365 Daves

#175 Know When To Fold 'Em

2008-06-23T21:57:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-22T21:40:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-21T16:27:00.002-05:00

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

2008-06-20T21:53:00.002-05:00

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

2008-06-19T22:03:00.002-05:00

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

2008-06-18T21:07:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-17T21:00:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-16T21:41:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-15T22:29:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-14T22:01:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-13T21:18:00.004-05:00

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

2008-06-12T21:05:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-11T22:40:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-10T22:31:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-09T22:13:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-08T22:07:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-07T21:34:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-06T22:40:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-05T22:18:00.003-05:00

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

2008-06-04T22:10:00.002-05:00

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

2008-06-03T22:02:00.001-05:00

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

2008-06-02T21:05:00.000-05:00

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

2008-06-01T20:53:00.001-05:00

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

2008-05-31T21:48:00.000-05:00

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

2008-05-30T21:06:00.001-05:00

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

2008-05-29T00:41:00.001-05:00

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

2008-05-28T00:21:00.001-05:00

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

2008-05-27T22:56:00.002-05:00

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

2008-05-26T21:56:00.000-05:00

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

2008-05-24T21:24:00.000-05:00

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"

#144 Brain Calisthenics

2008-05-23T20:58:00.000-05:00

The New York Times and Time magazine both have done articles about aging and the importance of exercising not only the body but also the mind. It might be a little premature for this, but I did some "brain calisthenics". Time has a 20 minute workout in which you can work on memory recall, sound tracking, and other focusing skills. There's also a number of other sites out there that have offered an online service for mental workouts such as the HappyNeuron.com.

#143 School Play

2008-05-22T21:47:00.000-05:00

Being a relatively new dad the opportunity for new things really occur almost daily, like today I attended my son's first school play. It was The Three Bears and he played a mushroom. I'm not really sure how I would have played a mushroom, but he did a great job as "a poisonous one"

#142 Air Zooka

2008-05-21T23:26:00.002-05:00

One plastic garbage can, one shower liner, one really big rubber band. That's all that was needed and I made an AirZooka. It also doesn't hurt to have a fog machine to shoot out really cool smoke rings. Take the liner and cover the trash can opening as tight as you can, like you would to make a drum. Wrap the rubber band (I got one at the local hardware store) around the edge so it holds the liner in place really tight. Cut a smaller hole on the bottom and you're done. Just tap the liner end with your hand and it blasts out a puff of air that can reach at least 20 feet away.

#141 Thanks for the Memories

2008-05-20T22:14:00.002-05:00

This one I have to preface by apologizing to great friend of mine. He knows who he is. We've had a lot of good times times together, especially in college as roommates for over four years. But the one thing he has forever scarred me with is incessantly playing certain songs over and over back in college. This was particularly hard to escape during the times we we lived in those 20' x 20'dorm rooms. So in his honor, I put together an iMix on iTunes called "Songs My College Roommate Has Ruined For Me". Here they are in no particular order:

Burn Down the Mission – Elton John
Tighten Up – Archie Bell & The Drells & The Drells
Moonshadow – Cat Stevens
Landslide – Fleetwood Mac
Monkey Man – The Rolling Stones
Both Sides Now – Judy Collins
Three Babies – Sinead O'Connor
2000 Light Years from Home – The Rolling Stones
Brandy (You're a Fine Girl) – Looking Glass
Le Freak – Chic
Moonlight Mile – The Rolling Stones
I Can See Clearly Now – Johnny Nash
Sweet Caroline – Neil Diamond
Tusk – Fleetwood Mac

#140 Harry Potter

2008-05-19T22:03:00.000-05:00

Today was the day I started reading Harry Potter to my son, it's also the day I may have started the process of turning my kid into a science fiction nerd. Which is fine by me I guess, because I loved this stuff when I was young and I think I turned out all right. Maybe he's a little young for it, but he was really excited about reading it, so were giving it a try and finding out what all the craze is about.

#139 PugFest

2008-05-18T21:35:00.000-05:00

What is PugFest? That's what I wanted to know. Well, I attended PugFest and it's basically a couple hundred pugs and their owners walking around sniffing each other, I'm speaking about the dogs. Amazingly ugly, but somehow they pull off being cute. Most noteworthy is the difference in size some of these things can be, from small and petite to grotesquely obese hunchbacked monsters. There were black pugs, grayish pugs, pugs with Packer jerseys, pugs with tutu's on, pugs with giant spiked collars, you name it they were there.

