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We rarely agree on policy, but this made my day…

I’ve had a “home” phone number my entire life – until yesterday. With the last person in our family getting their own mobile phone, I just didn’t feel it was necessary to pay the nearly $30 per month any longer.

First cable TV, now telephone. Any other utilities I can get rid of?

P.S. – I can be reached at 218-248-0468; drop me a line if you’d like the other three…

Today I had a clerk ask for my ID when paying with a credit card and she said:

“You were born the same year as my dad, but you look a lot younger than him – he has silver hair.”

Not sure if I should feel good about that or not…

Happy 20th Anniversary, Colleen – Ramsey County Courthouse, Saint Paul, Minnesota

Steak and pasta, DeGidio’s Restaurant & Bar, Saint Paul, Minnesota

It’s been almost two months since I returned to Facebook and about a month since I formally joined Google+. The redesign of this site is now two months old and the Tweet count is closing in on 8500.

My order of preference in posting right now is 1) this site, 2) Twitter, 3) Facebook and 4) Google+. I really haven’t jumped back into Facebook much (other than lurking) and Google+ just seems a bit redundant, nerdy and sparse. I still really like Twitter, but I need to be careful that I don’t turn the hose on too strong or I’ll drown in information overload.

Still trying to post something to this site every day, even if it’s just a cheater post (photo, quote or link). I’m pretty sure I miss out on communicating with some people by mainly posting here, but that’s OK. I also need to find the proper “voice” for my work accounts on these sites too.

Paid to be social – who would’ve thought I’d ever do that?

Every. Single. Day.

New Mountain Bike Trailhead Building, Lebanon Hills Regional Park, Eagan, Minnesota

As I mentioned in my recent iPhone post, I regularly use an app called Weightbot to track my weight. The two graphs above came from that app – the first was my best year (2009), while the second is the current year (which is somewhat incomplete, as I don’t have a scale during the week at work).

I currently have a goal weight of 160 pounds, which seems to be eluding me by about ten pounds. I got close in 2009 by running 1000+ miles, but right now I’m having trouble getting back in the 160s. My mileage total so far this year is just under 700 miles, but I’ve done a lot more cross-training (mainly biking). Diet is probably the remaining reason, but that’s a lot tougher for me to change.

All ten of those remaining pounds can be found primarily around my midsection. My pant size has remained steady at 32 inches, but the “beer belly” region is the one thing I wish I could re-shape. Effective exercises targeting this area seem elusive, but I keep trying. I’m now to the point where I’m relatively happy standing in front of the mirror, but it would be nice to have a little more definition in my core.

Looking at those graphs again, I have to question the body-mass index definition of “overweight” outlined at the 170 pound mark for a male who is 5’9″ tall. I don’t really feel overweight now – especially after coming down from a peak weight of nearly 200 pounds. I think the “normal” range for that height goes down to 150 pounds, which seems ridiculous to me. Still, I’d really love to see that 160 number appear on the scale someday soon…

Today’s Halloween is a bit sad for me, as it’s the first time since either of my kids were born that I haven’t been at home for Halloween night. Kid one isn’t even going out door-to-door this year (although there is still a Zombie Kardashian costume involved).

I also missed out on the Monster Half, the big Halloween party at Fortune Bay on Saturday night and a few other things I would have liked to be a part of. I did get to help kid two host her big party on Friday night, though, and last night we carved pumpkins (above).

The local Head Start program is bringing over a group of kids to the resort in the morning for trick-or-treating, which should be fun. Aside from that, Halloween night will be treadmill time in the exercise room (October will be a 100+ mile month), followed by the 5-0.

Have a safe and happy Halloween!

Next up on Craigslist:

Lightly used Kurt Kinetic bicycle trainer with front tire block. It’s been taking up space in the basement for a few years now and probably has less than a hundred miles of use. Perfect opportunity for someone else to have a low-cost way to stay busy this winter! Available for in-person pick-up in south metro, cash only. $150 or best offer. Please email with any questions.

UPDATE (10/28/2011): Sold – thanks again for the interest.

This story in the Duluth News Tribune today got me thinking about my ideal Northland living situation, which would be to design and build a small cabin on a lake. While I want my design to be year-round, I don’t want a giant lake home. All it really needs is:

• Character and warmth (exposed log beams, stonework)
• Wood-burning fireplace
• Heated floors
• Bathroom with nice, warm shower
• Kitchen with fridge, stove and microwave
• Washer and dryer
• Master bedroom with lots of blankets
• Guest bedroom with bunk beds
• High-speed wireless internet access
• Satellite/cable on a nice flat-screen TV with a good sound system
• Lots of windows facing the lake and forest
• Screen porch with rocking chairs
• Heated garage
• Dock with boat and kayaks
• Maybe a snowmobile?

