn something.

Figure Skating Jumps
Uploaded by oxygala. – Check out more sports and extreme sports videos.

Axel is the hardest and easiest to spot because they go into it facing forward.  That may have been the only thing that stuck in my brain but at least I know when I see it, to be impressed!

If you want a more detailed training series, Michael Weiss has a great set of video tutorials here.  I’m gonna get this one day!

This will probably be the most non-serious post about the 2010 Olympics.  But while I was watching ice dancing last night, I couldn’t help but think that these two

(Jana Khokhlova and Sergei Novitski of Russia)

Looked like these two…

(Russell Brand and girlfriend Katy Perry)

…had found a pair of skates and gone to the Olympics! 

Am I right or am I right?

In other news, the Canadians totally deserved gold.  It was beautiful!

(pictures courtesy of vancouver2010.com)

Wednesday night was spent on the large part doing two things.  One, I went to the gym with Melissa to struggle through Week 4.  Two, I recorded a Friday Night Lights podcast with Kaitlin and the hosts of another FNL podcast.  You might not think those things were related at all but I found one common theme: expectations.

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I think I figured out that C25K is even harder than I thought this week because I truly expected that each week would be very doable, comfortable even.  I thought they’d work us up slowly enough that it would seem easy as we went.  In fact, week 3 actually did seem a little easy.  But as I talked to Melissa and read a little on it, it appears that every workout is doable, but it WILL push my body.  So I think if I step back and look at the fact that it has been both doable and challenging and that it will continue to challenge me every step, I can brace myself for the run better.  I didn’t expect a challenge, but I got it and I can do it.

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You don’t have to watch Friday Night Lights to get this but we were doing reviews of several new characters.  And for one of them, I had high expectations. I expected a full-on bad boy with a lot of grit and push-back.  But for me, he didn’t live up to those expectations.  He’s much more compliant and warm-hearted than I imagined.  I expected one character and got another.  But it’s ok.   I think I’m going to like this new person they’ve created.

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Both of these things rolled around in my head right before drifting off to sleep last night and I realized how expectations relate to life.  Maybe you got something you didn’t expect or maybe you didn’t get something you expected.  Can anyone relate to a missed promotion, an unexpected sickness, blissful marriage, unruly children, the loss of a friend?  But while you’re in it, if you take a step back and take your expectations out of the equation and look at what’s in front of you, it’s ok.  Maybe you need to see what’s in front of you for what it is and not what it should have been.  I think you’ll find it’s a lot easier to deal with.  It won’t change it but maybe it will change your perspective.  Perhaps you can become more appreciative even though it’s not what you wanted?  Prepared for what’s to come?  Accepting of the past?  And maybe, just maybe, you’ll find it’s better than expected.

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I can’t think of a better day other than the first of a New Year to take stock, evaluate and maybe shift some perspectives.  And no matter what our expectations were, we all have something to be thankful for from 2009.

For me, today is going to be a day to appreciate all God’s blessings this past year and to be hopeful for what He has in store for 2010.  Things I can always expect and never be disappointed in His love, mercy and grace. May we all experience it richly in 2010.

Happy New Year!

You may remember when I painted my back door black after being inspired by this post.  One thing left to do was the lettering.  Shelley from Wonderfully Wordy did the vinyl lettering for Just a Girl.  Once on Shelley’s site I found lots of stuff I’d like to do.  My plan was to do the numbers on the front door and the Welcome sign on the back.  Well, the way my front door has 8 panels instead of 6, I wasn’t positive I’d like the spacing.  So I ended up leaving the front door clear.  And as much as I liked the numbers, I felt like a Welcome sign was more appropriate for us in our garage.

But of course I couldn’t just do that!   When Sally visited our house, one thing she said we needed to do was group the frames in our hallway and add our name to the top.  I loved these signs that Shelley had available.

We had a mix-up in my order and Shelley was fantastic and sent some extras with new shipment so I got this “Bubbles, steam, serenity” sign.  I love it on my bathroom door as I see it behind me as I get ready and as well from my bed.

Shelley was fantastic to work with.  She gave me all kinds of options and advice for what I ordered.  The items were shipped promptly (and adorably).  Her customer service when there was an issue was impeccable.  Can’t recommend her enough!  Go check her out!

This seems so random today but I’ve been wanting to do this post for a while.  Anyway, hope it helps fellow Gmailers!

I love getting email, especially when it’s from an actual person! But if there’s one thing I love after reading them all is seeing my Inbox completely free and clear of any emails.  Some of you may be wondering how I do it and sure that your box could never be empty.  But if you have Gmail, I have two features I started to use this year that should make it quite possible.

I find that there are only two reasons that I keep an email in my inbox and not archiving it.  One is because there is something I need to do and need the email as a reminder or need info from it and the second is if there are links/info I know I’ll need in the future or on a consistent basis.  Tasks will solve the first and Quick Links the second.

Here’s how.

Quick Links

I love Quick Links.  Basically these are bookmarks to an email.  These are great for emails that you need to consistently open.  For example, one of mine is Scott’s 2010 work schedule that I will refer to often throughout the year. Instead of keeping it cluttering my inbox, I created a Quick Link.  It shows up in a list in the bottom left of Gmail.

When I click on it in my Quick Links list, the email pops right up.  So it’s just as accessible as an email in my inbox.  In fact, since you get to give it a customizable name, I’d say it’s even easier to find!

So how do you add a Quick Link?

1. Expand your Quick Links menu in Gmail (Plus sign to the left)
2. Open the email you want a quick link to
3. Click Add Quick Link on the bottom right of your Quick Links list
4. A dialog box will pop up with some weird name like “inbox/234234”.  Just type in the name you want to see in your Quick Links list.
5. Click OK
6. Archive your email to clear it out of your inbox.

And voila!  Your email is easier than ever to find and your inbox is one step closer to being clear!

Tasks

Tasks are great for quick hit things you need to do.  Maybe a reply to someone that you need to take the time to do later.  For me, I have a lot of reminders to myself to do a blog post.  It may be an appointment or a request from someone to fax something.  There are infinite possibilities here.  But the difference between a quick link and task is the task can be checked off and when it’s done, you’ll never want to refer to that email again.

You can see my Task List on the bottom right of the screen shot above.  To add an email as a task list:

1. Select the email in your inbox by either clicking the checkbox in Inbox or simply opening the email.
2. Click on More Actions in the top level Gmail menu bar.
3. Click on Add to Tasks.
4. Archive your email to clear it out of your inbox.

To see your Task List, click on Tasks in your left sidebar in Gmail.  It should be right above your Quick Links.  From the Task List, you can mark off the task by simply checking it off.  There are lots more to Tasks as well.  You can give yourself a due date, put it in a customized task list, make notes, delete it, all kinds of things!

I think you’ll find by using just these two features you can keep your Gmail Inbox free and clear of hundreds of emails!

I’m guessing a lot of non-techie people have no idea what Google Wave is.  Honestly, I didn’t either.  I mean, I’d heard of it.  And I knew it was Google’s latest project.  And I knew I was a fan.  I’ve been a huge fan since 1999ish.  But this Wave thing, was waving right over my head.

This week, 100,000 invites went out.  I think I might have requested it but apparently it didn’t help because I haven’t gotten an invite yet.

While waiting, I’ve been trying to figure out what in the heck it does exactly.  I knew it would help with communication and possibly replace Gmail and Twitter.  That’s about as far as I got.  I’m still not sure of the details but this little video was fun to watch and gave a good high-level idea of what it’s trying to accomplish.

And if you have an invite you’d like to extend, my Gmail account is always open.

If you want a little more detail, check this video out: