#175 Know When To Fold 'Em

Gearing up for the Fourth of July celebration I looked at the flag we have and realized I don't know how to properly fold the flag. So I learned how to fold the American Flag from this site.

#174 For The Birds

Today the kids and I made a birdhouse. The kids painted it afterwards and it ended up looking very cool, psychedelic, Peter Max-ish. The kind of birdhouse that will attract some very laid back hippie birds.

#173 Roller Derby

Now with my newly shaved head I thought it might be time for a little counterculture sports, so I went to a roller derby. Milwaukee's very own all-girl Brew City Bruisers took on the Tampa Bay Tantrums. Knowing very little about the sport, I considered it to be about as valid as professional wrestling. But after having seen a match I have to say that it was hardly what I expected. The match was highly competitive and not scripted at all, and with names like Becky the Butcher, Pound Anya, and Ann T. Social, how could it not be entertaining?

#172 Hair Today Gone Tomorrow

Today was one of the harder things I've had to do mentally. I shaved my head. Part vanity, part insecurity, I wasn't fully prepared for this. But with a little peer pressure from my father-in-law Mac and his friend Nick, there was no way I was going to get out of it after I mentioned I was thinking of doing it. Off it went, and after the first look in the mirror I thought why in the world did I do this, but after an hour or so it started to grow on me.

#171 No Man's Land

After getting the "all-clear" I ventured into the place I probably haven't been into since I was a little kid, I used the women's bathroom, in a fairly busy restaurant bar. Thanks to a co-worker who stood guard as I went inside, my first impression was what a mess it was in there but then the tranquil pink walls took their calming effect on me and I was taken to another place and it didn't matter anymore.

#170 Tuvalu Honey

Tonight I researched the most obscure country that I could think of, and in terms of land area the 4th smallest country in the world is Tuvalu. It's right behind the Vatican City, Monaco, and Nauru. Located in the Southwest Pacific Ocean it has a population of 12,100 and a land mass of 10 square miles. It consists of nine islands that are actually atolls, islands formed by coral that surround a lagoon. The most interesting fact is that Tuvalu has been able to earn several million dollars a year by marketing the .tv suffix that it owns for internet addresses. Because of it's unique suffix, it has become a very attractive to televisions companies all over the world.

#169 Enquiring Minds

It must have seemed pretty odd to the little old gray-haired lady behind the counter as I entered the store at 10:00 at night and made a beeline for the tabloids in front of her. Feeling her stare, I perused the aisles to find an excuse to buy something else. I bought a beverage and a pack of gum to soften the embarrassment that I bought a National Enquirer. Besides the typical celebrity gossip, I was lucky enough to buy the issue that featured "The Blue Orb" that was infused with the positive energy of a psychic and was somehow transferred into the ink of every single copy. It's amazing power will bring me good fortune. I'm still waiting.

#168 Bucket List

I haven't seen the movie yet but I thought it was appropriate that I made a bucket list since it is all the the new things I wish to do someday but probably won't be able to do in the scope of this project. In no particular order here is a list of things that I want to do before I die.

Go scuba diving.
Go on an African safari.
Take a cruise.
Write and illustrate a children's book. (and get it published)
See The Pyramids.
Hold a monkey.
Visit all 50 states.
Go whale watching.
See the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.
Go to the Superbowl.
Skydiving.
Visit all seven continents.
See a tornado (from a distance)
Be a guest at the White House.
Swim with dolphins.
Lunch with Neil Diamond. (I can't really explain this one)
Go to an Irish Pub in Ireland.
See the Great Wall of China.

#167 Primal Urge

Within every guy there is an innate urge to see how far you can launch an object. It's almost unavoidable. It can be a rock, a spear, a discus, a ball, just about anything is launch-worthy. It's why goat tossing exists in Spain. It's pretty simple, It gives us great delight to see how far we can make things go. That's it. And because I'm not impervious to this, I fired a water ballo0n launcher. It was fun, they went far, we laughed.

#166 Mad Scientist

For my son's birthday party I had a Mad Scientist come to our house (in all fairness it was really my wife who did all the planning) Complete with tesla coils, slime, fire, twelve screaming kids and much more. Fortunately the house remained in tact, with the exception of a screen door that was run through within the first five minutes.