Guess I’ll stop at the Y Store and pick up another Powerball ticket with my loose change…

From Craigslist:

All your spookiest dreams will come true with this collection of Department 56 Halloween Village items, including the coveted carousel. Many items brand new, never removed from box (non-smoking, non-pet home). No sale of individual items – will be sold as one lot. Available for pick up in the southern suburbs, cash on delivery. You’ll have this home and set up in time for Halloween! All items in very good condition (except Swinging Ghoulies – one of the ghouls fell off its swing).

• Haunted Outhouse
• Ghostly Carousel
• Dead End Motel
• Halloween Hot Rod
• Bats & Spook Tree
• Haunted Front Yard
• Spooky Yard Scene
• Witch By The Light Of The Moon
• Halloween Water Tower
• Eerie Rocks & Road
• All Saints Church
• Lit Spooky Tree
• Haunted Tower Tours
• Creepy Creek Bridge
• Multi-Building Lighting System
• Scary Twisted Trees
• Black Cat Diner
• Rock-A-Bye Vampire
• Begging for Soul Cakes
• Halloween Village Sign
• Killing Time
• Shaking Graveyard
• Swinging Ghoulies
• LaGhosti Movie Theater
• Horse Drawn Hears
• Halloween Creepy Street
• Halloween Full Moon
• Strangers Beware
• Dr. Lunatic, The Mad Scientist
• Scaredy Cat Ferris Wheel
• Barleycorn Manor
• Helga’s House of Fortunes
• Haunted Front Yard
• Autumn Landscape Set

$500 or best offer. Please email with any questions.

UPDATE (10/27/2011): Sold – thanks for the interest.

• Mystic Lake Casino Hotel
• The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas
• Pebble Beach Resorts
• Vail Resorts
• Hawaiian Airlines
• Four Seasons Resorts Lana’i
• Apple, Inc.

My two month Facebook sabbatical ends tonight. It was a nice, productive break, but the influence of Facebook has expanded so much that you really do miss out on a lot of things now if you don’t have an account. I also needed to get back to being an admin on a few pages, watching out for kid one’s safety and catching up with friends who I only see online via Facebook.

I’m very proud of the changes I’ve made on this site and will continue to post (almost) daily here. My Twitter account is also still very active and automatically feeds the 7 Minute Miles home page.

I reinstalled the iPhone Facebook app, but I’m not sure yet how much I’ll post going forward. I don’t see what all the fuss was about regarding the layout changes, but I think the big stuff talked about at F8 is still yet to come, no?

I had the pleasure of witnessing the “reality distortion field” in person many times over the years at several Macworld and WWDC keynotes, ranging from San Jose to Boston to San Francisco. At a Microsoft party in San Francisco in 1998, I stood nearby as I tried to work up the courage to actually talk to him. I was too shy at the time to say anything, but I remember being shocked when I saw him in the bathroom later that night and he didn’t wash his hands before leaving.

That unpleasantness aside, what can you say about Steve Jobs’ contributions to the world? I first read the news today via Twitter on my iPhone while walking down the Las Vegas strip in front of the Bellagio. I stopped and watched the beautiful fountains, then headed to the Cosmopolitan, where a literal hoard of hipsters ran wild with their requisite iPhones. iPads are everywhere at the convention I’m attending and iPods are given away as prizes at multiple booths. MacBook Pros and Airs are the laptop of choice for millions and Apple is one of the most valuable companies in the world.

Personally, much of my technology career is based on the products and ideas that have originated from Cupertino. I literally would not be where I am today if it were not for the work of Steven Paul Jobs. And his association with Disney and Pixar cannot be understated either. Thank you, sir.

We all knew this was coming, especially with the way the resignation announcement was worded. Cancer sucks (curse you, Bruce McCullough). Condolences to the Jobs family and thank you, also, for sharing him with the rest of us.

56 is way, way too young, but as Steve said, “Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.”

Namaste, Mr. Jobs.

So many things going on right now – rolling out the new kiosks at work this week, trying to wrap up a bunch of items before I leave town, marathon expo on Friday, family races on Saturday, a wedding reception later that day, the Twin Cities Marathon Sunday morning, a benefit dinner Sunday night and an early morning flight to Vegas on Monday.

I also still have to get the new work website finished, design a new look for the Tapemark Pro-Am site, move my personal server somewhere cheaper, get Halloween items listed on Craigslist and finish cleaning the house. I’m already behind on a bunch of TV shows, but don’t really want to spend the time to catch up – I’d much rather work on relationships with family and friends.

More on that soon…

As posted earlier this week, I finally implemented a few design changes on 7 Minute Miles. I discovered that the updated news feed still has some issues that I need to test out further (thanks Joss Crowcroft), but overall I’m pretty happy with how it turned out.