#138 Top Album

2008-05-17T21:25:00.000-05:00

I intended to listen to the entire album of Thriller by Michael Jackson but I was surprised to find out that it was not the number one selling album of all-time, which is okay with me, it was the Eagles Greatest Hits. How did this happen? Are there really that many people who want to listen to Desperado? Nothing against the Eagles but how is this possible, it doesn't even have Hotel California which I would venture to guess is their top selling song. Regardless I listened to the top selling album of all time The Eagles Greatest Hits.

#137 The Freshmaker

2008-05-16T22:47:00.003-05:00

Here's a cool experiment that was made popular on youtube, I made a diet coke and mentos rocket. All you need is one 2 liter bottle of diet coke and seven mentos, drop them in and watch the fun begin. I bought the tube with trigger pin at a local hobby store, but you can find it at this site along with more info than you need to know about coke and mentos.

#136 Pop the Clutch

2008-05-15T22:18:00.003-05:00

With the help of some coworkers I attempted to pop the clutch on my car. I use the term "attempted" because after seven tries I was only able to get the car to start briefly before it stalled. I also use the term "I" in the sense that I really didn't do much other than lift my foot off a pedal when I got the cue, while Joel and Jeff did all the hard work of pushing. I was really determined to get the car to start this way but I didn't have the heart to ask them to try an eighth time as they stood there out of breath. Thanks again to all three for helping me on this one.

#135 Whigmaleerie

2008-05-14T19:42:00.006-05:00

While wanting to widen my word selection on a whim, I read every word in the English language that begins with the letter "W". Webster's of course. Here are some words I found to be worthy of writing:
wahine
wallaroo
wamble
waterzooi
wheedle
whiffet
whigmaleerie

#134 Chucks

2008-05-13T09:50:00.005-05:00

Arguably the most famous shoe of all time, the Converse All-Star Chuck Taylor. They started making these in 1908 and later paid homage to basketball player Chuck Taylor by putting his name on them. Nearly 100 years later I designed my own Chuck Taylors. You can go to their site and design your own shoe in a variety of styles, colors, and they will send them out in 2-4 weeks. I just hope they fit.

#133 Batting Cage

2008-05-12T09:26:00.002-05:00

One of the great things about this whole new thing a day stuff is that I can fill in the gaps some pretty ordinary things that I've somehow managed to avoid doing my entire life. For instance, I went to a batting cage. My wife even took part, and I have to say with the exception of missing a couple, she was hitting them pretty good. If you haven't done this yet, go out and do it. It's fun. More fun than I expected it to be, if I had a pocket full of tokens I would have used them all. The kind of fun that kids throw a fit over because they don't want to leave.

#132 Mother's Day

2008-05-11T08:51:00.003-05:00

Given it’s Mother’s Day it seemed like the appropriate time to do something that probably was long overdue, I visited my Grandmother’s grave. She passed away when I was away at college in 1992. She was born in 1908 along with her twin brother and had 8 siblings in all, two of which passed away when they were children. My memories of her are of a very independent Polish woman who was an avid reader– especially on history. She was a sports fan, and I remember her teaching me how to shoot pool. I also remember her driving around many of the other elderly people in her building so they could get their errands done. Below is my favorite photo of her, to me it says a lot about the type of person she was.

#131 Me Make Fire

2008-05-10T22:08:00.005-05:00

Fire. Realizing that you can't even provide yourself with one of the most basic needs of survival is a humbling thought. So just in case I get stranded in the middle of the wilderness, I made fire without using a match or a lighter. Hopefully if I'm ever in that situation, I just happen to be carrying one of these nifty little blocks of flint. It took a few tries but eventually I was able to get a pretty good flame going.

#130 Esperanto

2008-05-09T21:42:00.002-05:00

I've learned a few phrases in Klingon, a completely fictional language. I've learned some Swahili, a real language. Now for the last of my new languages suggested by a post from Bill, I learned how to speak some Esperanto. This is a language that falls somewhere in between. It's not fictional, it's a real language that was developed in the 1870's. It's intention was to be a universal second language. It is a neutral language that has a very simple structure and pronunciation. Many of the roots of words are similar to the Romance, Germanic, and Slavic languages. It has a 28 letter alphabet. All nouns end in "o". Add a "j" to make a noun plural. Adjectives end in "a". Here's a simple intro to esperanto. And to add to my list of languages I can say "Plian bieron, mi petas." and "Kie estas la necesajo?" – Another beer please. Where is the bathroom?

