Morning Friend,
We've all heard of the "boomers" and and the "gen x"ers and whys and wherefores and whatsits of society's ever-changing demographics.
It is our nature to all the time label things.
And that's all fine and well with a compartmentalizing kind of guy like me.
It's somehow comforting to know who and where I am especially in the dizzying splendor of this beautiful life I'm in the midst of.
Or to be more specific; the "mid" of.
No, I'm not going down "crisis alley" today my friend.
I'm schooled enough in crisis management by now to give short shrift to such trivialities as lamenting how much of my life is past in relation to Science's best guess as to how much might be left.
I sympathize with those who are genuinely saddened and unfulfilled at the so-called middle of their lives but as one who sees each day as a bonus I never thought I'd get, I just don't see the point in getting worked up about too much else.
So for the sake of numerical argument and correct product identification, it can be said that I have reached "middle age".
You'll have to forgive me if instead of a crisis I have a celebration.
Today, due to some positive lifestyle changes I implemented a few years ago - to my nieces' delight (and the consternation of the odd "fuddy-dud") - I feel like a kid!
It's not something I take for granted because I'm quite fortunate not to have seriously harmed myself over years of self-abuse.
It's not something I'm not grateful to God for because so much of what I've been given is simply miraculous.
It's not something that came natural or easy because physical well being - and even prowess - at "my age" requires an extra degree of attention to diet and exercise.
And it's not something unique to me because the overall mental, spiritual and physical condition of this demographic in society is at an all time high.
I know LOTS of people who look after themselves and are just as sharp and energetic as they were as children.
The bulbs of human life are burning brighter...longer, which has economists, social scientists and demographic labelers in a quandary.
What of this huge number of unrelentingly "youthful" and vibrant individuals turning 65 yet still "stoked" running amok in a world brimming with jobs and opportunities left by the heretofore retired or deceased?
Will "Seniors" still be an applicable moniker for a bunch of "post-hippie", "mid-grunge", "pre-rap" hooligans still partying like it's 1999....in 2025?
"Senior" from a chronological standpoint certainly but the word evokes far too much sepia-toned imagery for this new generation of geriatrics.
It seems to me this burgeoning compartment could well use a somewhat uplifting upgrade in terminology?
If I should be so lucky, if the Good Lord be willing and my flesh not weaken, as to grab even a quick bite at the Golden Years Cafe, it is my sincere wish to get the TEEN-IORS Discount!?
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as long as you live ( abundantly)
THREE Angels!
Angela, Ash & Janelle
Abraham Stainer Esq.
a.k.a. "Ab"
Tinker-Timmy & Friends
Jan'l. Angeela, Ash and Ab
Monday, February 28, 2011
Monday, February 21, 2011
HOT Stuff #86
Morning Friend,
The proverbial light bulb of an idea for today's discussion came to me from an un-blanketed foot hanging over the side of my waterbed.
It wasn't a delicately painted lady's foot, for that might certainly have forestalled my creative processes significantly; from a literary standpoint at any rate.
Since the foot was at the end of my own leg and the toes felt like they were painted with frost, I assumed the fetal position while the remarkably efficient heating machine of my body warmed the errant appendage.
It didn't take long of course given the heavy quilt, and as slumber's sweet return was soon being accompanied by a grateful lullaby of gratitude for the little heater chugging along mere inches beneath me and "Teddy" , I waxed nostalgically for a moment, to a time long ago when it would have been just me, the quilt and a stuffed bear, without a heated bed.
It isn't so long ago that I have to dredge the memory banks too deeply to recall the pre-sleep ritual of frantically sliding into a cold bed and earnestly "cocooning" until shivering tremors subsided enough for the Sandman to do his work... and before his shovel is back in the pail your bed is warm as....let's just say it's ready for butter and jam!
As someone with less than a layman's understanding of exothermic reactions, metabolic processes, circulatory systems and other scientific explanations for our body's ability to produce heat, I am curiously amazed by it, ( to the point of leaping from an electronically enhanced, heated doze and into the freezing fray of Museful meandering).
