Mindfulness

I’ve been doing a lot of reading about mindfulness and meditation. I first became interested in mindfulness at the recommendation of a nurse my wife and I were having a conversation with about my wife dealing with anxiety and depression issues. My first thoughts were this was some new age mumbo jumbo that was akin to using crystals or pyramids. This nurse also talked at length to use about Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT).
This same nurse recommended Mindfulness in Plain English which I’ve read. This book is an excellent and very well known meditation and mindfulness beginning text written in an easy to understand style. This book was my first exposure to meditation, zen and mindfulness.I’ve recently found a couple of good discussions of mindfulness including a general mindfulness discussion and a skeptic’s approach in The Frame Problem blog.

Currently I’m reading The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Zen Living which discusses how to live of zen. It discusses that the root of unhappiness in desire and discusses how to remove desire from your life. This all makes sense to me as I can see in my own life how my desire to have nice cars, cool computers, expensive cellphones, etc does lead to unhappiness in me when it’s something I can’t afford. Also, if I do desire (or covet) something and actually get it, getting it doesn’t give me any more than maybe some short term satisfaction.

Alcoholism

I’m an alcoholic. I haven’t had a drink of alcohol in 21 years but I’m as much an alcoholic as the day I took my last drink. I’m just an alcoholic who doesn’t drink. I also know that if I were to start drinking again within weeks I would be right back to where I was when I quit 21 years ago. Unemployed, friendless, and ruined family relationships.

During my drinking career I managed to get arrested multiple times – I lost count early. Almost all of the arrests were DUI and public intoxication although I did do some stupid things while drunk like breaking into a couple of places and I once was arrested for sneaking a case of bear into the restroom of a grocery store and getting drunk in there

I discovered at a young age that one of the funnest things to do was to get loaded and go out driving – looking for chicks, races, or just mischief. My first car lasted one week before I drove it up on top of some big rocks late one rainy night. That was a DUI. In my drinking and driving escapades also managed to sideswipe a house at about 2am, crashed into the front supports of a grocery store one snowy afternoon, hit a tree (I think it was a tree anyway, I don’t remember anything), and crashed head on into a car load of people while driving my best friend’s parent’s car. My friend wasn’t supposed to let anyone drive their car so he said he was driving in the crash confusion. We both went to the hospital and he nearly got a DUI. This was in the days when MADD was just getting started and the cops and courts didn’t take DUI as seriously as today. I was pulled over several times obviously drunk and just either just told to go home or had the cops follow me home. I actually got pulled over twice in the same night once when I went back out after the cops followed me home. I could have gotten a DUI either time but didn’t get anything.

My last drunk lasted about a month and ended with me getting my third DUI in a year and I was sure I was going to prison. I spent eleven days in jail and then my parents paid my fines in cash and the problem went away. Never was sure what really happened. Anyway, I started going to AA after that (again, I had gone off and on since I was 15) and so far haven’t had a drink since.

After getting sober I needed to figure out what to do with my life so I signed up for some electronics engineering classes at the Purdue extension in my hometown. I managed to get straight As for three years straight. The dean of the engineering school got wind of this and scheduled a meeting with me. He told me if I wanted to get an engineering degree I could get in the Purdue School of Engineering. This was quite an accomplishment for someone who majored in shop in high school and barely graduated and don’t remember most of it. I attended part of my senior year catching the bus from the juvenile center. I also kind of flipped out on PCP in Mr Bean’s last hour Social Studies class but nothing ever came of that. It was a different time then. I remember listening to Cheech and Chong with my mom and step dad when I was about thirteen. People today would be shocked to hear that stuff (I sure wouldn’t want my kids listening to it )

I graduated with a BSEE with a 3.86 GPA and had a job with Intel Corporation in Chandler, AZ waiting for me at graduation. I’ve been on many of the leading edge design teams working of many of Intel’s flagship microprocessors ever since. I’m currently working on design for debug features for one of Intel’s low power microprocessors.