#165 Twiddler on the Roof

Because I needed to do something new desperately, I twiddled my thumbs for fifteen minutes. It's a lot harder than I expected and after five minutes I was wishing I had decided to thumb-twiddle for five minutes instead. I recommend stretching your fingers ahead of time, or better yet, don't try doing something this stupid in the first place. Incidentally, I read that the longest time someone had done this was twenty hours, but I could not confirm this on Guinness. I just might hold the world record.

#164 Ujjayi Pranayama

Today I learned a new breathing technique called Ujjayi Pranayama. Used for yoga and meditation it is sometimes called the "ocean sounding" breath or for those of us less in tune with nature at the moment, is best described as "Darth Vader" breath. After much practice I can't say I was anymore relaxed than when I started, which is probably more of a comment on my own state of mind and not the breathing technique. The only real effect on me was a serious case of light headedness.

#163 Personal Handler

I'm not really sure exactly how to explain just how surreal this night was, other than by saying at the end of the night I was riding around in a limo with Fonzie and Shirley. Yes, the Fonz from Happy Days and Shirley from Laverne & Shirley. I also was hanging with Leslie Nielson who even at the age of 82 had us all laughing hysterically because of a hand held whoopie cushion that he kept squeezing every time he posed for a picture. For a good part of the evening I was the personal handler for Mark Metcalf (best known as "Niedermeyer" from Animal House or "The Maestro" from Seinfeld) At one point I was in the middle of a Blue Man performance, at another I was speaking to a Cher impersonator. All very surreal. This was all part of a grand opening of a new section at the Potawatomie Casino in Milwaukee. Through a friend of a friend, (thanks Erin and Gino) I was able to be a personal assistant with a couple others to a group of celebrities that were making appearances that night, including the before mentioned Henry Winkler and Cindy Williams.

#162 Tell me Something New

What did I do today? I ordered "Something". What did I order? I have no idea. I do know that it will be coming in a box and I ordered it from the Somethingstore.com. I also know it cost me $10. It will be one completely random thing from their inventory. It could be an ipod , it could be something completely useless (more likely).

#161 Adventure Day

Today was the second last day of school for my son, and I volunteered for Adventure Day at my son's school. It's a day when the entire school gets to participate in all sorts of activities in various "stations" Unfortunately it all had to be moved indoors because of the enormous amount of rain we've had. I was in charge of Rhythm Stick Hockey, the long and short of it; give a bunch of grade school kids some sticks and a bunch of balls and let the mayhem ensue. Fortunately, no one was injured on my watch.

#160 Pandora's Box

Here's a great site I heard about years ago in it's testing phase, but not until now did I set up an account on Pandora.com It's an online radio station that only plays music you like. Tell it a song or artist that you like and it uses a number of variables to determine other music you might like. Give each song a thumbs up or down and it defines the music you like even more. The great part about it is the other artists that I've found that I've never heard of before.

#159 New Thing For Old Man

Finding time to watch a movie these days has been difficult, so because I had nothing planned today I opted for the easy way of accomplishing something new, I watched No Country For Old Men. Great intense movie, full of suspense . The entire movie was great right up until the last couple of minutes when...

#158 Micro Lending

I found this site from another new thing a day person who I believe found out about it the same way. The site is called Kiva.org and it specializes in connecting people from developing countries who are trying to become entrepreneurs and lift themselves out of poverty with people who are able to give them small micro-loans. It works like this, they apply with certain lending institutions that are partnered with Kiva and request the amount they need to get their business off the ground. Kiva posts their request and in turn visitors to the site can loan to the person of their choice in increments as small as $25. For every person that gives a loan, the closer they get to their requested amount. All money is then agreed to be paid back in a certain time frame. Along with a group of almost 45 other people, I loaned some money to a group of women from Senegal who are trying to get supplies for their business in which they make and sell clothing. Here is their photo and story.

#157 Rabbit Season

I can do a pretty mean shadow puppet of a dog when I have to, but today I stepped it up a notch and I learned how to do a rabbit shadow puppet. It takes a little bit a of finger contortion but with a little practice it can be done.

