Pretty good turn-around this time. Only about a week between posts. So, running update. On Saturday I ran 16 miles in 2hours 56minutes. I've worked it out and if I can 8 miles every 90 minutes I can finish my marathon in just under 5hours. Now, I'm not setting a time goal, just a secondary goal. My primary goal is to finish. Any time will be fine, but if I can break the 5hour mark that will be awsome. Well, this week I'm in Boca Grande, Florida. For work, really. This kicks off my 2 month onsite bonanza. I'm currently reading How to Have Confidence and Power in Dealing Withe People. I've read it before, but it is really good. I always need a reminder about these kind of things. The interesting part is that this book from 1956 says very similar things to another book I read recently about having a heart at peace. The book(something about Anatomy of Peace, I think) talks about a heart at peace vs. a heart at war. The difference is seeing people as people. What I'm interested to find is that many other books I have been reading same similiar things in a different fashion. If we recognize that man has a creator and that we are made in His image then we also can come to the realization that other people are the same. This realization puts us all on a playing field. The common needs and desires are in all of us. The great part of all of this is that we can go back even farther then 1956 and see this same teaching. The Golden rule plays this out exactly. Do for others as you would have them do for you. Realizing this provides amazing confidence when dealing with people because I know that they just want the same thing I want. To win. Now, winning means different things to everyone. This is why life is such an adventure. Creating Win-Win situations is such a rewarding experience. I get what I'm looking for and they get what they are looking for. Ultimatly the best outcome. If there is a Win-Lose situation then that can not be sustained for an extended period of time. Eventually even the Winner feels the loss. Hmmm. I didn't mean to come around to this, but since I'm here, this seems to be what we are experienceing with our finances as a country. For a period of time there was a Win-Lose situation. The finance companies win by creating a market and flooding it with ready to expload loans. The average leasee buys in, thinking they are also winning but are actually losing, it just takes a couple of years to realize it. Now the "winner" is losing because everything is falling apart. Win-Win or no deal this needs to be the way buisness, and life, is done but people are selfish. I need to work on getting over my selfishness. That is what this really comes down to. I need to grow with my self-control.

A wakeup call to myself

So, here I am again. Several months with no information posted. No updates, no pictures, nothing. If someone was to stumble across this they might think I had given up on the internet and bought 100 acres of wilderness in the upper northwest. Built a log cabin and setup a self-sustaining community where we grow our own crops and hunt our own meat. Well, if that was your guess then you were not to far off. Well, except that instead of upper northwest we live in Virgina. Oh, and instead of log cabin we live in an apartment. Also, instead of growing and hunting we go to Wal-mart and Target. Besides those three things they would be absolutly correct about my life for the past 5 months.
Last Saturday I ran 16 miles. That's right, if you want you can go back wipe your eyes and read that again. 16 miles. At once. It took me about three and a half hours, but I got it done. The run was not to bad either. Actually, it was a lot of fun. I have been continually amazed over the past 5 months at how much running my body can actually stand. I have been running 4 days a week(Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday) with my longest run being on Saturday. If you must know I'm training for a marathon. On November 15, 2008 I will be running in the Richmond Marathon. When I signed up it asked me for a finish time and I put in 5:30(yes thats hours). I'm hopeing that I can drop my time to under 5:00 but moving out here to has seen my ~10min miles drop to ~12min miles. I have really worked hard the last two weeks to get closer to the 10min mark, but it has been slow work. I'm definitly planning on continuing to run after Nov. 15. Then, my distances will probly get shorter(more like 5-8 mile runs) but I definitly want to keep up the 4 days a week. One of the unforseen benefits has been the weight loss. Well, not really weight loss, as I'm still around 210, but more like fat loss. Every time I run my pants fit less and less. I started having to buy pants with a 38 waist(before the running) but now I have trouble keeping my 36s up with out my belt and that just looks funny.
Well, I'm hopeing to have more to say here. Stuff about books I've read or lectures I've listened to. Probly not so much about politics, but maybe. I am certainly a product of the system when it comes to that. I do not do a lot of investigating and I definitly feel strongly about certain things so some working that out might end up here. Well, until next time(hopefully not 5 months.) Peace.