A Pox Upon Me for a Clumsy Lout

Photo credit: http://lies.tumblr.com/post/
71144213373/a-pox-upon-me-for-a-clumsy-lout

I have failed you, faithful reader.

I promised you a weekly blog entry and I have failed you. For 25 months, I have failed you.

A lot has happened since then. I coached my second year of t-ball. We moved. We celebrated two Christmases. I finished writing my book. I started writing my second book. And I have watched It's a Wonderful Life more times than I care to admit.

I'm sorry.

But a few things have come into clarity for me in the last several weeks that have made me yearn to blog again.

• First, the scope of my first book did not allow me the space or the variety of topics I wish to cover related to It's a Wonderful Life. Hence the second book. 

• Second, I miss deep thinking. It's so easy to get wrapped up in every-day life and stop thinking critically about what matters to you. There is a lot that matters to me, and I can relate most of it back to It's a Wonderful Life in some manner.

Which is EXACTLY what I propose to do now. My goal is to use this blog to:

• Expand the thoughts in my book. 

• Discuss open-ended questions with YOU. 

• Discuss other Capra and Stewart films.

• I will listen to feedback if you have conflicting ideas....as long as you are respectful about it. 

• Relate lessons from It's a Wonderful Life to my life, and hopefully to your life, as well.

• Attempt characters studies.

• Share exciting news.

• Share personal experiences; Some deeply meaningful, some just for fun.

• Discuss IAWL-collecting.

I hope that you join me. You can be my Buffalo Gal. We can find adventure in our own back yards. There are so many lessons to learn here. I don't want to just teach them to you. I want YOU to teach them to ME. So please, join the discussion by subscribing to this blog. You can find the link on the right side of this page; In this column, right over here -------------------------------------------->

You can get in on the discussion right now by sending me a topic request. My only stipulation is that it has to relate somehow to It's a Wonderful Life, Capra or Stewart.

You can also join the discussion right now by posting either your favorite film, or why you love It's a Wonderful Life in the comments below. I sincerely look forward to hearing from you.

An update on my social life

When I re-started this blog, my first entry was about how I completely embraced social media.

Since then, my social (media) life has undergone a few changes. Here's the skinny.

I quit using HootSuite. I just wasn't feeling it. I'm sure it's useful, but not for me.

I don't remember if I mentioned this in the first blog, but I also committed to Tweeting at least once a day for a year. Because of that, I find myself not checking out Facebook much anymore. I was on that all the time. I'm still logged in almost all the time, but I don't check it incessantly like I used to.

Having said that, I forgot to mention that through Facebook, I got connected to WeRead. That's pretty handy. In years past, I would read a book, then add that to a "Books I've Read" list on my personal Web site. I did something similar with movies I have seen. Because of these social media services, I have not had to update those pages in years.

Photo by cybershotking 

Because of social media, I have decided to completely stop updating my personal Web site. It used to be a pretty popular site in the late 1990s, when it was housed at Geocities. I had a reputation as a great resource/reference for all things related to the film "It's a Wonderful Life," and my site was built around my love for that film. That's how I got the nickname "iawlfan." I even wet so far as to secure that prefix for four e-mail services, so that nobody could take them. It's obnoxious, I know it. But I was trying to create an online identity even back then.

The more I think about it, the more I am starting to believe that social media is going to kill off the need for personal Web sites as we know them. In fact, mine is officially dead. I probably won't take it down, but I probably won't update it anymore either. So there is another major change in my online presence.

And at some point, I will probably blog about my love affair with "It's a Wonderful Life." Maybe I'll blog my old stories from my reporter days.

Back to the WeRead thing....I also signed up with GoodReads. I did it before I realized that it is pretty much the same service as WeRead. Having used GoodReads now for several months, I have decided to switch to that instead of using WeRead. GoodReads backs corporate stores like Barnes & Noble (and by extension, my Nook), and other online book stores. and crosses over to other social media.