Our bodies are very similar to machines, in terms of the care and maintenance they require and the incredible physiological feats they perform, like heat production.
Even while asleep, the body "furnace" emits 250 btus of heat energy - plenty enough to keep toast, and your toes warm under the blankets as it amounts to the same as curling up to a nice 75 watt light bulb.
Awake but sitting idly ( as I am on the rarest of occasions), that number increases to 400 btus or 120 watts.
Moderate exercise ( or "work" for us in the blue collar crowd) can stoke that furnace up to 650 btus ( 190 watts).
The figure for heavy exertion such as riding your bike through heavy snow ( as so happens to be one of my more challenging Winter endeavors), goes a long way towards explaining how such activity is possible in the bitter cold, and how I manage even to break a sweat when it's minus 40.
Underneath my layers of outwear is not just a finely chiseled though slightly awkward musculoskeletal marvel, but a very high-efficiency human furnace pumping out 2400 btus ( 7x100 watt light bulbs! ) of long-john stoking warmth.
Kind of makes you wish there was a stationary bike at the bus stop doesn't it? ( and hopefully someone with dainty painted toes keeping the bed warm :)
But most interesting to me in all of this was based on the fact the industry standard for furnace size is 30-35 btus per square foot.
The human body at approximately 13 square feet, thus requires about 400 btus, which I have already stated is exactly what we're equipped with.
It is ALL as I suspected.
God is a furnace man.
And my brother Gray ( the furnace man) is, a "God"!
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as long as you live ( thermally)
The proverbial light bulb of an idea for today's discussion came to me from an un-blanketed foot hanging over the side of my waterbed.
It wasn't a delicately painted lady's foot, for that might certainly have forestalled my creative processes significantly; from a literary standpoint at any rate.
Since the foot was at the end of my own leg and the toes felt like they were painted with frost, I assumed the fetal position while the remarkably efficient heating machine of my body warmed the errant appendage.
It didn't take long of course given the heavy quilt, and as slumber's sweet return was soon being accompanied by a grateful lullaby of gratitude for the little heater chugging along mere inches beneath me and "Teddy" , I waxed nostalgically for a moment, to a time long ago when it would have been just me, the quilt and a stuffed bear, without a heated bed.
It isn't so long ago that I have to dredge the memory banks too deeply to recall the pre-sleep ritual of frantically sliding into a cold bed and earnestly "cocooning" until shivering tremors subsided enough for the Sandman to do his work... and before his shovel is back in the pail your bed is warm as....let's just say it's ready for butter and jam!
As someone with less than a layman's understanding of exothermic reactions, metabolic processes, circulatory systems and other scientific explanations for our body's ability to produce heat, I am curiously amazed by it, ( to the point of leaping from an electronically enhanced, heated doze and into the freezing fray of Museful meandering).
Our bodies are very similar to machines, in terms of the care and maintenance they require and the incredible physiological feats they perform, like heat production.
Even while asleep, the body "furnace" emits 250 btus of heat energy - plenty enough to keep toast, and your toes warm under the blankets as it amounts to the same as curling up to a nice 75 watt light bulb.
Awake but sitting idly ( as I am on the rarest of occasions), that number increases to 400 btus or 120 watts.
Moderate exercise ( or "work" for us in the blue collar crowd) can stoke that furnace up to 650 btus ( 190 watts).
The figure for heavy exertion such as riding your bike through heavy snow ( as so happens to be one of my more challenging Winter endeavors), goes a long way towards explaining how such activity is possible in the bitter cold, and how I manage even to break a sweat when it's minus 40.
Underneath my layers of outwear is not just a finely chiseled though slightly awkward musculoskeletal marvel, but a very high-efficiency human furnace pumping out 2400 btus ( 7x100 watt light bulbs! ) of long-john stoking warmth.
Kind of makes you wish there was a stationary bike at the bus stop doesn't it? ( and hopefully someone with dainty painted toes keeping the bed warm :)
But most interesting to me in all of this was based on the fact the industry standard for furnace size is 30-35 btus per square foot.
The human body at approximately 13 square feet, thus requires about 400 btus, which I have already stated is exactly what we're equipped with.