With the additional of post formats, I should be able to post something almost every day – favorite quotes, links to other sites I like and single images are quick and easy. I also want to write regular posts more often and will focus on my usual food, golf, running and travel stories, along with some personal posts about whatever grabs my fancy on that particular day.

I haven’t decided yet just how personal I want to get here – there is definitely a school of thought that says you need to cultivate your “online brand” and be aware of what a potential future employer might read. Others get all uptight if you swear, become too political or say something that’s out of the ordinary. And it’s much easier to write crazy stuff if you are anonymous (or an idiot).

Online publishing platforms like WordPress create an incredible opportunity for self-expression and wide dissemination of thoughts and ideas. Everyone likes to hold up freedom of speech as an ideal, but the reality is that words have consequences and must be wielded carefully. I hate self-censorship, but I’ve also been burned enough times by things I write to know I need to think twice (or more) before hitting the publish button.

I am who I am, though, and don’t plan to be anonymous or (hopefully) boring. So sit back, relax and enjoy the show…

Our last remaining cockatiel, Flavio, passed away tonight at the age of 20. That’s a pretty full life for an average cockatiel, but Flavio was no average bird. Loved dearly by our family, he will be greatly missed.

Flavio was preceded in death by his father, Kenneth Ruprecht Chinken, mother George, brothers Beaker and Whitey and sister, Norm.

Born in a Madison apartment during my senior year of college, Flavio traveled with us to apartments in St. Paul and Eagan, followed by the townhouse and finally Oakbrooke, where a short funeral service was performed tonight on the path to the pond.

CK writes:
You were one funny, sassy bird, Flavio. Thank you for bringing so much joy to our lives.

SK writes:
You always sung with me, even when I was off-key. We watched movies together, just you and me. But today I guess you thought it was time to leave your family on Earth, and fly to the one up above. Even though you’re gone now, I know you’re happy and you will stay with me for years to come. I love you Flavio, may you rest in peace.

MK writes:
We will forever and always love you Flavio! You will always be in our hearts! You were the BEST bird ANY person in the whole world could have, Flavio, you were EXTRAORDINARY! I will miss you with all my heart! I remember before you left, we used to sing Mockingbird together. R.I.P I <3 you!

The oldest post on 7 Minute Miles was written five years ago tomorrow. I’ll skip the usual “time flies” references and all that – just glad to still be around to publish anything…

A lot has changed in my life during this timeframe, but the look of this site has not. I was kicking around the idea that I should write a new theme and incorporate all of the new features that WordPress has added over the years, but I’m both lazy and a slow learner. In the end, I decided to mostly keep things the way they’ve been, but did tidy up the joint a little:

• Added new background image
• De-cluttered the title bar and re-named some links
• Modified the color scheme a bit and cleaned up the style sheet
• Removed the sidebar and created a new sub-footer section
• New social media and contact buttons in the sub-footer
• Moved the bucket list items to the footer area
• Upgraded the photo gallery to the latest version
• De-activated and removed unused plugins (and added some new ones)
• Adding a new running log section (not quite ready yet)
• Re-writing the about section and merging it with the old bio and fetish sections (in progress)

I’ve been thinking a lot about how personal web sites fit in with the current social media landscape and decided I’ll keep this site as my online home base and have Twitter continue to feed the home page with short updates. When I do write the occasional longer post here, Twitter and Facebook will announce those posts automatically. And I still like the concept of owning the box (and the contents) and not worrying about the (sometimes) arbitrary policy changes of other companies. Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn all serve various purposes for me, though, so they will continue to stay in the picture (despite my occasional idiot freakouts).

A few stats as of today: 919 posts, 95 pages, 182 approved comments (78,255 blocked spam comments), 39,194 unique visitors in 2010 (who viewed 400,295 pages).

I’ve read a few people say that Twitter and Facebook are killing the blog. I’d have to say that’s mostly true for me, as my last post on 7 Minute Miles was now more than a month ago. My current Twitter count stands at 6,581 updates and I’ve uploaded more pictures to Facebook lately than I have to the photo gallery. I do like having all three, though, and will spend a little time this month sprucing up this site (WordPress plugin updates, update/remove the stamps sections, page review for out-of-date info, etc.).

So, what’s new? I’ve been at Fortune Bay for seven months now and have seen a lot of snow and ice. The lowest temp I’ve witnessed on the outdoor thermometer was -38F, but the MINI has always started right up. Strangely enough, the Twin Cities has received a lot more snow this year than we have. I’ve been told the snowmobile trails were still pretty good, though. We lost a little bit of snow cover last week, but it’s cold again this week and there is a bit of snow in the forecast.