Thanks to Mark Pannell, an old Jr. High School buddy and social media strategist, and a guy who had more influence on my life than I think he ever realized (and quite possibly more than he should have ;) I found out about a site called about.me. No www. Just type about.me in your search/address bar and you will get there.

What this site does is it connects all of your Web sites and social media account in one place. You can even order (and it costs) business cards featuring your about.me profile picture and web site address, and a QR Code that you photograph with your smart phone, and the phone will go directly to your about.me profile. I tingle at the possibilities.

I was so geeked out about this service that I convinced my boss to create an account for our program at the office. It is a genius, but so very basic idea and site.

I also signed up for Klout. This site somehow judges your "influence" (a.k.a. "popularity") in the realm of social media. I'm not sure I really trust this service, since my Klout number is higher than Mark's, who, like I said, is a social media strategist by trade. He has his Facebook and Foursquare accounts linked to his Klout account, and yet I have a higher Klout score. That doesn't seem right to me. I can't decide if I am going to keep this or not.

Interestingly, within a week of signing up for Klout, Facebook started incorporating it, and it started being mentioned on other sites as well. I had never heard of it before I found out about it through about.me.

I added Flickr.com to my social set, because they are part of something called Creative Commons. In short, that means other people allow you to use their photos, as long as you credit them. Sometimes, there are more qualifications, but in general, that's the basics. Most of the images I have used so far for my blogs have come from Creative Commons. I will still use Picasa for my own images, because I love the Google suite of tools so much.

I started using Google Plus when it was released to the general public, but I haven't used it much. I think it gives you more control with less imposition and advertisement, but until more people figure this out, it won't be extremely useful. More people have to decide to add this to their arsenal of social media sites, or just make the jump from Facebook to Google Plus, and I just don't see that happening. Like my wife said: "I don't need something else to take care of, and all of my friends are on Facebook. Why would I change?" It's a fair question.

This morning I added Tumblr to my arsenal. I added it out of curiosity, thinking it was intended as a place to collect themes. For example, I create a Tumblr account about It's a Wonderful Life, and the service goes out and finds me all things on the Web related to the film. Apparently, that is not what it does. Or maybe it is. I'm so new to it, I'm still trying to figure out what it is and how I will use it. Time will tell whether or not I keep this account.

Oh, and I almost forgot: I added a "Favorite Quotes" page to this blog. You can find it near the top of the right-hand column. There you will find some inspirational, entertaining, quirky, deep, and/or off-the-wall quotes. There is no plan to add a quote a week or anything like that. I will just add quotes that resonate with me as I come across them. Who knows what will show up there. It just depends on what I come across and my mood at the time.

A pain in the belly and a change in weekend plans

I often complain about how nothing ever goes the way I plan it. Take Friday, June 24, 2011 as a prime example.

I'm warning you right now that there is a photo of surgical wounds at the end of this blog. You have been warned, just like Grover warned you all those years ago in your Little Golden Book that "There's a Monster at the End of This Book."

The day went very well. I got a lot accomplished at work and at home, and had written up about 10 items of out of about 30 to post for sale on ebay. Then the pain hit. It was in my belly. Jenn had made an amazing dinner of Dr. Pepper pulled pork, or something like that, and it was delicious. But I suspected that I since it was a new dish, maybe I just had gas, and I wouldn't be able to eat it again. No big dea.

But something was ringing in the back of my head, like "this is not just gas. This is something different." I went about my business for about an hour, until at around 9:30, I told Jenn that something wasn't right, and if I sit up in bed screaming to take me to the ER. She said my belly was hard and suspected gas, so I took some Gas-X and waited to see what happened. Around that time, my pain level was about 3 on a scale of 10.

I wrote up three more sale items, and noticed the pain was getting worse, not better, so I quit. We decided to go to bed around 11:30. At around midnight, Jenn said I was breathing funny and asked me if my pain was worse, or had moved. I admitted that the answer was both, but I didn't want to tell her because it was midnight and I didn't want to go to the ER and be stuck until 3 a.m. We were both very tired.

