My new home gym

I just finished setting up my new home gym. I don't need a treadmill or anything like that because I climb four stories of stairs four times a day and walk 2 miles to catch a variety of buses. Plus, after this ice and snow moves on to a memory, the mountain bike comes out and I will do about 20 miles a day on it.

All I needed was something for the old muscles to keep their tone and bulk up as much as muscles can when you are 60 something. I did some shopping. Scheels was a good place for that. They had all of the nifty machines including Bowflex. That machine impressed me the most so I registered on their website and got the free video. There were plenty of well built people demonstrating their variety of machines and some testimonials from a various assortment of young gorillas about how Bowflex changed their bodies. Indeed it did.

Did I mention I was 60 something?

Now the Bowflex has about a 5 X 5 footprint so I measured. I only had 4 feet available. After all, I was not planning to give up my Marcy situp bench. It has helped me get a stunning 2 pack set of abs! Plus, I am almost back in size 33 X 32 jeans and at my high school weight of 185 pounds. Yes, I am impressed with my progress but there is this little problem of chest sag starting to show up.

Did I mention I was 60 something?

Anyway, I pondered the space issue and pondered the budget issue and then remembered my Dad's home guy. He had the guys cut up a window weight and created the thing he could roll up on a stick and increase his wrist strength. It worked because he was a great golfer right up until the end. He died at 62.

Did I mention I was 60 something?

Anyway, inventory taken, I was off to Wal-Mart for a possible solution. It cost me about $4 and works great! My Marcy situp bench now has a bike tire I cut in half attached to a bathroom plunger handle. (New one not a used one!)

After situps, all I have to do is pull the tire under the Marcy and hook it up to the plunger handle sitting on my chest which is hooked up to the other end of the tire. Push it straight up and presto! resistance and a savings of about $1500.

Now that's not bad for an old goat fighting the inevitable, is it?

I did mention I was 60 somthing, right?

The Good Life?

Frankly, you have to be a bit of a liar to be a great copywriter. That's why I rank myself as just a good one. And here's why.

Back in the agency days, one of our best accounts was the State of Nebraska. The state's slogan for God knows how long is Nebraska...the good life.

On a nice spring day. Ok. On a beautiful fall day. Sure is. On a football Saturday in Lincoln. No doubt. But on a day like today, it really does take a bit of liar to pull that one off.

It's 9 degrees outside and the wind is howling out of the Northwest. There are still hundreds of homes without power from a brutal ice storm of two weeks ago. (Not to worry, though. At least you can put the frozen food out on the porch and it won't thaw. Hell, if grandma kicks the bucket, put her out there, too. You can deal with her later.)

This is the time of year when you wonder about the Indians. How did they survive? I know, the buffalo provided them with dandy heavy robes to keep warm but you have to wonder, did they think this was the "good life?" Maybe they sent smoke signals to the Seminoles asking about short-term teepee reservations near a nice Florida beach.

There really isn't anything good about brutal winds and brutal temperatures. Nebraska is too flat to ski. Only nuts go ice fishing. Any animal with a brain is in some kind of hole. The rest are fattening up for the packing plants.

Only Nebraskans venture out because they absolutely must get to the bar or Wal-Mart. It's an inherited teepee fever syndrome.

Good life? Not for me. Good grief it's cold. Bring on tornado season.

To Learn How To Fly

If you wanted to learn how to fly, Nebraska is the perfect place. No, I am not going to say it will make your flying lessons easier. If you want easy, try Florida or Arizona. Nebraska is the perfect place because of one of the great spirits of the Sioux Indians. It's the North wind.

Nebraska is almost always windy. For a pilot, that means lots of cross controlled cross wind landings and in the early stages, a cross and jumpy instructor. Lincoln has two North | South runways and one Northwest | Southeast runway which should handle almost anything. The only problem with such an arrangement is these runways are in Nebraska and in Nebraska, there is always a swirling crosswind to keep you on your toes. If you can comfortably land a plane in Nebraska, you can land a plane anywhere!

Right now, the wind is steady out of the Northwest about 40 with higher gusts. On down the road a piece, make those gusts about 60. That means an empty semi might be on the road in one minute and on its side in the ditch the next. Toss in a little winter snow and ice and you have a real challenge.

If you are into adventure, why don't you come to Nebraska and learn how to fly? Lindberg did and look how he turned out.

The University of Nebraska fight song starts...there is no place like Nebraska. Maybe the lyrics were written by a pilot who was trying to land here.

Finally

Make no mistake about it. I am a hawk. And the use of the AC-130 gunship in Africa was the right use of US military force. It sent the right message. The target(s) were people who blew up US embassies in Africa. If they were allowed to establish their bases in Somalia, I guarantee it wouldn't be long before some of the stable African governments would end up like Iraq.

Unlike many of the "yaps" you see on television, I lived in Africa. I also have been in other "troubled" parts of the world and I can assure you, many of those places may as well be on the moon. I also believe the Philippines will soon become a a "desired" base of operations for al-Quida. (The officer who got our parking place in Manila died when his car blew up in that spot a few weeks after I left.)

Iraq is a different matter. I hate the moments of silence that end The News Hour on PBS when they show those young soldiers, sailors, and airmen who have died in Iraq. We have blown it big time in that operation. That being said, I am still a hawk about it. The US cannot fight anymore "nice guy" wars. We need to be very hesitant to use our forces but when we do, they have to be unleashed. We won World War II because we used what needed to be used to end it.

I am tired of the loss of young Americans because the military is afraid of what will show up on the evening news. Remove the reporters and get the job done and then bring our kids home.
We wouldn't be sending gunships into Somalia if we had done that in the first place.

The boat

That boat looks like it is in trouble, doesn't it? The waves seem pretty intense and the sky looks threatening. There is a hint of high waves tearing at it if you look close. That boat is in trouble.

Or is it? Actually, that's a tractor in a farm field Southwest of Lincoln and the waves are a couple of small hills covered in soybeans. I took this shot in the middle of a thunderstorm. The wind was howling and I was in the worst spot a storm spotter could be. I was at a point where I was going to take the brunt of this storm--wind, rain, hail, lightning, and maybe a tornado.

In order to get the shot, I had to roll down the window for my trusty Nikon. I snapped a few shots, including this one which showed up on CNN, and pulled the camera back in and tried to roll up the window. The key word is "tried." It would not come up and just about then, hail started to come out of the sky-not from up above but from right to left and I was left. The stones were quarter to golf ball size and they were coming through the open window like practice shots at the flag from Tiger Woods. I just covered my head and took the beating. Soon it was all over and the storm passed. No tornado. Lot's of hail. Damaged fields. And a pretty good picture for the price of a few head dents.

After all, this is Nebraska and no place for the weather faint-of-heart.