Alcoholism and drug addiction has ravaged my family. My mother left my biological father when I was two because of alcoholic drinking and I grew up not seeing him much but when I did see him there were several “incidents’. I also heard from my mother quite often how he was an alcoholic. My wife, son, sister, biological father as well as various cousins, uncles, and aunts have had alcohol and drug addiction problems. My biological father drank until he died of a smoking related disease. I don’t think many active alcoholics are successful at quitting smoking so I consider his death alcohol related. Two of my half brothers were killed in separate car accidents which were both extreme DUI accidents. My other half brother was also killed in a car accident but as far as anybody knows he had been clean for awhile when the accident occurred and in fact the accident was the fault of the other driver.

I knew at a young age that since my father was alcoholic that I stood a good chance of also being alcoholic. So it came as no surprise to me when I noticed (and others did also) that my drinking was not like my friends. By the time I was fifteen I’d been in jail and had had many blackouts as well as some stupid and embarrassing incidents.

The reason I wrote this drunk log was two fold. One, it is a reminder to me where I came from and when I’m feeling pretty smug about myself and where I’m at the remember where I came from and where I could easily end up again. But also to possibly be an inspiration to someone else who may be struggling with an addiction problem. My family, friends, and former employers had all pretty much written me off but with (cautious) support from my family  and with guidance from th literature and members of AA I rose from the ashes and actually made myself somewhat of a success at least in my eyes. I know my family is proud of me also.

I Was Libertarian When Libertarian Wasn’t Cool

The passion of Ron Paul’s supporters is encouraging in today’s political environment where candidates need tens of millions for their campaigns. Ron Paul seems to have a real grass roots based source. I see signs hanging from fences and his supporters are all over the internet. Unfortunately, the supporters come across as a little too enthusiastic.

I’ve considered myself a Libertarian for 20 years or so. I’ve told my family and friends that and up until now I think most people didn’t know what that meant. Now, the Ron Paul campaign has brought more attention to the Libertarians everywhere. Unfortunately, Ron Paul’s shrill behavior at the debates and the somewhat fanatical actions of some of his supporters (the 9/11 truthers and other conspiracy theorists, the white supremacists that I’ve read contributed to the Paul campaign, and the internet whackos who’ve hitched themselves to the Ron Paul wagon) is making me think twice about announcing myself a Libertarian. I believe that Dr Paul is an honorable man and truely believes in the Libertarian philosophy but all the kooks and whackos have latched onto his campaign which has tainted the Libertarian name. I will now qualify my philosophy with “I’m a Libertarian but not a Ron Paul Libertarian”.

Maybe I’m really an Objectivist anyway…

My Money Management Spreadsheet

My Excel based debt tracking, bill tracking,  and investment tracking system has been under development for about 5 years – well before my To Do list manager.

It started out as a way of tracking all of my monthly bills. I get paid twice monthly – on the 16 & 31. My bills are due throughout the month. I wanted to be able to track all of my bills so that I wouldn’t forget any bills thus avoiding late fees and penalties. I also wanted to be able to automatically know where I’d get the most bang for my buck on paying off a debt with any windfall. Handling these tow tasks was relatively easy and have since added investment tracking, asset tracking and a net worth calculator which is updated daily.

Currently I’m working on a checkbook register. This is mainly to track spending (all this to tell me I need to cut back on Starbucks ) but also to use to replace my paper checkbook register. I plan to use a “Pocket Mod” template to carry a copy of my checkbook register with me with space for a few extra entries.

Of course I could do all this with Quicken easily – I even own Quicken 2005 but I get a lot of satisfaction from using a tool which I developed myself (see my My Productivity System post here).

I recently googled excel money management systems and found It’s Your Money which has a bunch of moiney management spreadsheet. They have a whole section with various financial Excel spreadsheets here. I have downloaded some of the free ones. I already have most of the functionality included in my spreadsheets but I am revamping some of the look and feel of my spreadsheets based on what I’ve seen on It’s Your Money.

My Productivity System Decision

So I’ve officially dumped all of the various productivity systems, to do list managers, etc out there and will be sticking with my own home grown, Excel base to do system. I tried out many diferent systems and several were very useful systems. All other systems started at a disadvantage though – they were built by someone else. I can take pride in my self-built system and can also constantly be tweaking the system which I enjoy. If my system doesn’t do something right, freezes up, or any other fun computer stuff, I have nobody to blame for myself (well, I may cuss Bill Gates on the occasional Excel/Windows problem ).