Jenn called her sister Heidi, and dropped me off at the ER door to register while she took Kaleb to Heidi's house.

When I saw the ER doc, he did the typical prodding and poking and said he believed appendicitis, which was exactly what we thought it was.  He ordered a blood test, IV, and a CT scan.

I wasn't thrilled about the IV. The last time I was admitted at a hospital and had my very own room, was in high school or college when something very similar occurred. At that time the nurse poked me three times with the IV needle (which is roughly the size of a knitting needle), and dug around each time, hoping to strike a vein. That incident was so painful, I literally told my mom to get her the f*** out of my room before I punched her. Even her replacement had to stab me twice.

At that time, I was at the hospital for the same symptoms as I had this last Friday night, but the pain was worse then. My parents didn't want to drive me to the hospital, which was about a half mile away, because they thought it was gas. I told them "You drive or I'll drive. Either way, I'm going." I don't think I had my license at the time. At that time in my life, I had a freakishly high (I mean absurdly super-human high) tolerance for pain. So when I gave that ultimatum, they decided to take me. I was admitted for 3 days before the doctors shrugged their shoulders, said "we have no idea what is wrong with you" and sent me home.

So I was apprehensive about being here again about 20 years later with the same symptoms and getting another IV with no tests having been done and no definitive answers. This nice little 80-year-old lady came in and said she was going to take some blood and start the IV.. While I am no stranger to blood tests, I decided to just look away until everything was over and not see the IV needle so I wouldn't flip out.

I told her about my previous IV experience and told her "I like you so far, so don't make me hate you." I was joking, of course...maybe.

She poked me with what I thought was a blood test (I have really bad veins, so I thought she might have a hard time. I asked her "warn me when you do the IV." Her answer was "it's done." I turned, looked into her eyes and said "I love you." Ask Jenn. She used the IV to take blood, then started me on saline and gave me a shot of morphine.

She handed me a what looked like a 30-ounce jug of clear (radioactive?) juice for the CT scan, and told me I had 10 minutes to drink it and an hour to wait after that to get the test done. I downed it in 2 minutes, not 10.

The CT scan went fast, and when I got back to my ER stall, the doctor came in and said the bloodwork came back consistent with appendicitis, and we would see what the CT scan said. At around 4 a.m., he came back and said I was being admitted for appendicitis and he was calling the surgeon to handle it the next (Saturday) morning.

I got to my room at about 5 a.m, and had to answer a bunch of intelligent, and a bunch of really ignorant questions. They told me they would leave us alone to sleep, but still came in every 15 minutes or so to bring this sheet of paper, or sign that sheet of paper, or help me change into a surgical gown, or ask me a question, or grab a chart that they had accidentally forgotten. In short, we didn't sleep much.

At about 7 am., I took a shower and scrubbed my belly with a special cleaning solution. The doctor came in and talked us through the procedure at around 8:30 a.m. I asked him about a catheter and he said "how do you know about that?" My answer was "I'm not stupid." Good news, he said. The catheter goes in and comes out (as does the small breathing tube) while I am under anesthetic and sleeping well. Good deal.

Being wheeled down to surgery with my mom in the background.
Everyone as picking on me, talking about what a big baby I was
about having to get a catheter,  except the guy in the blue.
I thanked him for being on my side. Scroll down much further and
you will see a photo of my surgical wounds. You have been
warned twice now. No complaining!!

My mom and my gurney arrived while we were talking to the doctor, so I got wheeled down to surgery right away. By about 9:15, the anesthetist put the mask over my face and told me to breathe deeply. I remember counting to seven quietly by myself and wondering why I wasn't knocked out again. Next thing I know, I'm waking up, head full of cobwebs with two nurses staring at me from a nursing station saying "there he is."

They wheeled me back up to my room and I slept a restless sleep for quite awhile. My mom had gone at some point, and Jenn had gone home, showered and changed, as well.