It is ALL as I suspected.
God is a furnace man.
And my brother Gray ( the furnace man) is, a "God"!
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as long as you live ( thermally)
Monday, February 14, 2011
Valen-whine #85
Morning Friend,
"Roses are red, Violets are..."
Blue is how many single and dateless souls are feeling today on Valentine's Day.
If you aren't single, but have forgotten that today is the year's BIG romantic event, then come on down and join me in the "blues pool"....the water is just fine, especially if you like yours icy-cold and bucket-administered.
Or I could come visit you in the dog house and we could cynically rail at the crass commercialism and shallow marketing sham of it all.
This tremendous boon for chocolatiers, florists, greeting card companies, restaurateurs, and pharmacists ( who sell more Viagra in the week leading up to today than every other week of the year), finds many bachelor-types feeling a little limp-spirited today.
Behind this mid-winter gift exchange and sharing of chemically-induced passion, is for some a sad reminder of their isolation.
The candy and chocolate hearts lining the store shelves are not broken ones.
The broken promises of yesterday have left many a mortal cardiac wound in their wake.
But as I have found along my own self-made solitary road, there is more to this day than some financially-faced affirmation of affection.
It is a none-too gentle reminder of the hard work, faith and trust and genuine commitment that goes into making "true love", true.
Unfettered and relentless, genuine love needs not of philanthropic finery nor pharmaceutical finagling.
It is natural....as natural as a....( you know!!!!)
I have basked in the warmth of love's blazing splendor but with an exhale of drunken breath did I extinguish its' flame.
My focus today and all days, isn't about not having a special someone to buy a flower for.
It's about continuing along the Good Lord's path and becoming someone special and worthy of sharing the light of true love with another.
It's about becoming a flower.
( a real one of course)
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as long as you live ( in bloom)
"Roses are red, Violets are..."
Blue is how many single and dateless souls are feeling today on Valentine's Day.
If you aren't single, but have forgotten that today is the year's BIG romantic event, then come on down and join me in the "blues pool"....the water is just fine, especially if you like yours icy-cold and bucket-administered.
Or I could come visit you in the dog house and we could cynically rail at the crass commercialism and shallow marketing sham of it all.
This tremendous boon for chocolatiers, florists, greeting card companies, restaurateurs, and pharmacists ( who sell more Viagra in the week leading up to today than every other week of the year), finds many bachelor-types feeling a little limp-spirited today.
Behind this mid-winter gift exchange and sharing of chemically-induced passion, is for some a sad reminder of their isolation.
The candy and chocolate hearts lining the store shelves are not broken ones.
The broken promises of yesterday have left many a mortal cardiac wound in their wake.
But as I have found along my own self-made solitary road, there is more to this day than some financially-faced affirmation of affection.
It is a none-too gentle reminder of the hard work, faith and trust and genuine commitment that goes into making "true love", true.
Unfettered and relentless, genuine love needs not of philanthropic finery nor pharmaceutical finagling.
It is natural....as natural as a....( you know!!!!)
I have basked in the warmth of love's blazing splendor but with an exhale of drunken breath did I extinguish its' flame.
My focus today and all days, isn't about not having a special someone to buy a flower for.
It's about continuing along the Good Lord's path and becoming someone special and worthy of sharing the light of true love with another.
It's about becoming a flower.
( a real one of course)
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as long as you live ( in bloom)
Monday, February 7, 2011
Whetherman #84
Morning Friend,
Some buffoon came walking through the locker room at work last week trumpeting the fact that the abnormally nice Spring-like weather we were enjoying - in late January! - was not going to last and more bitter cold was on the way.
Now I have patience aplenty these days...it's part and parcel of the whole "Serenity" thing.
You know, "...accept the things I cannot change...", like the weather for instance.
I get that. I might grumble a bit as I'm accepting this morning's fact that old "locker room Nostradamus" was right and therefore I'm "...changing the things I can...", like into long underwear again.
But last week, unencumbered as I was by the need for such Arctic garmentry, and more than slightly a-swoon with pre-Spring fever as a result, I could not hold my tongue.