#129 All By Myself

2008-05-08T22:26:00.003-05:00

Tonight I went to see a movie all by myself. It was a little awkward and I felt a little self-conscious about sitting there by myself before the movie started as people chatted with each other. The “lonely guy at the movies” was made even more noticeable by the fact that there were only about 15-20 people in the theater since it was a 9:40 pm show, so it’s not like you could just blend into the crowd. Also missing was the post movie talk that usually takes place afterward. It might have gone a little like this:

What'd you think?

Yeah I know, really cool effects. It took a little while to accept the premise, with all that building the Ironman in a cave and stuff.

How 'bout that guy behind me making all that noise with his popcorn? Yeah I couldn't wait 'til he was finished either.

Wow, it's past midnight already. I'm going to be really tired tomorrow.

#128 Othello

2008-05-07T22:12:00.002-05:00

No I haven't dove into Shakespeare yet, but instead I played the classic strategy game Othello. It was invented in the late 1800's by two Englishmen and the original version was called Reversi. It consists of black and white playing pieces and a grid. Here's rules and an online version.

#127 Tarot Cards

2008-05-06T21:33:00.004-05:00

In as little as five minutes I was able to do a tarot card reading with the help of this very cool illustrated set of cards I bought at the bookstore. "Uncover today's secret and tomorrow's promise" was the what the box stated. Here's what I learned:

The Moon card: "My intuition is very strong right now, but I'm still likely to be deceived. This is not the time to start anything new" – Great. It's a little late for that!

Eight of Cups: "Count your blessings and try to be content with what you have"– What I don't have is the eight bucks that I paid for these cards.

Two of Swords: "Aim for cooperation not confrontation"

Queen of Wands: "Dealings with authority figures will go well"- Is that why I got a speeding ticket?

#126 Card Cutting

2008-05-05T20:41:00.004-05:00

One thing a guy should know how to do is learn how to shuffle a deck of cards the right way. That way when you're playing poker and attempting to pull off the biggest bluff of all– the fact that you actually don't know how to play poker very well– you can at least look like you've been around a deck a cards a few times. With this in mind I've improved the charade and I learned how to cut a deck of cards a couple new ways. The first being the Charlier Cut (pronounced Shar-lee-ay) also known as the one-handed cut. The second is the Pivot Cut. Now I can at least look good as I hand over all my money to my friends.

#125 Balloon Launch

2008-05-04T21:59:00.005-05:00

Today the family and I held a balloon launch. Ten balloons all attached with a laminated card that directed the receiver to this blog in hopes that we can see exactly how far the balloons had traveled, the odds are pretty slim that someone will find them but you never know. The kids thought it was pretty cool and were hoping one would go as far as the North Pole.

Update: One of the balloons was found in Maniwaki, Quebec! That's over 650 miles! Most likely it traveled over two of the Great Lakes. A big thanks to whoever found it and took the time to post the comment. I would love to know more about how you found it?

#124 Trip the Lights Fantastic

2008-05-03T21:37:00.003-05:00

Some friends of ours have a band called Roshambo that we went to see and despite their best effort to get me up on stage to play the tambourine I managed to avoid my music debut and hang out in the back by the soundboard. I was too busy bothering the soundguy to let me control a handful of the hundred or so buttons and knobs that he was responsible for. He was completely accommodating to the barrage of questions I had for him and he gave me a pretty good run down of how it all works. I did manage to break him down and negotiate that I control the light show for the band. It was only for a brief time, but it was during the introduction of each band member and I managed to put the spotlight on the guitar player as the drummer was being introduced and playing his solo in near darkness.

#123 Swordfish

2008-05-02T20:51:00.003-05:00

Today I grilled swordfish. I didn't prepare it in any special way, no sword or anything – just the basics, fire and meat. It's not very appealing before it's grilled, some might argue not even after it's grilled. The taste was pretty good and it was really tender, like a good steak.

#122 Poet Laureate

2008-05-01T20:37:00.003-05:00

Not even knowing what a poet laureate was, I set out to first figure out what it meant and secondly I read the works of the current poet laureate Charles Simic. Every year I found out the United States Library of Congress appoints a poet to be responsible for a number of poetry readings and lectures at the library They also have the job of promoting poetry, whatever that means. They're also given $35,000 for this title. I read a few of the poems by Charles Simic and came to the conclusion that I'd rather be reading the ingredients on a cereal box. No offense to him, it's just not my thing.

#121 No Sense

2008-04-30T23:02:00.003-05:00

A friend gave me a suggestion that some of his colleagues had come up with, to go without one of my senses for awhile, so I went blindfolded for the evening – almost 5 hours. Definitely one of the more interesting experiences I've had and probably not the best night to have tacos for dinner. Once the novelty of it wore off after the first hour, it was hard not to think of the impact it would have on your life. Other than the obvious physical obstacles, it was the other little things like not being able to see my kids faces when they talked, reading, or even the sounds that you hear that I realize I take for granted.