The next 3 or 4 hours are very unclear. I finally shook off the uggyness, and ate the jello and drank the two cups of coffee and the Sprite that they brought me. I called my mom and gave her an update, and invited her back up. Jenn left again to do some shopping to prep for my homecoming, which was expected to be that night. Mom and dad came and visited around 3:30 p.m. and stayed until about 5:15. Mom said I kept talking and drifting off, then waking back up, talking again and drifting away. I was told if I could eat solid food, I could go home. I demolished the dinner plate. By the time Jenn returned, I had signed my walking papers and was ready to go. I was home by 7.

The night went by pretty well, but I didn't sleep much. In fact, I dozed off for 20 minutes at the most, but was able to watch the movie Gladiator from beginning to end, only rewinding a few times to catch what I missed to sleep. I know I was up a lot going to the bathroom, getting more to drink, and taking a painkiller at 1 a.m.

I fell asleep after 4:30 and was awake by 7:45. Jenn made me an omelette and coffee, and I scarfed that down as well. I took a shower, and we went to church. Then we came home and sat out in the yard for a bout three hours. While I was out there, my feet started itching, so I took off my shoes and socks, and I had this horrible rash on my feet. We sat there and watched it grow, even after rubbing cortisone cream on it, and taking two Benadryl. We don't know if the reaction was caused by the antibiotic I was given at the hospital, or the Percoset, so we called the doctor. He called in some Vicodin for me, and Jenn is picking that up right now. The rash has mostly faded from my feet, and the itching is all but gone.

Two of my three incisions in the awesome shave-job they gave me while I was out.
No, you may NOT see the third incision.

I consider myself pretty lucky. I was in and out of the hospital in less than 24 hours. I have three small incisions from my laparoscopic surgery, and some scars with a good story behind it. My pain level is very low (the highest it got was a 6 on friday night just as I was registering at the ER, and hasn't gone above 2 since then). I didn't have to experience a catheter while awake, I was able to get some reading done, and I'll be off for a week. Add that to the following 4th of July weekend, and I will have a 10-day recovery period before I have to return to work. That will allow me to read even more, work on some more small e-bay write-ups a few at a time, and watch some movies that nobody wants to watch with me. Jenn has been awesome, handling tasks that I usually do, and not complaining about it when I ask her to get me something or taking something away for me.

Mom and dad have visited at the hospital and at the house, I was able to update my progress and keep everyone informed through the wonders of my smart phone and the social media, and I got a new blog entry from it. The only downer is that I'm not allowed to drive for at least a week. That's frustrating. But so be it.

This is only my second surgery ever. My first one was to straighten my eyes out when I was six months old or so, and I don't remember that one. Hopefully, this will be my last surgery.

And to think...all I had planned for this weekend was to write up ebay sales and read.

Thanks to all of those who have thought about me, prayed for me, sent me cards, and sent well-wishes on Facebook. I consider myself a very lucky guy.

A Social Flutter-by

In 2006, I met my wife Jenn, and she introduced me to a Web site called "MySpace." I signed up, found about 3 people I knew and thought it would never fly. I suppose, technically, I was correct, because Facebook took over, and MySpace became a site for musicians and other artists.

I signed up for Facebook, too, but I got tired of checking two accounts and seeing the same people on both sites. So I cancelled my MySpace account and decided to just keep it simple.

Five years later, it's no longer quite as simple, but I'm having fun!!

Let's put this in perspective...

Up until two weeks ago, I had my Web site, which has existed at different addresses since 1998, a Facebook page, a Google site, a LinkedIn account, a Picasa account, a YouTube account, and sharing documents on Google Documents. Then there was the Twitter account, which I got but never quite figured out why or how to make it useful, and the blog you are reading right now.

That's all well and good, but then during the first week of May, a couple of things happened that changed my point of view about not only social media, but also how I handle my personal information on the Internet.

In early May, Jenn's second cousin (who I know mostly through family reunions and Facebook) "liked" a site called "Surviving the World." She happened to find this site through a social sharing site called StumbleUpon.

