Mr. Polehn writes

Once upon a time I owned a 1994 Toyota Camry .  I drove it something like 6 miles everyday for a few years (a meager commute).  At that time my job also involved a good amount of sitting and staring at a screen.  Making the realization that I was spending about ⅓ of my day sleeping, and the other ⅔ I was spending sitting was a big eye opener.  Pair this with the fact that I was weighing in at 240 lbs and it was becoming pretty obvious that I needed to make some changes in my life. One of the first things I did was get a bike.   At that point I hadn’t ridden a bike since I was about 12 years old.  Luckily, as the old proverb suggests, once you learn you never forget.  I soon started riding that bike to and from work just bout every single day.  It took some time but eventually I was able to make the uphill trip home without feeling completely exhausted.  I rode that bike just about every day until winter hit.  However, even thoug...

There are a lot of funny things that come with having a unique name.  People say it wrong.  People always want to know if you're related to the other <uncommon last name>s that they know (yes).  You spell it for people without being asked. And, if someone on the internet has your name you know they are trying to impersonate you.  It's not just someone who so happens to have the same name.  It's the lowest form of ID theft. Someone is out there masquerading as me.   We started hearing about this a few weeks ago, when we listed our old house for sale. Someone was trying to rent out our old house on Gorge Classifieds  and other sites, asking people to send them a deposit to rent our house without even seeing it.  He was using our house to scam people.  But, the thing that put it over the top is he was using my name to do it. Eventually this person tried scamming someone who actually knew me.  The email was forwarded to me...

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  Near the end of 2017 I did something I hope becomes an end of year tradition.  I planned out all the books I’m going to read in the next year.  I read some great books last year and I hope that having a plan will make this year even better. Why would I plan out a year of reading? Last year I was able to read a lot more than I have before.  However, there were still long periods throughout the year in which I wasn't reading anything, and some of what I read was just whatever was in front of me, not what I really wanted to read.  Like most things in life, I suspect, having a plan will help align what I do read with my goals.  There are several subjects I’m interested in, and didn’t read about.  There are authors I want to read more of, but haven’t made time to.  And modern fiction?  What is that?  (I  think I read one new book last year) I made a realization a few months back.  My pile of books I want to read is much tall...