#120 Crush

2008-04-29T22:52:00.003-05:00

Here's something I've never done and for good reason. I crushed a can my forehead. I'm guessing I was smart enough not to do this back in college, which leads me to the conclusion that I'm not getting any brighter.

#119 You Rah Rah

2008-04-28T22:31:00.001-05:00

Shouldn't everybody know the words to their alma mater's fight song? Well I didn't. The University of Wisconsin's song On Wisconsin is arguably one of the most popular school songs in the country, it's also Wisconsin's official state song. Composed in 1909 it has been called by John Philip Sousa "the finest of college marching songs" So without getting the nerve to actually tape myself singing the song, I learned University of Wisconsin's fight song. Here are the words and the music.

On, Wisconsin! On, Wisconsin!
Plunge right through that line!
Run the ball clear down the field,
A touchdown sure this time.
On, Wisconsin! On, Wisconsin!
Fight on for her fame
Fight! Fellows! - fight, fight, fight!
We'll win this game.

On, Wisconsin! On, Wisconsin!
Stand up, Badgers, sing!
"Forward" is our driving spirit,
Loyal voices ring.
On, Wisconsin! On, Wisconsin!
Raise her glowing flame
Stand, Fellows, let us now
Salute her name!

#118 The Art of Lawnmower Maintenance

2008-04-27T22:17:00.002-05:00

I've not had very good luck with lawnmowers, some I'll chalk up as circumstances beyond my control, the rest I'll take the blame for. Pure neglect. I've never changed the oil on one, never changed a spark plug, air filter, blade...nothing. Now that I've admitted that, I can say that today I gave the mower a little love, I changed the blade, filter, spark plug and oil on my lawnmower. How's that for pride in ownership.

#117 Common Sense

2008-04-26T21:56:00.000-05:00

Here's a suggestion from a friend of mine, I read Common Sense by Thomas Paine. It was a pamphlet written in 1776 presented to the American colonists as an argument for independence from British rule. It was written in a style that could be understood by the common people and was the first work to openly ask for independence from Great Britain

#116 Sir Duke

2008-04-25T21:49:00.003-05:00

This one I have to admit is a reach, but I went out after work with a couple of coworkers and did not plan for the evening to be taken up like this. I went to a place called Dukes on water street.

#115 Whistleblower

2008-04-24T21:19:00.000-05:00

My dad can whistle with his fingers like nobody I've ever heard. The ear deafening kind. His dad could whistle with his fingers, and I'm sure it goes on and on. So coming from what I can only imagine to be a long line of finger whistlers I figured it was time to carry on the trait. Problem is I've been trying to do this most of my life and all all I've been able to produce is a lot of air and lightheaded-ness. So today I gave it a real serious try. I researched it until I found a few good explanations for how it's done. I wasn't really expecting this to work but to my surprise I got it, I whistled with my fingers. It's not much yet, but it's a pretty good start. Here's one my attempts:

#114 Whoosh?

2008-04-23T22:54:00.003-05:00

I'm not really sure how to explain what it is that I tried today. We were at my mother and father-in-law's house and found this toy thing. It's red, football shaped, it's on strings with handles and I can't find it on the internet. I can say I've never done this before and it somehow turned into a battle to smash that thing as hard as you could into the other guy's handles so it would hurt. Not mention the intense tricep workout I got as result, I'm already feeling the hurt.

#113 Solo

2008-04-22T22:43:00.002-05:00

I searched the internet to see if there was a different version of solitaire than I was familiar with and had no idea there were hundreds of versions out there. I picked one that looked interesting and I played pyramid solitaire, sometimes called thirteen. Set up in a pyramid shape, you basically have to remove pairs of cards that add up to thirteen. It took about ten tries to finally win one, here are instructions on how to play pyramid.

#112 Share Nice

2008-04-21T21:44:00.000-05:00

Now for something completely uninteresting to most people: I bought some individual stocks on Sharebuilder. Investing for me up until now has been something very calculated and thought out, 401k, IRA's , Mutual Funds. For once I just wanted to be able to do it on my own and play the stock market. Sharebuilder makes it pretty easy and you can invest minimal amounts if you want.