I moved from the resort hotel to a house on the west end of Lake Vermilion about two months ago. It’s way bigger than I need, but the resort owners gave me a great deal that goes through the end of April. Don’t use the hot tub much, but it has satellite TV and wireless internet (and warmth). Lake Vermilion is a huge lake, so it takes about 25 minutes to get from Fortune Bay (on the east end) to the lake house.

Work has been going well. The winter is the slow season, so we try to do technology and facility upgrades now when there aren’t as many people around. My department has upgraded several key systems and I’m now working on an internal web site for employees to use for training and knowledge retention. Business levels have been above expectations, so maybe we’re finally seeing signs of the recession ending soon.

It’s tough being away from the family, although I still see them almost every weekend. The kids are growing up so fast – hard to believe my oldest is now a teenager! Two more years and I’ll need new car insurance. Wow. I miss a lot of my metro friends too and have been trying to keep in touch online and on Fridays – I usually work four ten hour days each week, so I can usually visit on my “day off.” If I haven’t talked to you in a while, please give me a call (218-248-0468) or drop me a line at dk@7minutemiles.com and we’ll get something scheduled.

I’m signed up for two marathons this year (Grandma’s on June 18 and Twin Cities on Oct 2) and have my name in the New York City lottery again too. It’s been a tough winter for running, but I have tried to stay active with the new snowshoes and cross country skis. Boston was the goal for this year, but now that the goalposts have moved, it may not happen for a while. I’ll still try, though, as I need to lose 20 pounds anyway.

As I posted on Facebook, my birthday last month was memorable. I had a business meeting that morning in Two Harbors, so I spent the rest of the day skiing at Lutsen. On the sixth run of the day, I fell on “The Plunge” and crashed into a safety fence. One of the support poles did a number on the left half of my face and I was a bloody mess. No concussion or broken bones, though. The ski patrol cleaned me up and I drove to Grand Marais for dinner at Sven and Ole’s Pizza. It took about three weeks to clear up, but my face is finally back to its old ugly self.

That’s about it for now – not much on the calendar the next few weeks. Might be a Phoenix trip in early April if I’m good…

I know, I know, it’s been more than a month since I wrote a post here, but I’m not dead (yet). I promise I’ll get back to a more regular publishing schedule soon.

In the meantime, here’s a nice relaxing photo from God’s Country to liven up the 7 Minute Miles home page.

It’s been almost a week and a half since I started working at Fortune Bay and so far things have been wonderful. The people on staff here are great to work with, it’s been interesting learning all the new technologies in use and I love the overall excitement of working in a casino. They assigned me a nice office just off the casino floor and I’m slowly getting used to where everything resides and how to get access to all of the tools I need to do the job.

There have been a few issues to deal with: we had a big storm last week that included a lighting strike behind one of the buildings that knocked out all of the cash registers and one of my staff members quit this week before I even got to meet him. I also still haven’t figured out what I’m going to do about housing next month, but I’m starting to find some leads.

The evenings last week were fun. A friend from the Twin Cities called me late Monday afternoon and said he was a half hour away. We played 18 holes at The Wilderness in two hours and 35 minutes, then had a nice dinner at the Grill. I played another post-work round on Thursday night – the course is spectacular and it’s hard to stay away when it’s right outside the door.

The other nights I spent scouting some of the nearby cities: Tower, Ely and Virginia. I looked at a few houses, drove by the schools and basically just checked out the overall vibe of each place. Based on the people I’ve talked to, Virginia and Ely probably have the best schools. My favorite house was in Tower, but I liked the general feel of Ely and Virginia has some nice bigger city amenities (Target, movie theater, McDonald’s).

I’d still love to find some lakeshore and build new, but prices on Vermilion don’t seem to be impacted much by the recession. This week I drove along the south shore and saw some amazing properties, but they were all way out of my price range. I’ll probably just rent for now and see what happens. The family comes up this weekend to check things out, so their input will help firm up plans too.

Tonight I ran for the first time since Grandma’s and I stopped in at the wellness center, which is located about a mile from the resort. Employees can use the facility for free and I spoke with the manager for a bit. She said the building is five years old and doesn’t get used much. All of the equipment is top of the line and the workout room overlooks the lake. I’m really excited to get trained on all of the machines and start getting back on track for TCM in October.

The rest of this week brings a bunch of meetings, the visit by the family (and maybe a few other friends), then one last consulting trip for 318 in Phoenix. I also found out today that my first business trip for Fortune Bay might be a September conference at the Palms in Las Vegas. Could this job get any better?

I know the snow and cold is coming in a few short months, but I just can’t get over how pretty it is in northeast Minnesota. More on the first week coming soon…