Dreaming of a Life Less Ordinary

  July 7,2026 The re-awakening…   Whenever someone asks me what my greatest gift was, I would tell them it was my creativity.  It always has been.  Since I was a boy and dreamed of being Luke Skywalker, I have dreamed up worlds.  I am good at ideas.  I am good at world building in my head.  What I have never been so great at is putting it to paper.   Since moving back to Indiana, all I have been able to do was blog about bike rides and Weight Watchers.  These aren’t bad things; I rather like doing both.  However, creativity and passion have been missing.  There were times I wondered if this was because I didn’t pursue my dream upon moving home.  Instead, I took another corporate job.  One that was easy until it wasn’t.  One that was worth it, until it wasn’t.  For almost three years I struggled to spin tales.  I struggled to create.  I struggled.  I had pretty much given up on ever writing the grea...

  Lot more of this in my future! Resignation You don’t just leave behind a job when you resign. It’s so much more than that. It’s the smile you would kill to get every day. It’s that friend you can talk to for hours at a time and never get sick of. It’s the dude who pumps you up and makes you feel like you are incredible. It’s not just the bad but the good you walk away from. If you listened to me, you’ve heard in my voice for a long time that I’ve been unhappy at work. I tried to stick it out. I tried to “make” it work. I tried to make it better. At the end of the day, the joy was gone. It was harder and harder to get up on time and prep for meetings. It was harder and harder to listen to people and take them seriously. Until one Friday when you’re so close to the end of your rope it all blows up and you are the asshole. It’s at this point I take my leave. I’m tired of looking for the silver lining. I’m tired of trying to like my job. I’m tired of staying for those people th...

  "Pennsylvania: Making 35 Miles Feel Like 100" June 13, 2026 Even with the headache, the heat, and thinking Pennsylvania was a lot hillier than it should be, it didn't really matter. The feeling of freedom you get when you start a bike ride is like nothing else in the world for me. The only thing I can compare it to is the deep breath before you plunge into a pool and take your first lap. There is a sense that nothing else really matters — there are two wheels between you and the road and it is total, complete freedom. Over the course of any ride, that freedom starts to melt away your worries, your anger, and any feelings of loss you might be holding onto. All that really matters is moving forward. Seeing where the road takes you. Last Saturday it took me to the 7th state I have done a bike ride in. It took me up and down in some serious heat. It tested me mentally and physically, which is what we do it for, I guess. In the end, nothing else seemed to matter — just me an...

  Our Weight Watchers topic for this week was Eat the Rainbow and of course that came with a joke from me about whether we were talking about Skittles. Then again, I think that is  taste  the rainbow — semantics. I have been thinking about eating the rainbow since Jentz, the old guy from the swimming pool who rocked the Speedo every day back in California, told me how he ate and how beautiful his plate was each day. I miss Jentz — there wasn't a woman at the pool he didn't hit on. Anyway, he told me he would go to Costco and load up on the chicken breasts and then make this beautiful plate of veggies that had all the colors in it. He went on and on about it being gorgeous. So, yesterday in our workshop we went through all the colors of fruits and vegetables and what nutrient values they brought with them. It was cool. I know greens are good for the heart. Yellow and orange are good for the eyes, and so on and so forth. It got me thinking about how I could get some rainbow...

 And sometimes, no words are needed—the image says it all.

Darth Sidious: "Wipe them out. All of them." I wish something cool would have gone through my head — like the profound words of the Dark Lord of the Sith — when the urge to purge came upon me. It did not. I just realized, before I left for Terre Haute for race weekend, that my closet was overflowing with stuff I wouldn't be wearing anytime soon. My journey has been remarkable since last year when I joined WW. I have lost 89 pounds, bringing my total journey to just about 250 pounds. Let me say that again: bringing my journey total to just about 250 pounds. Shall we take a moment to put that into perspective? What are some things that weigh about 250 pounds? How about a newborn baby elephant. A king or queen size mattress. A mature lioness. Of course, most standard washing machines would also be in this range. So, when I was struggling to recover from two ear infections and couldn't ride on Monday, the only urge I had was to purge all the 4X and 5X stuff that was in my...