#110 Really Swahili

2008-04-19T21:19:00.000-05:00

I wanted to learn a few phrases in another language other than Klingon
and the first language that came to mind was Swahili. Mostly because it's kind of fun to say. It's one of the more widely spoken languages of Eastern Africa and is heavily influenced by Arabic. Having decided on the language, I learned a few Swahili phrases like "Jambo" and "Tafadhali nataka bia baridi" and "Wapi choo?" In other words; "Hello", "I'd like a cold beer", and for about 1 hour later, "Where is the bathroom?" For more useful phrases here is great site.

#109 No Remorse

2008-04-18T09:50:00.003-05:00

Dit dit dit, dah dah dah. dit dit dit. At the very least this is what I'll remember from this new thing. In case I'm ever stranded on an island with a flashlight I can signal S.O.S. I learned some Morse code and with a little practice and I could probably master it, but then again why? The chart below is a pretty easy way of learning it, begin at the START and for dah (which is a dash) move down and to the left, for every Dit ( which is a dot) move to the right. For example the letter D would be; dah dit dit or –..

#108 Ring Taw

2008-04-17T09:27:00.002-05:00

This is one of those things that as a kid it somehow escaped me, probably because the video game world was just being discovered and playing Atari was all we wanted to do. Ask a guy ten years older than me and most likely playing marbles was great pastime for them. So today I played marbles, and lost bad. And thanks to my coworker Rick for being a good sport and taking part in something this ridiculous, although he's probably not complaining because he's now got a 12-pack of King Ludwig German beer coming to him.

#107 Oil Change

2008-04-16T22:43:00.004-05:00

How can a 37-year old guy claim he's a man if he's never changed the oil on his car? Well today I achieved this rite of passage when I changed the oil on my car. A couple of lessons learned:

Spend the extra 2 bucks to buy the bigger oil drain pan so you don't have to go into a panic when you realize the oil is going to overflow in the one that you have.

Do not try to drain your oil on a very windy day. The wind will redirect the stream away from your drain pan no matter where you try to put it. Trust me, it knows.

Do not drop the drain plug into the drain pan full of dirty oil. It will result in an unattended mess.

#106 The Taxman Cometh

2008-04-15T22:28:00.003-05:00

Yes, I'm exposing the unbelievable procrastination we have had this year in getting our taxes done when I say that I did my taxes online and E-filed. Every year on this day the news channels would cut to shots of people rushing to the post office to get their taxes turned in and I would wonder why on Earth would people wait that long? Well, there we were at 7:00 pm and we were beginning our taxes, not only were we up against the clock but we were doing it a way we have never attempted before. We did finish in time and although I do not recommend cutting it this close, I do have to say the online TurboTax version made it easier than it has ever been.

#105 Guitar Hero

2008-04-14T22:10:00.006-05:00

Learning an instrument has been something I've wanted to do for a long time and I can hardly say that I learned much when I learned how to play a song on guitar today other than my fingers are not physically capable of contorting to three different locations to play a chord. I'm much better at the one-note-at-a-time style of playing. Maybe I'm more of a linear thinker than a multi-tasker.

#104 Horse Around

2008-04-13T22:23:00.002-05:00

In preparation for hopefully witnessing a horse being born, I got a behind the scenes tour of an equine clinic and hospital. I've never even pet a horse before today, so this was really fascinating to see. Currently there were about 4 or 5 foals that had already been born and were in the stalls with their mothers. One particular foal had been born with a lack of oxygen so it was in need of some extra care because it still had difficulty in standing. I was also able to see the room where they perform the surgeries. In order to perform surgery, they sedate the horse in a separate room that has a floor that can then be wheeled out on tracks once the horse has laid down. I also got to pet a horse that was recovering from a broken pelvis and a foal that was about 1 month old. The horse that I might be able to see give birth is due on April 20th, so if the timing is right I could get the call to rush over there in the middle of the night!

#103 Never Give Up

2008-04-12T23:07:00.002-05:00

To see the complete video of what I did today click here. Afterwards, if you need a complete explanation of what you are seeing you can follow this link.

#102 What A Cream Puff

2008-04-11T08:48:00.000-05:00

In an effort to get a ride on a Zamboni (that giant ice resurfacing machine you see at ice arenas) I called the office of the Milwaukee Admirals hockey team. Unfortunately, they didn't have a spot for me. But I was offered something equally as cool and I took part in a cream puff eating contest during the Admirals last home game. Eating one of these famous Wisconsin State Fair cream puffs in less than 30 seconds in front of a crowd of over 8,000 people was definitely out of my comfort zone. My kids thought it was pretty cool to see dad on the jumbotron and I had an awesome time, despite coming in second to that big guy next to me, I think he won four tickets to see REO Speedwagon.