"MUST you tarnish the beauty of this marvelous TODAY with your dire "predictions" that themselves may or may not happen?!?", I queried loudly. ( I may have included an unflattering epithet directed at the weather service if I'm not mistaken.)
"Yeah but...", the poor fellow's smugness melted as his "town crying" had obviously fallen on the wrong ears; mine.
I had just arrived from a delightfully slushy ride to work with a lungful of fragrant air instead of the usual scarf-filtered ice crystals and was in no mood for this Negative Nelly's nattering.
Part of me - the Serene part - said, "let it go Tim...he likes to hear himself talk...he's not too bright...he doesn't realize that the weather forecast is easily available to all in this technologically advanced age and that even if it weren't, nobody had put their winter coats away because of a warm spell in January...leave him be...you can't CHANGE him!".
The other part of me - the Courageous part - said "You might not be able to change the man's delusion that he's the only one of 4.000 employees who follows weather patterns, but you just may be able to clue him in on a thing or two you've discovered about the untold richness of life's silver linings and the joy of living day-to-day".
So I asked him, "Why are you telling me that it's going to turn cold again in four days? Should I just bundle up tight and wait? Is there anything I can do to prevent it?? What if I die before then? What about if it's cold but not super-cold? What about in three hundred and sixty-four days...is it going to be REALLY cold then too????".
"What about the freakishly nice gift-with-a-sunny-bow-from-God-on-it TODAY!?!", I asked.
"Well, today is just over ten months away from the Mayan calendar's end of the world," he replied.
"Going to be a cold one I imagine?", I asked.
"Wear an extra sweater," he said
"Thanks." ( Serenity now.)
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as much as you live (patiently)
Some buffoon came walking through the locker room at work last week trumpeting the fact that the abnormally nice Spring-like weather we were enjoying - in late January! - was not going to last and more bitter cold was on the way.
Now I have patience aplenty these days...it's part and parcel of the whole "Serenity" thing.
You know, "...accept the things I cannot change...", like the weather for instance.
I get that. I might grumble a bit as I'm accepting this morning's fact that old "locker room Nostradamus" was right and therefore I'm "...changing the things I can...", like into long underwear again.
But last week, unencumbered as I was by the need for such Arctic garmentry, and more than slightly a-swoon with pre-Spring fever as a result, I could not hold my tongue.
"MUST you tarnish the beauty of this marvelous TODAY with your dire "predictions" that themselves may or may not happen?!?", I queried loudly. ( I may have included an unflattering epithet directed at the weather service if I'm not mistaken.)
"Yeah but...", the poor fellow's smugness melted as his "town crying" had obviously fallen on the wrong ears; mine.
I had just arrived from a delightfully slushy ride to work with a lungful of fragrant air instead of the usual scarf-filtered ice crystals and was in no mood for this Negative Nelly's nattering.
Part of me - the Serene part - said, "let it go Tim...he likes to hear himself talk...he's not too bright...he doesn't realize that the weather forecast is easily available to all in this technologically advanced age and that even if it weren't, nobody had put their winter coats away because of a warm spell in January...leave him be...you can't CHANGE him!".
The other part of me - the Courageous part - said "You might not be able to change the man's delusion that he's the only one of 4.000 employees who follows weather patterns, but you just may be able to clue him in on a thing or two you've discovered about the untold richness of life's silver linings and the joy of living day-to-day".
So I asked him, "Why are you telling me that it's going to turn cold again in four days? Should I just bundle up tight and wait? Is there anything I can do to prevent it?? What if I die before then? What about if it's cold but not super-cold? What about in three hundred and sixty-four days...is it going to be REALLY cold then too????".
"What about the freakishly nice gift-with-a-sunny-bow-from-God-on-it TODAY!?!", I asked.
"Well, today is just over ten months away from the Mayan calendar's end of the world," he replied.
"Going to be a cold one I imagine?", I asked.
"Wear an extra sweater," he said
"Thanks." ( Serenity now.)
love tImMy:/
Laugh as much as you breathe...
Love as much as you live (patiently)
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