Casey's Just Sayin'

I should be happy for my female blog counterparts and their upcoming excursion to Blogher 2010. That would be the gentleman's way to feel. I should be Mr. Jolly Good and Cheerio and Look at You! I should. But I'm really not. The six-year old boy inside me keeps yelling, "But what about meeeeee?" Someone should do a Wedding Crashersesque/Some Like it Hot treatment about a bunch of guys who infiltrate the Blogher world to, well, get with the women. I'm very excited about the accomplishments of those women who I've met through blogging, those who I almost feel like I know. Some of them have done spectacular things this year with their blog and are being recognized for their brilliance. But being happy for those folks and being disappointed at the nagging feeling that I didn't get invited to Marsha's seventh birthday party with the pony and balloons are not necessarily mutually exclusive. I have to ask why? Why is it that women can make such a strong con...

Hey Padrick Hey... What's wrong? Nuthin' Seriously, what is it? I thought it'd be fun to have a conversation with you on my blog and you're kinda bringing me down a little. Sorry... So, what is it? Well... I'm a little pissed at you. Me? Why? I had a nice contest to give you a cool name. I did some genius editing and came up with a picture of you. I spend hours every day with you. The middle one. What, the picture? I thought it was nice. Did ya? What is wrong with the f'in picture! You put that f'n piece of glass over my belly-button! So? I liked my belly-button. I liked to stick my hand in there. It felt weird and cool. Oh... I'm sorry. S'okay I guess. ....... Hey, listen, you know that's a touch screen, right? Yeah, so... Well, give it a shot. See how it feels. ....... Ooh, this is nice. Really nice. Oooooh... Um, Padrick? ........ Oh, that home button is amaaaazing! Padrick... You can go away now... and turn off that light on your w...

When you comment on a blog, do you prefer and why: 1) An e-mail response from the blogger about your comment. 2) A response just to you, but within the other comments on the post. 3) A comment on the post that includes responses to you and other commenters. 4) Not to receive a response at all. 5) To receive a response, but the format isn't important. I would appreciate your input. I usually reply within comments on the post, but it has occurred to me that if you aren't following the comments, you'll never see my response. Thanks in advance for the help. Casey (Took that pic on the beach a few years ago.)

I recently held a contest on Facebook. I'm not a big contest guy, although sometimes I'll partake, if the mood strikes me and the candle light is just right. So, here's how it happened: I wanted to have a name for my iPad. My kids named my Garmin Gary a couple of years ago. Yes, Gary the Garmin. They thought this was fun and ironic since Gary had a sultry female voice. "Arriving at destination, on right." sounded like she was reaching some sort of destination herself. Anywhoozle, I thought it would be proper to also give my iPad a name. After some internal conversation* I came up with iVan. I thought it was cute. Nobody, except Marcy - thank you Marcy - agreed with me. So I thought I'd have a little contest. I invited anybody over a week to submit their name suggestions. I offered a $20 Starbucks card to the one chosen and also stated that my children would do the choosing. The results were awesome. Some of my faves were Mortimer, Hal and Skinny Mike...

The anchors were strong but not for long The Storm ripped one away early in the voyage And the drift began Years later a second Squall pulled the other down Drifting Ever Since But your sails are strong to pull this ship along Thank you, Dear One

My wife dreams in exceptional detail. I find myself envying her talent for total recall of colors, conversations, clothing and the characters of her night visions. But I shouldn't be surprised. Do you know that she still remembers what she wore on most holidays, vacations, dates and family outings? How is that possible? I don't remember what I wore yesterday. Well, I do, but not the day before that. Back to her dreams. Sometimes, home for lunch or after work, my love will tell me her dreams. And while it can be difficult to listen to another's mind trips, with her it's different. With her I honestly believe if I listen close enough I'll hear an idea for another poem or story. And sometimes I do. I think I often don't sleep long enough to have truly involved dreams. It's not uncommon for me to only manage 3 or 4 hours in any given night. And I think this is bad for me. It affects my overall mood, my ability to think, my motivation and my reactions to stressfu...

I've spent a lot of time recently thinking about what a Casey Freeland retirement is going to look like. I think among my regular readers and commenters the financial spectrum is probably covered. Some of you are fairly set and close to or in your retirement years, and some of you are selling appliances to make rent and retirement is a word you have heard and you are aware that billionaires and movie stars do this thing. I'm somewhere in the middle. I have a mysterious malady called a 401K, but I'd have to put my entire salary in it for the next twenty years to make it a viable retirement option. In short, there is no plan, there is no reassurance, there is no date, no age and most certainly no golden f'in watch. Maybe this should bother me more than it does. All the investment firm commercials talk about retirement like it should be a done deal, as if we could make a phone call to them and somehow suddenly have a couple million at age 55 or so. I realize they are tryin...

I feel like every time I come over to Crescent City I write the same blog post. You know, appreciate my family, wish I was home, like driving by myself, love my wife, want to hug my kids, blah blah blah. So let's try something different. When you are away from home and by yourself: What's on the radio on the road? I've gone through stages for sure. NPR, scanning for local stations, my own iPod music etc. But for the last couple of years it's been audiobooks and nothing else. I belong to audible.com now and get a new book every month for $15. I have a bumper sticker that says, "Shhhh, I'm listening to a book." What kind of crap do you eat? Do you go to a restaurant? My love has no trouble at all spending the evening by herself at a busy restaurant. I'm not made that way. I usually buy some frozen garbage I can nuke in the hotel microwave that will make my tummy ache for the rest of the night. What kind of TV do you watch? Channel 45 for me here, whi...

How does a child get the courage to leap? Mostly I think it's when they see another child's bravery. So, yes, if Chloe and Lucas jump off a cliff, Lily will too. Cheers, Casey

I made some bacon in the oven this morning. At 42 years old, I just learned that sweet little technique from my sister a couple of weeks ago. No stove mess. Bacon is more uniform. Delish. But I can't help but wonder why it took me so long to know this little fact. It never came up. Then I think of the holes in knowledge we all carry around with us, an errant word definition or pronunciation, mistaken geographic data or mismatched historical timeline. For example, when I was just about done with the 4th grade my teachers all got the big idea it would be good to send me and five of my fellow future 5th graders to the 6th grade school. This other school had only 6th graders. So we would go to all their classes, spend our recesses and lunches with them and other than attending the year-end environmental camp essentially act as 6th graders. At the time, I thought of it as a compliment to my intelligence, almost like I was being moved ahead a grade. But it didn't play out like that. ...

I have a handful of those I consider blog buddies in the cyber village and Suzy is one of them. She is one seriously funny chick and not afraid to say EXACTLY what she thinks. She was kind enough to put me on the sidebar of her site for the month of July. So if you don't yet follow Suzy, hop on over and check her out. Cheers, Casey P.S. - Regarding my sidebar pic, guess how I got the letters in the mirror to face forward. Did not use any 'puter tricks.