A big thanks to Tim Van Wagoner at the Milwaukee Admirals for helping me out.

#101 BMA

2008-04-10T08:41:00.001-05:00

Tonight I attended an awards dinner held by the Business Marketing Association, our design firm had won and award for some work we had done for Harley-Davidson. Sorry no pictures, I wasn't really thinking about taking the camera out. Anyways it was good time, lots of food, drink and time spent with coworkers.

#100 The Last Lecture

2008-04-09T15:00:00.000-05:00

On ABC last night I saw a story about a man named Randy Pausch a 47 year old computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon who has been diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. He has three children and wife and was given 6 months to live, I believe that was 8 months or so ago. He gave his final lecture to students and colleagues called "How to Live Your Childhood Dreams". It has received over a million viewings on YouTube. I watched "The Last Lecture" I highly recommend watching it.

#99 Home Brew

2008-04-08T07:48:00.004-05:00

For two weeks I've been waiting for my new thing #85 to come to fruition. I uncapped the bottle and I drank homemade root beer. Very flat. I'm not sure what happened, maybe not enough yeast, bad yeast, the yeast didn't activate, I don't know. Despite it being pretty flat the taste was great and we made root beer floats with it. Master brewmeister I'm not.

#98 Star Grazing

2008-04-07T07:48:00.000-05:00

I know that I have already had a posting of eating a some different tropical fruits but this particular fruit keeps getting suggested and my son picked it out for me when they went grocery shopping. I ate a starfruit, in my opinion one of the cooler looking fruits around. It comes from Asia from what I understand and it tastes kind of pinneapplely-melony-grapefruitish.

#97 In Six Words

2008-04-06T22:44:00.002-05:00

There's a book that has been getting a lot of attention called "Not Quite What I Was Planning" in which people were asked to submit their life's memoir in six words. The book also features submissions from many celebrities and a site that you can submit your six word memoir to. So I wrote my memoir in six words. I submitted it to the site and it goes like this:

No hair. Big Hair. Losing hair.

#96 Letter to the Editor

2008-04-05T22:25:00.000-05:00

I wrote a letter to Time Magazine's editor. The subject was about the April 7th issue cover story on biofuel. I always wondered why people felt the urge to write the editor and give their two cents. I basically had to force myself to do it, I had a definite opinion, but absolutely no desire for a complete stranger to hear it. But then again I am writing a daily blog.

#95 Pay It Backward

2008-04-04T08:43:00.000-05:00

Tonight I paid for someone's meal behind me at the drive thru. I've made two other unsuccessful attempts at this, on both occasions I've gone to order something and absolutely nobody drove up behind me. Tonight it started to look like the same was going to happen, when I got there the line was about five deep in front of me and again nobody behind me. By the time I got to the pay window, finally I could see a car pull up to order spot, as they rounded the corner I could see it was a car full of teenage boys. I told myself that I was going to go through with this as I winced in preparation for the little red digital readout of what the damage was going to be...$17.37! I told the cashier I was paying for the car behind me, got my change and pulled out of there as fast as I could to avoid looking like some creepy old guy that just bought their meals. As I pulled into the street and drove away I could see the cashier pointing to my car and all three in the car staring at me in disbelief.

#94 Old Fashioned Guy

2008-04-03T07:43:00.001-05:00

I'm not sure how this is possible, but I've managed to live my entire life in Wisconsin and never had a Brandy Old-Fashioned Sweet. Quite possibly our state's unofficial drink besides beer, it's virtually unheard of anywhere else. I believe there's a number of different variations on the recipe and if you have one feel free to post yours here. But here's what used:

2oz. Korbel Brandy
4 dashes Angostura Bitters
2oz. 7up
1 tsp. sugar
1 Maraschino Cherry

#93 The Nose Knows

2008-04-02T07:33:00.001-05:00

There's no graceful of saying this, I stuck a thing called a Neti Pot up my nose poured saline through my sinus. The Neti Pot is a simple device that's supposed to help with sinus problems, since I don't have any sinus problems at the moment I can't really report if it works or not, but I can say it felt like the water was going to come out my eyeballs, then for a brief second there is a sensation that I can only imagine is what drowning would feel like. After that it's a piece of cake.

Here's the video, my apologies to anyone who actually wants to see this.

#92 The Constrictor

2008-04-01T22:50:00.005-05:00

Having never been in Boy Scouts I missed the boat on Knot Tying 101 and with my recent discovery of The Windsor for ties, I learned how to tie a knot with rope called "The Constrictor" The Constrictor knot is a binding knot which I guess means you can tie it to another object. It's also very difficult to untie. All this is great, but to be honest the only real reason I chose this knot is because it had a cool name.