My investigation into the various tools has led to some improvements to my to do list manager (ToDo). I had been developing my ToDo for several years and it worked well for what it was. During my research I read a lot about David Allen’s Getting Things Done (GTD) time management system. I have incorporated some GTD principles into ToDo and also into my daily work and task management.

My baby

I thought I’d blog about something I’m truly passionate about and that is my car.

In August of 1998 I went looking for a black SS Camaro but couldn’t find one. I wasn’t real crazy about the “fish-mouth” front of the new Camaros but being a Chevy guy that’s what I was going to get. I couldn’t find one exactly like I wanted so I stopped in a local Pontiac dealer on the way home and looked at the WS6′s (they had two) and fell in love. I brought my black, fully optioned, M6 Trans Am WS6 home that evening. I started modding the car right away with things like K&N air filter, home ported MAF, Magnecore plug wires, and a Mecham cat-back exhaust. Then things got out of hand

I would like to document everything that I’ve done with the car and my results. I should also mention mistakes (there have been many) I’ve made and things I’d do differently.

Here’s the list of current mods to the car:

Current Powertrain Components

• 422 cubic inch iron block LS1 motor – (6L block with 4.030″ bore)
• Lunati 4340 Pro Series Forged Custom Crankshaft with 4.125 inch stroke
• Lunati 4340 6.250″ Billet Connecting Rods
• Ross custom forged pistons
• 0.043″ ring package and tool steel pins
• Childs and Albert Plasma Moly Ring Set
• Clevite H Series Race Bearings
• ARP Connecting Rod Bolts
• ARP Main Studs
• ARP Head Studs
• ARE blueprinted oil pump
• ARE Stage 3 ported/polished LS1 racing heads
• Solid Roller cam
• Whisper airbox lid
• ARE custom computer tuning
• T&D adjustable rockers arms
• Cloyes adjustable timing set
• SVO 30# fuel injectors
• Walbro 255L in tank fuel pump
• NGK TR6 spark plugs (gapped at 0.038)
• Stock LS1 ignition system
• Relocated coil packs with custom coil pack brackets
• MSD 8.5mm LT1 plug wires
• Stock LS1 Mass Air Flow Sensor (aftermarket ported ends)
• Stock LS1 Throttle Body (ported/polished)
• Stock LS6 composite intake manifold
• Stock LS1 water pump
• Grotyohann 1-3/4″ longtube headers, ceramic coated & 3″ off road y-pipe
• Mecham cat-back exhaust (4″ Mufflex ready to be installed)
• ASP underdrive crank and alternator pulleys
• No AC
• No PS
• No AIR
• No EGR
• No ABS
• No TCS
• Throttle cable with non-TCS throttle cable

Current Drivetrain Components

• ARE prepped TH350 transmission with trans-brake and reverse manual valve body
• B&M Hammer ratchet shifter
• Yank 4000 rpm stall torque converter
• TCI SFI-approved flexplate
• Denny’s “Nitrous Ready” cromoly steel driveshaft (3″) with 1350 yolks/U-joints
• Ford 9″ Detroit Locker rear with 3.50 gears w/Moser 35-spline axles
• ARP long wheel studs
• Weld Draglite 15×10 (7.5″ backspacing) wheels out back with Mickey Thompson ET Streets 26/11.5×15
• Weld Draglite 15×3.5 wheels in front with Mickey Thompson ET Fronts 26/4.5×15

Current Suspension Components

• HAL 12-way adjustable racing shocks (front and rear)
• V6 Camaro rear springs
• Hal drag front springs
• Spohn adjustable torque arm
• Wolf Racecraft rear swaybar
• Removed front swaybar
• Stock LS1 front dual A-arm components
• Stock LS1 engine K crossmember
• BMR bolt on subframe connectors
• BMR tubular lower control arms
• BMR LCA relocation brackets (need installed)

Safety

• Wolf Racecraft 6-point bolt-in rollbar with sidebar swingouts both sides
• Crow 5-point racing harness
• SN92 Helmet
• Fireproof proban racing jacket

