Gibbs 1, Hendrick 0

Kyle Busch won the race yesterday. I thought this was a neat picture of him going to get the flag. His teammate, and my personal favorite, Tony Stewart, finished second, and had this to say about the race. I think this was my personal favorite, though. He took it a step further and said he would take the Goodyears off his personal vehicles and replace them with Firestones. You just don't get this kind of candor anywhere.

Weekend Entertainment

I saw this guy on the Apollo last week. The 2 things that impress me the most are how lost he is in his performance and how the crowd responds. We should all be so lucky to have people enjoy watching us do what we love to do.

If you're into Oprah moments and other "dreams come true" type moments (I am, BTW), check this out. If you can get through Tina's four and half minutes of babbling, you'll see he does a nice job.

America has some sense....

....this guy got voted off of American Idol last night after wowing us with his most flaming performance yet.

The Final Countdown

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I had been having trouble embedding videos from YouTube. I put this one up as a test, but it's actually not too bad.

Happy Leap Day!!!

Nothing new to report. It snowed last night....supposed to snow again tonight...yippee. This pic was taken earlier this week in Dubuque, IA. On a side note, I heard the pigs outnumber the people 3 to 1 in Iowa.

Hunka-hunka Climbin' Love

So, I did another one of these things. The last one I wrote about was the Go Vertical Challenge at the Sears Tower in November. I did the Step Up for Kids at the Aon Building in January. The Hustle Up the Hancock this past Sunday concluded this year's climbing season. My wave started at 11:45, and I finished in about 45 minutes. I always meet some nice folks in the stairwells. There's usually a good mix of folks from the serious athletes trying to beat their best time to those who are closer to my fitness level. I even had one of the water girls compliment me on my shoes (I got'em on EBay). This was the first time I'd worn them out, even though I'd had them for over a year. I think they're snazzy. Some people got game, others just got gear.

As usual, I was looking for the exit somewhere around the fifth floor. The steps for this one are really steep. To give you an idea, this climb is 12 more floors than the Aon Building, but it's got fewer steps. Long story short, the steps are steeper. Back to the climb.... I took my usual breaks along the way. I know I stopped at least 3 times in the 30's.....I just wasn't feelin' it. I got out of the 30's, and once I got past 47, I was halfway home. It was five floors here, 4 floors there until the end. At the top, I got my medal, banana, bottle of water, and headed for the elevator line. It was down to the lobby and across the street to get my car out of the garage. The worst part of the whole day was the parking. Under 2 hours would've cost $17. I was there 2 hours and 2 minutes, which ran my parking bill to $23.....what a joke. I guess it's all for a good cause. I think they raised close to a million bucks for the American Lung Association and other lung health type stuff.

I've never had trouble getting going on the day after these things. For whatever reason, I was worthless yesterday. I was much better today.

The girls are staying with me for a couple of days as their mom is out of town for some kind of training for her job. As we were going to bed tonight, we read the Bible, then prayed. Gracy has a classmate who just lost her baby brother. Her name is Damaris, and the funeral is tomorrow, Wednesday. He had had heart complications since birth, and he just passed at 5 months old. Please say a prayer for them.

Back to tonight, we said a prayer for Damaris and her family, and I explained that God knows what it's like to lose a son. I asked Nora about it, and with a great big smile and all the pride she could muster, she said "He lost his Son for the glory of God!" Once again, with all the things that I've gotten wrong in my life, I continue to be amazed at how blessed I am to have such wonderful daughters.

Barack-WOO!! Obama-WOO!!

I like Barack Obama. I don’t know if he’d make the best president, but I don’t know that he’d be any worse than what we’ve seen recently. You can imagine my disappointment when I heard that longtime Cubs Superfan Ronnie “Woo Woo” Wickers was spotted in the lobby of the Hyatt Regency where Obama made his speech after the Super Tuesday voting. The Cubs haven’t won a World Series since 1908. If Ronnie’s tendency to get behind a loser bleeds over into the presidential race, this does not bode well for Obama.

It was a good race, Mr. Obama. There’s always next (election) year.