#91 Knot Me

2008-03-31T22:32:00.004-05:00

I think I was in 8th grade when I had to learn how to a tie a tie, most likely a knit tie in some sort Miami Vice pastel color. I learned it and stuck with it the rest of my adult life. It wasn't until today that I learned that I've been tying the "Four in Hand" knot, which I also learned is best suited for short-necked guys, which I do not have. I've been making my neck look even longer than it needed to be. Now with my new found awareness of my self-inflicted long-necking, I learned how to tie a tie in "The Windsor" knot, a knot for long-necked guys like me.

#90 Jaws of Life

2008-03-30T21:46:00.006-05:00

What do The Who, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Neil Young and I have in common? As of today, we've all played the Jaw Harp. It's also known as the Jew's Harp, Mouth Harp, Marranzano, and about 800 other names. I remember as a kid wondering how this sound was made and have always wanted to give it a try. So turn up your sound and marvel at the breathtaking intonations of the jaw harp...

#89 Capital T for Tour

2008-03-29T11:51:00.003-05:00

For four and a half years I was literally blocks away from our State Capital in college and never stepped foot in the Capital Building. Today I took a tour of the Wisconsin State Capital Building in Madison, Wisconsin. The tour was far more interesting than I ever thought it would be. The whole family loved it. In its maze of staircases we got to go in the Senate Chamber, Assembly Chamber, Governor's Conference Room and the Supreme Court. I'm not a big history buff but the stories behind some the areas of the building were great not to mention the whole tour was less than an hour.

#88 Book Reading

2008-03-28T11:25:00.005-05:00

To my recollection I've never sat down and just read an entire book of the bible. I have had to read parts of it in high school but I thought today I would read an entire book from the bible, the book Matthew. It took a few hours to read mostly because it was late evening and I kept dozing off.

#87 Crack the Code

2008-03-27T22:02:00.005-05:00

We've had an old combination lock that has been sitting around for years without being used, mostly because its been that long since I've needed one but now it's because the combination has been long forgotten. So today I cracked the code on my combination lock. Here's the catch, when I went to find the old lock I couldn't find it. So because this was my plan for the evening I had to go out and buy a brand new one, take the little combination sticker off the back without looking, and try to figure out the code. So now you're wondering, "How did I do it?" Well, let's just say you can learn just about anything on the internet, which is great if you need to find out your combination but not so great if you're the kind of person who will rob you blind.

#86 New Hart

2008-03-26T21:42:00.004-05:00

I heard on the radio about a website called Hulu.com that has a pretty large variety of old and new tv shows that you can watch online. There's plenty of shows that I remember from my childhood like Fantasy Island, What's Happening, and Buck Rogers. So tonight I watched The Bob Newhart Show for the very first time. It aired in 1972-73 and I have very faint memories of this show as a kid, the characters are vaguely familiar to me somehow and the styles and decor are all too familiar.

#85 Soda Jerk

2008-03-25T21:57:00.004-05:00

Once upon a time I tried homebrewing my own beer. Since then most of the equipment has been gathering dust in the basement. Now that I'm a family guy, I put some of this stuff to good use and I brewed my own root beer. It's not nearly as involved as brewing beer, but it still requires a couple weeks of waiting for the yeast to carbonate what has been bottled. It's also not the easiest thing to explain to a five and three year old they have to wait 2 weeks to try the the soda we just made.

#84 Mixed Up

2008-03-24T08:34:00.001-05:00

It was 1982 and I was wearing tight stone-washed jeans, a polo shirt and docksiders and my mullet waved from side to side as I furiously scrambled the sides of this multicolored cube known as the The Rubiks Cube. After an hour or so I proudly held up the puzzle to reveal my accomplishment, one whole side was blue! That's about as far as I ever got. The Cube soon was forgotten and probably made it's way to a cardboard box somewhere in the basement or retired to a place where the other 100 million mixed-up cubes decided to go. Recently we bought another cube and I decided to confront this thing head-on. So today I learned how to solve the Rubik's Cube. I did it with the help of this site. Now the eighties-me can be at peace.