Power Adder

• Nitrous Express wet kit with blowdown tube and bottle heater (currently not installed)
• NOS Progressive Controller (currently not installed)

Track Results

• N/A: December 10, 2004 – 1/4-mile = 11.316 @ 122.53  (1.732 60′)
• N2O: No results since rebuild

OneNote versus Excel for Data Management

I’ve been using my OneNote based GTD system for a few days now. It does keep track of everything and the ability to redefine the note flags for next action, to do, etc is nice. Having everything somewhat organized and all in one application is the biggest selling point with me since before I hade everything in multiple Excel spreadsheets (money related, ToDo list, movie rating list, pets log, work out log, etc) and a Word document (my Journal) along with Outlook Calendar and Contacts.

However, I still miss some of the features of my old Excel based ToDo list. Like sorting. The way my ToDo workbook worked was I had separate worksheets for several categories like Home, Computer, Personal, etc. I entered tasks in the appropriate sheet along with a due date (if appropriate) and priority from 1 – 10. I had (still have) macros that would then sort all of the separate sheets and pick the 10 next due tasks from all of the separate category worksheets and put them on one worksheet and the 10 highest priority items from all of the categories and put them on another worksheet. Doing this would show me problems with my prioritization I’d picked and due dates I had selected. For example if I sorted and “do something nice for wife” came out above “change the oil in race car” it’s obvious I need to adjust my priorities. Same thing with the task due dates.

With OneNote I can do sort of the same thing with the note flags summary. Maybe it’s no more than getting more comfortable with OneNote since I was not using it at all before starting this GTD push about two weeks ago. I really like the idea of almost everything being in one application and I’ve been trying to find something like this for years. If OneNote could insert Exel spreadsheets (like Power Point) it would truly be my killer app and I’d move to it 100%. I’m still using my Word journal and my Excel financial spreadsheet which I’ve been working on much longer and have many more features than my Excel ToDo spreadsheet.

I think getting OneNote set up the way I really want it may take years. I’d like to have everything in it. My journal is an easy transition to OneNote. I can see having man, many things documented in OneNote.

Some examples:

• old addresses
• birthday list
• passwords (?)
• account numbers

Like I said it could take years to get all of that data into OneNote and I’m still not 100% sure I’ll be sticking with OneNote but I do plan on giving it a shot

Mindfulness

I’ve been reading Mindfulness in Plain English. Meditation is something I’ve always wanted to try and I’m finally trying it. I’m only about half way through the book and am just getting into the mechanics about how to meditate so I don’t know what I’m doing yet but I think I have already been unknowingly practicing my own form of mindfulness. Over the years, I have done a lot of soul searching (much of it while working out) and I am able to step out of myself and look at myself objectively. I don’t do it often or consistently or even consciously  but from what I’ve been reading in the book this is something that I’ve learned on my own to do. I’m anxious learn how to meditate properly and see what kind of results I can get.

Update on My Productivity System Decision

I spent a lot of time looking at various software tools to implement a Getting Things Done type productivity system. I don’t like the inflexibility of all-in-one or GTD specific packages. I also struggled with figuring out to use the Excel ToDo spreadsheet I developed several years ago. In the end I’ve decided to go with a M$ OneNote based system. I saw several posts here and here which talk about ways to Implement GTD in OneNote. I’ve developed my own sytsem which I think will work good for work related tasks but I’m not 100% sure it will work well for all of my home and non-work tasks and projects. My system is a hybrid between several GTD implemntations I’ve seen and read about and “Ready, Set, Do” which is a Mac based set of scripts that I read about here.

I’m using OneNote 2003. From what I understand OneNote 2007 has many improvements which make implementing a GTD system much better. I may consider getting OneNote 2007 at some point after I’m fully convinced that OneNote is working for me.

Long time, no see

I haven’t updated this in a really long time.

I’ve been messing around with productivity tools lately. I found lots of discussions on Getting Things Done (GTD) and an offshoot of that called Zen To Don (ZTD) which I like. I wasted a lot of time messing around with various GTD tools but I keep coming back to my own Excel “To Do” spreadsheet. I have been doing the “collect” from GTD for years in this spreadsheet.