#156 Facebook

Not really knowing what to do with it or why, I joined Facebook. I know what it is and I've heard plenty about it, but as someone who hasn't even joined myspace, I'm not really sure how much I will be using it. Time will tell.

#155 Add the Kraut

One of the last remaining foods that I’ve managed to elude since my child-hood has been sauerkraut. This has required a great deal of mental fortitude or more likely, stubbornness. It’s no easy task to grow up in a German family living near Milwaukee where sauerkraut is almost as abundant as water. So despite the smell and the name, I ate sauerkraut, on a bratwurst.... Say! I like sauerkraut! I would eat it on a train in the rain, in a boat with a goat, on a yacht with a brat. I will eat it here and there. I will eat it anywhere!

#154 All-Star

To the baseball purist the fact that I voted for my choice of players in the MLB All-Star game most likely goes against the integrity of the game and they’re probably right. And I apologize. Number one I only voted for Brewers in the National League. And for the American league it was based entirely on name recognition. I also may have left a number of “hanging chads” on my ballot.

#153 Go For The Juggler

I've been able to juggle 3 objects for a while, but nothing more. I considered trying to add a fourth for today's thing but I believe that would take more than a day to do, so instead I learned to juggle with a behind-the back-move. It took a while to get the hang of, maybe 2 hours total, but I was able to do it with some consistency now.

#152 Sprecher

Milwaukee is known for a lot of things and depending on who you ask (and the time of evening) you're likely to hear about the beverage very near and dear to our hearts – beer. It is seems only right that I took a tour of Sprecher Brewery. Sprecher is a micro brewery that makes a fine selection of craft beers as well as a killer root beer and other sodas. The best part of any brewery tour is of course the sampling. I highly recommend the Abbey Triple – a Belgian style ale. And for the soda enthusiast, the Cherry Cola made from Wisconsin's very own Door County cherries.

#151 Barbershop

Cutting another person's hair for the first time ever can be a pretty nervy experience, but not if you make that first person your son. He was the perfect guinea pig because at his age he really doesn't care what he looks like yet. So I gave my first haircut and I completely messed up. I took a huge chunk of hair out from behind his ear as I was trying to sculpt around his ear. So what started as light trim, ended up being a full fledged "summer haircut" to help blend in the missing chunk. As expected, he really didn't mind.

#150 Typo

I've wanted to do this for a long time now but procrastination and being a complete sissy about needles have prevented me from doing this – I donated blood. It took only 45 minutes at the local Red Cross and it was not at all as bad as I thought it would be. And the cookies afterward didn't hurt either.

#149 Frankenstein

With whatever we had lying around the house I "invented" a new drink. Here's what you need to make your very own Frankensteins.

2 oz. Rum - the cheaper the better.
3 oz. Orange Cream soda - not easy to find, especially when it's buried at the back of the fridge.
1/2 box of grape juice - must be from a juice box for authenticity.
3 oz. Iced Tea - just because
Splash of lemon juice

Combine ingredients over ice, preferably in a mason jar to give it that moonshine look. Now this is important... Garnish with one lime flavor ice pop. Enjoy.

#148 Star Bright

According to sources like the IAU (International Astronomical Union) the naming rights to a star or any celestial body can't be legally sold or even recognized for that matter. Despite what they say, I had a star named. Somewhere out there a stars got the name "365 Daves" . The official information is as follows:

This is to register the Star designated as 240067 with Magnitude 9.8, type A0, located at the coordinates: RA 12H 34m 18s, and Declination -58° 43m 2s, to be known and named:
365Daves
Here's a link to it on Sky Map.

#147 Memorial Day

Today we headed out to Elm Grove, Wisconsin and I went to see a Memorial Day parade. Lots of great antique cars, fire engines, marching bands and unfortunately, a few clowns (for me they rank up there as one of the more freaky things in life) Despite the clowns, the weather was beautiful and the parade was a great time.

#145 Groundbreaking

Not eventful, not exciting, and not very cool but it was necessary – I used a rototiller. Just one of the things you find yourself having to do out here in the 'burbs. My arms payed the price and as I heard someone else describe their rototilling experience, "it was like trying to hold on to a runaway bull"