I had played with StumbleUpon a couple of times in the past, but ended up moving on instead of really locking into it. But Surviving the World changed that for me, and StumbleUpon is now on my Chrome browser toolbar, and a tool that I use daily when I am bored or have a couple of extra minutes to fool around and I don't want to get locked into a bigger project.

Then I found a handy sharing tool called Shareaholic. The site says I have been a member since August, 2010, but I don't remember signing up for it. But apparently I did. But I didn't really start using it until early May. More about Shareaholic later.

The most important event to influence my view of personal information and sharing it on social media sites occurred on May 4, when I attended the Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Association of Ohio (ADAPAO) conference in Columbus for work. Having set up a Web site, blog, Twitter and Picasa accounts for work, I attended the conference looking for ways to better use social media to further our goal.

During that time, I sat in on two presentations given by Alvin Trusty, who is the Director of Educational Technology at the University of Findlay. His biggest message was that whether you intend it or not, information about you can and will be found on the Internet. His example was about a co-worker who used the Internet for research and e-mail. She used no social media, and did not put personal information online if she could help it. She was convinced that nobody could find anything about her online. In short order, Alvin Trusty found a photo of her from a High School yearbook.

The point is, information about you is on the Internet. If you own your information, you can control it. And if you put your name on enough information, and post all good information, you can drown out the bad stuff, like that picture of you sleeping in your own vomit that your roommate took but didn't tell you about, but uploaded it to Facebook and tagged you in it. If you put your real name on your online stuff, and if you upload and share a lot of it, the chance that a future employer will find that information decreases.

That one concept changed almost everything for me. The one thing I still won't do is announce on Facebook when I am not home. That's just stupid.

Since then, I have updated all of my previously-existing social media, started blogging again (which is why I am writing this), and I have joined several additional social media sites, including the following:

• Delicious - A bookmark sharing Web site that I soon will be using to network the resources of my co-workers.
• FourSquare - Discover places to visit and things to do in your own hometown or anywhere else. You do this by "signing in" to the places that you visit. If you have the most visits to a place, you can be the "mayor of the business. The extra benefit of this is that there are deals and offers, so when you check in at, say, a restaurant, you get a coupon on your phone for a free or reduced price on an item. But you have to be careful about how you do this. Check your settings. Do you want to broadcast where you are on Facebook or Twitter? Make sure you check the security settings. The only people who know where I am on FourSquare are friends of mine, and I don't have the service automatically post my location on Facebook or Twitter.
• HootSuite - A social media dashboard that helps you monitor and post to several social media services at once.
• Springpad - This is a notepad/to-do list combined with a method to research the stuff you take notes on.

And what makes all of these services so handy is that they all have apps, so you can check them on on your smart phone while you are on the road.

Not only that, but most of these services link to your Shareaholic account. So when you find a site you like, you click the Shareaholic button, and you can share the site through most of these servies.

In addition to that, I also began listening to podcasts again, specifically The Dave Ramsey Show, and CNet's Buzz Out Loud, which is a technology podcast. And my Android phone automatically downloads these, so i can listen to them wherever and whenever (I'm listening to Buzz Out Loud episode 1472 as I write this).

I also connected to Mashable to follow and comment on social media news.

The point to all of this is two-fold. First of all, control your information. The more services you sign up for, and the more sharing you do on each, the more you can control what others see when they type your name into a search engine. Second of all, you never know if you can use something unless you try it out. I came close to NOT using FourSquare due to home security issues. But since I can control the settings, I decided to give it a shot. Will I keep using that or Springpad? I have no idea. But I'm giving both a try.

So go out there. Explore the world. Use the knowledge of others to expand your own. There are some great tools out there. You just have to find what works best for you. Enjoy!

And while your at it, check out my social media sites. The links are at the right. -->

So tell me...what are YOUR favorite social media outlets? I probably have room in my life for a few more!

As for me, I am going to see what I can StumbleUpon.