#83 1000

2008-03-23T09:48:00.004-05:00

What's the highest you've ever counted to? I started thinking about it and I'm guessing my entire life I've probably never gone past two or three-hundred. The other question is "Who cares?" The answer to that is easy; Nobody except me at 11:30 at night trying to figure out if I can count to 1000 before the clock strikes midnight. Well I did. I counted to 1000 out loud. Actually it was more of a quiet whisper because everyone was already sleeping, which makes it even creepier and weird. A lot goes through your mind when you're counting to 1000, like "Why am I doing this?" or "Did I just say four hundred and fifty-three or four hundred and fifty four?" Also notable is that I realized that I could actually count and be almost asleep (588 was where I had to snap out of it) and it's also not very easy to say anything with "seven hundred and..." in front of it.

#82 My Natural Color

2008-03-22T20:49:00.001-05:00

My Grandma (we called her Oma) would always have Easter eggs that were colored a deep rusty brown. As a kid I never thought twice about them, I just knew they were a lot different than the brightly colored ones we had. It wasn't until I was a little older that I realized she would color her eggs using yellow onion skins, the same way they had always done in Germany. So for Easter I colored eggs using natural ingredients. In order to do this you need to add the ingredients right in the water as you hard boil them. I first tried using frozen raspberries which didn't work at all. Then I used yellow onion skins combined with some tumeric to get the golden yellow colored eggs in the photo below. Then I used ground coffee to get the tan colored ones. Here's an article that I used as a guide.

#81 New Thing, Old Dog, New Trick

2008-03-21T22:30:00.003-05:00

Our dog has got a few tricks that she has known since she was a puppy. Since we had kids, taking the time to teach her new things has taken the back burner. So today I taught an old dog a new trick, jumping on command. Surprisingly this took only a few short sessions and a lot of dog treats. Not too bad for an old dog, it proved she's still capable of learning things quicker than me.

#80 On Wisconsin

2008-03-20T09:19:00.003-05:00

Today I read the Wisconsin State Constitution, instead of spending what could have been the entire day ready a pretty lengthy document, I read the Declaration of Rights. Basically this section just reflects the United States Bill of Rights. Nothing really noteworthy or interesting to really write about here. I'll just chalk this one up as going through the motions.

#79 Smart Car

2008-03-19T21:26:00.005-05:00

About ten years ago I saw these little tiny cars all over Europe. They were the smallest car I've ever seen. Just recently they've been introduced to the United States, although slightly larger than their European counterpart. There's a waiting list of over a year to get one. So today I took a test drive in a Smart car. Thanks to the people at Bergstrom Auto for letting me drive one. The Smart car was surprisingly roomy for a guy my size, it's a 2 seater and the automated manual transmission took some getting used to. You can also change to manual mode and shift the car with the paddle shifters on the steering wheel, but my left foot kept searching for the phantom clutch on the floor as I was shifting.

#78 Myth Busting

2008-03-18T22:16:00.003-05:00

Tis the season for coloring eggs and spring is right around the corner. In two days the vernal equinox will be upon us signifying the start of spring. This is when the sun is directly over the earth's equator and the length of day and night are about the same. This is also the day when you may start to hear that you can balance an egg on its end. The skeptic in me never believed it, so today I put my myth busting to the test, I balanced eggs on their end, two days before the vernal equinox. Truth is you can do this any day of the year. One explanation I came across was the egg has small little imperfections or bumps that act as a small little tripod if you hit it just right. I was able to make 4 of the 6 eggs stand on end. Here's Snopes take on this as well as a guy from a physics department who conducted an experiment on this topic.

#77 Mensa

2008-03-17T22:23:00.004-05:00

I was disappointed to find out that I am in fact not a genius. I took a test from Mensa. It is actually called the Mensa Workout and is not the actual test given to qualify as a member for the elite organization. To be a member of Mensa you need to test in the top 2% of the general population. My score was 22 out of 30 for the workout.

#76 It's a Sign

2008-03-16T07:51:00.002-05:00

Today I learned the American Sign Language alphabet. There's a couple of letters I really have to struggle to sign but I think if I continue to keep familiar with it I could probably permanantly commit it to memory.

#75 Fiesta

2008-03-15T07:39:00.002-05:00

Tonight I went to a fundraiser for the YMCA Strong Kids program. The event had a Mexican theme with a five course meal including a couple of things I've never had before, octopus in a seafood appetizer and a cactus salad. I also have never been part of a live oral auction. I also ended up on stage as part of a pass the hat game for cash.

#74 I Can't Drive 55

2008-03-14T21:43:00.001-05:00

Today I drove the speed limit all day. This is not an easy thing to do. There is a very powerful involuntary desire to just keep going the same speed as the other cars around you. It's also a very good way to anger a lot of people. Many dirty looks, one car rode my tail so close I could've reached back and changed his radio station, and one hand gesture, not a vulgar one, but just a "hey what's the matter with you?" kind of thing.