The 40 Year Old … Snowboarder?

So before last weekend, I had never been skiing or snowboarding before.  I even included it in my 101 things To Do in 1001 Days.  So last weekend I joined Aiden’s Boy Scout Troop on a ski trip to Winterplace, West Virginia.  And based on some good advice decided I would try to learn to snowboard.

OK get your laughs out now ….

Can we continue?  Thanks … I thought it would be an adventure and boy was it.

The package we had included a lesson so we eagerly got our gear and reported to class.  Our “new” snowboarding group included Aiden, two other Scouts and two teenage boys and myself.  We had a wonderful instructor Mark, who demonstrated great patience with the boys and me.

I must have fallen 800 times during that lesson, but each an every time (with Aiden watching me) I got up and tried again.  And eventually, I was consistent enough to go down Green (easy) hills.

I loved the feeling of negotiating my way down the mountain (ok hill), and despite being incredibly tired and sore the next day, I suited up and went out to do it again.

It’s pretty simple to see there are two “Life Lessons” that were clearly illustrated …

Life Lesson #2:  You should never, ever give up.  No matter how many times you fall you get up dust yourself off and try it again.  Tenacity pays-off.  Sure tenacity hurts sometime, but if it was worth starting it is worth finishing.

And

Life Lesson #3:  Don’t let yourself believe that it’s too late, or you’re too old to learn something new.  It’s not and you are not.

I had a blast learning something new with my son despite the fact that later on the second day I fell and probably cracked a rib.  But even then, I forced myself up one more time and tried again.  Once it heals, I will definitely be back to try it again.  But this time I’ll focus more on following instructor Mark’s “How to Fall” instructions.

1000 Days As A Lion

“It is better to live one day as a lion, than a thousand days as a lamb. ” – Roman Proverb

1000 Days as a Lion

When I was considering restarting the 101 Things in 1001 Days Challenge around the first of the year, I didn’t realize that a very important milestone was coming up in my life.  As I was considering when to begin this challenge, I knew I wanted to start it sometime in January and I then realized that January 16th, TODAY, is 1000 days away from my 40th birthday.

So I made the decision to officially start the challenge on January 15th,  yesterday, and today starts the countdown to my 40th Birthday, a fact a still find a little hard to believe.

To be clear, I’m not overly worried about turning 40 … 1000 days from now, I’ve never really cared about how old I was as long I still got a chance to see one more birthday.  But I find markers like this are a great opportunity to take measure of who I am and the person I’m still trying to become.   Instead of worrying about getting older, I’ll use this countdown and the 101 Things Project to attack the 1000 days and make the absolutely most of them.

The 101 Things are included on their own page and just as last time I’ve got to commit to coming up with the 101 Items, I’m such as slacker … something else to work on 😛

Renewing Kofacts.com for 2012!

So I began writing this blog in February 2007 and since then I’ve posted about everything.  I’ve posted pictures and misic videos that I was obsessed with at the time, to political essays and acticities for my scout den.  But at I sit in my home office almost 5 years later there are really two things that have stood out for me using this medium.  And for 2012, I’m going revive one of them and do away with the other.

First, it was the list of 101 Things to Do in 1001 Days.  This was great fun first defining 101 things I wanted to do and them tracking my progress toward complete over the next 1001 days.  I did things that I never would have done had I not put it on the list and regularly had to review it and ask myself, “Why Haven’t you Done That Yet?”  I even took multiple things and combined them like “Taking the Boys to A Yankee Game” and “Take the Boys on a Train” which turned out to be so much fun.

Boys in Times Square

 

So for 2012, I’ll be brining the second chapter of Kris’ 101 Things in 1001 Days, but this time I’ll only give myself 30 days to come up with the 101 Things!  I’ll be adding a page to the site to track the items and be making posts as I complete each one.

 

Secondly, my blog has had 38,811 views since it went online … and before you ask that does not count my views.  And that is roughly 669 views a month.  Not bad, and thank you for reading!

 

But of those 29,069 views were for one story which is still to this day the most popular story on my blog.  IT was written Jan 8, 2009 and it was my story of having discovered and then attempts to deal with my Facebook account having been taken over.  Appearently if you search google for “someone hacked my facebook account” this story is the very first one that comes up.   

 

Visual Evidence 😉

While this story gets sooo many views and it helps the over all view stats for Kofacts.com  It also masks how much or how little progress I’m going to make in creating content that people will actually want to read so I’m going to do the unthinkable, I’m going to remove that entry from my blog.  That’s right I’m going to take the entry that generates 75% of the traffic on my site and I’m going to delete.  I have a thought of making another Blog only about the topic but we will see where that goes. 

So always thank you for reading my blog, I’m excited about everything that 2012 has in store for us and I’ll be writing about it all right here!

Wesley Rides A Two Wheeler

It’s taken a couple weekends but Welsey is now riding his two wheeler.  I’ve been taking him up to the park on Saturday’s to try riding the trail.  Unlike Aiden who took just two pushes.  Wesley seemed to like going 50 yards, and stopping.  Waiting for me to come get him started again.  But look at him now.

Here is another video of him later.

He’s not quite a driven as his older brother so it will take him a little longer to become completely comfortable with it.

You can mark # 7 off my 101 in a 1001 List.

Aiden Rides a Two Wheeler!

So today I took Aiden’s training wheels off of the new bike and we went up to the school determined to learn how to ride a two wheeler.  Aiden was clearly a little concerned but he jumped at the chance anyway. 

We started off having him peddle with me running next two him lightly holding the seat and whispering encouragements to him.  Then I let go.  Luckily we had brought wes with us so he distracted him a little as they sped down the path.  After about 25 yards Aiden looked back and noticed I was gone.  He slowed down and stopped.

After turning around we did it again this time after I let go he never stopped even after discovering that I wasn’t holding on anymore.

We are really very proud of him.  He loved riding his bike today

I shot some video of him riding as well:

Vodpod videos no longer available.

This is very similar to a shot taken of me after I learned to ride in my cousins driveway:

Wes was a big help all day as he played the hare for Aiden to keep up with.   Great Job Wes.  wesley added that he will learn to ride a two wheeler in September, when his birthday comes around . . . I think he’s looking for a new bike!